Bash’s lungs locked. The world tilted around him, too sharp, too bright, too familiar.

  The wind brushed his face like a memory, cold and clean, and suddenly he was twelve again, standing on the training fields near the mountain base. His body moved on instinct, but his mind was screaming.

  “S-C! What the hell is this?”

  Silence.

  “Answer me. You said Earth was still under reconnaissance! If we came through a White Portal, that means occupation. That means they took it!”

  Nothing. The quiet filled with his own pulse pounding in his ears. The rest of the team were still behind him, adjusting, blinking through the light, but he didn’t hear them. He was shaking now, rage and fear mixing into something unsteady.

  “Tell me this isn’t what I think it is!”

  The neural link flared once, like static. Then, finally...

  “Bash.”

  Her voice. Calm. Too calm.

  “This is not Earth.”

  He froze.

  “You are on world L-47, Spartor designation Kaelith,” she continued, her tone clinical. “Terraforming and colonization began one hundred and three Earth-years ago. Abandoned approximately eighty years later due to core instability in local portals. Atmospheric stability at ninety-seven percent. Ecosystem self-sustaining.”

  The information washed over him, cold and unreal.

  “Kaelith’s diameter is one-quarter that of Earth. Gravitational pull is proportionally reduced 0.23g. You will experience increased speed, strength, and acceleration. Your typical Spartor baseline, adapted for four-times-Earth gravity, will now exceed normal parameters by an estimated factor of twelve.”

  He blinked. “Meaning?”

  “Meaning you can jump higher, hit harder, and fall farther without damage. However…”

  Her pause tightened something in his chest.

  “…the local fauna evolved under the same low gravity. Expect proportional mass and velocity compensation. Do not underestimate them.”

  He stared out across the ridge. His anger dulled, replaced by confusion, and something worse. Longing. The mountain line, the cold wind, the smell of pine and soil, it was all home. His home. The color of the sky was even the same pale, washed blue of dawn over the northwestern base where his family had lived. Where they’d died.

  “You all right?”

  Calen’s voice came from behind him, cautious.

  Bash didn’t answer immediately. He couldn’t. His heart was still caught in that echo of memory. He turned slowly, eyes scanning the others. They were getting their bearings, Taren flexing her hands, Rixor rolling his shoulders, Nyra already adjusting her scope to the sunlight.

  Rixor gave a low whistle. “Feels like I lost half my weight.” He bounced once on his heels, then crouched and leapt straight upward. His body arced cleanly into the air, almost five meters before landing in a soft crouch. “Ha! I could get used to this.”

  Bash forced a breath. “Be careful. The gravity’s lighter, but momentum isn’t. You’ll hit harder coming down.”

  Nyra pulled up her wrist display, flicking the projection outward. The translucent grid hovered between them, a topographical map marked by shifting zones of red and orange light.

  “Five beast zones,” she said. “We’re in the middle, neutral ground. South zone is our closest target, roughly two klicks uphill. Marked as solitary predators.”

  “Perfect warm-up,” Rixor muttered, re-adjusting his hammer strap.

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  Calen leaned closer to the map. “What about the others?”

  “West shows swarm activity, east is pack behavior. North and northwest, two minor individual types. Everything’s spaced about two to three klicks apart, so we shouldn’t draw overlap unless we screw up.”

  Taren studied the terrain ahead, eyes narrowing. “Let’s start south. If they’re solitary, we can test the ground without risking a cluster.”

  “Agreed,” Bash said.

  The team began to move.

  The incline was steep, but in Kaelith’s gravity, it felt effortless. Each step carried them meters higher. The dirt gave beneath their boots with a soft crunch, lighter than any soil Bash had felt in training. The vegetation grew thick and bright, tall, bluish grasses that shimmered faintly when brushed, releasing a scent like wet soil and rain.

  The silence of the mountain wasn’t silence at all. It pulsed with faint life, chirps, distant howls, rhythmic rustles from unseen creatures.

  Rixor adjusted his grip on the war hammer. “Feels strange not seeing the Nexus walls.”

  Liora nodded. “Feels strange knowing there aren’t any.”

  They climbed higher, the sun angling low and pale across the valley. The view expanded behind them, a stretch of ridges and rivers, clouds curling like white smoke.

  When they reached the peak, the map’s marker pulsed beneath their feet, steady, certain. Yet the slope beyond was empty.

  “Nothing,” Taren said, scanning through her targeting lens.

  “Map’s wrong?” Rixor asked.

  Nyra frowned, adjusting her display. “No. Coordinates match perfectly.”

  Bash felt the faint pulse in his head again, S-C’s calm tone threading through the wind.

  “Migration data reflects historical averages. This region records beast presence across prior cycles. You are observing natural variance.”

  He repeated it aloud. “The map’s predictive, not live. We’re standing in a migration route, not an active zone.”

  Calen gave a humorless laugh. “So, we hiked for the view.”

  “Not wasted,” Nyra said, scanning westward. “Next zone’s closer, fifteen to twenty minutes, downhill. Pack density minimal.”

  Rixor grinned. “At this gravity? Call it ten.”

  They turned downslope.

  The forest thinned quickly as they descended, the trees giving way to sweeping plains of golden grass. The air felt different here, cooler, drier, with an undercurrent of static energy that prickled the skin.

  Bash crouched near the edge of the clearing, motioning for the others to follow suit. Through the wavering heat haze, movement rippled across the far end of the valley. Massive shapes, dark and broad, lumbered through the field.

  Nyra adjusted her scope. “Visuals locked. Approximately one hundred, maybe more. Large quadrupeds, herd pattern, non-hostile posture.”

  Taren leaned forward. “Quadrupeds. Heavy mass, low stance, herd pattern. Probably herbivores.”

  Bash focused, eyes narrowing. The creatures were huge, each easily three times the size of any bison he’d seen on Earth. Their hides shimmered with iridescent patterns of bronze and silver that shifted when they moved. Each had six horns, three curving forward on either side like stacked blades.

  The ground trembled faintly as they walked.

  Rixor whispered, “How do they even move that much mass on this gravity?”

  Nyra replied absently, “They don’t have to fight it. They float on it.”

  Bash thought, “S-C, classify.”

  “Tier One, Greater. Herbivorous, high kinetic mass. Tend toward solitary feeding, but herd-reactive. Aggression minimal unless provoked. Stampede risk significant.”

  He nodded slightly, keeping the exchange silent. T1G, he thought. Not aggressive, but one wrong move and the rest follow. We isolate one, no chain reaction.

  The team nodded. Years of drills had burned the procedure into instinct.

  They began to spread out.

  Bash signaled positions with quick hand gestures, Nyra, Calen, and Taren forming the high and mid-range arc; Rixor, Liora, and Darik taking the secondary flank.

  They moved silently through the grass, the sound muffled under the low wind. Bash felt every breath stretch longer, lighter in his chest. The low gravity made motion feel effortless, almost dreamlike.

  The isolated beast stood near the edge of the herd, separated by a shallow ridge. Its massive head dipped and rose in slow rhythm as it grazed, horns glinting under the white sun.

  They closed to within two hundred meters.

  “Positions,” Bash whispered.

  Nyra knelt, her rifle settling against her shoulder. The faint shimmer of blue current pulsed along the barrel, her Stun imbuement primed.

  Taren checked her sidearms, both barrels clicking softly into place. “Range synced.”

  Calen unsheathed his blade, crouching beside a rock outcropping.

  Rixor’s hammer gleamed faintly as he took cover behind a low hill, ready to surge forward if the beast charged. Liora and Darik mirrored him on the other side, bows half-drawn, fingers steady.

  The world felt smaller in that moment, sound fading, heartbeat slow and heavy.

  Bash crouched behind a ridge of stone, the red light of his Razorvein knives catching on his wrist. He drew one, feeling the balance, perfect weight, seamless design, the faint pulse of power under the surface. He glanced at his sidearm, secured, loaded, then at his team spread like shadows across the field.

  The herd continued grazing in the distance, unaware. The sky was cloudless, pale, the kind of silence that comes right before something breaks.

  Bash inhaled through his nose. The air tasted clean, sharp, alive.

  “S-C.”

  “Online.”

  “Any advice?”

  “Do not miss.”

  He almost smiled.

  Rixor met his eyes from across the field and nodded once. Nyra adjusted her scope. Calen exhaled.

  The team was ready.