The Ark was quiet.

  That kind of quiet that hummed just beneath perception, low machinery, air cycling through vents, the

  faint pulse of power conduits deep in the walls.

  Bash sat awake long before the lights rose. His gear was half-packed, but his mind wasn’t.

  Progress report, he thought, rubbing the scar around his wrist clamp.

  S-C’s voice came almost instantly, smooth and unhurried. Eighty percent confident I can mask major

  lies.

  He frowned. You said three sessions and we’d be there.

  I did, she admitted. But the Nexus isn’t what I thought. It’s adaptive, its routines cross-check resonance

  with embedded personality patterning. If we move too soon, even one fluctuation could flag you for reevaluation. And Bash… we don’t survive that.

  He exhaled, jaw tight. So what’s the plan then?

  Keep letting me observe. I’m learning. Near-certainty first. It’s best we know how deep the water is

  before we start swimming with predators.

  He didn’t answer.

  Her tone shifted, amused, almost playful. Remember, Bash, if you die, I die. And I’m finally starting to

  have fun.

  He ignored it.

  Rixor stirred from the next bunk, stretching until his joints cracked. “You gonna sit there whispering to

  yourself all day, or are we going to hit that portal and finally get you an ability?”

  Bash didn’t look up. “Not sure it’s meant to be for me.”

  That killed the banter.

  Even Taren paused halfway through strapping a holster. Rixor’s grin faded.

  Nyra crossed the room and sat beside him. “You’re overthinking it,” she said softly. “You’ll unlock.

  Maybe your system just likes making you wait.”

  He smirked faintly. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “Exactly. Now get your head right, we’re burning daylight.”

  He finally stood. “Gear check in the cafeteria.”

  They found Liora, Darik, and Calen already seated, weapons stripped down for inspection, trays half eaten.

  “Morning,” Taren said.

  “Barely,” Calen replied. “Systems synced, ammo full.”

  Bash nodded. “Power seals, coolant valves, fatigue diagnostics, check it all.”

  Ten minutes later, everything gleamed. Rixor twirled his hammer idly, restless.

  “Squad 09-Kappa,” Bash told the registrar drone at the portal wing.

  “Authorized for portal 531,” the drone replied. “Extraction beacon issued.”

  The team filed down the endless corridor. Fifty portals, identical and pale, shimmered like vertical

  mirrors. Theirs pulsed faintly on the far wall, a white aperture into nowhere.

  “Same drill,” Bash said. “Tight formation.”

  They stepped through.

  The disorientation came, always the same: the lurch of gravity’s absence, the vertigo, the light fracture.

  Then, impact.

  Mud.

  Cold and thick around their boots.

  Rixor landed on his feet, hammer resting across one shoulder. “Finally got the landing down.”

  “Congratulations,” Taren muttered, scanning the area.

  The air was damp, thick with decay. A heavy fog clung to everything, coiling low between roots and

  trunks. The forest rose around them, tall, skeletal, branches gnarled and weeping with black resin. Each

  droplet hit the mud with a soft hiss, eating tiny holes wherever it landed.

  “Creepy,” Calen said under his breath.

  “That’s one word for it,” Nyra replied.

  “Map up,” Bash ordered.

  The projection appeared, faint blue through the haze. “Closest signal, individual. Four klicks east.”

  They moved out, boots squelching in rhythm. Every sound seemed too loud, swallowed by the mist a

  second later.

  The trees thinned. Shapes emerged, stone walls, broken roads, the skeleton of a city lost to time.

  Windows stared empty; steel beams bowed under their own rust. Plants had claimed everything.

  Planet was taken by Spartors roughly three centuries ago, S-C said in his head. The species that lived

  here was pacifist, engineers, builders, innovators. They never adapted to conflict.

  Bash’s teeth clenched. And the Spartors wiped them out.

  Efficiently.

  The thought hit deep. He could almost see the streets of his own world folded into this ruin, different

  sky, same story.

  “Eyes up,” he said, voice sharper than before.

  They moved through the narrow streets, checking corners. Visibility was low; the fog bent light

  weirdly, making buildings seem to breathe.

  Then the rumble came.

  A wall to their right collapsed outward, and something massive burst through, a scorpion the size of a

  tank, armor glistening black and red under the dim light.

  “Contact!” Bash shouted.

  The tail struck before anyone could react. It slammed into Darik, impaling him clean through the side

  and throwing him across the street.

  “Darik!” Taren screamed.

  Rixor roared and charged, hammer swinging. The blow hit the beast square in the head, sending it

  crashing through another wall. The impact shook the ground, but the scorpion recovered fast, claws

  carving furrows in the asphalt as it reoriented.

  “Spread!” Bash commanded.

  Darik was down, gasping, black fluid spilling from the wound. Taren was beside him in seconds, one

  hand glowing faintly against the hole in his armor. “You’re not dying here. Not today.”

  “Just patch it enough so I can...”

  “Shut up,” she snapped, firing her other pistol without looking. Every alternate shot burst in green light,

  spreading micro-healing waves across the team.

  The scorpion lunged again. Rixor blocked, but the tail whipped back, slashing across his arm. The hiss

  of poison filled the air.

  “Poison confirmed,” Taren warned, adjusting her pulse rhythm. Her cadence shifted, every fifth second

  a burst, every sixth another wave. The timing perfect, relentless.

  Bash’s knives flew. Razorvein screamed as it tore through joint gaps, carving molten lines through the

  armored plates. Liora dashed in under the creature’s belly, her curved blade slicing deep into the softer

  membrane there.

  Calen’s arrows struck the carapace one after another, cracking sections open; Nyra’s rifle followed with

  precision bursts, driving into the exposed muscle beneath.

  The scorpion staggered, shrieking.

  “Keep pressure, don’t let it dig!” Bash shouted.

  The ground trembled again. Another one crawled into view from the far street, smaller but faster, the

  tail twitching like a whip.

  “Second target!” Taren yelled.

  “Behind you!” Nyra screamed.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Taren turned, eyes wide. The tail was already descending, until Darik, still half-kneeling, lunged

  upward. His blade flashed, blocking the stinger before it hit.

  He grinned, blood still leaking down his armor. “Told you I wasn’t done.”

  “Keep him covered!” Bash barked. “Nyra, get me its eye!”

  Nyra vaulted onto a half-collapsed balcony, rifle steady against the frame. She watched the creature’s

  rhythm, waited, breath even, the barrel tracing its head movements. The scope’s reticle pulsed faintly,

  her weapon’s lattice aligning with the target’s resonance signature. Ten seconds, complete

  synchronization. Then she fired. The shot cut through the air like a drawn line of light, unerring,

  punching through debris and distance to strike dead center.

  The bullet hit true. The left eye burst, spraying a mist of dark ichor. The beast howled, thrashing

  violently.

  “One main eye down!” she called.

  Taren’s pistols fired in alternating cadence, pulsing healing waves into both fronts. Darik, fueled by

  them, was back on his feet, deflecting claws with impossible precision. Each parry sent a faint shimmer

  across his armor, the resonance feedback of his Cleaver amplifying Taren’s restorative field until both

  energies flowed as one. His movements tightened, every counter faster, every strike heavier. The

  wound sealed mid-motion, skin reknitting beneath the armor’s faint mineral glow.

  The first scorpion stumbled, its underside shredded from Liora’s blades, its back cracked by Calen’s

  shots, its joints shattered from Bash’s knives. Rixor hammered it again and again, each impact echoing

  like thunder.

  He was trembling, black liquid oozing from the wound in his arm.

  Finally, he bellowed, “I’m done with this thing!”

  He leapt, hammer raised high, the weapon thrumming with the stored resonance of every blow he’d

  traded. The air warped as the charge reached its limit. When it came down, the impact detonated in a

  seismic burst, the ground heaved, stone splintered, and the scorpion’s head vaporized in a burst of

  molten ichor.

  The pulse hit Bash like an explosion. He stumbled, clutching his chest.

  Pulse detected, S-C said evenly. Tier Two Common. DoT, poison alignment.

  He forced his breathing steady and rejoined the fight.

  The second scorpion lashed blindly. Taren kept both pistols firing, dual pulses of healing stabilizing

  everyone. Nyra shifted aim, lined up the other eye, and held her breath again. Ten seconds. Shot fired.

  Perfect hit. The beast shrieked, thrashing uncontrollably.

  Bash, still distracted by the surge of the last pulse still echoing in his chest, didn’t see the tail coming. It

  caught him broadside, smashing him through a building wall.

  “Bash!” Taren shouted.

  He hit hard, rolled through rubble, and came up in what looked like a workshop, dust, rusted tools,

  shattered glass. The air was cold and still.

  Wait, S-C said. Something’s here.

  He froze.

  “Back wall. Table. In one of the drawers.”

  He crossed the room, boots crunching over debris. The first drawer came open easily, empty. The

  second rattled with scraps of metal and broken glass. The third wouldn’t budge. He pulled harder; it

  stuck, then gave with a sharp crack. Inside, something small, triangular, faintly glowing blue.

  That’s a relic, S-C whispered, tone shifting, almost reverent. Old. Unknown class. But real.

  Bash turned it in his palm. Light refracted inside it like liquid crystal. You said eighty percent. You

  ready to test that today?

  Take it. Don’t let go. I need to read its resonance. If I can mask this...

  Nyra’s scream cut her off.

  Bash bolted.

  By the time he cleared the rubble, the battle was done.

  The second scorpion lay twisted and still, its carapace riddled with cracks. Steam rose from the corpse,

  black liquid seeping into the street.

  Nyra stood on a rooftop, chest heaving, rifle still smoking.

  “I just unlocked again,” she called down, disbelief and pride mixed in her tone.

  The others looked up at her, smiling, exhausted. Even Rixor laughed weakly.

  Bash stayed quiet. The relic warm in his fist.

  They harvested both beasts, their tail tips hardened into crystalline fragments, glowing faintly before

  shrinking into polished trinkets.

  Taren checked Rixor’s arm and Darik’s side again, cleansing the last traces of venom. Both men stood

  tall by the time she was done.

  “Let’s move,” Bash said. “Before anything else crawls out.”

  The march back through the ruins was silent except for their boots and the occasional drip of resin from

  the trees. Fog rolled low between the buildings.

  You ready? Bash thought.

  Confident I can mask the relic’s emission and keep your baseline steady, S-C said. Just… don’t panic.

  “Right,” he murmured. “That’ll be easy.”

  The white portal shimmered ahead, calm and cold.

  The Ark’s air hit like a blade of ice. The smell of disinfectant replaced the swamp’s rot.

  They handed off the fragments, twenty-six each, and entered the Nexus debrief chamber.

  The scanner’s light swept across Bash’s body, then lingered. His pulse hammered. He forced his

  breathing slow, even, focused only on the warmth of the crystal against his chest.

  Hold steady, S-C whispered. Almost through.

  The light blinked green.

  Bash exhaled quietly.

  The cafeteria buzzed with voices again, though quieter tonight. Rixor reenacted his hammer strike in

  slow motion while Calen groaned about cleanup duty.

  Bash poked at his food, lost in thought. The relic’s pulse thrummed faintly under his shirt.

  “Bash?” Taren asked. “You okay?”

  He blinked, then nodded. “Got sent through a wall pretty hard. Just tired.”

  They accepted that.

  He excused himself early, slipping down the quiet hall to his dorm.

  Portal 091 tomorrow, S-C said as the door closed. Eight percent Thorn alignment. Could be our next

  chance.

  He unlatched his armor, pulled the relic from his shirt. It shimmered faintly in the dark.

  Sleep with it touching you, she instructed. I’ll study it overnight.

  He slid it back under his shirt, against his chest. “That close enough?”

  Perfect, she said softly. I’ll wake you if anything goes wrong.

  “Don’t.”

  He lay back, staring at the ceiling as the lights dimmed. The hum of the Ark faded into the rhythm of

  his own pulse, steady, strong, synchronized with the soft glow beneath his shirt.