Chapter 1: The Sky Broke First
The world ended not with a whisper, but a siren—shrill, mind-raking, and endless. It cut through the air like a knife through nerve, a sound so sharp it made the skin crawl and the heart race. People fell to their knees in confusion, eyes scanning the blood-red skies as the first wave of silence fell like a hammer just after the last note of alarm. One long, unending wail across every city, every outpost, every hidden shelter. They called it the Event. No one knew exactly what started it. Satellites fell from the sky. Digital archives turned static. And then came the mechs—massive, biomechanical beasts that tore apart the remnants of civilization with precision and instinct.
Zane Kyros stood atop the crumbling watchtower of New Bastion, the last fortified refuge carved into the skeleton of a pre-Event hydroelectric dam. Its concrete walls bore the scars of a hundred battles, patched with scrap metal and scorched plating. Below, a maze of jury-rigged buildings, power conduits, and rusting turrets clung to survival like barnacles to a sinking ship. hair whipping in the ion-charged wind. The distant screech of a Ravager Hawk echoed through the valley below—mechanical wings slicing through clouds like blades. He squinted against the dim twilight, his irises flickering faintly with a pale blue light.
The storm was coming.
Literally.
Zane raised his arm. Tiny arcs of electricity danced along his forearm, snapping and crackling with growing intensity. Lightning obeyed him now. After the Event, some survivors called it mutation. Others called it divine punishment. Zane didn't give a damn what they called it—he called it power.
Below, the gate alarms screamed.
"Mecha stampede!" someone shouted from the lower walls.
Zane exhaled through gritted teeth. "Time to hunt."
He sprinted down the steel steps, thunder humming beneath his feet. Runners scattered from his path, the usual awe in their eyes. The youngest called him a Guardian. The elders, a freak. Zane had no interest in either label.
He reached the arming chamber at the base of the tower. The power grid flickered as he passed, static flicking along light fixtures like nervous fireflies. He pulled on his reinforced jacket, its weave designed to handle high-voltage bursts, and belted a plasma sidearm to his thigh.
From outside, the unmistakable roar of metal jaws crunching stone snapped his attention back. Through the crack in the gate's blast doors, he saw the leading Ironfang—sleek and brutal, a killing engine of wire muscle and carbon-plated bones. Its eyes glowed like twin furnaces.
Zane stepped into the lift cage and slammed the switch. The cage groaned as it ascended to the gate wall.
"Gate team, hold positions. Let me through first."
"You're insane, Kyros," the squad leader barked over comms.
"I'm effective," Zane replied.
The gate cracked open.
Zane exploded from the lift in a surge of white-hot lightning, the voltage snapping the air around him. The first Ironfang lunged. Zane sidestepped mid-air, flipping over its back and driving both fists down. The beast convulsed as thousands of volts coursed into its spinal module.
It collapsed in a smoking heap.
The rest of the stampede didn't slow.
Ten. Fifteen. Maybe more. Each one is a calibrated weapon system disguised as a predator. Zane welcomed the odds. They made things interesting.
He launched into the fray. Every movement was precise, primal. Electricity arced from his limbs, blinding and beautiful. He dashed across the back of one beast, then springboarded off it to spear another with a bolt through its optic node.
The defenders behind the gate watched, stunned. Some dropped their weapons, unsure if they were witnessing salvation or madness.
"Come on, you metal bastards," Zane growled, eyes flaring with luminance. "I'm just getting warmed up."
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