The air in the new mining tunnels hung heavy and bitter, a perpetual haze of dust and foulness that burned lungs and stung eyes.

Two days had passed since Azgoth's onslaught had scarred South Point, and Angar refused to let his injuries slow him one bit. Yielding to wounds was yielding to life. He would not.

Pain lanced through his broken body and ruptured abdomen with every one-handed swing, his cast-bound arm at his side, the reattached hand throbbing like a forge hammer against an anvil.

His jaw was still a shattered ruin, but bound minimally now. He wanted the girls to see as much of his melted and disfigured face as possible.

He was deep in the vein-riddled caverns, pickaxe in grip, chipping away at yttrium ore clusters alongside sworn members of the Lord Hungers cult.

He swung unerringly, the tool's head biting into the veined wall with a resonant crack that echoed down the tunnels.

Sweat mingled with the corrosive mist, beading on his scarred skin, but he didn't falter. This was not just labor, but a lesson etched in sweat and stone.

The next group of girls would arrive soon, shuttled in for their audience with him. They'd see what the unyielding grind of their existence would be if they joined the Lord Hungers.

There'd be no pampered pauses for recovery. There'd be no excuses.

Suck up the agony and press onward. Life didn't halt for pain, nor did the Holy Empire's many enemies.

Those around him but one were cult members, all stout Tributeans with hunched shoulders and callused hands, grunting in rhythm with their swings, their faces smeared with grime.

They were adapting too quickly to the lack of battle and war, empowered by the System's gifts that made hunts easier and wildlife less lethal. Comfort and peace were poisons, dulling the edge they needed to survive the infernos to come.

Beside him, unarmored and shirtless, labored Garioch, the fifth-Tier Saint, abandoned, purged by Salvador like a vile sin.

His frame was a spectacle of sculpted muscle, towering even over Angar's bulk, making the light Strider Crusader Armor he'd worn during the battle be mistaken for a medium Armiger set.

His skin shone and glimmered with an unnatural sheen. It wasn't quite metallic, but undeniably forged, a product of United Front gene-craft. That faction wasn't as technologically advanced as the Old Guard, but their forging methods were brutally potent.

Garioch's pickaxe cleaved through a chunk of yttrium ore with effortless power, sending sparks dancing, the bioluminescent flora providing the only light.

As they worked, Garioch filled the silence with his tale, his voice loud and raspy, his accent strange.

"Most likely," Garioch began, pausing to wipe his brow with a rippling forearm, "I was snatched in a raid when I was too young to remember. The United Front doesn't consider those taken slaves, but 'liberated' instead.

"The tougher kids, the ones who could survive their gene-forging techniques, get shipped off to special training facilities, molded into warriors. I was raised and forged to be a Zerger."

He swung again, the impact shuddering up his arms, dislodging a cascade of ore dust that shimmered in the air like unholy snow.

Angar nodded silently, his cybernetic eye continuously adjusting to the gloom.

"Zergers," Garioch continued, "they're the rage-fueled brutes who board your imperial ships, axes high, carving through crews in those cramped corridors. The Front's got two flavors of raiders. There're the Zergers for the up-close slaughter, and Rippers for mid-range."

He leaned on his pick, his strange skin catching the glow of bioluminescent fungi clinging to the walls. "Since there're so few Reptiloids, Grays, and Pleiadeans in the Front, they treat the ones they've got like damned royalty. I was bred for the Grays, raised in their norms, breathing their atmo. I was indoctrinated to snap to their orders like a whipped dog. No questions, no hesitation."

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Garioch's eyes darkened. "They mess with our minds. It makes us resistant to dark whispers and able to shrug off most psionic assaults like rain on armor. But not Gray Psychics. We're putty in their hands. Around them, we became docile as lambs, unable to even think of rebelling against our masters."

He hefted the pick again, slamming it home. "So, one raid, we hit this transport cruiser. My axe is drinking deep of all that imperial blood, carving through the sheep like a hot knife through butter. Then comes cleanup, rounding up the women and kids for liberation. This one girl, she looks right at me, not scared at all, and says, 'Why are you doing this to your own kind?'"

He paused, his massive chest heaving. "I never wondered before," Garioch admitted. "But it ate at me ragged. Why was I helping these big-headed Gray bastards enslave Terrans? They drilled into us that imperials were less than animals, not even sentient, not until liberated. But there I was, staring at faces that looked like mine. They seemed sapient enough. As real as any of us."

Garioch swung harder now, the pick biting deeper. "Anyway, Divine Theosis sent me my first message then. We're taught to ignore those, to consider it a monster, a tyrannical AI, a master of lies and manipulation. We're supposed to disregard them unread. But I read it. And those words...they resounded in my soul. I kept it buried, kept doing my job, but all that kept eating away at me, day by bloody day."

His rhythm faltered for a moment, as his gaze went distant. "Then God spoke directly to me. Filled me with light. It was pure, blinding glory. No ignoring that. Being careful, it took long weeks, but I rigged the ship to blow, just as they taught me. I slipped away right before, and bolted for Ulmatron, the nearest imperial planet.

"I repented my sins on bended knee. I got a lot of shit for being from the United Front, for having a Heretic body, but as it was done to me without consent as a kid, the Church said it hadn't damned my soul. I failed the Grim Ordeals four times before Divine Theosis realized what was clear, and I was raised up as a Crusader. That was right on the cusp of ascending to the second Realm too, where I wouldn't be able to try again. It granted me a Class Reset, thank the Three, so I could take advantage of my new estate."

He drove the pick into the wall one last time, then let it hang loosely from his grip, his head tilting back, looking skyward as if piercing the cavern's ceiling to Heaven beyond.

A fervent sparkle ignited in his eyes, and his voice dropped to a reverent whisper. "No one believes it, but God still talks to me. I must be His new Chosen."

Even if Angar's shattered jaw and melted face hadn't silenced him, hearing that statement, he'd have been at a loss for words.

But the revelation shifted something in his mind, reshaping his suspicions about Hidetada's motives for sending Garioch with Salvador.

Angar couldn't linger on the tale, though he wished the man addressed why a chapter sigil was scratched out of his armor, as the clomping of many footsteps reverberated through the tunnels leading to this chamber.

He tightened his grip on the pickaxe, channeling fresh vigor into his swings despite the fire screaming through his wounds.

As the girls filtered in, the tool's head bit into the vein with renewed fury, sending shards of yttrium skittering across the grimy floor like scattered stars.

With Jon buried in administrative chaos and endless logistics, Angar had enlisted Yuuga to shepherd the incoming groups of girls, to field questions as they watched their deformed leader unrelentingly mine.

As the Mecian and Torminian contingents had already been vetted, he'd increased the group sizes to fifty, about the maximum his current number of shuttles in South Point could handle.

He wasn't sure which fief these latest arrivals hailed from. It didn't matter. They weren't Mecian or Torminian, so he didn't need to measure each girl.

Angar's hulking size, presence, and piercing gaze often elicited wary flinches or averted eyes. He'd been told countless times he came off as intimidating. But Tributean women were immune.

It wasn't so clear-cut in Kondune, Amaravati, and Iramvati City, but for the rest of Tribute, women feared for their men, and harbored no innate fear of men.

What they weren't immune to, however, was Venerable Sister Yuuga's unbridled brand of fervent, blunt offensiveness and madness.

The Presbyter knew what Angar wanted, exactly how to intimidate these girls in the perfect way, and how to ham it up, too.

Regret twisted in his gut as he swung again. He'd love to petition Hidetada to appoint her as the Zephuros' chaplain.

But now, that path was barred. He'd already elevated her to a prominent role within the Lord Hungers. The cult had a dire need of ordained Ecclesiastics to perform certain rites. Yuuga was a perfect fit.

As Angar mined, the venerable sister gave her spiel. When finished, the first question asked of her was, "Is that Sir Angar? What happened to him?"

"He fought a powerful evil and got banged up some, is what, Child," stated Yuuga. "He survived though. Stay in his cult, and this could be you, your only temporal reward for service and devotion a melted face and getting right back to work."

That silenced the girls for a moment. Then one asked, "I know all off-worlders are extremely dark, but why's the skin of the large fellow next to him so strange? Like it's fake?"

"Is he married?" asked another. "Does his wife and kids have fake skin?"

Another chimed in. "Why isn't he stretched-out and stick-like, as all other off-worlders are?"

Angar sighed as he bent to collect yttrium already showing signs of oxidation, transferring it to a protective container, preventing it from succumbing to the corrosive atmosphere, transforming into compounds like yttrium sulfate or even potentially pyrophoric dusts.

This was the second group with Garioch present. When the Saint wasn't there, they asked questions pertinent to their terrible fates. He would have to ask the Saint to leave when the next group arrived.

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