Kruger

The ash hadn't even settled when the next wave came.

Kruger drop-pods tore through the sky like silver needles, landing with seismic weight into the cratered battlefield. Medical teams spilled from the vessels—white-armored, silent, precise. No time for questions. No words.

Just stabilization. Extraction. Triage.

Kaiell barely remembered being lifted. His body was one wound wrapped in another. The last thing he saw before blacking out was the fractured clearing—the wreckage of the voidlings, the mangled bones of war, and the spectral glow of Nelis vanishing into a deep Viora rift, his task already done.

Darkness.

Then—

Cold light. Soft pressure. A pod. Sealed and humming.

Kaiell's eyes fluttered open to the sound of diagnostic glyphs scrolling down a translucent screen above his head. The pod had a scent—sterile and synthetic, tinged faintly with metal and ozone. He tried to move.

Pain answered.

But only for a moment.

The glyphs responded—adjusting nerve-dampeners, regulating Viora flow, compressing inflammation. His body relaxed. Not healed. But stabilized.

A face appeared on the other side of the pod's curved glass.

Commander Seth.

His armor was scorched in places. One shoulder braced with synth-wire. But his voice was steady. Flat.

"You did well."

Kaiell tried to speak, but his throat failed.

Seth tapped a panel. The glass hissed open. Warm air brushed against Kaiell's skin.

"You passed," Seth said, crouching beside the pod. His face looked older now, like the weight of survival had etched new cracks into his skull.

"The worst exam we've run in two decades," he added.

Kaiell managed to whisper: "That… was an exam?"

Seth didn't smile.

"It was never about who could fight. It was about who could survive while evolving."

He placed a small metal tag onto the pod's edge—a silver pin in the shape of the Kruger insignia, engraved with a number: SE-4.

"You're being transferred," Seth said. "Five of you made it. Five that met strain thresholds past the acceptable Viora curve. You're going to Suela Acambeny."

Kaiell blinked, barely comprehending.

Seth continued.

"It's not a planet. Not a battlefield. Not a school. It's… something else. A node where the Krugers shape those who are no longer just human."

"You'll be under someone who knows more about Viora and the Void than any living soul. She'll teach you what it means to carry strain without breaking."

He stood.

"Your war isn't over, Kaiell. It's barely begun. But for now… rest. Heal. Forget this hell for a while."

He looked down one final time, and his voice softened just slightly.

"Takla bom."

The words struck like a memory Kaiell had never lived—ancient, buried in the human soul.

He mouthed it back, the meaning not needing to be explained.

"All paths end in the same way"

Seth stepped away as the pod's casing re-sealed, pressure equalizing. The engines rumbled softly. The ship was already climbing toward the upper atmosphere.

Kaiell let the weight carry him.

His limbs ached.

His breath trembled.

But inside, the cells still burned.

Thirty-six Ibex, alive and evolving.

And somewhere beyond the void and flame