The Mutated Class 7 Guut didn't scream as it charged; it moved with the silent, terrifying efficiency of a guided missile. Its scythe-arms slashed through the air, aiming to decapitate the boy hovering in the center of the courtyard.
But the boy didn't flinch.
Just as the obsidian blades were about to make contact with Max's neck, Max simply raised a hand. He didn't block the blow; he caught it.
THUD.
The impact should have shattered Max's arm. It should have driven him into the ground. Instead, the Guut stopped dead in its tracks, its momentum swallowed instantly. Max's fingers, wreathed in violet flame, gripped the sharp edge of the shadow-scythe.
The Guut's eyeless face seemed to contort in confusion. It pulled, trying to free its weapon, but Max's grip was absolute.
"You are..." Max spoke, but the voice wasn't his. It was a chorus of a thousand whispers layered over his own. "...empty."
Max squeezed.
CRACK.
The shadow-scythe shattered like brittle glass. The Guut shrieked, stumbling back as its arm dissolved into grey dust up to the elbow.
Max drifted forward, his feet not touching the gore-slicked pavement. The Guut, realizing its predator status had just been revoked, lashed out with a flurry of martial arts kicks—the same moves that had decimated Commander Zog.
Max didn't dodge. He flowed.
When the Guut kicked high, Max's upper body turned into mist, the leg passing harmlessly through him. When the Guut punched low, Max materialized behind it, moving faster than the eye could track.
"Too slow," the whispers said.
Max struck back. He didn't use a fist. He lashed out with a whip of solid darkness that extended from his arm. It wrapped around the Guut's remaining arm and yanked.
With a wet, tearing sound, the Guut was pulled off its feet and slammed into the ground. The concrete shattered, creating a crater twice the size of the one Zog had made.
The Guut scrambled to rise, its regeneration kicking in, the severed arm growing back in seconds. It roared, summoning its full density, turning its skin into armor harder than diamond. It tackled Max, driving him into a wall.
Max didn't struggle. He looked at the creature pinning him with a cold, dead stare.
"My turn."
Max placed both hands on the Guut's chest. The violet aura exploded. It wasn't an impact; it was a vacuum. Max began to drain the creature. The Guut howled as its density plummeted, its armored skin turning soft and pliable.
Max shoved the weakened monster away. Then, he looked across the courtyard.
Lying in the mud, barely conscious, Commander Zog watched in awe. His massive claymore lay a few feet away.
Max extended a hand toward the sword.
ZING.
The heavy blade flew through the air, slapping into Max's palm. The moment Max touched the hilt, the blue circuitry etched into the metal turned a deep, corrupted purple. The blade hummed with a hungry, vibrating resonance.
The Guut, sensing its end, tried to run. It scrambled up the side of the ruined building, looking for an escape.
Max crouched, the ground cracking beneath him, and launched himself upward. He moved like a violet comet.
"No escape," Max whispered.
He intercepted the Guut in mid-air.
What followed was a blur of violence. Max spun the massive claymore as if it weighed nothing. He unleashed a flurry of slashes that mirrored Zog's earlier technique, but faster, wilder.
SLASH. SLASH. SLASH.
First, the legs were severed, falling to the ground below.
Then the arms.
Then the torso was bisected.
The Guut fell in pieces, but Max followed it down. He landed amidst the falling chunks of shadow-flesh, swinging the sword in a blinding crescendo of destruction. He didn't just kill it; he minced it. He chopped until the "Siege-Breaker" was nothing more than a pile of twitching, dissolving cubes on the asphalt.
Max stood over the remains, chest heaving. The violet flame on the sword flickered and died, the circuitry turning grey.
Max's eyes rolled back in his head. The blackness receded, revealing the whites of his eyes again. The whispers silenced.
"Commander..." Max mumbled, his voice returning to that of a scared seventeen-year-old.
His knees buckled. The sword clattered to the ground, and Max collapsed face-first into the mud, unconscious.
"Max!"
Commander Zog grunted, forcing himself to his feet. He clutched his chest, feeling ribs shift uncomfortably. He limped over to where the boy lay.
Zog rolled Max over. The kid was breathing, but he was pale as a sheet, his skin cold to the touch.
"You crazy, magnificent bastard," Zog wheezed, a pained smile crossing his bloody face. "You actually did it."
Zog holstered his sword—now drained of energy—and scooped Max up in his arms. The pain in Zog's chest was blinding, but he ignored it. He carried the unconscious boy back toward the VTOL, stepping over the dissolving remains of the Class 7 anomaly.
As they reached the ramp, the sound of heavy engines filled the sky.
Three large, yellow transport ships descended, marked with the emblem of the HPF Cleanup Division.
Men in full hazmat suits swarmed out before the ships even touched the ground. They carried flamethrowers, foam sprayers, and body bags. They began moving efficiently through the courtyard, spraying the dissolving Guut matter and collecting the remains of the fallen agents.
One of the cleanup captains ran up to Zog. "Commander! We picked up the distress beacon. My god, the casualties..."
"Secure the site," Zog ordered, his voice rasping. "Collect the remains of Agents Raj and Sarah. Give them full honors. And get a sample of that Class 7 slush. It was mutated. I want to know why."
"Yes, sir!"
Zog turned and limped up the ramp of his VTOL. He laid Max gently on one of the stretchers in the medical bay and strapped himself into the pilot's seat.
He punched in the coordinates for the Southern HPF Training Centre.
"Computer," Zog said, wincing as he engaged the thrusters. "Engage auto-pilot. And get me a medical stim. I think I'm bleeding internally."
As the VTOL lifted off, leaving the nightmare of the Northern District behind, Zog looked back at the sleeping boy.
"The Void," Zog muttered to himself. "Harry wasn't kidding. If we can train him... he might just be the one to kill the King."
The ship banked south, soaring toward the heat, the desert, and the hardest training of Max's life.
The landing was a haze of flashing lights, shouting medics, and the oppressive, dry heat of the desert rushing into the open cabin of the VTOL. Max barely remembered being lifted onto a gurney, or the way the bright sun of the Southern District pierced through his eyelids before the darkness of unconsciousness pulled him back under.
Max opened his eyes to a blinding, sterile white.
The air smelled of antiseptic and lemon. The rhythmic beep-beep-beep of a heart monitor was the only sound in the room. He tried to move, and a dull ache throbbed through his entire body, as if he had run a marathon after being used as a punching bag.
"He's shifting. Pupillary response is normal."
Max blinked, his vision clearing. Hovering over him was a familiar face framed by chestnut hair. Malina. Her blue eyes were wide, scanning his face with intense scrutiny.
"Max?" she whispered.
"Hey," Max croaked. His throat felt like sandpaper.
"He's up!" Edy's voice rang out from the foot of the bed.
Max pushed himself up on his elbows, wincing slightly. The room came into focus. He was in a high-tech medical bay with large windows overlooking a vast, orange desert landscape.
Standing around his bed were the survivors. Malina looked like she hadn't slept, her arms crossed tight. Eren was sitting on a chair, vibrating his leg nervously. Edy was leaning against the wall, looking relieved.
And sitting in a wheelchair next to Max's bed—wrapped in so many bandages he looked like a partially unraveled mummy—was Commander Zog.
"Welcome back to the land of the living, kid," Zog grunted, pointing a bandaged finger at him. "You slept for eighteen hours. I was starting to think I'd have to find a new shadow-sponge."
Malina didn't wait for pleasantries. She stepped closer, practically looming over Max.
"Max, tell me the truth. Is there pain in your cerebral cortex? Do you feel any numbness in your extremities? I read the medical report—your energy output spiked 400% beyond safe human limits. That kind of drain can cause permanent neural damage."
She reached out, checking the display on his heart monitor, then checking the IV drip. "Your heart rate is slightly elevated. Are you dizzy? How many fingers am I holding up?"
"Malina, Malina, stop," Max laughed weakly, gently pushing her hand away from his face. "I'm fine. Seriously. Just... sore. Like I fell down a flight of stairs."
"You fought a Mutated Class 7," Malina said, her voice trembling slightly. "You didn't fall down stairs; you fell into a meat grinder. Harry told us... he told us about Raj."
The mention of Raj's name sucked the air out of the room. The relief of Max waking up was instantly replaced by the heavy, suffocating weight of grief.
Max looked at his hands—the hands that had held the sword, the hands that had avenged his friend. "Yeah," he whispered. "Raj is gone. And Sarah... probably her too. The whole facility was wiped out."
Eren looked down at the floor. "We wanted to come with you," he mumbled. "But Harry forced us on the transport. He said we'd just get in the way."
"Harry was right," Zog said, his voice surprisingly soft. "That thing... it wasn't normal. If you three had been there, you'd be dead. Max only survived because he's a freak of nature."
Zog grinned painfully. "A useful freak, but a freak nonetheless."
"So, what happens now?" Edy asked, trying to break the tension. "We're in the middle of a desert. It's hot. Our friends are dead. And we're supposed to... what? Do pushups?"
Zog pressed a button on his wheelchair, spinning it around to face the window.
"Now," Zog said, looking out at the endless dunes, "we stop playing games. Raj and Sarah died because they weren't ready. Because the Guuts are evolving faster than we are."
He turned back to them, his single blue eye burning with intensity.
"You are at the Southern HPF Training Centre. This is the hell-forge. The instructors here don't give gold stars. They break you down and rebuild you into weapons."
Zog looked at Max. "Especially you, Shadow-Boy. You accessed the Void yesterday, but you lost control. Next time, that power might not just kill the Guut—it might kill your friends. You need to master it."
"I'm ready," Max said, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. He felt shaky, but he stood up. "I don't want to lose anyone else."
"Good," Zog nodded. "Because your new instructor is waiting in the courtyard. And let me tell you... compared to him, I'm a teddy bear."