The sky was red with fire. Not the gentle glow of a dying sun, nor the creeping ember of dawn, but the raging, all-consuming inferno of war.
Gaius Voss lay face down in the mud, his breath ragged, his limbs trembling from exhaustion. The weight of his rifle pressed against his back, the metallic scent of blood and burning flesh filling his nostrils. Screams echoed through the trenches—some distant, some close, some cut short with a sickening finality.
A whistle shrieked in the sky.
His body reacted before his mind could catch up—rolling over, pressing himself against the earthen wall of the trench just as an explosion sent dirt, metal, and body parts flying into the air. The ground trembled beneath him, and for a moment, his ears registered nothing but a high-pitched ringing.
He forced himself to move.
Muscles screamed, lungs burned, but he pushed through, crawling forward through the narrow trench, past corpses slumped against the walls, past soldiers gripping their weapons with hands frozen in death. The acrid stench of promethium grenades mixed with the sickly-sweet scent of spilled blood, the air thick with the heat of burning bodies.
Somewhere ahead, a voice was shouting orders, muffled by the constant roar of artillery.
Gaius wiped the grime from his eyes and pressed on, stepping over a fallen comrade whose face was barely recognizable beneath the torn remains of his helmet. His uniform was soaked through with sweat and filth, the once-proud insignia of the Imperium of the Eternal Flame barely visible beneath the layers of blood and dust.
He had been fighting for hours. Maybe days. Time had lost its meaning in this hell.
Another explosion, closer this time. The trench walls cracked, dirt collapsing in a suffocating wave, and Gaius threw himself backward as debris rained down where he had stood moments ago. He barely registered the pain of his ankle twisting beneath him as he staggered upright, heart hammering in his chest.
"Voss! Get your ass over here!"
The voice cut through the chaos like a blade. Gaius turned, spotting Aulus Kor, his commanding officer, crouched further down the trench, gesturing wildly for him to move.
He didn't hesitate.
Forcing his aching body forward, he half-ran, half-stumbled toward Aulus, gripping the rough walls for balance. Bullets whizzed overhead, embedding themselves into the wooden supports, sending splinters into the air. He slid to a stop beside the older man, his breath coming in sharp gasps.
Aulus' face was covered in grime, a deep cut running from his temple to his jaw, but his dark eyes burned with intensity. He shoved a blood-stained map into Gaius' hands.
"We're getting slaughtered out there," he growled. "Command's orders are to hold the line until reinforcements arrive. But those bastards—" he jabbed a finger in the direction of the enemy trenches, barely visible through the thick smoke and flames, "—aren't waiting for reinforcements. They're pushing hard, and if we don't move, we're dead."
Gaius glanced at the map, the lines and markings swimming before his eyes. Imperial trenches on the left. Bellum forces on the right. A no-man's land of corpses in between. The front was collapsing—if the Bellum warriors broke through here, the entire sector would fall.
"Orders?" he asked, his voice hoarse.
Aulus exhaled sharply, wiping sweat from his brow. "We're taking the 3rd Battalion and counterattacking. We flank their assault force, drive them back before they reach the command post."
Gaius felt the weight of the words settle over him like a physical thing. They were already exhausted. Already battered and broken. And now they had to charge into the fire?
Aulus must have seen the hesitation in his eyes.
"Voss." His voice was quieter now, but no less firm. "You and I both know there's no retreat. The Imperium doesn't lose. We either win, or we die standing."
Gaius clenched his jaw and nodded.
Aulus clapped a hand on his shoulder. "Good man. Rally the others—we move in five."
Gaius turned, scanning the trenches for any survivors still capable of fighting. He moved with purpose now, barking orders, pulling men to their feet, handing out fresh ammunition. Some soldiers looked at him with dead, hollow eyes, too far gone to comprehend anything but the killing. Others clung to his words like a lifeline, something—anything—to focus on beyond the terror.
By the time he returned to Aulus, twenty men stood ready.
Not enough. Never enough.
But it would have to do.
Aulus raised his rifle, pointing toward the shattered landscape ahead. "On my mark, we climb, and we run. Don't stop, don't hesitate. If you fall, you get back up. If you see your brother fall, you keep moving. The enemy won't wait for us to grieve."
A tense silence settled over them.
Then—
"GO!"
Gaius didn't think. He moved.
His boots slammed against the wooden planks as he surged up the trench wall, the momentary exposure sending ice-cold adrenaline flooding through his veins. The world beyond was a nightmare of smoke, flames, and shattered earth.
And then—
The Bellum warriors saw them.
A guttural war horn bellowed across the battlefield, followed by the deafening roar of a thousand warriors calling for blood.
The Bellum Empire was not like the Imperium.
They did not fight with structured formations, with disciplined volleys of gunfire and coordinated strikes. They were berserkers, warriors whose Qi was infused with raw, feral brutality. Their blood-slicked armor gleamed beneath the firelight, their weapons crude but deadly—massive battle-axes, serrated swords, war-spears dripping with the blood of the fallen.
And they charged.
Gaius barely had time to register the thunder of footsteps, the war cries, the madness in their eyes, before he was caught in the storm.
He sidestepped the first warrior's downward strike, the impact shaking the ground as the Bellum brute's axe embedded itself into the mud. He moved with the fluidity of a trained killer—his blade flashing as he drove it into the exposed gap beneath the warrior's arm, twisting the steel until he felt something tear.
The warrior screamed, staggering backward. Gaius ripped his blade free, pivoting just in time to avoid a second strike from another attacker.
His instincts took over.
A breath. A shift in weight. A calculated step forward.
He ducked low, letting a blade pass inches from his face, and then drove his shoulder into the enemy's gut, sending them stumbling.
No wasted movement. No unnecessary flair. Every motion was precise, efficient, deadly.
A Bellum warlord stormed toward him, massive and armored in ritual bone-plates, a glowing red rune carved into his forehead. He lifted his spiked war-hammer, Qi crackling along its surface, and swung with the force of a landslide.
Gaius moved before the hammer even fell.
He threw his weight sideways, rolling beneath the strike as the hammer obliterated the ground where he had stood.Shards of rock and debris exploded outward.
He didn't let the warlord recover.
Gaius closed the distance in an instant, shifting his stance—one step forward, blade angled upward—and plunged his sword through the warlord's throat.
A gurgled gasp. The light fading from his eyes. The lifeless body crumpling to the ground.
Gaius ripped his sword free and turned.
More enemies. More blood.
He let the fire inside him consume the fear, the exhaustion, the doubt.
There was no room for hesitation.
There was only war.
And he was not done killing.