Rhastan IV hung in the void like a scarred jewel.
Once, its surface had been etched in lines of fire and steel, the endless lattice of strip mines and ore refineries glowing against the black. From orbit, the planet looked alive: sprawling worker barracks, luminous conveyor lifts dragging precious metals to shuttle ports, vast highways carved through red stone like arteries.
Now, as Seraphine's vessel descended into the upper atmosphere, the glow was gone. A pall of smoke and dust lingered across the horizon, swallowing the brilliance of the colony's cities. The landing beacon still pulsed dutifully on their HUD, but the voice of the colony — the chatter of traffic control, the noise of thousands of miners — was silent.
The shuttle bay doors screeched open when they docked, revealing only darkness. No workers rushed to offload, no officials came to greet their commander. Instead, the cavernous bay lay abandoned, scattered with overturned crates, half-unloaded ore containers, and the stink of scorched metal. Tools were left mid-repair, a hover-loader sat humming against the far wall, its operator long gone.
Seraphine stepped down the ramp first, boots echoing on the empty deck. A glimmer of unease pressed at the edge of her senses — the air here was wrong. Heavy. As if grief itself clung to the walls.
Her strike team fanned out behind her, weapons drawn.
"Report," she said softly.
"Our scanners reveal no life signals on this part of the sector, our ship can't scan the whole planet, something is interfering with our long range scanner, we have to orbit around it which will take some time," Vrenn, the Syneth pilot said.
"How many workers do we have on this planet?" Seraphine asked.
"This planet is a massive sydrianite mine, we can't afford to lose it. Most of our businesses need this mineral to build starship and weapons. We have over a hundred thousand workers and staff and that might not be an entirely correct figure." Jirru, a human mech cultivator said.
"Is it possible to hold all those people hostage?" Yesh, an aurai medic asked.
"We have to assume the worst." Jirru said, a somber expression on his face.
Seraphine turned toward the pilot.
"Vrenn, you and the gunners take the ship back up. Patrol the skies. If you see anything — anything — moving out there, I want it flagged and reported immediately."
The Syneth inclined his head, already speaking across the neural-band to his gunners, Kieran, Mara and Rook. Kieran grumbled something about "missing the fun," but they obeyed, boots clanging as they marched back up the ramp. Moments later the roar of thrusters filled the bay, the starship lifting away to take its place among the clouds.
Seraphine glanced at the others.
"The rest of you — with me. We take bikes and sweep groundside. If the cultists are here, they'll bleed for it."
They mounted the hover bikes lined along the bay wall — sleek black frames humming with antigrav thrusters, exhaust trailing pale light. The convoy ripped out of the docking tunnels and into the heart of the colony.
The streets stretched wide and empty, designed for cargo haulers and miner caravans. Massive banners of the mining guild flapped loose in the wind, their poles bent. Storefronts were abandoned, food stalls overturned. No bodies, no blood. Just absence. The silence grew heavier with every block.
The main operations complex loomed ahead, a fortress of glass and steel rising above the strip-mines. Its mirrored walls reflected the dust storms gathering over the horizon. As they drew closer, Seraphine's unease sharpened into something clearer — a resonance she could feel in her bones. The planet was humming, faint but insistent, like the breath of something that should not be awake.
She slowed her bike and raised a fist, signaling halt. Her voice was calm, but her eyes burned.
"There's an energy here. Not natural. Keep your guard up."
And then it came —
A roar of heat and light split the avenue. A plasma blast slammed into the pavement where they'd been a heartbeat before. Dust and stone erupted in a geyser, hover bikes swerving aside to escape the fireball.
Shapes emerged from the smoke. Dozens of them. Figures in black robes, their faces hidden behind bone-white masks etched with spirals. Each carried weapons crusted with glowing runes, and around them hung an aura that prickled at the soul itself.
The cultists encircled them in silence, only the faint hiss of energy weapons breaking the stillness.
Seraphine swung her bike sideways, leaping off in one smooth motion. Her hand reached for her blade, the silver edge gleaming with Celestial light as she drew it.
Her voice cut the silence like a bell:
"Leave this planet… or die."
The cultists laughed, a sound like broken glass. Then, all at once, they lunged.
Seraphine stepped forward, her breath steady, her pulse aligned with the slow thrum of the planet's broken resonance. The air bent to her as she drew on her meridians — stars birthing themselves in her shoulders with a flare of searing brilliance.
Celestial Vein: Orbital Bloom.
Six radiant orbs spun outward, forming planetary rings around her, burning arcs of light. Plasma bolts hissed toward her, but each one met the shield of a star and disintegrated, scattering embers. A cultist lunged — his mask cracking with laughter — and was instantly vaporized as a star grazed his chest.
Her squad crashed into motion.
Jirru's mech slammed into the ground with heavy resonance, twin void repeaters (dual wielded plasma guns) snapping into his hands. Wind qi coiled tight around the barrels, and when he fired the plasma roared like a storm, every shot curved with surgical precision. Three cultists collapsed in shrieking fire before they could close. Another blinked out of existence, only to reappear at Jirru's back — but the mech twisted, boosters screaming, and crushed him beneath an armored heel.
Above, Yesh had already climbed the jagged frame of a broken crane. She whispered to herself, exhaling fire qi into her dusklance (sniper class plasma rifle). The weapon's rail hummed, a predator's growl. Her first shot ripped a cultist's skull apart, the second split through a shield-bearer mid-incantation. From her perch she was calm, detached, every pull of the trigger a death sentence whispered from heaven.
Below, Veyra, an aurai scout, flowed like shadow itself. Her plasma spear painted arcs of orange, splitting ribs, cracking masks. She blinked from one cultist to another, body phasing into blur, until blood hissed against the heat of her weapon.
Halvek, the human engineer, fought with brutal economy, his arms a blur of sabers and fire. Every strike was precise, mechanical, leaving a trail of molten edges and a spray of ash. A testament to his dedication of the body path of cultivation.
The two human body cultivators roared into the chaos, fire qi igniting across their skin. Plasma swords cut through black robes as they drove forward shoulder to shoulder. One was cut across the chest but laughed through the pain, his qi blazing hotter, carving down his foe in an incandescent sweep.
Yet the cultists were far from broken.
One opened his mask wide into a burning maw, spewing orbs of blue plasma that scattered the squad. Another slammed the ground, spines of black crystal tearing upward in jagged eruptions that forced Seraphine to leap skyward. A triad moved as one, weaving their arms in unison to form a dome of shadow that swallowed Jirru's firestorm until Yesh's shot tore it apart.
Seraphine landed light, her stars arcing back around her, eyes narrowed. A circle of pale light erupted beneath her feet.
Celestial Vein: Lunar Pulse.
Gravity bent. She surged upward, riding her own resonance, then dove through the melee like a falling moon. Her stars followed, crashing through cultists, flaring explosions of light and heat that lit the battlefield like dawn. She raised her blade, starlight condensing into her arm as a hooked glaive fell toward her heart.
Celestial Vein: Astral Reflection.
The shield of starlight rang like a struck bell. The glaive's energy recoiled in a vicious snap, tearing through its wielder in a blaze of his own power. The cultist crumpled, mask splintered into dust.
For a breath, silence. Smoke curled upward. The enemy lay burning in the dirt.
Seraphine's stars dimmed. She planted her blade into the ground, eyes burning like suns.
"Well that was quite the welcome," Seraphine murmured.
"Lady Seraphine, we are getting some readings in the main operations complex," Vrenn's panicked voice sounded through the comms.
"Huge bursts of qi are coming through our scanners, if the energy is not dispersed we are looking at an explosion that will level this entire planet."
Seraphine nodded, " Our plans just accelerated, let's deal with the cultists first. In the mean time, request the biggest ships we can find, we need to evacuate the civilians as soon as we can. How long do we have?"
" We have at most 24 hours before we reach critical levels. The nearest space station is about 18 hours away," Vrenn said.
"Put in the request anyway, I trust you to be our eyes in he sky Vrenn, the rest of us, move out, we are now on a clock."
They mounted their hoverbikes and blasted off toward the operations complex.