The impact knocked the wind out of him.
Marcus landed on the canvas roof of the lower deck. The fabric stretched, groaned under his weight, but held. He rolled to absorb the shock, ending in a crouch.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Around him, fifty men rained from the sky. Narcissus landed like a boulder, snapping a support beam under the canvas.
They were aboard.
The noise was absolute. The grinding of the wheels, the creak of timber, the howl of the wind—it was like standing inside a giant wooden lung that was wheezing its last breath.
Marcus pulled his knife. He slashed the canvas.
"In!" he screamed.
He dropped through the slit into the darkness below.
He expected a cargo hold. He expected crates of grain or spare parts.
He landed in hell.
The smell hit him first. Ammonia. Rotting flesh. Old sweat. It was thick enough to taste.
Marcus gagged, covering his nose.
He looked around.
It wasn't a cargo deck. It was the Engine Room.
But there were no pistons. No steam boilers.
It was flesh.
Hundreds of oxen were yoked to massive wooden capstans. They walked in endless, crushing circles, pushing the beams that turned the drive shafts for the wheels below. Their hides were raw, rubbing against the wood until bone showed. Their eyes were rolled back in terror.
And between the oxen were men.
Slaves. Chains rusted to their ankles. They pushed alongside the beasts, their bodies emaciated, their skin gray with soot and exhaustion.
"Move! Push, you filth!"
A figure walked the catwalk above the wheel pit. An Overseer.
He wore a leather apron and a gas mask with a long, drooping snout to filter the stench. In his hand, he held a long rod with a copper tip.
He jabbed the rod into the flank of a stumbling ox.
Crack.
A blue spark jumped. The ox screamed—a horrible, high-pitched sound—and lurched forward.
Electricity. A cattle prod powered by a backpack battery.
Narcissus dropped down beside Marcus. The giant gladiator saw the scene. He saw the chains. He saw the misery.
Narcissus froze.
He had been a slave. He had fought in the pits. But this? This wasn't combat. This was a machine made of pain.
A low growl started in Narcissus's chest. It wasn't human.
"Narcissus," Marcus whispered, grabbing the giant's arm. "Wait."
It was too late.
A slave—a man with one eye—looked up from his yoke. He saw the fifty black-faced demons drop from the ceiling.
He didn't cheer. He didn't ask for help.
He screamed.
"Intruders!"
The Overseer on the catwalk spun around. He saw Marcus. He saw the knife.
The Overseer didn't panic. He raised a flare gun.
Marcus threw the knife.
It was a perfect throw. The Ghost guided it.
But the Overseer flinched. The knife hit the glass eye-piece of his gas mask. Clink. It shattered the glass but didn't kill him.
The Overseer pulled the trigger.
POP.
A red flare streaked across the dark hold. It hit the far wall and stuck, burning with a blinding crimson light.
The shadows lengthened. The red light made the room look like the inside of a artery.
"Kill them!" Marcus roared.
Stealth was dead. Violence was the only card left.
Narcissus exploded.
He leaped onto the catwalk. The timber creaked under his weight.
The Overseer tried to raise his electric prod. Narcissus grabbed the rod with his bare hand. He ignored the shock. He didn't even blink.
He yanked the Overseer forward and headbutted him. The gas mask shattered. Blood sprayed inside the rubber hood.
Narcissus threw the man over the railing. The Overseer fell into the grinding gears of the capstan below.
Crunch.
The scream was cut short as the machinery ate him.
"Break the chains!" Marcus yelled to his Tunnel Rats. "Free the slaves! Cause chaos!"
The Romans spread out. They didn't have keys. They used hammers and chisels. They smashed the pins of the yokes.
"You are free!" Marcus shouted at the slaves. "Rise up! The masters are dead!"
The slaves hesitated. They were broken men.
Then one of them—the one-eyed man—grabbed a discarded chain. He looked at the Overseer's body being crushed in the gears. He looked at Marcus.
He roared.
It started a riot. The slaves turned on the surviving Overseers. They used their chains as whips. They used their teeth. The oxen, sensing the chaos, stampeded, snapping the wooden beams.
The Behemoth shuddered. The rhythm of the wheels faltered. The massive land-ship began to slow down.
"Caesar!" Narcissus yelled from the catwalk. "Soldiers!"
At the far end of the deck, a heavy iron door slammed open.
Enemy troops poured in. These weren't the mask-wearing shock troops. These were the ship's marines. They carried repeating crossbows and shields.
Thwip-thwip-thwip.
Bolts flew. Two Tunnel Rats went down, pinned to the wooden floor.
"Hold them here!" Marcus ordered.
He looked up at the ceiling. The radio signal—the Moonlight Sonata—was gone. The vibration in his chest had stopped.
The Enemy Player knew they were here.
"The head is upstairs," Marcus said to Narcissus. "I have to kill the brain."
"Go!" Narcissus shouted. He ripped a massive iron lever from the wall—a brake handle. He swung it like a club. "No one passes the Dog! Go!"
Marcus didn't look back.
He sprinted for the spiral staircase in the center of the room. He dodged a crossbow bolt that whizzed past his ear.
He hit the stairs and started climbing.
Second deck. Barracks. Empty. The soldiers had all gone down to fight Narcissus.
Third deck. Armory. Racks of grenades and rifles that looked like muskets.
Fourth deck.
Marcus kicked the door open.
He stepped out onto the upper observation platform.
The wind hit him. The night air was crisp and clean, wiping away the stench of the slave deck.
He was high up. The desert floor looked miles away.
In front of him stood the antenna array. The copper wires hummed in the wind.
And in the center of the deck, sitting on a velvet chair, was a desk.
A simple, wooden desk.
On it sat a microphone. A real one. Chrome. Modern.
And a speaker.
Marcus walked toward it. His sword dripped black blood onto the pristine white wood of the deck.
The speaker crackled.
There was no static. The sound was crystal clear.
"Boarders detected. Sector 9," a voice said.
It wasn't the bored air-traffic controller. It wasn't the synthesized propaganda voice.
It was him. The Player.
"Well played, Marcus," the voice said. It sounded amused. Impressed, even. "I didn't think you'd jump. That was... uncharacteristically brave for an NPC."
Marcus stopped ten feet from the desk. He looked around.
The deck was empty. No guards. No Emperor.
Just the desk. And a camera.
A small, black lens mounted on a tripod, tracking Marcus's movement.
"Come closer," the voice said. "Let's have a chat before I kill you."
Marcus sheathed his sword. He walked to the desk.
He looked into the camera lens.
"I'm not an NPC," Marcus said.
"We'll see," the voice replied.
A hatch in the floor behind the desk hissed open.
Hydraulics whined.
A figure rose from the deck.
It wasn't a man in a toga. It wasn't a Parthian King.
It was a suit.
A mechanized, exoskeletal suit made of bronze pistons and pneumatic tubes. It looked like a deep-sea diving suit crossed with a gladiator's armor.
Steam vented from the joints.
The visor slid open.
Inside was a face. Young. Asian. Pale. He wore a headset and blue-light blocking glasses.
He looked like he was sitting in a gaming chair, but the chair was a walking tank.
He smiled. It was the smile of a kid who just unlocked a new skin.
"Hello, Marcus," the Player said. "My name is Liang. Welcome to the Boss Fight."