Page 109 of Scorching the Alien Empire
“No. Whatever it is, it has master control. It’s rewriting commands, logging me out constantly. It’s only because of its remote delay and our local access, I’m able to loop through new instances.”
My brain is looping.
Razgor doesn’t stop. He’s locked in, hands moving with blinding precision. Then—“Got it!” he declares, sweat gleaming on his forehead.
Movement. Noise.
The green fluid in the thousands of tanks begins to drain, siphoning into the towering columns that support them. The sound is deafening—countless massive drains swallowing gallons of liquid simultaneously. The space-knights glance up, their stances shifting between awe and wariness, weapons poised to shoot.
“Berserkers!” Dracoth roars, nearly bursting my eardrums. “Defensive formation! My position!”
Instantly, the space-knights move as one to obey. Hundreds converge, rushing from every corner of the chamber, forming a protective semicircle around us. It’s pure muscle-bound meathead discipline—but despite the tension thickening the air, lovely tingles flow through me at the alluring sight, at their delicious obedience.
Then, as if on cue, a thousand shields flare to life, a solid wall of dazzling blue. The chamber falls into breathless silence.
The soft hiss of retracting tubes breaks it. Then comes the drip, drip of fluid. The loud, wet plop of flesh slapping metal.
Like overripe apples tumbling from lifeless branches.
Are they juicy, fresh, or rotten to the core?
Chapter 22
Dracoth
Copycats
Moltenfurycoursesthroughmy veins, a searing river of wrath threatening to consume me. This day—long, brutal—each passing second another gut-wrenching loss, another grotesque revelation. The weight is almost unbearable. A shattered legacy. A birthright that once promised endless glory, now reduced to self-inflicted genocide.
Our females—ripped apart, butchered, defiled. No longer just false visions meant to break me. No, the truth is here, all around, written in blood, reeking of terror.
And I am responsible.
A clone of the one who gave the order. The one who fought like a brutonous to tear the heart from our own people. My father—no. My predecessor. War Chieftain Gorexius.
The ancestors weep at my very existence. A mockery made flesh—the worst of us reborn, a hemovyrn haunting the living.
I am no different from these clones.
They fall in their tens of thousands, like crimson rain. A downpour of human blood, each drop a tear I cannot shed. There is no place for softness inside me. My blazing hatred burns away such weak things. Only the hard and the strong remain. I am fire, a creation of war, and I swear on Arawnoth’s molten heart to exact bloody and savage vengeance upon the Scythians for these atrocities.
My warvisor-enhanced senses flood my mind with data. Exact number of emerging clones. Heart rates spiking. Adrenaline flooding their systems. Rush wafting from their wild, manic eyes. I was right to warn Jazreal and Sarkoth and to form this defensive line.
The Gods demand more blood this day.
From the opened vats, monstrosities crawl. Their grotesque, twitching movements reek of agony. Some have no legs. Few bones. They tumble from such height they splat across the metal floor with a sickening wet slap. Fleshy innards explode, slicking the ground in viscera. Like rotten fruit falling from Draxxi Great Woods—except these were meant to be warriors, not waste.
“THAT IS. FUCKING. DISGUSTING!”
Princesa’s voice cuts through the carnage, her silver-crimson eyes wide with horror. Her beautiful face twists in revulsion. I tighten my hold on her, a fierce instinct to protect not just her body, but her mind.
Most clones emerge intact—physically, at least. Their bodies lack honed muscle, their skin unmarked by battle scars. Some move slowly, their expressions blank, their hands wandering over their own faces, as if discovering their own existence. Some prod at each other, stroking skin with childlike curiosity.
Then the others appear.
Fangs bared. Claws extended, gleaming in the dim red light. The rage-filled ones leap down as soon as their tanks crack open. Rush-fuming eyes dart amongst the emerging throng, bestial visages sizing up prey.
They pounce like venefexes from the shadows with claws aimed at throats and eyes. Thousands of them moving in a murderous crimson wave of snarling, sneering fury.
