The first thing Janus noticed was the smell. It was not the scent of moldy stone and recycled air from his Sector 15 bunk. It was the sharp and sterile sting of ozone and high-grade antiseptics. He tried to move his right arm, but a spike of agony anchored him to the bed. He gasped, his eyes snapping open to find himself in a room bathed in soft and amber light.

  He was not in a ward. He was in a private recovery suite. The sheets were made of genuine synthetic silk, and a holographic monitor hovered silently at the foot of his bed, displaying his vitals in steady and green pulses. His old, dull bracelet had been replaced. He now had a bronze one on his wrist. he thought.

  “Easy, soldier. You have been under for three days.”

  Janus turned his head slowly. A woman in a crisp and white medical uniform stood by the door. She was not a Serf-medic. The silver sigil on her collar marked her as a High-Output Healer. She approached him, but she did not look down at him with the usual disdain reserved for the navy-haired. She looked at him with something closer to awe.

  “Where am I?” Janus rasped. His throat felt like it had been scraped with sandpaper.

  “Fort Aegis. The forward command center for the Khorum front,” she replied, checking the mana-drip connected to his left arm. “You were brought in by a... well, the report says a dead dwarf delivered you to our gates. You had lost forty percent of your blood volume. Your mana veins were almost completely collapsed from exhaustion.”

  “The dwarf,” Janus muttered. Memories of the gray static and the screaming coming back in a violent wave. “Is he...?”

  “Secure. In the morgue. Or what is left of him,” she said. She paused, her professional mask slipping. “I have never seen a body desiccated like that. It was as if you reached into his very cells and turned off the lights. The High Commander is waiting to speak with you, but only when you are stable.”

  For the first time in his life, Janus was not being told to get up and work. He was being told to rest. A meal was brought to him an hour later: real protein, fresh fruit, and a glass of nutrient-rich juice. It was a "Noble’s breakfast."

  As he ate, Janus focused on his internal state. His primary Core was sluggish, but his Abomination Core was humming with a low and predatory vibration. He realized with a start that he had done something new. He had not just destroyed the dwarf. He had used the Unmana as a bridge. He remembered when his consciousness had entered the dwarf’s battered body. He had controlled the machine through the dead pilot, feeling the dwarf's fading electrical impulses as if they were his own. Snippets of the dwarf’s life, such as the smell of a forge or the sound of a daughter’s laughter, had flickered through his mind before being consumed by the static.

  The door slid open with a pressurized hiss. A man in a high-ranking officer’s uniform stepped in. He had a scarred jaw and eyes that had seen too many Rifts.

  “Specialist Vane,” the officer said, snapping a sharp salute.

  Janus almost choked on a piece of fruit. No one had ever saluted him. No one had ever called him "Specialist." He knew this title was bestowed to low-ranking soldiers who had out-of-the-ordinary powers that could help the war effort.

  “I am High Commander Marek,” the man continued, pulling up a chair. He did not wait for Janus to salute back. “I have spent the last seventy-two hours looking at the wreckage of a Dwarven scouting squad. We found two pilots crushed into the desert floor five miles away. We found a sniper with his head turned into a hollow shell. And then there is the pilot who walked you to our door. Their black boxes caught nothing but static and a few seconds of you falling and shouting from the sky. Care to tell me how an F-Rank recruit performed a squad-wipe of Dwarven mobile suits?”

  Janus set the juice down. His heart was hammering against his ribs. This was the moment. If he lied poorly, they would dissect him. If he told the truth, they would execute him.

  “I do not remember everything, High Commander,” Janus said, leaning into the truth of his exhaustion. “I was terrified. When I entered the Portal back on Varkas, something went wrong and I ended up there. I was confused. I felt a bullet hit my shoulder, and something just snapped.” The silence that followed was the cue for the High Commander to continue.

  “The status update on your bracelet is blank in the Skill slot, Vane. That usually happens when a talent is too new or too volatile for the Codex to categorize,” Marek said, leaning forward. “But the evidence is in the morgue. You controlled that body, did you not?”

  “I think so,” Janus whispered. “I felt a connection to the dead body. My mind connected to the flesh. It was like my mind divided itself into two. In one of them, I was controlling my body. In the other, I was moving his. I made it carry me until I could not stay awake anymore.”

  “Necromancy,” Marek breathed, his eyes narrowing. “A rare branch for a human. Usually, that is the filth the Tyranny of the Flesh uses, but if you can turn their own dead against them...”

  “It is not like that,” Janus interrupted, trying to play the part of a confused boy. “It felt heavy. Like dragging a mountain. I do not think I can do the same again. I certainly cannot control more than one like them.”

  “We will see about that,” Marek said. For the first time, the "respect" felt like a cage. “Once you can stand, we have a training room prepared and some fresh corpses for you to test. If you can replicate this, Vane, you will not be heading back to the trenches. You will be the Empire’s new favorite toy. We have never had a necromancer in our ranks. We need to learn the Sigils. We want to replicate them. Do you think you can help us?”

  “I am not sure. I did not use any Sigils, but I would like to practice.”

  After Marek left, Janus was finally alone. He felt a strange, lingering density in his chest; controlling the corpse had changed him. It was as if his soul had gained a layer of hardened scar tissue, making it feel just a little stronger.

  He tapped his bronze bracelet, and a flickering amber holographic display appeared in the air. He held his breath as the new data synced.

  NAME:

  RANK:

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  RACE:

  All his attributes had risen, a side effect of the trauma and the sheer volume of mana his body had been forced to process. The most surprising jump was in his Control CapacityControlCapacity

  He was still a whelp compared to the monsters on the front lines, but looking at the numbers, he was finally starting to feel powerful.

  Two days later, Janus was led into the heart of Fort Aegis. He was no longer wearing the gray rags of an F-Ranker recruit. He had been given a black tactical jumpsuit made of reinforced fibers that felt like a second skin. As he walked, soldiers moved aside to let him pass. They did not look at his navy hair with disgust. They looked at him with a wary, superstitious distance. Not only were his powers extremely rare, he had somehow managed to kill a whole squad of mobile suits and even got promoted from F-Rank to D-Rank. All this while having navy hair. People saw him as an anomaly just for being alive.

  The training room was a vast amphitheater of steel and glass. High Commander Marek stood on an observation deck above, flanked by two men and a woman in white lab coats. In the center of the room, lying on a metal slab, was a dead Dwarf.

  “The scanners are active, Specialist,” Marek’s voice echoed over the intercom. “We want to see the mana flow. We want to see how you bridge the gap between your soul and a lifeless vessel. Whenever you are ready.”

  Janus stepped up to the slab. The Dwarf looked peaceful, his eyes closed, his thick beard still smelling of oil and stone. Janus felt a spike of nausea. He was not just testing a skill. He was desecrating someone.

  Janus told himself. "

  He reached out and placed his hand on the Dwarf’s cold chest. He closed his eyes and reached deep into his Abomination Core, but he did not pull the power out directly. Instead, he forced the Unmana through his primary Core, wrapping the jagged, static-filled energy in a thin, shimmering layer of his own Mana. It felt like trying to hold a handful of needles while wearing silk gloves. It hurt.

  A low, vibrating hum filled the room. On the observation screens, the mana-scanners began to flicker.

  “Fluctuations are erratic,” one of the scientists muttered. “The frequency is... unlike anything in our database. It is not traditional Necromancy. It is almost like he is erasing the concept of death in the localized tissue.”

  Janus gritted his teeth. The strain was immense. He felt his consciousness stretch, pulling thin until it snapped into the Dwarf’s mind.

  Suddenly, he was not just Janus. He was Balder, a father of two who had died thinking of his wife’s vegetable soup. The memory hit Janus like a physical blow. He saw a flash of a mountain pass, a hidden door guarding mobile suit gear, and a shipment of Aether-Fuel meant for the front lines.

  The Dwarf’s hand suddenly twitched. Then, with a wet, grinding sound of stiff muscles, the corpse sat up.

  A gasp went through the observation deck. The scientists scribbled frantically. Where Janus’s fingers pressed against the Dwarf’s chest, the skin began to turn to gray ash. The eyes of the corpse snapped open, and Janus recoiled internally; he could see the flickering Static swirling in the Dwarf’s pupils. He prayed the scientists couldn't see it from the observation deck. What he found most surprising was seeing himself both as the Dwarf and as Janus.

  Two voices said in unison. “It is... too much.” Janus gasped, his nose beginning to bleed. He tried to let go, but it was as if the corpse were alive and drinking his Unmana. He managed to yank his hand away, and the Dwarf collapsed back onto the slab like a discarded toy. The gray smoke dissipated, leaving the corpse’s face and chest partially withered.

  “Forty-two seconds,” Marek noted, his voice sounding impressed despite the horror of the display. “And the body is already decomposing. It is a high-cost skill, then. Destructive to the host.”

  “I told you,” Janus panted, wiping the blood from his lip. “It is heavy. And I... I saw things. I saw where they are keeping the fuel. The Aether-Fuel. In the pass of Kuldar.”

  The room went silent. One could have heard a pin drop. Marek jumped over the railing, dropping near Janus, his eyes burning with a new kind of hunger. He knew Janus had arrived on Khorum on the day of his battle and then spent days unconscious. He could not have studied the intelligence maps. He could not have known that there was a passage there. He was most certainly telling the truth. “You saw his memories?” Marek said, his voice thick with glee.

  “Just... flashes,” Janus lied, downplaying how much he saw. Though if they could check him, they would see his heart was racing.

  “You are not a soldier anymore, Vane,” Marek said, putting his hand on Janus’s shoulders, removing his hand quickly when Janus winced at the touch. This time, the respect was thrilling. “You are a key. We are going to put you on the front lines, and you are going to pick the brains of every Dwarven commander we kill.”

  Marek gestured for Janus to follow him out of the amphitheater. They walked down a corridor of polished obsidian toward the High Commander’s private office.

  “Since you are now a Specialist, you are no longer a cog in the infantry,” Marek said, his voice dropping to a more confidential tone. “You have the right to form a small, specialized tactical unit. A squad that works directly under your command to facilitate your... talent. Do you have any names in mind? Anyone from your training group you trust?”

  Janus did not have to think. He knew that if he was going to survive this war, he needed people whom he could trust one hundred percent.

  “I want Rick and Lyza,” Janus said firmly.

  Marek stopped at his office door and turned, a slow, mocking grin spreading across his face. “Rick? As in the Rick Thorne?”

  Janus nodded. “Yes. Do you know him? We trained together.”

  Marek let out a sharp, barking laugh that echoed in the hallway. “Thorne is a scion of a High-Noble house. His class is Solar Sovereign; he has the potential to incinerate entire Dwarven battalions with a single localized sun-flare. He is currently being groomed for a High-Command position in the North. Specialist, you would be able to summon Rick Thorne to your squad only if you could raise an entire army of the dead. You are far too green to have that kind of pull.”

  Janus felt a sting of his old life as a Serf returning. Even as a "hero," he was still beneath the true elite.

  “However,” Marek continued, his eyes reflecting the cold blue flicker of his holographic tablet. “The girl, Lyza, is viable. Her compatibility ratings for support and stealth are optimal. I’ll have her transfer papers authorized by sunset. As for your second slot, I will assign someone more... suited to your new standing.”

  He deactivated the tablet with a sharp flick of his wrist. “Ensure this mission is a success, and we’ll relocate you to Fort Haven to continue your training. If you prove useful, we may expand your squad’s parameters and grant you further autonomy in your command.”

  Marek opened the door to his office, signaling the end of the conversation. “Go back to your suite. Get some rest. Your first real operation starts in twenty-four hours. We are going to find that Aether-Fuel, and you are going to show me exactly what else Balder knew.”