Bukayo had advanced ahead for over two stellar hours, his form as a "Child of the Night" melding seamlessly into the enveloping darkness. In this state, he immediately perceived a comprehensive augmentation of his physical stamina, cognitive acuity, and spiritual essence.
With preternatural sharpness, he identified a secluded and shadowed passage, its confines too narrow for an ordinary adult. Leveraging his youthful frame, Bukayo slipped into the constricted channel with ease.
Cautiously, he dislodged the grille of a power distribution chamber, descending with feline grace onto the shoulders of an unsuspecting foe below. With surgical precision, he drove his razor-sharp dagger into the enemy's eye, eliciting a scream that pierced the silence.
The cry drew the attention of others, their footsteps echoing as they converged.
Bukayo's eyes gleamed with an otherworldly light. Vaulting upward, he yanked the power switch, plunging the area into deeper darkness.
The blacker the night, the mightier he grew.
This was his hunting ground, a sacred arena for the consecration of his newfound gifts through acts of devotion.
Nimrod, still several kilometers from the Arbites' precinct tower, caught the acrid scent of blood wafting through the air.
A kilometer from the tower's gates, he broke into a charge, his colossal frame surging forward with the momentum of a juggernaut.
Drawing upon his experience digesting the "Lawyer" potion, he discerned that, having just consumed the "Barbarian" potion, he had already progressed a third of the way toward its full assimilation.
Nimrod understood the core essence of the "Barbarian" to be the forceful shattering of established rules, unbound by the mere trappings of savagery. This aligned perfectly with his post-gene-awakening plan to unify Vostonia through the martial prowess of a Primarch.
Yet, he reasoned, if he could break those rules in a manner both barbaric and indelibly imprinted as such in the minds of others, the digestion of his potion would surely accelerate.
Thus, Nimrod, a human tank incarnate, barreled directly into the hastily reinforced guard detail at the gate.
The kilometer's distance was trifling for him, insufficient to reach his full velocity before he crashed into the throng.
Eight guards raised their weapons, too slow to aim, their arms twisting like noodles as they were hurled skyward. Their chests caved in, bodies tumbling through the air in chaotic spirals.
A thunderous explosion snapped their fading consciousness to clarity for a fleeting moment. Their final glimpse revealed the entire third-floor wall of the Arbites chamber collapsing in ruin.
Nimrod's gang members witnessed a clearer spectacle: their lord sprinting, leaping, and smashing through the wall, seizing the once-untouchable Arbites overseer in his iron grip.
Dimitrov's head breached the ceiling, his vision a blur of pain and disorientation.
"You are…" The Arbites' pupils contracted sharply as, through the haze, he recognized the giant's piercing eyes and faintly familiar features. "Nimrod… how… have you become this?"
Receiving no reply, his consciousness waned. Struggling, he gasped, "Kill me… and Lord Estupinian… will never spare you."
"My thanks for the intelligence," Nimrod intoned, snapping Dimitrov's neck with a twist of his wrist.
He plucked the Arbites' vox-caster from his belt, activating the dome's public broadcast channel. Turning to his followers, his voice resounded with divine authority.
"They say that for a Lower Hive dweller to enter the Upper Hive is akin to ascension, a dream so distant even the Lower Hive's own believe it unattainable."
"Is it truly impossible?"
"Today, we shall shatter that delusion, not by the grace of Upper Hive lords."
The thunderous voice of a Primarch reverberated across the Khanty-Mansi Dome, shaking its very foundations.
"I, Nimrod, shall lead you into the Upper Hive!"
Bukayo, drenched in blood, withdrew his dagger from a guard's spine, his eyes alight with fervor.
Mere work cycles ago, he had resigned himself to never returning to the Upper Hive.
Now, he would reclaim it as a new being—a "Sleepless" Beyonder and Nimrod's "Child of the Night."
The workers of the Khanty-Mansi Dome seized weapons and tools, streaming from factories to join the swelling tide of rebellion.
At the freight elevator to the Upper Hive, the guard captain bellowed, "Seal the gates!"
Amid the grinding groan of the closing gate, he sprinted toward the control room, the only place capable of relaying news of the Lower Hive's uprising to the vertical elevator's far side.
Two steps in, a gunshot rang out.
Rawlslev's precise shot felled a gate guard, leading a hundred elite fighters into the freight zone. Nimrod had entrusted him with securing the elevator to the Upper Hive, and he would not fail his lord.
He remained uncertain whether Nimrod was a divine entity, as some whispered, but he resolved to abandon the term "boss."
Since Nimrod rejected divinity, Rawlslev chose to address him as "lord," recognizing that his master valued loyalty and the unerring execution of tasks above all.
Nimrod boarded a freight elevator alone, while seven others carried ten-man elite squads each.
Clutching their weapons, the fighters felt their bodies ascend rapidly, glimpsing other elevators rising and falling, a labyrinth of pipes, and glaring lights flickering through the smog.
They could not suppress their awe.
"So this is the hive… I only see it now."
"The dome below looks like an ant's nest."
In the Upper Hive, Freight Zone E-1989, the stationmaster noticed lights flaring in Zone F-17. Frowning, he muttered discontentedly, "The Khanty-Mansi Dome grows ever more insolent. This is the third unannounced arrival in five cycles. Even with soaring production, they should not act so brazenly."
"Stationmaster," his statistician whispered, "I hear Dimitrov's stellar performance, boosting output, has earned him a promotion to the Upper Hive. And…"
Lowering his voice further, he added, "They say he's aligned with a royal cadet branch."
"His luck holds," the stationmaster said enviously. "That Nimrod emerged in his dome, defeating the premier barrister Golovin. Managing a dome's industrial combine is beneath such talent."
He shook his head, puzzled by Nimrod's choices. Rumor had it he spurned offers from the Finder family and other noble houses, returning to the squalor of the Lower Hive.
Taking up the vox-comm, he switched to the Finder family's channel.
"Khanty-Mansi Dome has arrived. Send someone to collect the shipment."
"No trouble at all, I'm on my way," came the reply.
Pocketing the vox, the stationmaster's mood lifted at the prospect of a gratuity for the inconvenience. Leaning back, he glanced at the surveillance screens.
In an instant, his smile vanished, his eyes widening as he shouted, "What is that?"
The statistician peered closer. "An Ogryn?"
The stationmaster shook his head, watching the giant seize a guard, wielding him like a flail to sweep aside others.
Frantically, he reached for the vox to switch channels.
A deafening crash followed, then the shattering of glass.
Horror gripped the stationmaster as the giant hurled the guard toward them.
Astonishingly, the guard, flung dozens of meters, smashed through blast-proof glass.
Before he or the statistician could react, the projectile guard struck them, knocking them unconscious.
Having previously navigated the Upper Hive as the Finder family's advocate via passenger trains, Nimrod now set foot in a freight station for the first time.
Yet, the moment he emerged from the elevator, he mastered his surroundings, pinpointing the control room's location with unerring instinct.
To Rawlslev, he commanded, "Rally the others as they arrive."
Raising his gaze, he scanned the spires piercing the clouds—bastions of the hive's true power, home to its noble families.
He had ascended one such spire before, the Finder family's domain. Now, his quarry was the tower of the Boleslav family.
His eyes settled on two spires of equal grandeur, one unmistakably belonging to the servants of the Omnissiah.