"This? This isn't a battlefield. It's a sermon. And I'm the god you pray to before you die." — RAID-13
The air was thick with smoke and static.Ash rained from the sky like the world was burning its last letter of surrender.
Ten thousand war-machines stood on the ridge — some humanoid, some crawling, all bristling with plasma lances and neutron blades. Their formation was clean. Precise. Efficient.
In the center of the crater below them, a lone man stood — coat fluttering, one hand in his pocket, the other gripping a black mech-core crackling with anti-light.
RAID-13 tilted his head and smiled.
"Didn't expect a welcoming party," he said, his voice echoing across the scorched rocks, calm as if he were commenting on the weather. "This many toys for little old me? You shouldn't have."
The enemy commander — General Vaegus of the Terran Crown Division — barked over the speakergrid:
"Stand down. You're surrounded. Your mech signature is outdated. Your combat license has been revoked. And your sentence is death."
RAID chuckled.
"Oh, I'm surrounded?" he raised an eyebrow, eyes flicking toward the sky, where orbital cannons were already charging. "No, no. I think you're the one who's trapped. In this little… mistake you call a military."
With a sharp snap of his fingers, the ground cracked.
And then it rose.
From beneath the battlefield, forged in forbidden cores and nightmares, erupted VANTH-OMEGA — his personal mech. Thirty meters tall, matte black with streaks of infernal red. It didn't land. It descended, like judgment.
The entire battlefield fell silent for one breathless moment. Then—
BOOM.The mech slammed into place behind RAID like a divine executioner, its twin horns glowing, engines howling like a beast dragged from hell.
The war-clouds registered its reactivation.
MECH CLASS: VANΘ-Ω [ VANTH-OMEGA ] STATUS: REINSTATEDPILOT: RAID-13 [DEAD. ERROR. CORRUPTED.] THREAT RATING: APOCALYPTIC
The first volley hit RAID like a meteor swarm. Plasma streaks. Auto-cannon bursts. Drone fire.
He didn't move.
The shots slammed into a kinetic barrier just before him, bursting into sparks. He yawned mid-barrage.
"Really?" he muttered. "That's how you open? You bring a planet's worth of ammo and can't even scuff my boots?"
Then he vanished.
No jump-jet. No countdown. No shout. Just motion — a blur of hate and momentum.
In one instant, he was gone from the crater floor.In the next, he was inside the enemy formation — slicing through an elite unit with nothing but his bare hands and a stolen phase blade. Bodies hit the ground before their screams caught up.
RAID spun, ducked, disarmed a mech-knight, and rammed the blade straight through the cockpit window. The pilot's final thought was "Why is he laughing?"
Above, VANTH-OMEGA activated its Execution Mode.
Arms split into multi-barreled graviton launchers. Its core spun up like a dying star. The air turned red.
"Command," RAID said calmly, "clean this filth."
The mech obeyed.
From its chest burst a beam so dense it folded sound. Dozens of war machines vanished — no explosion, no debris — just vaporized into red mist.
General Vaegus screamed into comms, "ALL UNITS—FOCUS FIRE ON THE CORE UNIT!"
But the moment the order echoed…
A voice whispered in his ear — behind him.
"You're late to your own funeral, General."
Vaegus spun — but saw nothing.
Then the cockpit lights went out.
One second later, his mech exploded from the inside out.
RAID landed atop the flaming wreckage, dusting soot from his sleeve.
He looked up at the remaining army, eyes glowing with mockery.
"I'll say this once," he shouted. "Run. Before I decide to get creative."
Half the army opened fire.The other half ran.
Both halves made a mistake.
RAID-13 raised one hand.VANTH-OMEGA dropped from the sky in full battle mode — wings spread, cannons unleashed, blades singing.
The sermon had begun.
And in this war-forged chapel of fire, RAID was god, butcher, and prophet.