Kaelen woke up expecting the damp cold of stone.
He expected the smell of rotting straw, the scuttling of rats, and the oppressive darkness of a dungeon—the kind of hole his father threw traitors into back in the Royal Capital.
Instead, he woke up in soft, clinical white light.
Kaelen sat up, his head pounding. He wasn't in a dungeon. He was in a square room, pristine and sterile. The walls were made of smooth, seamless white metal panels that hummed with a faint, rhythmic vibration. There were no iron bars.
The only barrier between him and the outside world was a shimmering, transparent wall of energy on the open side of the room.
"You're awake, Sleeping Beauty."
Kaelen snapped his head toward the voice.
Ciro was sitting on a metal chair just outside the energy wall. He wasn't wearing his terrifying black helmet. He was casually balancing a synthesized red apple on the tip of his vibrating energy dagger. His scarred face wore a smirk that made Kaelen want to scream.
"Where am I?" Kaelen demanded, scrambling to his feet. He tried to summon the dignity of a Crown Prince, but it was hard when his white uniform was torn, bloodstained, and covered in soot.
"Level 50. VIP Detention Block," Ciro answered casually, taking a loud, crunchy bite of the apple. "We call it 'The Golden Cage'. Reserved for guests too valuable to kill, but too stupid to let go."
Kaelen marched toward the transparent barrier. He reached out to grab Ciro's throat.
"I wouldn't touch that if I were you," Ciro warned, not looking up from his apple. "That's not glass. It's a photonic forcefield. Touch it, and it'll burn your fingerprints off. Punch it, and the kinetic feedback will break your arm."
Kaelen froze, his hand inches from the humming energy. He pulled back, glaring at Ciro with pure, unadulterated hatred.
"You think you've won," Kaelen hissed. "My father won't let this humiliation stand. He will send the Grand Wizards. He will summon the Frost Giants from the North. You haven't won a war; you've just delayed your execution."
Ciro stood up. The playfulness vanished. He walked closer until his face was inches from the forcefield.
"Your father just lost five of the most expensive Dreadnoughts in the Kingdom in less than an hour," Ciro said, his voice dropping to a cold whisper. "He isn't sending anyone. He's terrified."
Ciro pointed to the massive window behind Kaelen.
"Look outside, Prince. Look at what you called 'garbage'."
Kaelen turned slowly. The window stretched from floor to ceiling.
The view took the breath from his lungs.
He was high up in the Spire. Below him, the City of Glass Bones sprawled out like a glowing jewel in the middle of the grey wasteland.
But it wasn't a dead ruin anymore.
The city was alive.
The streets were bathed in the soft glow of holographic streetlights. To the west, Kaelen saw hundreds of figures—the Techno-Cult Engineering Corps—working on the walls with mechanical limbs, their welding torches creating showers of sparks. To the east, massive glass domes protected lush green fields where automated machines harvested crops Kaelen couldn't name.
And in the central plaza, the wreckage of his own ship, The Iron-Heart, was being dismantled by massive yellow Loader Droids.
The wood was being recycled. The metal was being melted down to build new defenses.
It wasn't a shantytown. It was a Metropolis. It was cleaner, brighter, and more advanced than the Royal Capital, which still reeked of horse manure and coal smoke.
"Impossible..." Kaelen whispered, pressing his hand against the cold glass. "How did you build this? Without magic? Without mana-crystals?"
"We don't need magic," Elara's voice echoed from hidden speakers in the ceiling, calm and omnipresent. "We have Science."
Kaelen looked up, spinning around. "Elara! Face me! Don't hide behind your voice!"
"I'm busy, Kaelen," Elara replied, sounding bored. "I have five hundred mouths to feed and an Empire to build. Enjoy your breakfast. It has more nutritional value than anything you ever ate at the Royal Banquet."
A slot in the wall hissed open. A tray slid out, carrying a bowl of warm protein porridge and a glass of crystal-clear water.
Ciro tapped the forcefield with his dagger hilt.
"Eat up, Your Highness. You'll need the energy."
"For what?" Kaelen sneered. "To sit in this cage?"
Ciro grinned. It was a wolf's grin.
"Because starting tomorrow, you work. There are no free rides in the Ashlands. Not even for Princes."
Ciro turned and walked away, leaving Kaelen alone in his cage of light, staring down at the futuristic city that was supposed to be his conquest, but was now his prison.
The Command Room
Elara cut the audio feed to the detention block. She let out a long sigh, leaning heavily against the main console.
"SUBJECT KAELEN: HEART RATE ELEVATED," AURA reported. "STRESS LEVEL: HIGH."
"Let him stress," Elara muttered, rubbing her temples. "It might teach him some humility."
She looked at the massive holographic map hovering in the center of the room. It displayed the entire known Ashlands.
In the center, a blue dot pulsed—The City of Glass Bones.
But surrounding it were red zones. Lots of them.
"Analysis, AURA," Elara commanded.
[REGIONAL FACTIONS DETECTED:]
WEST:The Red Raiders (Motorized Bandit Clans). Threat: High Mobility.SOUTH:The Flesh-Mongers (Slavers & Bio-Harvesters). Threat: Psychological.NORTH-EAST:The Oil Barons (Industrial Warlords). Threat: Heavy Armor.
"News of our victory against the Sky Fleet has spread," Elara said, tracing the borders with her finger. "These Warlords aren't stupid. They know a new power has risen. They're scared."
Ciro walked back into the room, tossing his apple core into a waste recycler.
"They're not just scared, Elara," Ciro said, leaning on the table. "They're greedy. They know we have clean water. They know we have electricity. If we stay passive, they'll form a coalition. They'll swarm us like hyenas on a lion."
"We can't fight the whole desert at once," Elara countered. "Our ammunition is limited. The Eclipse is in the hangar undergoing repairs; the rail-cannon barrel melted after that last shot."
"So what's the plan?" Ciro asked. "Do we wait for them to knock?"
Elara shook her head. Her eyes glowed with the sharp blue light of the data stream.
"No. We don't wait. We expand."
She pointed to the North-East sector—the territory of The Oil Barons.
"Our fusion reactor provides electricity, but electricity can't build tires or lubricate joints," Elara explained, pointing to the resource readout. "Our vehicles—the skiffs, the heavy loaders, and the Eclipse's secondary thrusters—need petrochemicals. We can't synthesize heavy polymers and rubber from sunlight alone. We need black gold."
Elara looked at Ciro.
"Prep the team. We are initializing the Diplomatic Corps."
"Diplomatic Corps?" Ciro snorted. "You mean me, Ghost, and a bag of thermal detonators?"
"Something like that," Elara smiled thinly. "We're going to pay a visit to the Oil Barons. We're going to offer them a trade deal."
"And if they refuse?"
Elara looked back at the map. She didn't look like a Princess anymore. She looked like an Empress of Rust.
"Then we remind them what happened to the Sky Fleet."