"You know," Ethan said, still chuckling, "I was just thinking about how the Imperial Military’s quality has really gone downhill."

He tilted his head, and in the moonlight, Xavier caught the glint of his teeth.

"One general retires, and suddenly the whole group can’t even catch a single beta person in a forest. How long has it been? Four hours?"

The words hit Xavier’s sore spot. But in his defense, Ethan was by no means a simple beta.

Xavier’s grip tightened on his rifle.

Everyone knew that Grayson could have ended this chase in forty minutes, and the rest of the time would be fighting. But Xavier’s people were too disciplined to point it out.

Xavier’s eyes narrowed. He could feel his old insecurity rising, burning in his chest.

It had followed him since the academy days, since the promotions, since every operational briefing where someone’s gaze would drift to the empty chair that Grayson used to occupy.

But he was not Grayson.

He will never be Grayson.

He was Xavier Hunter, the second young master of the Hunter family, a general in his own right.

He would not let a cornered rat bait him into stupidity.

"Whether it’s Grayson or me," Xavier said, his voice was freezing cold, "you still end up in Imperial military custody, inside the prison cells. Hands. Now."

Ethan’s head tilted further, an oddly birdlike gesture.

"Am I?" he asked, loaded with something that made the hair on the back of Xavier’s neck stand straight up.

The ground moved.

Not an earthquake—nothing so dramatic.

A series of low, percussive vibrations traveled up through the soles of Xavier’s boots and into the bones of his legs.

The forest floor beneath the leaf litter moved, bulged, and then cracked open in half a dozen places simultaneously.

Something enormous emerged from within the ground.

The first one hauled itself out of a fissure three meters to Xavier’s left.

It was the size of a hover car, with its mandibles dripping with bioluminescent fluid that hissed where it hit the ground.

It wasn’t a Zerg.

Xavier had fought Zergs on different front-line locations and had the scars to prove it.

Zergs were intelligent and coordinated.

But these were not that.

These were nothing like that.

The creatures’ bodies looked like a patchwork of mismatched segments. Some armored in thick, dark chitin. Others were covered in a membranous skin that pulsed with visible hemolymph.

Their legs were too numerous, their joints bent at angles that no natural insect exhibited.

There were too many eyes, clustered in asymmetric groups—glowed a sickly green in the moonlight.

These were called Lowborns by the Zergs and Insectoids by the rest of the universe.

They were not intelligent enough to be a member of the Zerg alien race that humanity feared. They were just like the Star Beasts of the beast men in the Beast Galaxy.

But these were not the typical Lowborns; it was something worse in its own way.

It looked like it was scientifically modified, mutated Lowborns, created by pumping mutagenic chemicals into the local fauna and letting biology do the rest.

Crude. Brutal. But effective.

And Xavier understood all that and felt the weight heavy in his stomach.

For the four hours they chased him, Ethan hadn’t been running.

He had been stalling.

Every seemingly panicked sprint through the forest, every abrupt change of direction, every moment where they had almost—almost—cornered him only for him to slip away at the last second—it had been deliberate.

While Xavier and his squad chased the man through the trees, Ethan had been laying a chemical trail.

The mutagenic compounds he had sprayed along his route had seeped into the soil. It found the insect colonies beneath and began the accelerated mutation process.

Four hours was enough time for a chemical specialist of Ethan’s caliber to turn an entire forest’s worth of harmless native insects into a swarm of mutated horrors.

"Son of a—" Xavier bit the curse short and pivoted. "DEFENSIVE FORMATION! Fall back to the—"

But it was too late.

The insects erupted from the ground in waves—five, ten, fifteen of the massive creatures, with smaller, faster variants skittering between them like living shrapnel.

The air filled with the wet crunch of splitting earth and the high, keening shriek that the Lowborns made when they smelled warm blood.

Xavier’s rifle rang—three controlled bursts that punched through the nearest Lowborn’s thorax and dropped it in a spray of luminescent ichor.

Beside him, Lt. Hawn was firing in rhythmic patterns. Each shot was fired precisely, with utmost lethal impact.

But for every creature that fell, two more dragged themselves from the holes.

In the middle of the chaos, Xavier heard Ethan’s voice clearly, almost cheerful.

"Have fun!"

Xavier whipped around. Through the strobe of muzzle flashes and the writhing mass of chitinous bodies, he caught a glimpse of Ethan’s lab coat disappearing over the ravine’s edge.

It seemed like a preset route.

Xavier gritted his teeth so hard he felt something crack in the back of his jaw.

Every rational fiber of his being screamed at him to maintain formation, protect his squad, and deal with the immediate threat.

The insectoids were dangerous—those mandibles could shear through standard-issue exoskeleton plating.

The mutagenic instability meant their behavior was erratic, unpredictable, and impossible to model with the standard combat system.

But a part of him wanted nothing more than to vault over that ravine’s edge and drag Ethan back by his throat. But he still had to give orders.

"Lieutenant!" Xavier’s voice cut through the din.

Lt. Hawn appeared at his side, ichor splattered across his chest plate. "Sir!"

"Get coordinates to command. I want a drone on him in sixty seconds."

"Yes, sir!"

Xavier turned back to the swarm.

A Lowborn the size of a small transport vehicle was bearing down on his left flank, its mismatched eyes blazing green, mandibles wide enough to bisect a man.

Xavier changed his stance, raised his rifle, and fired.

The creature’s head detonated. Its body skidded forward another three meters on momentum alone before collapsing in a heap of twitching limbs.

Xavier didn’t flinch, already tracking the next target.