The mining station had a name now.

Yalira called it Brask’s Tomb, dry-faced and deadpan. Tessa called it Home Base. Jorik just called it the station. Owen rotated between all three depending on his mood.

Whatever they called it, the place worked. Stone walls, two levels, defensible approaches. Yalira had set up early-warning markers on all four compass points—small piles of stones balanced just precariously enough that anything bigger than a desert rodent would knock them over and tell her something was coming. Jorik had reinforced the lower-level entrance with stones from the wreckage, narrowing the doorway so only one person could enter at a time. Tessa had organized supplies, food stores, water reserves. Within four days, the station felt less like an occupied territory and more like a base.

Vren came down from the original camp on Day 49. He brought supplies, news from the surface (no drone activity in their sector for the past week, which was a good sign), and a sealed package from Gorvax that he’d retrieved from a relay drop near Zone 18.

Owen opened it that night, alone in the upper level.

Inside was a single sheet of cured beast hide, with text written in Gorvax’s old, precise script.

Dragon,

The river chamber is everything I needed. The iolite veins respond to controlled CE channeling in ways I haven’t seen since before I was assigned to your sector. I am healing faster than I expected. I would estimate eighty-five percent recovery within two weeks at this rate.

Yalira has been generous with her time. I have been working through old training methods I had set aside for centuries. There are some I think will be useful to you.

The Ordained hunter is named Wenrik, sub-rank Cantor. He is a battle-mage of the Third Choir. His specialty is rhythm-based CE projection — he attacks in patterns. Once you find the pattern, you can break it. Once you break the pattern, he loses his ability to channel at full strength. I will teach you what I can in the next two weeks.

Be well. Eat. Sleep. Stop carrying everyone.

— G.

Owen read it twice.

Then he folded the sheet carefully and tucked it inside his jacket against his chest.

---

The next morning, he started training again.

He’d been hunting and grinding credits for almost a month, but he hadn’t been training in the proper sense — not the way he had during cosmic training at Veridian Crossing, where every day was structured progression. The hunts were keeping him sharp in combat instinct, but his actual technique work had stagnated.

Yalira watched him drilling forms in the morning light on the lower level of the station, raised an eyebrow.

"What’s that about?"

"Gorvax sent me information. The next hunter’s a rhythm-based battle-mage. I need to break his patterns. Which means I need to be faster at adapting mid-fight than I have been."

"And the forms help with that?"

"The forms help with everything. They reset my fundamentals."

She watched a few more minutes. Then she stripped off her outer jacket, drew her daggers, and stepped into the open space across from him.

"Spar with me."

"Yalira, you’re not—"

"I’m not as strong as you, no. But I’m faster than you, and I read movement better than you, and I’m a smaller target with a lower CE signature. If you can break my rhythm, you can break a Cantor’s. Probably."

He thought about it.

"Okay."

She came at him fast.

---

For the next four days, Owen trained in the mornings and hunted in the afternoons.

Yalira was a vicious sparring partner. She wasn’t using lethal force, but she also wasn’t pulling her strikes in any meaningful way — she’d hit him hard enough to leave bruises if he failed to block. She moved unpredictably. She could change direction mid-strike in ways Owen’s larger frame couldn’t match. She used short, fast combinations and forced him to read her body language faster than he was used to.

By the third morning, he was starting to see it.

Not just her movement — the rhythm of her movement. Yalira fought in three-beat phrases. Strike, strike, withdraw. Strike, feint, strike. There was variation, but there was structure beneath the variation. Once Owen could feel the structure, he could anticipate the third beat. Once he could anticipate, he could counter before she finished.

On the fourth morning, he finally caught her.

She came in on a familiar combination — strike, feint, strike — and Owen moved before her second motion completed. His hand closed on her wrist mid-strike and twisted, taking her dagger out of her grip and putting her off-balance in the same motion.

She rolled clear, came up grinning.

"There it is," she said.

"There what is?"

"The thing you couldn’t do four days ago." She retrieved her dagger from where it had skidded. "You’re reading patterns now. Not reactively. Predictively."

"Was that the goal?"

"That was the goal."

---

The afternoons, they hunted.

They moved through the eastern hunting grounds in a rotating pattern, hitting smaller Lifer groups and solo prisoners who were vulnerable. Owen’s rank kept climbing. By Day 51, he was at #11. By Day 53, he was at #9. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

Some of those climbs came from direct kills. Some came from the leaderboard naturally compressing — other prisoners died to other hunters, retired into hiding, or got eliminated in inter-faction fights between the Crucible Kings and the Wraith Collective. The two big Lifer factions had been escalating their territorial disputes, and the chaos was good for credit-hungry mid-tier hunters like Owen’s group.

On Day 52, they crossed paths briefly with Korvan.

The old prisoner was alone — apparently still working solo, even after his offer to alliance with Owen’s growing group had been politely declined. He’d been moving south, away from the Lifer faction territories, hunting smaller game.

He stopped when he saw Owen, gave a slow nod.

"Dragon King."

"Korvan."

"You’re climbing well."

"Trying to."

"You took out Brask. And Vexis."

"Yeah."

"Mm." Korvan’s weathered eyes flicked over Owen’s group — Yalira, Tessa, Jorik, all watching back with various levels of caution. "You found yourself a crew."

"Sort of."

"It works for you."

"It does."

"Good." Korvan adjusted the strap of his pack. "Hunter lands in nine days. Word’s already moving on the network. Prisoners are starting to position. Those of us who don’t want to get caught in the kill zone are heading south."

"You’re going off-grid for the hunt?"

"For at least a week. Cantor hunters aren’t gentle. They sweep wide and they’re patient. Best to be far away from where the prey is concentrated." Korvan’s gaze sharpened. "You’re number nine on the leaderboard, Dragon King. That makes you concentrated prey."

"I know."

"You have a plan?"

"Working on it."

Korvan nodded slowly. "If you survive, find me when this is done. There’s something I want to talk to you about."

"What is it?"

"Not now. After the hunt." He shifted his pack again. "Stay alive, Dragon King."

"You too, Korvan."

The old prisoner walked on.

---

That night, back at the station, Owen sat with Tessa on the upper level. The fire was small, contained in a stone bowl Jorik had carved out of the floor. Yalira was on the lower level, sleeping. Jorik was on watch outside.

"What do you think Korvan wanted?" Tessa asked.

"Don’t know."

"It seemed important."

"Yeah."

She nudged a piece of dried meat across the stone toward him. "Eat."

He ate.

After a while, she said: "Owen. I want to ask you something."

"Okay."

"This crew. The four of us. Plus Vren when he comes down. Plus Gorvax, technically." She paused. "Where does this go after Prison World?"

Owen thought about it.

"I don’t know," he said finally.

"You haven’t thought about it?"

"I’ve thought about it. I just don’t have an answer. We get out — you, me, Jorik, Vren — when our sentences end. Yalira’s a Lifer, so she doesn’t get out the same way I do. Gorvax doesn’t get out at all unless I figure something else out. Different exits. Different timelines."

"And after?"

"After, I have a partner on Earth I haven’t seen in over a year. A pile of dragons I left behind. A planet I swore to protect. And a Tribunal that’s going to be watching everything I do for the rest of my life." He ran a hand through his hair. "I haven’t really had time to plan past the next hunt."

Tessa was quiet for a long moment.

"Earth," she said finally. "You actually call it that. Like the species name and the planet name are the same word."

"Yeah."

"That’s strange."

"It’s strange to me too. I’ve gotten used to all the other words for it. The Tribunal calls it Sector 4-7 Sub-Q. Korvan calls it my Cradle. Gorvax calls it... a lot of things, depending on his mood. But for me, it’s always going to be Earth."

"Mm." She watched the fire. "Do you think you’ll make it back?"

"I have to."

"That’s not the same as thinking you will."

"I know."

The fire crackled.

After a long moment, Tessa said: "I’ll help you, Owen. Whatever it takes."

He looked at her.

"I know," he said.

"I mean it."

"I know."

---

Day 53. Late evening.

Owen sat on the lower level of the station, working through the materials Gorvax had sent — sketched diagrams of Cantor combat patterns, written notes on the Third Choir’s CE structures, training drills designed to disrupt rhythmic projection. The Sower had compressed years of cosmic-warfare studies into a working manual designed for a single fight.

The Cantor’s name was Wenrik.

In seven days, he’d land.

Owen had climbed from rank 19 to rank 9. He’d added almost three million credits to his total in just over two weeks. He had a crew, a base, a recovering Sower hidden in a shielded cavern, and now he had detailed intelligence on his next hunter.

He was as ready as he was going to be.

In a few days, that would have to be enough.

Yalira appeared in the doorway, leaning against the stone with her usual easy posture.

"How’s the homework?"

"Coming along."

"Good." She crossed to sit beside him, glancing at the diagrams. "Anything I can help drill?"

"Probably. Tomorrow. Today I’m just absorbing."

"Mm." She bumped her shoulder against his. "Owen."

"Yeah?"

"Whatever Korvan wanted to tell you — it’s going to be after the hunt. Means he thinks you’ll survive."

"That’s not how I read it."

"It’s how I read it." Her amber eyes held his. "Get through this. Then go figure out what the old man wants."

Owen smiled, small and tired.

"Yeah," he said. "Okay."

Outside, the night wind moved across the dunes of Prison World.

Seven days until landing.