The holographic countdown, stark and unforgiving, burned into Zardinu’s vision. `[Sovereign Protocol Initiated. Countdown: 364 days]`. He stood beneath Telip, a speck under a ridge of reanimated bone. The trench floor shuddered under the tread of the ancient drake. Its empty eye sockets, blazing with that pale, cold light, stared not at Zardinu, but into the endless void above, a silent sentinel. Zardinu’s breath plumed in the frigid air of the abyss. Panic scraped at his throat. Three hundred sixty-four days remained to conquer his first Zone or face the terminal penalty. Not just death, but his very soul consumed, his potential legion unleashed as a world-ending scourge. *“A fine creature, is it not?”* Hattusili’s voice, a dry whisper from the depths of Zardinu’s mind, broke the silence. *“Telip of the Arcanum Draconis. A potent first step.”* Zardinu snarled, the sound echoing strangely in the vast space. “Potent? I have a countdown burning my retinas and an edict threatening to dissolve my soul! What good is a drake if I rot in a year?” *“Short-sightedness. The edict punishes failure, but your true obstacle is lack of territory,”* Hattusili said, detached. *“A true ruler over death creates rather than merely conjures. These ranks obey your will as tools of engineering.”* “Creation? From what? Bones and dust?” Zardinu scoffed, though a sliver of curiosity pricked through his dread. *“Precisely. You hold the power to reshape the very earth with the remnants of the fallen. To raise not just an army, but a domain. A fortress, a stronghold, a kingdom of carrion. This chasm, this graveyard, is your quarry, your foundation.”* Zardinu looked around the immense chasm, now dimly lit by stray shafts of light from the shattered city above and the pale glow of Telip’s eyes. Countless bones lay scattered, half-buried in the rubble – the remains of forgotten creatures, perhaps even early Crucible casualties. A new sensation bloomed in his chest: not just terror, but a flicker of the old ambition, the desire to build, to dominate. This was a challenge, a desperate one, but a challenge nonetheless. He focused, channeling the dark energy that now thrummed in his core. He extended a hand towards a cluster of gnarled, massive ribs half-buried in the chasm floor, close to where he stood. A pale, necrotic aura pulsed from his palm. `[Target Acquired: Undulating Rib-Spine (Grade C)]` `[Architectural Blueprint Available: Ossuary Wall Segment (Tier 1)]` A holographic schematic flickered before him: an interlocking barricade assembled from fitted bone. It pulsed with a faint green highlight, indicating the available material. Zardinu felt an instinctive understanding, a surge of knowledge that had not been there moments before. “Telip,” Zardinu said. “Unearth those ribs. Stack a defensive barrier, starting here.” He traced an arc across the floor. The colossal drake shifted. Its massive head lowered, its snout nudging the designated area. With surprising dexterity for its immense size, a clawed forelimb, each bone talon longer than Zardinu’s body, began to scrape away debris. The ground shuddered. Smaller, forgotten skeletons, disturbed from their long slumber, began to rise, their empty eye sockets turning towards Zardinu. `[Minor Skeletons (x12) – Loyal. Awaiting Orders.]` “You twelve,” Zardinu directed, pointing toward the cleft. “Assist the drake. Strip the silt, scavenge every scrap of marrow, and pile them there.” The minor skeletons, their movements jerky and uncoordinated at first, began to obey. Their bony hands scrabbled at the earth, uncovering femurs, vertebrae, and fractured skulls, adding them to the growing pile. Telip, with a mighty crunch, extracted the first of the massive ribs, carefully positioning it as per the blueprint Zardinu projected. The assembly ran slow and crude, yet the spine locked tight into bedrock. Zardinu watched the masonry take root. --- Far above, behind Alaca Bastion’s ramparts, Shilan stood rigid before the holographic display in the command bunker. Silt from the Undercity streaked her uniform. “...and then the ground tore open,” Shilan reported, staring straight ahead. “A fissure swallowed the sector. An ossified drake, a hundred meters from snout to tail, climbed from the depths. Zardinu directed it from below.” Legate Kastor leaned over the table, skin scarred and gray. Beside him, High Arbiter Tychon folded his arms in polished white plate. “An ossified monstrosity, Shilan? The interface recorded nothing beyond a localized seismic tremor in Sector 7. No high-grade threat signatures appeared.” “It was not wild fauna,” Shilan said, holding her stance. “Zardinu directed it. The energy spiked directly from his coordinates before the sensor network blacked out.” Tychon gave a sharp, humorless chuckle. “Are you implying the network failed? That our scanners missed a titan while an exile manifested an unrecorded vocation? The tremor was a common tectonic fault. Zardinu tumbled into the dark, crushed or devoured by scavengers.” “But I saw–” “You saw smoke and collapsing stone,” Kastor countered evenly. “Our telemetry is definitive. Your claims of an unclassified summon are filed as sensory misattribution under combat fatigue.” Observation error. Yet she had watched the marrow knit and heard the beast shriek into the dark. It defied every doctrine taught since integration. “Your orders remain active,” Tychon stated coldly. “Track Zardinu. Recover his corpse for scrap analysis. We do not tolerate wild rumors destabilizing the ranks. Squad reinforcements will meet you at the breach.” Shilan snapped a salute, fingers brushing her collar. “Understood, Legate. Arbiter.” Tychon’s voice cut through the doorway. “Do not let a botched pursuit distort your record, Enforcer.” Shilan stepped out into the corridor. The core protocols claimed total infallibility. But what if the machinery had simply failed to see? Down in the dark, the bleached bulwark climbed five spans into the dust. Guiding the small labor gang, Zardinu locked an ox-sized pelvis into the gateway arch. His spine thrummed with raw mana. Let the Bastion hunt him down here; he would turn this tomb into an unassailable bastion of marrow and iron teeth. Above the rising battlements, gold runes flared in the murk: `[Quest Alert: Establish First Domain – Build a functioning Osseous Stronghold (0/1)]` `[Reward: Unlock Ashen General Summoning Protocol]`

A Kingdom of Carrion