Oliver was perfectly calm. His brain calculated their exact attack angles."Left flank attack at forty degrees. Right flank attack at negative thirty degrees," Oliver muttered softly to himself.Oliver dropped to one knee. He let the left monster fly completely over his head.As the monster passed over him, Oliver thrust his left hand straight up. He held his sharp titanium combat knife.The knife sliced cleanly through the soft, pale belly of the flying beast. The monster's guts spilled out, and it crashed into the wall, dead instantly. It turned into a pile of black ash.One dead. Two left.The monster on the right landed next to Oliver. It swung its massive, clawed paw, trying to rip Oliver’s head off.Oliver did not dodge. He raised his black metal left arm. He caught the giant monster’s claw with his bare metal hand.CLANG! The sharp claws scratched harmlessly against the alien steel. Oliver’s fingers locked around the monster's wrist like a vice. He squeezed.CRUNCH. The beast’

"Thirty feet! Got it, boss!" Billy yelled over the radio.On the map, Oliver watched the green dots move."General Vega," Oliver ordered. "When the Anchor locks the ceiling, you will take the civilians and run exactly one hundred yards. Then you will stop. The floor beyond one hundred yards will vanish in thirty seconds.""We are running, Commander!" Vega answered.Oliver shifted his mind to Sector Nine. "Captain Ren," Oliver said smoothly. Blood dripped onto his black armor. "Your bridge is breaking. You do not have an Anchor disc. But you have plasma rifles.""Yes, Commander! What do we do?!" Ren cried. The sound of rocks smashing echoed behind her."Look at the right wall," Oliver instructed perfectly. He read the structural integrity of the stone on his magical map. "There is a thick pillar of black rock. It is holding the weight of the ceiling. If you destroy that pillar, the ceiling will fall at an angle. It will create a ramp connecting your broken bridge to the upper ledge.""

The air in the deep underground cavern was hot and heavy. It tasted like ash and old blood.Commander Oliver walked down the broken ramp of stone. He moved with slow, perfect, robotic steps. The giant explosion he had caused by stabbing his own magical arm had destroyed the perfect clone army. But the explosion had also destroyed a part of him. He was changing.Half of Oliver’s face was now a solid mask of smooth, pitch-black alien metal. The Wraithborn magic had crawled up his neck and over his cheek. His right eye was a glowing, burning red circle of fire. His entire right arm was a heavy, dark weapon that pulsed with thick purple veins. Thump. Thump. Thump. The magic beat in time with his human heart.Behind Oliver, his three remaining human soldiers walked in silence. Sergeant Miller, Private Davis, and Private Smith. They carried their heavy blue plasma rifles. They were covered in dirt and sweat.They stared at Oliver’s back. They were terrified of him. They knew he was the onl

Slowly, heavily, the giant doors began to swing inward. CREEEEEEAK.A gust of freezing cold air blew out of the Citadel. It smelled like ancient dust and pure ozone.The squad raised their rifles, ready for an army of monsters to charge out. But no monsters charged.The doors opened completely. Oliver lowered his metal hand. He looked inside the Overlord’s castle. His cold gray eye widened slightly. His supercomputer brain froze for exactly one point five seconds."What is that?" Davis whispered in horror.The inside of the Citadel was not a dark, scary dungeon. It was not a cave filled with blood and bones. It was a perfectly clean, brightly lit room.The walls were made of smooth gray metal. Bright white fluorescent lights hung from the ceiling. There were large, neat desks arranged in perfect rows. Glowing blue computer screens covered the walls.It looked exactly like the human command center that Oliver had built on the surface of Sigma-12. It was a flawless, perfect replica of

Oliver looked at Davis and Smith. "Private Davis. Private Smith. Take the spare plasma batteries out of your backpacks," Oliver ordered.The two soldiers quickly pulled out four small, blue glowing battery packs.Oliver took the batteries with his left hand. He held them tightly. Then, he gently touched the batteries with the tip of one black metal finger.Hsssss. The blue electricity inside the batteries mixed with the dark purple magic of Oliver's finger. The batteries began to glow with a strange, bright pink light. They hummed loudly.Oliver walked to the front edge of the bridge. He placed two pink batteries on the ground, one on the left side, one on the right."These batteries are now unstable," Oliver explained. "They are constantly shooting a beam of mixed energy between them. If a Wraithborn monster walks between these two batteries, the energy will violently reject their dark magic. It will act like an invisible wall of fire. It will burn their legs off."He walked to the b