The augmented thrall’s face was pinned to the floor by Angron.
The red light flickered.
The floor cracked, and the nearby metal racks rattled.
The body was still thrashing.
Fingernails dug into Angron’s arms, tearing open several bloody gashes.
The neural needles trailing from the thrall’s back whipped wildly across the floor, spitting sparks that left a trail of scorch marks on Angron’s legs.
Angron did not let go.
Those blood-red eyes, pressed against the floor, were still weeping.
The sounds tearing from his throat were like a wild beast’s, yet also like the final gasps of a human choked by raw pain.
More clasps popped open.
*Click.* *Click.
Click.* The entire underground hall woke up.
One by one, the people on the metal racks broke free of their restraints.
Their bodies slammed to the floor, limbs pushing them up in contorted postures.
The crude devices on the backs of their heads glowed red, cables trailing behind them like tails yanked straight out of their brains.
They could not see that the doctor was dead.
Nor could they see that Angron had just breached the manor.
They only received the final command.
Kill all intruders.
The first wave of augmented thralls lunged forward.
Angron grabbed the augmented thrall at his feet and swung him horizontally.
Three bodies were swept aside, smashing through two rows of metal racks.
He let go and took a step forward.
The ground sank under his weight.
An augmented thrall lunged from the left, sinking his teeth into Angron’s shoulder.
Several teeth shattered, but he refused to let go.
Another wrapped his arms around Angron’s waist, his occipital device flashing frantically as his fingers clawed into the seam-like old wounds beneath Angron’s ribs.
Angron drove his elbow down.
*Crack.* The thrall hugging his waist was smashed into the floor.
He grabbed the one biting his shoulder by the nape, ripped him off, and hurled him into a corner.
He held back his strength.
If he could avoid crushing their skulls, he did.
This slowed the battle by a fraction of a heartbeat.
Taking advantage of this split-second window, a third augmented thrall crashed into his knees.
Metal plates on the thrall’s back popped open, and several bone spurs, sharp as short spears, impaled Angron’s calves.
Angron looked down.
Pain surged.
The residual fragments of the Butcher’s Nails in his occipital lobe throbbed in tandem, stretching the spark of pain along his nerves.
The green light in his eyes deepened.
Enough.
He could hold back, but he could not afford to drag this out.
There was still the manor above.
Outside, there were the districts just liberated by the relay tower.
And the Bloody Sand Arena could not rely on Oenomaus to hold the line forever.
He had not come here to waste time with these broken, tortured souls.
Angron grabbed the bone spurs embedded in his leg and ripped them out along with the thrall, hurling the entire mass into the center of the hall.
Boom!
The floor collapsed into a crater.
The surrounding augmented thralls were jarred into a brief halt by the shockwave.
Angron used this split second to scan the backs of their heads.
Every single device was flashing.
But at different intensities.
Some pulsed rapidly in red, others faintly.
One of the thralls was the largest.
This one was sewn with far more metal plates, and a fist-sized receiver was driven into the back of his neck, sending out pulses of red light like a beating heart.
With each pulse, the movements of the other augmented thralls grew faster.
Angron locked his eyes on it.
Every machine had a source.
Directives did not materialize from thin air.
In his past life, he hadn’t understood military neural control, but he understood basic logic.
To control a swarm of things, there was always a host, a relay, a node that broadcasted the signals.
Find the brightest one.
And smash it.
Angron lunged toward the massive augmented thrall.
The surrounding thralls pounced in unison, as if pulled by a single thread.
A hand grabbed his wrist.
He snapped it with a twist.
A mouth clamped down toward his neck.
He slammed his forehead forward, shattering the attacker’s nasal bone without crushing his skull.
Two thralls scrambled up his back, driving neural needles into the open wounds on his spine.
Electricity surged.
Angron’s footsteps faltered.
It felt as if a red-hot saw was rasping through his brain.
The sensation was all too familiar.
The operating table.
The restraint frame.
The nails drilling into his skull.
A volcanic rage erupted within him.
He almost crushed the two bodies on his back to pulp.
But his raised hands froze halfway.
It was not them biting him.
It was the devices.
Angron turned and slammed his back against the wall.
Boom!
The two thralls on his back were knocked loose as the stone wall buckled under the impact.
He did not follow up with a strike.
Instead, he spun back and resumed his charge toward the largest thrall.
The giant opened his mouth.
The stitches tore open, and a piercing electronic screech wailed from his throat.
Every single augmented thrall went berserk.
Angron crashed right into them.
A chaotic mess of flesh and metal was thrown aside.
His shoulder plowed through the first, his fist caved in the chest of the second, and his knee launched the third.
In the underground hall, red lights flashed wildly as metal racks fell like dominoes.
The giant thrall lunged before him, locking its arms around his shoulders like pincers.
Its strength was immense.
Far greater than the others.
The receiver at the back of its head shone blindingly bright.
Angron let it hold him.
Then, he reached his hands behind its neck.
The device instantly blared an alarm.
The giant thrall began to thrash madly, its teeth sinking into Angron’s chest and tearing away a chunk of flesh.
Angron did not make a sound.
He drove his fingers beneath the receiver’s base.
The sharp metal edges sliced into the webbing of his fingers.
He ripped outward.
On his first pull, the receiver only budged slightly.
The movements of the other thralls in the hall became even more frenzied.
A second yank.
The receiver cracked.
Red light flared violently.
A third pull.
The entire receiver, along with chunks of flesh and cabling, was torn completely out of the back of the neck by Angron.
The piercing screech cut off instantly.
The giant thrall went rigid, then slumped to the floor.
The surrounding thralls collapsed as if their strings had been cut.
Over a dozen bodies collapsed to the ground simultaneously.
Some clutched their heads, twitching on the floor.
Others stared blankly, letting out hollow, broken wheezes.
Yet a few still pulsed with red light.
Those devices had already burned too deep into their brains, continuing to execute the final command even after losing the relay.
They dragged themselves up once more.
Angron spared them a glance.
This time, he did not hold back.
As the first lunged, he punched straight through its occipital device, driving both metal and skull down into its chest cavity.
The second leaped, only to be caught by the waist and slammed down hard enough to break its spine.
He pinned the third by the crown of its head, driving his thumb into the seam of the metal device to crush its control core.
The body shuddered once and finally went still.
The hall gradually fell quiet.
The surviving augmented thralls lay on the floor.
Some were twitching.
Others whimpered softly from their throats.
Angron stood in the crimson light, his chest heaving.
He was covered in claw marks, bite wounds, and scorch burns from the neural needles.
His wounds were already healing.
The pain did not vanish.
He looked down at the receiver in his hand.
The crest of House Talq was engraved on its casing.
Next to it was a string of experimental serial numbers.
Angron walked over to the console.
The doctor’s corpse was still wedged beneath it.
The screen remained active.
An experimental log scrolled across it.
[House Talq Proprietary Project] [Defense Unit Experimental Batch: 37] [Scheduled Delivery Site: Bloody Sand Arena Perimeter Testing Center] [Purpose: Riot Suppression, Arena Reboot, Thrall Re-education] Angron scrolled down further.
A new deployment order popped up.
[House Private Force Assembled] [Objective: Reclaim Bloody Sand Arena] [Route: Backdoor Maintenance Shaft, Old Underground Beast Pen Passageways, Abandoned Sewage Pipelines] The countdown timer had already begun.
Angron gripped the edge of the console.
The metal slowly deformed under his grasp.
The Bloody Sand Arena.
Oenomaus was still there.
The wounded, the newly liberated slaves, the command deck, the armory—everything was there.
The High Riders had no intention of reclaiming the manor first.
They were going to flank them from behind.
Just as Angron turned to leave, the communicator on the wall crackled to life.
*Kzzzt—* The distorted voice of a tech-slave rasped through the static.
The signal was terrible.
The background was filled with the din of gunfire and sirens.
“Angron!” “The back gate of the Bloody Sand Arena is under attack!” “They’re coming in from underground!” Angron looked up.
The crimson light of the underground hall reflected off his face.
He did not answer.
Instead, he smashed the console with a single fist.
Sparks showered down as the crest of House Talq shattered in two on the screen.
He turned and walked toward the exit.
Behind him, the surviving augmented thralls continued to twitch and whimper.
Angron paused for a brief moment.
He did not look back.
“Those of you who can live…
hold on.” The metal stairs groaned under his heavy footsteps.
From above came the chaotic din of battle from the courtyard.
And further away, in the direction of the Bloody Sand Arena, the thunder of artillery began to roll.