The laboratory lay in gloom. Cold fluorescent lights flickered overhead, their pallid glow reflecting off the metallic floor. The air was thick with disinfectant and machine oil, heavy enough to make each breath feel labored.

  “Chen… it’s been a long time.”

  Lian’s voice slithered through the cavernous space, low and deliberate.

  Chen flinched. His hands clenched before he could stop them, pupils tightening as fury rose sharp and fast in his chest.“That’s impossible.”

  A soft laugh answered him. Lian stepped into the light.

  The flesh-wings on his back twitched, then slowly unfurled. They were misshapen and ruined, warped into something diseased and obscene.

  “Correct,” Lian said pleasantly. “My body did not survive the transient. However, Human technology brought me back.” His smile thinned. “Imperfect, perhaps. But sufficient.”

  Chen stared at him. The shock ebbed, replaced by a cold, cutting clarity.“So. A failed copy.”

  Lian’s smile stretched, straining into something unstable.“Copy or continuation makes little difference. But tell me, Chen. Do you know what occupied my thoughts all this time?”

  Chen remained silent. His fingers trembled, his body held tight, coiled for violence.

  Lian moved closer, voice dropping, savoring every word.“I remember the way your predecessor broke. How he begged me to end it.”

  He clicked his tongue, amused.“Nostalgic.”

  “Shut up.”

  The word tore out of Chen’s throat. Gold vanished from his eyes as darkness surged in its place. He lunged.

  Silver claws flashed toward Lian’s throat.

  Lian twisted aside just in time, nails slashing toward Chen’s chest. Chen’s wings snapped open, air erupting beneath him as he vaulted upward. He flipped midair and came down hard, his tail whipping toward Lian’s side.

  The impact sent Lian crashing into the wall. Metal screamed as fractures spread outward.

  Lian rose slowly from the wreckage, blood staining his mouth, his expression alight with feverish delight.“Yes. That’s it, Chen. This is who you really are. Untamed. Feral.” His gaze burned. “This is the version of you I loved most.”

  Chen shook. His fists clenched until his nails cut skin. A growl crawled up from his chest, raw and unrestrained. Memory surged with it, pain and hatred tearing through what little control remained.

  “I’m going to kill you,” he said, voice hoarse with promise.

  Lian spread his arms.“Then come. Show me what the reigning Star Emperor is worth. Or kneel again. Beg me, like before.”

  Gold flared.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Chen vanished.

  He struck again and again, movement tearing the air apart. Lian barely kept up, each block slower, each defense heavier. The laboratory walls buckled under the force of their collision. Lian was thrown across the room, blood spilling freely, yet his grin only widened.

  “Yes!” he laughed, breath hitching. “You’re no different from me. Just another copy. Or will you fall again, Chen? Begging for mercy?”

  “Enough.”

  The roar ripped through the chamber. Chen’s eyes blazed, brighter than the lights above. A psychic shockwave burst outward.

  Instruments shattered. Monitors imploded. Reinforced glass disintegrated into a storm of fragments.

  Lian slammed into the floor. Still, his gaze mocked.“Is that all? You think this is enough to kill me?”

  Chen lowered his head. Something guttural vibrated in his throat. He advanced slowly, each step heavy with intent. His black robes billowed around him like a funeral shroud, his golden braid lifting, poised like a blade.

  The sound that escaped him was no longer human.

  He raised his hand. Silver claws gleamed.

  Lian did not look away. His eyes locked onto Chen’s, transfixed.

  The claws fell.

  Blood filled the air.

  Yan Qing had always known.

  Chen was not human.

  The fear of the Other had lived quietly in Yan Qing’s heart for a long time. Chen’s rare, almost unreal beauty and his carefully cultivated moments of awkwardness had dulled it, softened the instinctive terror into something manageable.

  Approachable. Harmless.

  Yan Qing had never truly believed it.

  Those moments of self-sabotage were deliberate. A disguise meant to blunt human fear. Beneath the polish lay something colder, something that never quite vanished.

  Still, seeing Chen like this shook him to the core.

  The gentle blond man stood drenched in blood, licking crimson from his fingertips. At his feet lay what remained of a humanoid body, flesh torn away to bare white bone amid dark pools on the floor.

  “Mangled” felt insufficient.

  “…Figures,” Aiden whispered, voice unsteady. “An alien’s still an alien.”

  Chen turned.

  His gaze settled on the five newcomers, empty and devoid of warmth.

  Even Xiao felt the chill.

  “Don’t make a sound,” Xiao said calmly, though tension threaded every word. “Face him. Back away slowly. Once we hit the corridor, run.”

  Chen rose to his feet.

  “What about you?” Sam asked.

  Xiao lifted a small cylindrical injector. “I just need to get this into the back of his neck.” His bracer unfolded into an anion rifle. “Go.”

  He charged.

  Chen sidestepped with inhuman speed and appeared before Xiao in the next instant. His hand closed around Xiao’s throat and drove him into the floor.

  The stray anion round detonated behind them. Concrete cracked beneath Xiao’s body as pain tore through him.

  “Run,” Xiao gasped, golden blood spilling from his mouth. He drove the rifle toward Chen’s neck.

  Chen flung him aside.

  He crouched, teeth bared, blood slicking his torn body. Xiao forced himself upright, breathing ragged. Facing a Star Emperor meant more than politics. It meant confronting an ancient bloodline made flesh.

  When Chen lunged again, Xiao roared,“Run!”

  They bolted.

  “My god,” Aiden panted. “Our training is nothing compared to this.”

  “Shut up,” Lanice and Sam snapped.

  Aiden faltered.“Wait. Where’s Yan Qing?”

  They clashed again in the specimen chamber. Xiao dodged another strike and took to the air. Chen’s wings were damaged. It was Xiao’s only advantage.

  The injector was gone.

  Chen watched from below, eyes tracking every movement. Impatience crept into his motions. Blood ran freely, but his ferocity only intensified.

  Neither noticed the third presence.

  Yan Qing crouched behind a shattered tank, shaking.

  This was wrong.

  Chen should not be like this.

  Something brushed Yan Qing’s leg. He looked down.

  The injector.

  Xiao coughed violently, struggling upright. Then he saw it.

  That human was still here.

  Chen followed his gaze.

  He saw Yan Qing.

  Interest flickered.

  Xiao lunged.

  Too slow.

  Chen caught him midair and hurled him aside.

  “Yan Qing, run,” Xiao shouted. “You can’t fight him.”

  Yan Qing did not move.

  He looked at Chen, at the familiar stranger approaching him. Fear screamed at him to flee.

  But concern cut deeper.

  “I’m sorry,” Yan Qing said quietly. “I didn’t know you’d become like this because of me.”

  The injector was clenched in his hand.

  He was only human.

  The needle pierced flesh.

  “NO!”