Interstellar Beast Master

Chapter 95: Vagrant Beast Masters II

Anastasia stood still, framed by the broken bones of the Hollow Stacks, her masked face betraying nothing. The red slits of her mask stared down the gathered Vagrant Beast Masters without a twitch.

The Mastiff at the woman’s side growled low, a guttural rumble that vibrated the cracked floor.

But before the others could speak...

WHIRRR.

HAO, the Hostile Arena Operator, spun its metallic body forward with jittery excitement. Its purple-tinted metallic wings fanned wide as it circled Anastasia with unfiltered admiration.

"Oh, Blood Witch," it crooned, voice gleaming with static cheer. "HAO is a huge fan of the Judge! Such artistry, such execution! To think- one shot! Five Guardians!"

It whirled a little tighter, eager.

"Blood Bitch, Blood Witch, can you introduce me? Can I shake his hand? Does he shake hands?! HAO can compute over six thousand different handshake variations!"

...!

Anastasia didn’t even blink.

She merely stared at HAO as if it were an annoying insect buzzing too close. She offered it nothing. No words. No acknowledgment.

HAO bobbed back slightly, not discouraged but chirping in mechanical amusement.

It was then that the woman with the Mastiff finally spoke.

She stepped forward, her voice cool and cut from the same alloy as the broken earth around them.

"You can call me Rebecca Kain."

The Mastiff at her side huffed once, settling but still baring its teeth.

Rebecca was tall, her body lean and sharp, dressed in armor-like cloth that barely covered her scarred skin. Wild black hair fell in loose waves over her shoulders, and she wore no armor beyond worn leather bands strapped to her forearms and calves. Her gaze was natural, unaugmented, and was sharper than steel- cold and calculating.

No cybernetics.

No enhancements.

Just a Beast Master sharpened by violence and survival.

Her voice cut across the tension like a blade.

"I was the Master of the Rustblood Circuit Arena... before the Masked Guardians destroyed the only real place these poor fools above had to call a sanctuary."

Rebecca’s eyes, unflinching, scanned Anastasia with quiet calculation.

"You come throwing the Judge’s name around like a weapon." She gestured at the others, a casual sweep. "The Vagrant Beast Masters have their own power. Their own alliances. We’re not rabid dogs waiting to be leashed. And..."

Her mouth twisted into something that might’ve been a smirk.

"There’s already a few of us curious about the Judge."

Anastasia tilted her head slightly, her crimson slits unblinking.

Rebecca’s smirk faded, her voice sharpening.

"You think you can waltz in here with threats and masks and bark at us? Tell you what."

She stepped closer, her bare feet silent against the fractured ground.

"Why don’t you come see the Vagrant Den yourself? If you’re bold enough. Walk in without your precious Judge. Let’s see if you can still talk to us like this without that name hanging over your head."

...!

Anastasia’s response was immediate.

Cold.

Simple.

"If I can actually meet some competent Beast Masters of the Hollow Stacks, I’ll be very happy."

...!

The Vagrant Beast Masters exchanged glances.

A silent consensus passed among them.

The Mastiff rumbled deep in its throat, but Rebecca raised a hand. The beast stilled immediately.

"Fine."

She turned without another word, her Mastiff following like a loyal shadow. The others shifted, forming a loose perimeter around Anastasia.

HAO floated closer, wings twitching excitedly.

"Come, come! This will be so much fun!" it chirped, spinning in place before zipping ahead.

The Vagrant Beast Masters led the way, and Anastasia followed without hesitation.

They moved deeper into the broken bowels of the Rustblood Circuit Arena, descending through tunnels so old and buried that even the neon-stained ruin above seemed modern by comparison for minutes.

Their path was long, winding.

After what felt like countless twists and turns, minutes of walking across fortified underground tunnels...

Then they reached it- a thick, rusted gate embedded into the floor of the tunnel, no wider than a maintenance hatch.

A keypad gleamed with dull light.

Rebecca knelt, tapping a hidden code into the keypad. After a moment, the hatch hissed open, a mechanical groan echoing as the ground slowly split apart.

Revealing...

A ceiling?

No.

A sky.

A sky below the Hollow Stacks.

...!

Anastasia stepped through the hatch last.

And paused.

What stretched before her was...a hidden city beneath the Hollow Stacks.

A metropolis tucked in the bowels of Ebonreach Metropolis itself.

The ceiling, impossibly high, mimicked the night sky, embedded with faint lights like stars. Towering structures of black steel and shimmering neon sprawled outward. Roads of glass and metal curved between the towers, glowing with embedded circuitry.

Floating platforms carried Vagrant Beast Masters and their beasts from place to place. Sleek, flying Interstellar Beasts wove through the air, their bodies alight with shimmering aether currents.

Holographic signs advertised black market genetics, Entropic Beast augmentations, cybernetic weaponry.

It was a haven hidden from the broken world above.

A city not ruled by corporations or Enforcers.

The neon bathed everything in deep purples, blues, and violent reds.

Here, humanity’s desperation had given birth to its own kind of brutal, raw beauty.

This was their haven.

The Vagrant Den.

The true city beneath the Hollow Stacks.

Rebecca Kain gestured, her bare hand tracing a loose arc in the air.

"Welcome," she said.

"To Solace Verge."

...!

Anastasia stood in silence, drinking it all in.

It was cleaner, sharper, more alive than anything above. It was a dream clawed into existence with blood and teeth.

Rebecca’s dark eyes gleamed as she continued walking, the Mastiff by her side.

"This is where the real Hollow Stacks live. Not the broken shells the Enforcers burn and the corporations forget."

Anastasia’s fingers twitched at her side. A city below the Hollow Stacks...that she never heard of all her life? It was kept that much a secret?

HAO zipped by, wings whirring.

"Welcome, welcome! HAO welcomes the Blood Witch to Solace Verge!" it sang.

The neon lights reflected crimson on her mask as Anastasia followed them deeper into the underground city.

Anastasia walked slowly, her bootfalls muted against the immaculate metal beneath her.

Her mask reflected the neon light.

Solace Verge unfolded before her like a secret the world above had forgotten how to dream.

The first thing she noticed was the buildings. Not the leaning, rust-eaten carcasses of the Hollow Stacks, but real structures- solid and deliberate. Their exteriors gleamed with dark glass and reinforced alloy, humming softly with embedded energy lines. Some reached up in towering arcs toward the cavernous ceiling, their tops lost in the false starlight overhead.

It was closer to Skyglass Heights than anything she’d ever seen below the surface.

Steel, glass, and ceramic alloys. No exposed rebar. No cracking concrete. Here, the buildings stood proud, self-contained fortresses of civilization clawed out of the stone.

Wide streets spread between the towers, paved with a black synthetic polymer that drank the neon glow and made it dance at the edges. No potholes. No decay.

Clear roads.

Clean.

Above them, floating bridges connected one monolithic building to the next, thin and delicate-looking but supported by sophisticated graviton stabilizers, the same kind that only the wealthiest districts above enjoyed.

And the people...

Anastasia’s gaze swept the moving crowds.

These weren’t the starved and broken remnants she’d seen in the Hollow Stacks.

Here, humans walked tall, many with gleaming cybernetic augmentations- but not the crude, rusted replacements scavenged from black markets. These were polished, refined.

Sleek platinum arms integrated seamlessly into flesh. Chrome legs with smooth, organic articulation. Dermal overlays etched with light-responsive circuitry that shimmered in the neon haze.

Their faces, though, still bore the hard, unforgiving edge of survival, but it was survival with dignity.

Initiate Beast Masters moved among them openly, no longer forced into hiding.

Small, sleek Interstellar Beasts padded beside their bonded Masters- felines with obsidian fur laced in golden aether veins, hawk-like creatures with feathers of shifting color.

And above?

The cavernous underground sky wasn’t empty.

Flying beasts, natural and bonded, glided effortlessly. Long serpentine bodies traced arcs across the air, wings slicing through the darkness, scales catching the artificial starlight.

Neon signs glowed bright and sharp on the sides of buildings: advertisements for gene mods, beast enhancements, combat arenas, and even information brokers. Their flickering images offered silent promises to the desperate and the ambitious.

No Enforcers here.

No Guardians.

Just the unspoken law of the Vagrant Den.

Solace Verge lived because it had to.

It was raw city built by those the world above had discarded, evolved into something stronger.

And yet, even with its shining veneer of success, tension hung in the air like static before a storm.

Clusters of people gathered at street corners, speaking in urgent, low tones. Glowing holoscreens displayed footage and commentary about the chaos above- the massacre of Guardians and Stackborn in the Hollow Stacks.

The death of Guardian Dawn and Guardian Theresa.

The killing of other masked Guardians.

The Judge.

Anastasia caught snatches of conversation as she walked from above, her enhanced hearing sharpening each whisper.

"...Five Guardians dead..."

"...Skyglass Heights declared Martial Law topside..."

"...Whoever killed them moved like a ghost. Some say he’s Stackborn..."

The citizens of Solace Verge weren’t panicking.

But they were aware.

They were watching.

Calculating.

Anastasia took it all in, her stride slow but confident, her mask betraying none of her thoughts.

This place...actually caused her to be fucking furious.

There was already Skyglass Heights far above the Hollow Stacks, and now it turned out there was an underground Haven that was the Solace Verge below it.

Sandwiched in the middle, Hollow Stacks burned while top and bottom thrived!

"..."

Her rising anger could not be measured, but it was contained.

Rebecca Kain walked ahead of her without turning, the Mastiff at her side padding silently.

HAO zipped along, chattering nonsense and excitement in equal measure.

"Isn’t it glorious?" it squealed. "Home sweet home, Blood Witch! Underground skies and flying dreams! And now- now the Judge will know we exist!"

Anastasia didn’t reply.

But her mask gleamed as she lifted her gaze to the sky of false stars and floating beasts.

Solace Verge was no hollow ruin. And she would see what power it held...and whether it could help her and Damian to kill their enemy!