(Fifth update-please vote and subscribe) Enemies of old, join

Me in ruling the Iron Ring

Segmentum Tempestus, Iron Ring, Taras system.

On the surface of Taras Prime, Sector C-5.

Twenty-eight Tripod Walkers marched in formation beneath a dim yellow light much like Gardinal's.

Everyone in the formation looked remarkably alike: sparse, cropped gray hair, pale skin, and dull yellow eyes.

These were the traits of their shared caste on Gardinal, the result of countless generations of genetic iteration.

But they were unlike their caste ancestors, whose bodies had been carved apart and laid in morgues.

After submitting to the Monarch, the sixth generation of walker pilots had grown up with an average projected lifespan of thirty-nine years.

Their faces brimmed with vibrant fighting spirit. They were the Monarch's new warrior nobility.

They no longer lived as their fathers had, crammed into tiny rooms in tenement blocks.

Under the Lord of Light's orders, the Gardinal system had been replanned, with clear roles assigned to its ten planets other than the primary world.

The fourth planet's development revolved around Tripod Walkers. Its few existing factories had been converted to civilian production, while newly built factories handled manufacturing and assembly.

In the new Hive Cities modeled after Paragon City, the pilots had become the new masters of the Hive Spires.

The lead pilot inspected the stream of runes appearing across his Cogitator array and shouted, "Enemy contact at ten o'clock!"

"Warhound Titans! Plasma shields!"

The Gardinal II-class Tripod Walker was 16.5 percent larger than the earlier model, which had been comparable in size to a Warhound Titan.

The extra space accommodated a replacement Heaven's Punishment-class Reactor, whose output allowed the Tripod Walker to carry the plasma shields used by Knight Mechs.

Unlike the first-generation experimental walkers built to face the Rangdan Xenocides in the High Lords' era, when pilots were treated as