Sector Four of the Raven mines was infamously known as the "Open Graveyard." Here, where the humidity strangled one's lungs and the "Corrupt Ether" gases slowly dissolved internal organs, slaves didn't die quickly; they underwent a slow, agonizing biological disintegration. This was the precise location Ether chose for his foundation. Ether—his rank effectively reset to (Early Rank 1)—walked with an eerie, rhythmic calmness through the pitch-black cavern tunnels. The gazes of the slaves no longer held the simple fear of an "Overseer"; they held a bewildered questioning of this entity who appeared physically frail yet radiated a bone-chilling surgical coldness.
"Kai, gather the 'Specimens' I tagged in Side Cave No. 9," Ether commanded, unzipping his leather tool roll containing rusted scalpels and chemical reagents extracted from the Rust Phantom. "Remember, we do not want the strong. The strong still possess hope, and hope is an unstable chemical impurity that rots absolute loyalty. I want those who have nothing left but hatred and the primal desire to breathe for just one more day."
An hour later, seven men and women lay sprawled across the jagged stone floor. One had lost both arms in a stone crusher; another had eyes melted into scarred pits by mine acid; the rest suffered from "Energy Necrosis," leaving their flesh looking like charred, brittle wood. They represented the absolute nadir of human existence.
Ether stepped toward the armless man and, in a lightning-fast motion, drove his finger into a central acupoint on the man's chest. The man screamed, but Ether didn't so much as blink. "Silence," Ether said in a parched, clinical tone. "I am not offering you healing; healing is a delusion for the weak. I am offering you 'Reconstruction.' I will turn your disability into a weapon and your agony into an engine. The price is that your soul and body become the private property of my laboratory."
Ether initiated (Spectral Anatomy). Assisted by the "Decay Accelerator" fluid and the Rust Phantom's essence, he began performing live spiritual surgeries before the horrified onlookers. He used no anesthetic; he required their nerves to be in a state of maximum hyper-arousal to successfully fuse the phantoms. He implanted shards of "Rust Ore" into the nerve endings of the armless man's stumps, then forcefully merged the "Decay" energy with his shattered spiritual pathways.
Slowly, a viscous black substance oozed from the man's wounds, hardening into spectral prosthetic limbs that resembled the chitinous legs of a giant insect. They were neither flesh nor metal; they were "Condensed Energy of Hatred and Rust."
"This is (Abomination Protocol - Type I)," Ether whispered, moving to the next victim. "You no longer lack arms; you possess 'Demolition Tools' that feed on enemy energy and rust it upon contact. You are not a cultivator... you are a parasite within the body of this world."
By dawn, Cave No. 9 housed seven beings that could no longer be classified as human. Their eyes glowed with a faint, sickly green light, and their bodies were covered in pulsing black scars. Ether had hardwired their nervous systems into the (Central Spectral Reactor) he had begun constructing in the heart of the sector. This reactor didn't run on crystals; it ran on the "Spiritual Resonance" of these abominations. The more they suffered, and the more they worked, the more energy Ether secretly siphoned.
Kai stood by, watching the scene in sheer awe. "Ether... you aren't building an army. You are building a single, massive 'Organism' where these slaves are the limbs, and you are the brain."
Ether smiled, wiping the blood from his hands with a filthy rag. "Exactly, Kai. Miral watches me as a weak individual, but she doesn't realize I've begun spreading my 'Nerves' into every corner of this mine. These seven will return to work as ordinary slaves, but they will function as my 'Sensors.' They will gather intelligence, and they will slowly leak 'Rust Poison' into the Raven family's energy depots."
Suddenly, the cavern walls vibrated. The distant blare of a brass horn announced a "Surprise Inspection Convoy." It wasn't Miral this time; it was "Count Raven Junior," Miral's younger brother, notorious for his cruelty and sadistic "testing" of slaves.
"Kai, activate 'Falsehood Protocol' immediately," Ether said coldly as his body began its artificial trembling once more. "Send the abominations back to their posts. Let Count Raven see how weakness can be a blade that cuts throats without ever being seen."
Ether glanced at the reactor hidden behind a hallucinatory wall. It pulsed slowly, collecting a "Rust Tax" from every mining operation in the sector. Power was returning to him, but it wasn't the power of a conventional cultivator; it was the power of an "Engineer" holding the keys to total systemic collapse.
"Phase One is complete," Ether thought as he walked out to meet the convoy, his back hunched in feigned subservience. "The 'Silent Contagion' phase has begun."