The dark rock bridge spanning the Great Mantle Deep gap looked like the stone-hard rib of a forgotten world titan.
Only twelve meters wide and nearly a half-mile long, the natural arch of black fiery stone stretched across a deep pit of churning, white-hot magma. One hundred and forty miles beneath the lunar surface, the heat was so intense that the airless void shone with mirages of radiant infrared light. On either side of the narrow bridge, waves of melted silver-steel rolled against the cave walls. It cast deep crimson reflections across the ceiling.
At the far end of the bridge stood the entrance to the Brood-Mother’s central nursery. A towering six-sided portal carved directly into the planetoid’s iron core mantle.
And guarding that portal was the Brood-Mother’s royal guard.
Six huge bio-titans, standing over six meters tall, were set in a three-sided finger bone across the dark rock bridge. They were Void-Carapace Reapers—horrifying amalgams of armored praying mantis and deep-sea crustacean. Their back shells were not made of ordinary living hard shell. Their shells were layered with rainbow-bright purple and silver crystals that pulsed with uneven spatial distortions. In their four main limbs, they gripped scythe-like bone blades that shook at high-pitched frequencies. That left faint, smoky trails of snapped space in their wake.
