[The Expansion Series 01] • Absence of Blade

**This isn’t about victory. This is about survival.**

Mose Attarish isn’t used to making mistakes. As an intelligence agent on the contested world Olios 3, he gathers the intel to direct the Osk’s operatives into every chink in the Terran forces’ armor. Through sabotage, espionage, and assassinations, the Osk have held their own in the war for Olios 3 – barely. Every failed mission brings the war’s end nearer, and when faulty intel nearly kills one of his operatives, Mose takes it hard.

Gau Shesharrim doesn’t blame Mose for what happened. Bad intel is one of the risks of the job, and it’s a job Gau wouldn’t trade for any other. But his latest brush with death has made even this seasoned assassin consider the merits of early retirement. Too bad the top brass don’t care what Gau wants.

Shomoro Lacharoksa follows a mission apart from the rest of the colony. In a lonely base, she researches the technologies that give the Terrans their invisible edge, hoping to bolster the Osk’s foundering campaign.

It might not be enough. The Terrans are doing research of their own, and no one—not even the Terrans themselves—is prepared for what they will unleash.