The first clash near Glasswake did not last long, but it told Aurelian a great deal.
The glass-pale beasts were fast, quiet, and far more difficult to track than their size suggested.
They did not attack like Voidshade Fenrir, which tended to move in hungry packs with brutal directness.
These creatures curled through the crystal debris as if the field belonged to them, bending light around their bodies and slipping between broken rocks in ways that made targeting systems hesitate.
If not for Lysara’s sensors and Eirenne’s constant correction, the first wave might have reached the unfinished outpost before anyone understood how many there were.
Rhoswen held the line well.
That mattered more than the number of creatures she killed.
The Crimson Bulwark stayed close to the marker boundary, striking only when the beasts crossed into the protected zone and forcing them away from the construction drones without chasing them into the deeper belt.
Several times, Aurelian saw her engines flare as if she wanted to push forward, but each time she corrected herself and stayed where she was supposed to be.
Astra noticed too.
"She is improving," Astra said from beside him.
"She is," Aurelian agreed.
On the tactical display, Rhoswen smashed another beast away from the shield spine, then let Solenne’s drones finish it with concentrated beam fire.
The creature split apart in a spray of glittering fragments that drifted across the debris field like broken glass.
Rhoswen’s voice came through the channel a moment later.
"I am being very controlled."
"You are," Aurelian said.
"I would like that noted."
"It has been noted."
Astra added, "Do not ruin the note."
Rhoswen went quiet for exactly two seconds.
Then she said, "Understood."
The remaining beasts did not keep attacking blindly. After losing five of their number, the pack began circling the outpost at a greater distance, moving through the reflective dust and testing the defensive range.
That made them more dangerous in some ways. They were not mindless animals rushing toward heat. They learned quickly enough to know where the pain began.
Lysara adjusted her scans.
"They are responding to shield harmonics," she said. "Not simply power output. The outpost spine may resemble something they hunt or something they consider a rival."
Meridian sounded unhappy. "My shield spine is not flirting with space beasts."
Rhoswen laughed once before catching herself. "Sorry."
Aurelian ignored that and focused on the map. "Can we change the harmonic profile?"
Meridian answered after a short pause. "Yes. It may make the shield less efficient for a few hours, but it should reduce their interest."
"Do it."
The shift worked almost immediately. The beasts kept circling for a while, but the pressure faded.
One of them made a final pass toward the construction site and was driven back by Solenne’s drones.
After that, the pack withdrew into the inner debris belt, their bodies vanishing one by one among the glittering stones.
The first battle of Glasswake ended with no losses beyond two survey drones, one damaged construction arm, and a large amount of irritation from Meridian.
For a frontier outpost inside Mournveil, that was acceptable.
Barely.
Aurelian ordered the wreckage of the beasts collected by remote drones. Their crystalline spines contained unusual energy-conducting structures, and the tissue around their cores held faint traces of sources.
It was not as rich as the Voidshade Fenrir hunt, but it was still useful, especially because the creatures seemed common enough that controlled hunting could provide regular materials.
Neris became much more interested after hearing that.
"Can we store them safely?" Aurelian asked.
"Yes," Neris replied. "But separate from food, people, ammunition, and anything Meridian likes."
Meridian’s voice entered immediately. "Why was I included?"
"Because you dislike strange things leaking on your tools."
"That is not a flaw."
"It is still true."
Aurelian let them continue for a moment, mostly because the argument made the command channel feel normal again after the fight.
By the end of the first day, the Glasswake outpost had a working shield bubble, a small command module, two docking clamps, and enough repair capacity to handle light damage. It was still far from a real station, but it existed. That alone changed the map.
Eirenne marked it under a temporary name.
Glasswake Forward Site One.
Rhoswen immediately objected.
"That is a terrible name."
"It is descriptive," Eirenne said.
"It sounds like a storage box."
Meridian replied, "It currently has the soul of a storage box."
Aurelian looked at the display. "We’ll rename it after it survives a week."
Rhoswen seemed satisfied by that. "Reasonable."
Astra glanced at him. "That was generous."
"It gives everyone something to argue about later."
"That is not always useful."
"With this fleet, it keeps them busy."
The next morning, the exploration groups began moving beyond the outpost.
Aurelian did not take the entire fleet deeper at once. That would have defeated the purpose of establishing Glasswake as a staging point.
Instead, he divided the expedition into smaller groups. Solenne sent scouting drones along the outer belts.
Lysara took a survey line toward the reflective storm region, accompanied by two escorts.
Meridian stayed near the outpost to finish stabilizing the platform. Rhoswen was assigned to Aurelian’s hunting group, which would test the nearby space-beast routes without crossing into the Ashring Drift.
Rhoswen accepted the assignment with the expression of someone trying not to celebrate too openly.
Astra remained with Aurelian aboard the Black Crown.
That was non-negotiable.
The fleet moved slowly through Glasswake’s inner approach, where crystal dust drifted in wide ribbons between asteroid fragments.
The light from the system’s pale star scattered across everything, making distance difficult to judge.
Sometimes a rock looked close enough to touch, only to turn out to be thousands of kilometers away.
Other times, sensor shadows appeared empty until a piece of debris slid out of the glare and forced the smaller escorts to adjust course.
Mournveil was teaching them already.
Not with words.
With inconvenience.
Eirenne expanded the scan range carefully. "I am detecting more life signs ahead. Not the same as the glass-pale creatures. Larger bodies, slower movement, clustered near a warm dust current."
Rhoswen’s voice sharpened. "How many?"