Causing Phriktion

The thin air of the mountain tops was harder to breathe than Adonis had expected. His beskar'gam's life-support systems usually handled conditions like this, but today he'd left the armor behind in favor of attire that would better appeal to the audience he had requested. He was here to further the Mandalorian Empire's reach, yes, but also for personal reasons. This was a reckoning.

It was his first time back on the savannas of Vaal since reclaiming his family's- no, his- armor from the Angelis Estate. These mountains were far from where he'd grown up. His name carried weight at home, but out here it meant less. That would change. He would carve the name Angelis into the memory of every Vaalian, present and future. The Mandalorians had given him the strength to see that destiny clearly.

Part of that destiny was making a name for himself- and for Vaal. The planet had been battered by decades of shifting alliances, never able to find its own footing. Adonis intended to change that. He saw a future where Vaal stood at the forefront of Mandalorian trade. A century ago, vast deposits of phrik had been discovered here, enough to secure the world's prosperity indefinitely. Yet the people remained cautious, afraid of what the future demanded.

As Adonis crested the Skyspire Veins, the beauty of the range and the scale of the operation left him stunned. The mines themselves, carved with techniques inspired by the local Vaaldredge, were the subject of myth. Children whispered they were vast enough to swallow a dreadnought. That wasn't true, but they dwarfed any shafts Adonis had seen. He gathered his thoughts and stepped toward a building perched atop the peak, an office, judging by its look.

"Ah, Adonis Angelis. I've been looking forward to this," came a voice through a wall of smoke. An old man, his face lined and tired, looked up with beady eyes. "You've made a lot of noise, stirred up a mynok's nest of trouble." His tone dripped with disdain.

"The Fourth," Adonis said, flatly. His gaze never wavered.

"Excuse me?" the old man asked, attempting intimidation.

"Adonis Angelis the Fourth." His brow furrowed as he pressed each word. "You know who I am. You know who my father was, and his father before him. Without my family, Vaal would still be mired in the muck of the Gulag Plague." His posture straightened as he spoke, pride and legacy carrying him forward. He stepped closer, peering down at the old man without the mask of armor, only his name.

"And you're going to listen to what I have to say about these mines."