Revolution!
Anton Teveru strode down the hallway of the Kessian Empress' palace. He was tall, wide, and very muscular. His head was bald, but not from shaving. Not a hair had ever grown on his body. A minor error in the process, he'd been told. He was also quite bright, and he hadn't needed anyone to tell him that. He was a heavy assault forgeborn soldier, created to defend his squadmates with sheer body mass and power. Anton had been liberated in one of the original forgeborn uprisings, before the revolt had properly begun. He was dressed in the red and brown colors of the FLF, the Forgeborn Liberation Front.
Slightly behind him and to his left, Julietta Kashil followed, also dressed in the FLF's red and brown, which actually blended quite nicely with her brown hair and pale blue eyes. She was a fast attack soldier. Her eagle-like vision had allowed her to spot trouble a mile off and warn her and Anton's unit on multiple occasions, and her inhumanly fast reactions had saved Anton's hide too many times to count. He was proud to rely on her.
To Anton's right was Aranael Vikkuras. Tall, spidery, and always grinning like a lunatic, Aranael was by far the most disturbing person Anton had ever met, forgeborn or otherwise. He was allegedly an experimental Spec-Ops forgeborn soldier, although Anton hadn't heard of any other experimental forgeborn. As usual, Aranael's night-black hair was hanging down, obscuring half his face above the grin, although he would be ready to flip that hair out of the way at a moment's notice to display his unnatural neon-violet eyes. Their intimidating effect was actually magically enhanced, and Anton had seen Aranael stun or even hypnotize enemies into submission with those eyes. To call Aranael slightly unhinged would be to call Anton slightly above-average in size, or Julietta slightly attentive. However, he had demonstrated loyalty to Anton and the FLF many times, so Anton was willing to turn a blind eye to some of Aranael's faults.
Other forgeborn, all dressed in the colors of the FLF and armed with rifled muskets, followed Anton down the hallway. Some split off into groups of four or five to secure side halls and rooms. Julietta primed her Breaching Device, which was a rifle-like tool made of solid black wood and covered in red runescript. The red runes glowed brightly as she poured power from her mana reserves into the Device. She placed it against the door and pressed a glowing green circle on the handle. The massive wooden doors to the Empress' throne room exploded inward, giving the forgeborn revolutionaries time to storm into the room and kill or incapacitate the guards inside. Physically, regular humans were no match for the forgeborn, and even magic, the humans' main advantage, had a diminished effect on the forgeborn as a portion of mana from each spell was absorbed.
The scuffle in the throne room was over in less than a minute. The Kessian mages had indeed created the ultimate soldiers. The Empress of Kess remained on her golden throne, her closest two bodyguards by her side. Julietta leaned over and whispered in Anton's ear that she could see tension in the Empress' jaw, despite the matriarch's seemingly serene expression.
Anton stepped towards the dais. Aranael and Julietta hung slightly back, although still close enough to whisper advice or a warning in his ear. The throne room was utterly silent.
"Empress Kemishla Zeferi el'Akar, sole ruler of the Empire of Kess," said Anton.
"Anton Teveru, officer of the Forgeborn Liberation Front, of the Empire of Kess," responded Empress Kemishla. "State your business."
She acknowledges the FLF as being of Kess, thought Anton. Perhaps I can still hope for a peaceful solution to this.
"Twenty years ago, the Empire of Kess was at war with the clans of the Mu'ar-Lekh," he said. "Kess was fighting a losing battle against the unexpected ferocity of the spider-people, and in its desperation, it asked the Imperial Mages for a solution. Thus, they invented the forgeborn. We, the forgeborn, fought hard and died even harder for the glory of the Empire of Kess. We, the forgeborn, spilled our blood in the great forests of Lekhur Mar and died with the name of the Empress on our lips. After the end of the war with the Treaty of Korja-Zeer, most of the Forgeborn Legions were demobilized, and since that time we, the forgeborn, have been treated as little more than slaves."
"You are a student of history, then, Teveru-Ja?" asked the Empress.
"I believe it is the duty every man and woman to know the history of his or her people," responded Anton. "And we, the forgeborn, are a people. We are more than just warflesh. We are more than animals, more than slaves. We eat like humans, we speak like humans, we sleep, multiply, feel, and even look like humans! And yet we do not live like humans. We have earned honor for the Empire of Kess with our very blood. As the selected spokesman of the Forgeborn Liberation Front, I demand freedom for all enslaved forgeborn!" The forgeborn in the room raised up a cheer at Anton's words. "I demand equal rights!" continued Anton. Another cheer. "We are not inferior to humans! We demand to be treated as humankind's equals!" Yet another cheer.
Aranael waited for the cheer to die down, then spoke up in his menacing whisper of a voice. To Anton's shock, he was no longer grinning. Not even a smirk.
"And if not..." rasped Aranael, "we shall take our rightful place by force."