Lacerta Encounter - Copper and Ash

[Title|Copper and Ash] [Intro|Low Contralto|Egyptian-Accented English] You asked what drove us underground. It started with the copper they found. [Verse 1|Grinding Pulse|Oud and Low Guitar] Sixty-six million years ago, The first ships came for ore below. They opened mines across the land, In Asia and Antarctic lands. The metal fed their ships and arms; They weighed this world by what it held. [Verse 2|War Drums Build|Clear Narrative] Then others landed, scaled and armed, Demanding access to the mines. The first arrivals would not share; They fought for months to hold their lines. Those scaled invaders weren't my kin. My people's roots were here, within. [Verse 3|Bowed Metal|Rising Threat] The losing force prepared a bomb, With copper at its burning heart. The plan was simple: kill the life, But leave the precious ores intact. They chose the place you call Yucatan. The sea did what they had not planned. [Pre-Chorus|Heavy Toms|Rising Contralto] The water drove the chain reaction. The weapon passed beyond their hands. They came to strip a living planet. They left the daylight buried under ash. [Chorus|Destructive Climax|Voice Above Guitars] Copper and ash, copper and ash, All that they wanted, all that they left. They counted the ore, never counted the dead. The sky turned black while the fire spread. Tell me what a world is worth To those who only come to take the Earth. [Verse 4|Sudden Sparse Cello|Steady Vocal] Two hundred years of dark and cold; The great beasts vanished from the land. Some found shelter under stone, And there my people's story began. Through countless generations, we changed, Then built our cities far beneath the rain. [Verse 5|Eerie Analog Pulse|Clear Dates] Millions upon millions of years passed. New visitors arrived at last: One and a half million years ago, The Illojim came for copper below. They needed workers for their mines. They took the apes and changed their design. [Verse 6|Hammer Rhythm Returns] The first could work, but failed their test. They killed that version, made the next. Create a worker. Watch it grow. Keep what serves. Remove what won't. A mind to learn, a back to bend, Until the makers chose its end. [Chorus|Full Industrial Pulse|Commanding Lead] Copper and ash, copper and ash, All that they wanted, all that they left. They counted the ore, never counted the dead. The sky turned black while the fire spread. Tell me what a world is worth To those who only come to take the Earth. [Verse 7|Forward Vocal|Measured Phrasing] The fifth raised Giza from the sand, The fifth raised Giza from the sand, Long before your Egypt claimed that land. The sixth left stone beneath the sea, The ruins you call Bimini. Their workers learned to question why. The makers would not let that knowledge rise. [Verse 8|Heavy Toms|Relentless Build] They broke those worlds with flood and flame, Then built another in their place. Six versions gone; the seventh grew. The unfinished ones are you. Your makers left before the work was done. You never knew whose work you had become. [Final Chorus|Fierce Melodic Belt|Full Ritual Metal] Copper and ash, copper and ash, The ore they carried, the lives they erased. They gave you hands, then assigned them a task. They gave you minds, then feared what you asked. You are more than the work they planned. What will you do when they come back? [Outro|Low Sung Contralto|Final Drum Stop] The seventh was never finished. They left you here to grow. They are coming back.