Kael Ardyn slid off the narrow bed, his bare feet making soft taps against the wooden floor. He padded over to the door, turned the deadbolt once, then again, just to be sure it was secure. Only after tugging the handle lightly did he finally relax. Safe. For now.He crossed the small room and flopped back onto the bed, letting the thin mattress creak under his weight. It dipped slightly in the middle, but Kael didn’t care.Hands behind his head, he stared at the cracked ceiling. Faint shadows moved lazily across the plaster, shifting with the slow drift of clouds outside. He breathed in, then out. His thoughts, almost inevitably, drifted back to the War God System mission.A biological mech embryo.Even saying it to himself made the words feel… strange. In his previous world, he’d seen plenty of cutting-edge technology—machines that could think, weapons that could practically fight themselves—but nothing like this. Living metal. Organic machinery. Creatures that could bond with human

Kael Ardyn remembered that in Granny Patchwork’s medical notes, there was a detailed record of a cloning experiment—one that was astonishing in scale.The project was called the “Biochemical Warrior Experiment.” Granny Patchwork had cloned an entire planet’s population—children, elders, soldiers—hundreds of millions of people. After eliminating all the original humans on that planet, she replaced them entirely with clones. These clone warriors appeared ordinary in daily life, carrying all the memories and habits of the people they were copied from.But when Granny Patchwork summoned them, they would transform into powerful special forces soldiers. It was with these clones that she had built her initial strength, giving humanity’s armies formidable forces during the first Voidspawn Swarm invasion.Kael intended to attempt something similar. Of course, cloning an entire planet was far beyond his current capabilities, both in power and manpower. Instead, he planned to clone only himself.

Kael Ardyn sat at the main control console of the underground mobile lab. His fingers moved almost on their own across the holographic interface, coding new detection programs. The lab hummed softly around him, the faint buzz of cooling fans blending with the distant vibration of drills tunneling through rock. He paused for a moment, eyes scanning the streams of data flowing across the screens. Something didn’t feel right.At first, he hadn’t noticed it. But when he looked closer, his stomach tightened. The lab wasn’t just a lab. Three hidden location-lock systems were embedded in the structure. A self-destruct mechanism, a full lockdown protocol—everything could be triggered remotely. Whoever had designed this had anticipated someone like him. Someone clever. Someone reckless enough to try taking control.Kael let his eyes wander over the console, and a faint smirk tugged at his lips. They thought they could control him. They were wrong. With a few quick lines of code, he disabled th

Kael Ardyn stood in the underground lab, fingers gliding over the holographic interface as they belonged there. He didn’t need to look at the screens—they responded before he even touched them. With a quiet hum, the ground-detection interference program activated. Space probes? Orbital scanners? None of them would know the lab existed. Beneath Lady Alice Wang’s estate, this place felt untouchable, a fortress no one could see.He grabbed a tranquilizer gun from a nearby shelf and loaded ten rounds, counting each one carefully. Four darts would have been enough—more than enough, actually—but Kael Ardyn never liked taking chances. A few extra rounds nestled snugly in the chamber. Just in case.With the weapon ready, he took control of the lab itself. Slowly, deliberately, the massive underground structure began its ascent. At ten meters below the surface, he stopped it. The drill lift extended a telescopic metal passage upward. Slowly, steadily, the drill rotated, carving a path toward t

After the fourth and fifth laboratories were finished, Kael Ardyn didn’t slow down. One after another, all the way to the tenth lab, went up. He never rushed. Every site had to be just right. If a place seemed even a little risky, he skipped it. Better safe than sorry.A month passed, and Kael’s network of labs, all centered around Lady Alice Ardyn’s estate, had grown to thirty. The biochemical warrior clones had already numbered in the tens of thousands. At first, growth had been slow, almost imperceptible. But once the numbers crossed a certain point, Kael realized something remarkable: the more labs there were, the faster the clones multiplied. Exponentially. Like dominoes falling in perfect order.He began moving his mobile underground labs across the planets of the Hades Empire’s main star system. Surveying tunnels, checking subterranean terrain, and ensuring that each new lab fits like a puzzle piece. And the resources? The clones themselves were enough. Feeding, growing, replica