The chamber vibrated. The BioCore’s pulse reverberated through every conduit, every wall, even through the floors under their feet. Raymond could feel it, like a living heart synced with his own. The System whispered in a steady hum inside his mind:Host stabilized. Neural resonance at 96%. External threat approaching rapidly.Raymond exhaled, tightening his fists. “Then let’s make it 100%.”Above them, the reinforced ceiling cracked further, sending fragments of metal and shattered conduits raining down. Helix dropships hovered at the breach, their anti-gravity thrusters sparking against the twisted wreckage. Titans, mechanized brutes larger than anything Raymond had fought, stepped onto the chamber floor, each with arms like reinforced battering rams.“Looks like we’ve got company,” Lira muttered, scanning the incoming forces. Her cybernetic implants flickered, overwhelmed by the energy in the room. “And they aren’t messing around this time.”Raymond’s eyes narrowed. Good. We don’t

The elevator shaft roared as Raymond and Lira ascended from the Resonance Vault. Unlike before, when the chamber felt like a sleeping beast, now it hummed with awareness. Panels brightened as they passed. Bio-circuits unraveled and rearranged like tendrils of thought.The Core wasn’t just active. It was aligned with him.Lira leaned against the rail, watching him closely. “You’re quiet. Too quiet. Usually you’d be ranting, panicking, or having a moral crisis.”Raymond didn’t answer right away. His fingers glowed faintly, each pulse synced to the Core’s rhythm. Even his breathing seemed to echo the chamber.Finally, he murmured, “I’m trying to understand where I end and the Core begins.”Lira’s expression softened, but she didn’t push. She’d seen him shaken before, but this was different. He wasn’t just introspective.He was changing.The elevator slowed, rising toward the upper chamber. As it neared the final meters, the System whispered inside Raymond’s skull with clarity he had neve

The bolt of white celestial fire slammed into the ground between Raymond and the three advancing mechs. The explosion erupted like a star being born, light swallowed the clearing, heat ripping through the air in expanding rings.Raymond dropped instantly, covering his face with his forearm as dust and burning leaves shot past him. The shockwave flattened trees. The mechs staggered, alarms blaring in metallic panic.When the radiance faded enough for him to squint through, someone descended from the sky.Not fell.Descended.Wings of pale, radiant flame unfurled behind a slim silhouette. Hair of silver-gold drifted as if suspended underwater. Her boots touched the ground amid a swirl of stardust.Raymond’s breath caught.“Sophia…?”The Celestial Healer opened her eyes, pure white, no pupil, no iris. An angelic glow pulsed from her skin, too bright, too controlled.She wasn’t just using power.She was channeling something ancient.Something dangerous.“Raymond,” she said softly, her voi

Raymond didn’t fall.He rose, violently, lifted by a column of black, spiraling energy that cracked the ground beneath him. The air warped, bending around the sudden burst of power as if reality itself wanted to pull away from him.His team shielded their faces.Marcus squinted through the roiling darkness. “Ray, pull it back! You’re gonna rip yourself apart!”Raymond couldn’t answer.He was barely breathing.Barely human.The curse inside him, once a whisper, now howled through every artery.«Let me guide the transformation. You don’t need to think. Just surrender.»The voice wasn’t the System.It wasn’t the curse.It was something older, buried deep within the Forbidden Protocol like a bone-etched command.Raymond clenched his jaw and roared against it, veins bulging black along his neck.The energy around him expanded again, bursting outward in a shockwave that sent trees snapping like brittle glass.Azriel stabbed her staff into the ground to brace herself. “This isn’t just corrup

Raymond froze.The body on the table was him, his own face, his own features, but pale, twisted, and struggling for breath. Every faint pulse of the chest sent a shiver through the metallic hall.Azriel stepped back, eyes wide. “He… he’s a clone! Or a construct. Something the Prime Scalpel made to… test you.”Lira’s knives twitched in her hands. “Why? Why would he do this?”Raymond didn’t answer. His pulse raced, not from fear, but recognition. He had felt this before, when the System whispered inside him, when the curse coiled and pulsed like a heartbeat of darkness. He had sensed potential. Potential… himself.Sophia’s weak voice broke through the tension. “Raymond… you can save him… or you can…” Her words trailed off.The curse inside him stirred, whispering like silk sliding over a blade: «Excise the weakness. End the failed experiment.»Raymond clenched his fists. The System chimed urgently: [CURSED ENERGY DETECTED] [STABILITY RISK: HIGH] [MEDICAL OUTCOME: CRITICAL]His eyes flic