2025-05-29 03:01:45
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Chapter 15: The Lab That Shouldn’t Exist
Sector V. The air was dense. Not just with radiation, but with something deeper—like the land itself remembered suffering.The old Citadel bio-lab loomed like a decaying monolith, half-sunken into the earth. Its steel was twisted. Its glass scorched black. Yet power still flowed faintly beneath the surface—pulsing in rhythms too clean to be random.Aiden and the others approached through the underground access tunnel Ilsa had mapped from old archives. The metal doors hissed open. Beyond them: silence. Stale air. A hallway lit by flickering emergency strips and walls scratched by something non-human.[SYSTEM ALERT – Local Signature: Viral AI Fragment Detected] [Judgment Event Incoming – Stability Required]Aiden’s pulse spiked. [SYNC: 69.2%] He could feel the system watching.They reached the core research chamber. Glass pods lined the walls, most shattered. A few still held remnants of hybrid subjects—half-human, half-core tech. Rhea stared at a preserved specimen labeled “Subject Del
Chapter 14: System Council
Aiden stared at the encrypted file Locke’s spike had unlocked. Lines of dormant protocol flickered—then bloomed into a single phrase:“Echo Zero: Trial Simulation for Global Judgment. Initiator: Council Prime.” Ilsa’s face drained of color.“I thought the Council was disbanded. After the Collapse.”Rhea shook her head. “No. They just hid. Let the system spread without borders—then waited to see who’d rise.” Aiden scrolled deeper. Names flickered.Council Members:— Prime Architect: Kaelen Cross— Echo Engineer: V. Selene— Behavioral Core Analyst: H. Saive— Signal Divergence Officer: L. Morn— Unknown Position: “Mother Node”He paused on the last. Mother Node. There was no image. Just a voice recording. Aiden hit play.“If you’re hearing this… my son, you’ve come far.” Rhea gasped. “Is that—?” Aiden nodded slowly. “My mother.”The message continued. “Kaelen built the architecture. I was the one who wrote the ethical overlays. But the Council stripped me out. Said morality slowed the
Chapter 13: Trigger Unit 03
The alley behind the safehouse steamed with vapor and the faint whir of system interference. The man who emerged wore battle-worn Citadel armor, but his movements were off glitchy, like his body didn’t fully obey him. Trigger Unit 03. Aiden’s system flared.SYNC CLASS MATCH: 78% – SYSTEM VARIANT DETECTEDThreat Level: RED // Status: CORRUPTED USER – TRIGGER FAILURE“You’re a failed Trigger,” Aiden said. The man grinned. “Call me Locke. Or ‘The Thing That Should’ve Died.’ Your father made me the prototype.First to bond with the system core. Didn’t go well.” He held up his left arm. A tendril of black code flickered from under the skin.“Too much sync, too fast. The system cracked me open like a bad update.” Rhea stepped out behind Aiden. “Then why are you still alive?” Locke tilted his head.“Because even corrupted data can bite back.” And with that, he charged. The fight was like watching gravity bend. Locke blinked across space with unstable Flash Drift, leaving feedback trails in h
Chapter 12: The Copy Protocol
Rain swept across the ruined cityscape. Aiden stood on a rooftop overlooking the industrial district, eyes locked on a darkened data center below.“This is where the clone was compiled?” he asked. Ilsa nodded, scoping the facility through a cracked monocular. “Citadel’s old Codex Hub.Before the collapse, they used it to test AI autonomy protocols. That’s where Vex pulled the clone.” Rhea was still pale, recovering from her abduction.“And where she’s hiding her next move.” Aiden checked his pulse tracker.Sync: 62%Emotion Surge: Disbelief. Anger. Control maintaining.“I want to see what she took from me,” he muttered. Then he leapt from the rooftop, landing with practiced force.Inside, the Codex Hub was a skeleton of what it once was black walls pulsing with traces of old intelligence routines.SYSTEM LINKED – Unauthorized Sub-AI Detected: Origin // VEXCORE_01Accessing Echo Residue...]Aiden walked through shimmering lines of archived data echoes of a digital battlefield long past
Chapter 11: Trigger Theory
Ilsa, Aiden, and Rhea stood before the cracked remains of Citadel Archive Station K-7—one of the original research hubs from the Echo Project era.Aiden stared at the half-collapsed tower. “So this is where they wrote the end of the world?” Ilsa nodded. “This is where they tested the first reset algorithm. Your father helped build it.”SYSTEM NOTE: Location recognized – Archive K-7 – “Trigger Vault” access restrictedKey Required: CORE FRAGMENT – Present. Access override in progress… Welcome, Cross Lineage.The vault opened with a grinding shriek. Cold air rolled out.And with it… a whisper. Not a voice. A presence.Like the system itself was watching. Inside, a sterile chamber glowed with red lights. Holograms floated frozen mid-motion. Scans of a synthetic world. Simulations of burning cities.Test logs titled “Trigger Theory: Viability in Post-Collapse Environments.” Aiden reached out, activating the primary console.A figure flickered to life. K-Cross. His father. Younger. “Reset T
Chapter 10: The Fracture Unit
Underground ruins stretched endlessly beneath the western edge of New Era City. Forgotten by time, hidden from maps, and protected by traps only the dead remembered. Aiden crouched beside a locked steel hatch, faded symbols carved into its face.“Same mark from the data spike,” Rhea confirmed. “Fracture Unit seal. We’re in the right place.” She ran a bypass loop through her wrist-link.Click. The hatch hissed open. Stale air, rust, and power residue spilled out.They descended into the dark. They followed a twisted corridor of broken glass and collapsed tech. Old Citadel banners hung in shreds. Ghosts of old battles.Echo Alert: System Signature Detected – Frequency: Pre-Split / Tier-XRhea raised her weapon. “Something’s still active down here.” Then a voice echoed through the dark: “Turn back. You don’t belong here.” They froze. A spotlight snapped on revealing a figure on a steel walkway above. A woman. Tall. Muscular. One arm replaced by sleek chrome tech.Her eyes shimmered red
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