Chapter 7 – The Lab Beneath the Silence
Kael crouched atop the ridge, Ravager silent beside him, both watching the landscape below—a dead basin cracked open like a scar, its center pulsing faintly with artificial light. The Codex pinged again.
[Node Signature: Tier II. Power Source: Active. ArkHive subroot detected. Risk level: elevated.]
"Looks like this one's still breathing," Kael muttered.
He descended cautiously, boots crunching over brittle rock. Ravager stayed close, ears twitching. The scent here was wrong—electricity and something sweet, like fruit left too long in the sun.
They found the lab half-buried beneath obsidian stone. A glass corridor jutted out of the mountain like a jagged tooth. Kael tapped his Codex and the doors opened with a hiss of escaping dust.
Inside, it was cold.
Dead screens blinked back to life. Long-dormant lights flickered in the halls. Cryo-tanks lined the walls, shattered. Strange scrapes echoed somewhere deep within.
[Warning: presence detected. Hybrid signature faint.]
Kael's grip tightened on his makeshift blade.
"Stay sharp," he whispered to Ravager.
They moved deeper.
Signs of a battle—clawed walls, blood trails, one long gurney flipped over.
And then—the control room.
Glass windows overlooked a central chamber, where one massive tank remained intact, fluid swirling like smoke inside it. A shape floated within—vaguely humanoid, but not quite.
[File access: Restricted. Encryption broken. Downloading...]
Kael stared at the screen.
PROJECT: XENOVORAX
His heart pounded. Data poured into his Codex.
Adaptive genome architecture
Multi-DNA fusion experiment
Host candidate: UNKNOWN
Status: ESCAPED CONTAINMENT
Kael's reflection wavered in the screen.
"You are the vessel, Kael."
He spun around. A voice—no, not from the room. Inside his head.
"Not chosen. Not saved. Grown. Broken. Rebuilt."
The screen flashed: a face. Not his. Not human. Yet somehow… familiar. It smiled.
The tank hissed.
Ravager growled.
Kael backed away.
Then the glass shattered.
A flood of fluid and steam—and something moved.
Not Xenovorax. Not yet.
This was a guardian. Half-machine, half-reptile. Its skin was plated like armor, eyes blinking like processors.
[Designation: SENTINEX. Former lab warden. Protocol: termination of all intruders.]
It lunged.
Kael dove.
The lab exploded into chaos. Claws raked sparks across the floor. Kael ducked behind a console. Ravager leapt onto the machine's back, trying to rip its neck apart.
Sparks flew. Blood. Screams.
Kael's Codex flickered.
[Emergency override authorized. Prototype ability unlocked: Adaptive Reflex Burst. Duration: 7 seconds.]
He activated it.
Time bent.
Kael saw movements before they happened. He twisted, grabbed a broken injector pipe, and jammed it into Sentinex's spinal port. The machine screamed.
Ravager slammed it to the ground. Kael rolled under it and stabbed upward.
The thing convulsed, then collapsed.
Silence.
Kael leaned on a railing, panting. His hands shook—but not from fear.
From power.
[Prototype Synch: 18%. Mutation Index: Rising.]
But then—
The lab lights dimmed.
A second screen lit up. Static. A faint face.
Dr. Rhane.
Blood on his collar. Wild eyes.
"If you're hearing this... they've already won. Don't trust the data. Don't trust the Codex. They lied. Even I didn't know... what Xenovorax truly was."
He paused. Then:
"You're not the first vessel."
Kael's heart dropped.
[Incoming genomic instability spike. Symptoms: migraine, tremors, rage surges.]
Kael dropped to one knee.
Inside him, something shifted again.
Not a memory.
A hunger.
End of Chapter 7
Next: Chapter 8 – Kael is no longer just human. And something beneath the ash is watching.