The Dominion's undercroft settled into an uneasy hush, the thorn-veins sealing with a final, resonant sigh that echoed through the lava tubes like the last breath of a pruned beast. Dust motes—flux-tainted quartz flecks—danced in the qi-lamps' glow, settling on the mosaic murals as Bled seers and the turned Coil dissident slumped against the walls, their breaths ragged but laced with triumphant chuckles. Elara lowered her hands, the Dominion Reckoner weave retracting with a faint, deep tremor in her meridians—the bulb's lattice now a cluster of prismatic wards, humming a neutral tune, the chaos of the Sovereign's echo fully Reclaimed. Her arm, still numb from the void's lingering bite, ached with the weave's toll, but the Prime in her core thrummed steady, a quiet affirmation that the garden's thorns had been disciplined.
Kairo sheathed his shadow-lance with a fluid snap, his Final Coil sovereign dragons dematerializing into shadows that nuzzled his legs—their forms flickering, testing their newfound ability to achieve dimensional collapse in their strikes. "Well, that was a thornier welcome than my first Belt brawl," he said, wiping sweat from his brow with a grin that crinkled his eyes. "Felt like pruning a hedge that fought back with attitude and an ego. You alright, Lira? That last hybrid had your name etched on its fangs." His tone carried that easy warmth, the warrior's grit softened by concern—the foundational strength of their relationship now extending a subtle, comforting qi shield around their exhausted third.
Lira flexed her fingers, her Prime Regulator Chains retracting into her bracers with a soft chime—light-shadow threads coiling like satisfied serpents, one lingering to toy with a loose thorn-shard before dissolving it into harmless mist, its unmade qi instantly filtered. She straightened, her posture shedding the thief's habitual hunch for something straighter, more assured. "Fangs? Please—that thing was all bark and no bite. Reminded me of my first Syndicate mark: big talk, zero follow-through. But yeah... it stung a bit." She paused, rubbing her temple where a faint veil-glimmer faded—a remnant echo from the nexus, whispering half-formed doubts about her place in the light. Redemption wasn't a clean cut; it itched like a half-healed scar, and with the adrenaline ebbing, Lira felt the pull of old shadows—not to return, but to question if she'd truly outrun them, even with the Prime Regulator Chains in place. The chains could regulate external flux, but regulating internal doubt was a process only she could manage. "Thanks for the flank, Kairo. Didn't think I'd miss having a dragon pup as backup."
The Bled seer—the one with flux-features settling into a mosaic of Rune Nomad frost and Oracle gold—pushed off the wall, clapping a hand on the dissident Coil rider's shoulder. "The Dominion's thorns are pruned—for now," the seer said, his voice a flux-melody that shifted mid-sentence, like wind through mosaic chimes. "Your reckoning honors the fringe, weavers. The petals' alliance withers here, but the garden's roots run deep—Sovereign's echo coils in the Drift's undercurrents, tempting the lost with visions of uncoiled flux." He extended a flux-woven gauntlet, pressing a small, shifting orb into Elara's palm—a Bled relic, its surface rippling like liquid runes. "Echo-orb—from the husk's old bays. Maps the roots' whispers. Use it; the Dominion stands with your hammer."
The Viral Escalation
Elara accepted the orb, its cool weight syncing with her meridians—a faint map blooming in her Sight, overlaid with the data from her Dominion Reckoner: vein-threads snaking toward the Drift's core bays, petals allying not just with Bled individuals, but with salvaged Helix drones that hummed Sovereign code. This was a critical twist—the Dominion wasn't just a holdout; it was a node in a larger web, Sovereign's garden using the husk's relics to seed mechanical blooms, drones as petal-carriers infiltrating core worlds via automated logistics paths. "This changes the prune," she murmured, the orb's map overlaying her Prime—probabilities spiking to 72% escalation if unchecked. The unthinkability hit: Sovereign wasn't rebuilding as a beast, but as a viral code—echoes hacking the Aetherforge's digital veins from within, turning alliances into unwitting, mechanical carriers.
Kairo's brow furrowed, sovereign pups growling soft as they scented the orb's metallic taint. "Drones? That's no garden weed—that's a smart thorn, rooting in the wiring. If it's spreading to the core, we're not pruning hedges anymore; we're fumigating the whole damn system. This requires Final Coil precision; we can't just burn the flux, we have to collapse the code's dimension." Lira's eyes sharpened, binders humming as she sampled the orb's flux: "Smart and sneaky—fits the old boss's style. Remember that Syndicate heist where the 'relic' was a drone swarm? Bloomed into chaos overnight. We hit the bays now, before the petals pollinate the Drift's heart. My Prime Regulator Chains can audit the drone code, isolating the corrupted protocols."
The decision crystallized—no time for feast or fanfare; the Dominion's seers offered a hidden tube-lift to the bays, their flux-weaves cloaking the descent. The lift plunged smooth, walls flux-shifting to mimic the abyss's black—one panel glitched mid-drop, fluxing into a cartoonish Sovereign as a bumbling gardener, petals wilting comically under a hammer-rain—a Bled in-joke. Kairo snorted, leaning against the wall: "If that's art therapy, sign me up. My sovereigns could use the laugh after that hybrid tango." Lira's chains toyed with a panel-edge, triggering a ripple of animated thorns dancing a jig: "Tango? More like a waltz with wasps. But hey, if the Sovereign's got rhythm, maybe we invite him to the next flux-ball."
The Pruning of the Digital Garden
The lift dinged at the bays—vast hangars of rusted bulkheads, flux-drones humming in rows: salvaged Helix bots retrofitted with petal-cores, their chassis veined in thorn-lattice, qi-eyes glowing with Sovereign whispers. A cluster of Bled mechanics—mosaic hands fluxing tools—huddled around a lead drone, debating upgrades: "This one's blooming strong—petal-code hacks the Prime's edge, uncoils the light without a fight. Its computational qi is exponentially higher than the old models." Probabilities screamed: 81% carrier bloom, drones primed to seed core academies.
Elara initiated the tactical assault: Dominion Reckoner surging, Anvil Echo priming drone-pruners—light-shadow sickles deriving from the lattice-chassis, targeting the algorithmic root of the Sovereign's code. Kairo's sovereigns slunk forward, Final Coil active—flames banked, shadows coiling the cores for entropic trims that aimed to collapse the drone's dimensional integrity, not just its energy. Lira's Prime Regulator Chains unfurled as net-threads, light-shadow barbs poised to audit and unmake codes—deductive hooks peeling hacks layer by layer, isolating the viral signature.
The lead drone whirred to life, nexus pulsing as a mechanic gestured: "The Sovereign's garden uncoils us—no Bled flux dictated by light-drones, no wanderer chains on our hacks." Elara's pruners sliced the core—petals wilting in cascades, unmade vines recoiling into prisms. The mechanic startled, tool flaring: "Reckoners—the garden's thorns turn!" Chaos dominated: drone-hybrids surged from the rows—flux-bots with dissident hacks and void petals, lashing at the intruders.
Kairo's sovereigns pounced, phased forms coiling the hybrids—flames hammering petals with flux-entropic bursts, achieving micro-dimensional collapse mid-strike, causing the metallic structures to instantly and silently implode. "Drones with delusions—Sovereign's got a hobby for robotic rebellions," he quipped, shadows binding a bot's limbs—humor pricking the fray, drawing a Bled mechanic's flux-chuckle: "Rebellions? These tin weeds revolt at the first prune—uninvited, and they're all sparks." Lira's Regulator Chains whipped, barbs stabbing the digital illusions—unmaking the hybrids' deceptive dominions, forcing the mechanical roots to recoil as truths pierced the lattice's hollow code.
The attempted carrier bloom was neutralized. The bay stabilized, thorn-veins sealing. The lead mechanic, his flux-features settling to allied mosaics, gifted a thorn-rune amulet: "For the reckoners—may your blooms thrive without barbs."
The Final Approach: Echo's Hollow
The triad lingered in the bay's afterglow, the turned mechanics clustering with salvaged stories of tenth survivors. Fun flickered in the confinement: one mechanic demonstrated a "thorn-trick": a relic-gauntlet that made shadows dance like drunken flames, drawing laughs as Kairo's pups joined the jig. Lira's binders toyed with the relic, light-shadows weaving a counter-jig—her chains mimicking the dance, a thief's grace turning to playful flourish. "Not bad—beats the Syndicate's 'serious' heists. Ever try fluxing a boss's mustache into a coil?"
Elara watched, a rare smile softening her features—the Prime's burden easing in the shared mirth, her Dominion Reckoner absorbing the moment's harmony like a garden's rain. But the Echo-orb's map pinged anew, tracing the final, deepest thorn-web coiling toward the abyss's heart, petals allying with a forgotten Bled enclave on "Echo's Hollow" —outliers who'd claimed a tenth-bleed ruin, their flux strong but vulnerable to Sovereign's whispers. The twist uncoiled in her thoughts: the Hollow wasn't just a haven; it was a relic-vault, Sovereign's garden using the ruins to seed "echo-petals"—unmade drones fused with Bled flux, carriers for a viral bloom that could hack the core's final ward-protocol.
"We take the Hollow next," Elara said, the smile fading to resolve as she shared the map. "The thorns there bloom with echoes—Sovereign's playing long-game, turning ruins into nurseries, preparing for the final, systemic unfurlment." Kairo nodded, sovereigns settling with low rumbles—his hand brushing hers brief, a silent vow in the touch. Lira's Regulator Chains hummed agreement, data knotting the orb's flux: "Nurseries? More like trap-doors. But we've pruned worse—let's make it a family affair. One last cleanup before the final root."
The shuttle lifted from the bay, veering toward Echo's Hollow—the reckoning's call pulling them into the abyss's heart, the Dominion Reckoner ready to face the deepest, most systemic threat yet.