Chương 39: 38: The Twelve Prototypes II

Antartica. Testing Grounds. The testing never stopped. Snow continued to fall. The next half hour became an endless cycle of hypotheses, deployments, observations, and revisions.

"Voltage Trial." Tesla towers unfolded beneath the glacier, millions of volts converging into a lattice of blue-white arcs that engulfed the proving grounds. For several seconds, the world became nothing but lightning. The prototypes flew straight through it. Telemetry scrolled relentlessly.

"Unexpected cellular adaptation."

"Conductivity increasing."

"Neurological efficiency rising." Victor laughed as another bolt struck him square in the chest.

"That tickles!" Every new weapon became another lesson written into flesh. Conflict Drop wasn't merely enduring the punishment anymore. It was studying it. Absorbing it. Rewriting itself around it. Plasma left shimmering sapphire veins beneath Selene Armitage's skin until heat simply ceased to recognize her as a target, her footsteps leaving rivers of glowing glass through the glacier.

Roman Volkov's muscles crackled with branching lightning that leapt harmlessly between his fingers before splitting the sky itself, every heartbeat punctuated by distant thunder. Freya Holm's breath crystallized into glittering frost as ice answered the smallest movement of her hands, walls, spears, and towering fortifications blooming from the frozen continent as naturally as breathing.

Victor Hale laughed as he flew straight through a microwave array, the invisible radiation bending around his body before erupting behind him in a cone that vaporized a distant mountainside. Miriam Holt sneezed, accidentally releasing a wave of emerald fire that rolled across an entire valley before extinguishing itself without melting a single snowflake, burning only what she subconsciously regarded as an enemy.

Linh Dao caught a localized gravity well between her palms, compressed the distortion into a flickering black sphere no larger than an apple, frowned at it for a moment, then casually threw it into orbit. Naomi Eze disappeared into a cryogenic beam and emerged wrapped in drifting mist, every movement leaving razor-thin sheets of black ice hanging motionless in the air behind her. Mateo Ruiz discovered the sonic resonance cannons only made him louder.

Every laugh became a visible shockwave that rattled glaciers loose from distant peaks. Cass Vega drifted through reality-disruption fields with a puzzled expression as fractured geometry folded obediently around her instead of tearing her apart, her brilliant gold eyes briefly reflecting impossible shapes the instruments couldn't measure.

Elias Mercer stood motionless inside an electromagnetic storm while thousands of blue arcs crawled lazily across his skin before sinking beneath it like rain into dry earth, the electricity simply becoming another part of him. Atlas Okoye continued lifting whatever impossible mass the scientists placed before him, each new weight somehow making the next feel lighter as the ground beneath his boots fractured deeper into the continent.

Yuna Akiyama blurred effortlessly between collapsing ice cliffs, leaving faint cyan afterimages that lingered several heartbeats after she had already landed somewhere else. Every new assault stopped resembling a stress test. It looked more like another organ waiting to be grown.

"Interesting..." Pens scratched furiously.

"Adaptive integration confirmed."

"The serum isn't merely resisting environmental stress."

"It's incorporating it." Another volley followed. Plasma. Cryogenic beams. High-voltage discharge. Reality-distortion fields. Again... Again... Again... Every failed attempt to harm them quietly became another evolutionary advantage. The graphs refused to level off. Thirty-two minutes. Thirty-three. Thirty-four. Henrik leaned toward another display.

"…Adaptive acquisition?" Adrian slowly shook his head.

"…Adaptive assimilation." Silence followed. If the testing continued... What exactly would these soldiers become? The prototypes only grew stronger. Then, something unexpected drifted across the proving grounds. A faint fragrance of bergamot. Underneath it lingered the dry, earthy scent of fresh tobacco, carried effortlessly through the wind. One scientist happened to glance upward.... His pen stopped. His expression emptied.

"…Sir?" Nobody answered. His eyes never moved.

"…Sir." Henrik frowned.

"What?" The analyst slowly raised a trembling finger.

"…There's someone up there." Heads turned. Far above the proving grounds, almost lost against the pale sky, a solitary figure floated motionless. He'd been there long enough for snow to gather around him. Except... The snow wasn't drifting. It was pixelating. Tiny white squares flickered into existence before dissolving around his silhouette, as though reality itself struggled to decide how to render the space he occupied.

"... Who's that?" Nobody answered. More heads slowly tilted upward. A perfectly circular distortion spread through the blizzard, as though reality itself had developed dead pixels. The nearest drones altered course on their own. No command had been issued. Their guidance systems simply refused to cross an invisible boundary. Conversation died across every platform. Binoculars rose. Camera lenses zoomed. One technician whispered,"… Enhance." The image sharpened.

A blond man hovered impossibly high above the continent, hands resting casually in the pockets of an expensive ash-colored suit. Broad shoulders and an athletic physique filled the tailored fabric perfectly, every seam cut with such precision that the suit seemed made for no one else. A neatly tied chocolate necktie hung perfectly against the white shirt despite the screaming winds. A layer of well-kept stubble sharpened an already striking face, while silver-rimmed glasses rested upon calm features.

A polished watch gleamed beneath one cuff, and a tortoise-shell brooch fastened his lapel. His brown leather shoes were immaculately polished despite long fractures running through them, as though they had walked across something no cobbler could ever repair. Even at this impossible distance, the wind carried an unmistakable fragrance of bergamot threaded with the faint metallic scent of gunpowder. His pale blue eyes never left the proving grounds. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road.

If you spot it on Amazon, please report it. Beside him floated a perfectly smooth white sphere no larger than a football. A single blue lens regarded the facility below. Neither moved. Neither needed to. Silence spread across the observation platforms.

"... How long has he been there?" Nobody knew. One engineer hurriedly checked the telemetry. Nothing. Radar. Nothing. Satellites. Nothing. Motion sensors. Nothing. Every recording showed empty sky. The man had simply... Been there. Watching. Dr. Rowan Pierce felt the color drain from his face. His lips barely moved.

"... Lucien." Nobody laughed. Not this time. One younger researcher swallowed hard, his voice catching in his throat.

"I-It's God." A nervous scoff escaped another scientist.

"Oh, come on. We get it, he's strong, but he's no Go-" TCHK. A pin-thin blue beam lanced from the drone's solitary lens. Every reinforced pane, containment field, and defensive barrier between Lucien and the scientist might as well have been painted on the air. The beam passed through them without the slightest resistance. The scientist didn't explode. He scattered.

His body dissolved into billions of tiny luminous squares, unraveling into pixelated data that drifted silently into the Antarctic wind before fading from existence. Silence. Only an empty patch of heated walkway where a man had stood a heartbeat earlier. Even Alistair Voss, who only moments earlier had dismissed Lucien as folklore, slowly lowered his tablet. The scientists stopped looking at the prototypes. They looked at the man who had been watching them all along.

— Below, the proving grounds finally noticed what had stolen the scientists' attention. Victor Hale hovered beside Atlas, squinting toward the speck hanging impossibly high above the continent.

"…Who the hell's that?" Naomi shaded her eyes.

"Someone important, judging by their faces." Mateo glanced between the observation platforms and the distant figure.

"They've stopped writing."

"They never stop writing," Cass muttered. Prototype Two tilted her head.

"…I think that might be Lucien." Victor barked a laugh.

"Lucien doesn't exist."

"Exactly," Roman called.

"That's just some bloke in a fancy suit."

"Probably management," Miriam grinned. Atlas folded his arms.

"I was expecting horns." Yuna shrugged, unable to look away.

"He's… annoyingly handsome." Naomi smirked.

"You noticed that from up there?"

"I noticed he looks like he walked out of a magazine." Roman rolled his eyes.

"Oh, piss off. He's just a pretty boy in an expensive suit."

"Someone's jealous," Cass said.

"I'm not jealous."

"You sounded jealous."

"I said I'm not jealous." Freya's expression never changed.

"… Why are the scientists afraid?" Far above them, Lucien remained utterly motionless. His pale blue eyes never descended toward the prototypes. Instead, he regarded the face of his watch. Tiny blue sparks danced beneath the crystal as he documented something with one thumb against the watch's side. Click. He calmly opened the inside of his tailored coat. A collective breath caught across every observation platform. The lining wasn't fabric. It was an armory.

Rows upon rows of impossibly compact devices rested within hidden compartments that folded through depths the coat physically couldn't possess. Pistols built from shifting black alloys. Cylinders suspended inside transparent magnetic fields. Needle-thin rods threaded with pale blue circuitry. Instruments whose purposes couldn't even be guessed. Some possessed moving geometries that refused to remain consistent between blinks, while others quietly emitted harmonics that made nearby electronics flicker.

They didn't resemble weapons humanity might invent centuries from now. They resembled relics abandoned by civilizations millions of years ahead.

"…Dear God…" someone whispered. Lucien's fingers drifted past dozens of impossible devices before selecting something almost laughably mundane. A micro-drill. No larger than a fountain pen. He placed it against the side of his watch. VZZZZZT. Blue sparks danced as microscopic mechanisms repaired themselves beneath the glass. The drill folded back into the impossible armory. Lucien resumed typing into the watch as though nothing unusual had happened. Victor blinked.

"…Seriously?" Roman's jaw tightened. The effortless composure. The immaculate suit. The absurdly handsome face. The fact the man hadn't even acknowledged them. Something about it all crawled under his skin.

"Oh, fuck this," Roman growled.

"Someone wipe that smug look off his face." KRAAAAK! Lightning exploded around his body as the glacier shattered beneath his feet. He launched skyward, accelerating until he became a spear of blue-white electricity. Air detonated behind him in overlapping sonic booms as both fists drew back.

"Hey! Come here! Let me talk to you, man!" His punches came faster than artillery. Thousands. Each capable of flattening mountains. He reached Lucien. SPLAAAAT! It resembled an egg hurled against a steel pole. Roman's body burst apart on contact. Not because Lucien's body was impossibly durable, but because the Null Suit refused to permit foreign matter into its protected space. The microscopic exclusion field surrounding him locked the boundary of his existence in place. Roman's momentum had nowhere to go.

Instead of transferring into Lucien, it reflected back through Roman's own body, tearing flesh from bone and bone from itself faster than biology could withstand. Arms. Torso. Skull. Everything exploded into a crimson mist that continued forward while Lucien remained perfectly still. Blood, bone, and fragments of cobalt-threaded uniform splashed harmlessly across his ash-coloured suit. For a heartbeat, nobody understood what they had witnessed. Then the world erupted.

"ROMAN!"

"No!"

"What the...?!" Yuna screamed. Miriam stumbled back, a hand flying to her mouth. Mateo's eyes widened in disbelief.

"He…" Naomi stared at the drifting cloud of blood, unable to finish the sentence. Cass took an involuntary step backward.

"That's... impossible." Even Atlas, who hadn't flinched through orbital training or neutron-matter exercises, stood motionless.

"…He just touched him." The observation platforms exploded into panic.

"Prototype Ten has been obliterated!"

"No biological integrity!"

"There's nothing left!" The shouting died as quickly as it had begun. Silence reclaimed the frozen wasteland. Lucien glanced down at the blood staining his sleeve.

"… Unfortunate." The fabric rippled. The blood vanished. Every stain dissolved into the weave itself until the suit appeared freshly pressed once more. He sighed softly, reached behind his back, and something unfolded. Click-click-click. An elegant black cane extended from a compact metal cylinder, its polished surface catching the pale Antarctic sunlight. Prototype Nine arrived next. Victor Hale crossed the distance in less than a heartbeat, both hands cocked for a strike powerful enough to split continents.

The cane rotated once within Lucien's fingers. CLACK. Panels unfolded. The shaft separated into impossible mechanical layers. A shoulder stock extended. A barrel telescoped forward. Blue circuitry illuminated beneath black alloy. Within a fraction of a second, the walking cane had become a sleek rifle humming with restrained violence. Victor's eyes widened. Lucien fired. The rifle barely made a sound. A thumb-sized projectile crossed the distance. Victor ceased. KWOOOM.

A perfectly circular hole the size of a bucket appeared through the center of his chest. There was no explosion. Only absence. Silence. Every prototype froze.

"…Victor?" Naomi's voice barely escaped her lips. Mateo stared, the color draining from his face.

"That's... impossible." Linh's pupils contracted.

"No..." Even to them, Victor had never looked slow. He'd been the blur they chased, the streak that reached orbit before they finished blinking, the one who joked about the sun between heartbeats. They couldn't even follow him. Yet the man in the suit had. He'd reacted. Selene looked from the rifle to the motionless figure suspended in the air, genuine disbelief cracking her composure.

"…How?" Cass swallowed.

"Victor was already moving."

"He was at full speed," Atlas muttered, unable to hide the disbelief in his voice.

"Nobody should've even seen him." Freya felt a knot tighten in her stomach.

"…He aimed after Victor started."

"No..." Elias whispered, eyes fixed on Lucien.

"He fired where Victor was going to be."

"No," Naomi said quietly, horror creeping into her voice.

"He fired... because he already knew." Far above them, Lucien lowered the rifle a fraction, his attention already returning to the watch in his hand, as though the fastest man any of them had ever known had been little more than an interruption. THUD. Victor's body finally struck the ice far below. Across the observation platforms, every scientist had stopped watching Victor. Their eyes were fixed on the rifle.

"…Is it… breathing?" one whispered. The weapon felt alive. Black alloy shifted beneath its surface like muscles settling under skin. Pale blue circuitry pulsed with the rhythm of a heartbeat, while microscopic plates expanded and contracted in slow, measured breaths. Even its impossible geometry subtly flexed and readjusted itself with the unconscious ease of a living creature.

"That's not engineering," another scientist murmured.

"That's anatomy." The projectile never slowed. It punched through the glacier. The bedrock. The mantle. The core. It erupted from the opposite side of the Earth in a pillar of molten stone that reached into space. The continent lurched. Mountains groaned. Earthquakes rippled beneath the Antarctic ice as fractures spread outward for hundreds of miles. Every observation platform convulsed violently. Scientists stumbled into railings as consoles slid across the heated walkways.

Coffee mugs toppled, shattering across reinforced flooring while holographic displays flickered wildly. Snow cascaded from surrounding peaks in roaring avalanches that thundered into the valleys below.

"Stabilizers!" Anti-gravitic platforms fought to remain level, their generators whining as warning lights flooded every control station.

"Seismic spike!"

"Magnitude twelve... no, it's still climbing!"

"We've lost satellite synchronization!"

"Planetary stress exceeding every predictive model!" One engineer simply stared at the telemetry, his lips moving without sound.

"…He shot through the Earth." Nobody answered. Scientists looked from the monitors to the distant horizon, then back again, as though reality might change if they checked twice. Another researcher slowly removed his glasses.

"…Jesus Christ." A senior analyst let out a single, hollow laugh before covering his mouth. Another scientist's face drained of colour.

"Did he just…"

"He went through the mantle…"

"The outer core…"

"The inner core…"

"The entire planet…"

"The core's still rotating!" someone screamed, their voice cracking.

"HOW IS THE CORE STILL ROTATING?!" Warnings flashed across every display as instruments desperately recalculated values they had never been built to measure. Then the room fell silent. Nobody had an answer. Nobody could even imagine one. Across the proving grounds, the remaining prototypes instinctively widened their stances as the glacier bucked beneath them. Ice split apart with deafening cracks, entire ridgelines collapsing into widening fissures. Even Atlas shifted his footing to steady himself.

Naomi never took her eyes off the impossible tunnel still glowing beneath Lucien's rifle. Nobody spoke after that. They simply watched the planet tremble around the man in the ash-coloured suit. Lucien looked toward the widening cracks with mild annoyance. He clicked his fingers.

"Pearl." The white drone drifted forward, its solitary blue lens brightening. A gentle humming filled the frozen air as soft blue light poured across the fractured glacier, flowing into every crack like liquid thread. The knitting radiance continued downward through the planet itself, chasing the impossible wound left by the projectile. The fissures halted. Closed. The tunnel through the Earth sealed from end to end. Molten rock became solid once more. The planet settled as though the shot had never been fired.

The humming ceased. Pearl returned silently to Lucien's shoulder. Scientists stared at impossible readings. They could only stand in speechless disbelief.

"The... the hole..." one researcher whispered.

"It's gone." Another scientist had quietly clasped his hands together, lips moving in silent prayer. A woman beside him slowly reached beneath her lab coat, produced a small silver cross, and gripped it so tightly her knuckles turned white.

"…Yea, though I walk through the valley..." she muttered under her breath, never taking her eyes off Lucien.

"No amount of praying is going to explain this," another scientist whispered, though he sounded as though he might start praying himself. Even among the prototypes, the display had unsettled them. Freya silently crossed herself. Elias glanced sideways.

"…You religious?" Without looking away from Lucien, Freya answered quietly.

"…I am now." Pearl gave a small, pleased chime. Lucien made another note on his watch.

"Collateral corrected." His pale blue eyes finally lowered from the display to the remaining prototypes.

"Now," he said calmly, "shall we proceed with introductions?"