CHAPTER 1198: STORM BRIG.

Nebula realized too late. Every teleport, every flicker of his blade field—it was being traced. Cain wasn’t chasing his movements, he was predicting them. He anticipated the next shift in coordinates and struck through it, catching Nebula mid-switch.

The result was catastrophic. Nebula’s torso erupted in a spray of blood and shards of broken armor, and for a moment his body flickered like unstable light. He staggered back, clutching his side, and Cain could see it—the hesitation, the first crack in his composure.

But victory didn’t come easy. Nebula’s eyes glowed, fury and exhilaration twisting his features. "You really think you’ve figured me out?" he hissed.

Cain’s only response was a grim, silent glare.

Nebula’s blades rose again—not thousands this time, but tens of thousands, merging into one monstrous shape above them. The sky dimmed beneath its shadow. Cain’s grip on {Eidwyrm} tightened, his pulse hammering in his ears. This wasn’t a duel anymore. It was annihilation waiting to happen.

The battlefield trembled as both monsters prepared to move once more.

The Grid’s core trembled under the weight of collapse.

What had once been a pristine monument of order now looked like a city bleeding light—streams of broken data coursing through the air like veins cut open. Cain stood in the center of the storm, his blade lowered, the hum of the dying servers vibrating through his bones.

Behind him, Hunter dragged a wounded Steve out of the wreckage, blood smeared across his cheek. Roselle was silent, her eyes fixed on the crumbling horizon.

"The Daelmonts won’t stop," Hunter said between ragged breaths. "Even if we burn the whole system, they’ll just move to another city. They’ve done it before."

Cain didn’t turn. "Then we find the core. The real one."

"The Deep Root?" Susan’s voice carried from behind a shattered terminal. "That’s a myth. Something the council made up to scare people off digging too deep."

"Everything starts somewhere," Cain replied, his tone cold, final. "Even rot."

Lightning flashed across the skyline, illuminating the ruined towers in stark, blue light. The rain came harder now, washing soot from his armor and revealing the faint glow of runic burns beneath the surface.

Roselle stepped forward. "Then we move before the rest of their forces regroup."

Hunter looked up, exhaustion in his eyes. "And if we run into the other factions? Half the city’s on fire, the other half’s looking for someone to blame."

Cain sheathed his sword, the motion smooth and deliberate. "Then they’ll find me."

The wind howled through the broken structures as they made their way toward the edge of the district. Their boots splashed through shallow water mixed with ash and blood. Neon signs flickered like dying stars overhead.

Steve limped, clutching his side. "You really think this ’Deep Root’ is real? We’ve been chasing ghosts since the first breach."

Cain paused, glancing back. "Ghosts leave shadows. We follow those."

They reached the entrance to a maintenance shaft buried beneath a collapsed plaza. The old lift system still hummed faintly—an echo of forgotten machinery buried under the city’s veins.

Roselle drew her gun, eyes scanning the dark. "We don’t know what’s waiting down there."

"We never do," Cain answered, stepping into the lift.

As they descended, the walls around them pulsed faintly with life. Data streams coiled through conduits like serpents, their light fading the deeper they went.

Hunter checked his rifle. "Feels like walking into a throat."

Susan smirked weakly. "Let’s just hope it doesn’t swallow."

The lift stopped with a hiss. The air below was heavier, charged with a static that made the hair on their arms rise. Ahead, an expanse opened—a subterranean network vast enough to swallow districts.

Everywhere they looked, roots of living metal twisted through the darkness, glowing faintly gold beneath grime and rust.

Steve whistled. "Guess the myth wasn’t much of one."

Roselle crouched near one of the roots, touching it lightly. "This... isn’t Daelmont tech. It’s older."

"Older than the Grid," Susan added, scanning the readings on her visor. "The material density’s off the charts."

Cain walked ahead, his boots echoing through the chamber. The hum of the structure resonated with something inside him, something deep and unpleasant.

Hunter frowned. "You hear that?"

Cain stopped. The sound was faint at first—a rhythmic pulse, like a heartbeat beneath steel. Then it grew louder, accompanied by whispers of static that formed half-words, fragmented data streams.

Access denied.

Core instability detected.

Reinitializing protocol... incomplete.

The voice came from nowhere and everywhere, cold and mechanical yet trembling with decay.

Cain’s eyes narrowed. "It’s aware."

Steve took a step back. "You mean sentient? Like—alive?"

"Alive enough to resist," Cain said.

Roselle stood, weapon ready. "Then we cut it off before it spreads."

Before he could answer, the ground beneath them shifted. The roots convulsed, metal shrieking as panels peeled away to reveal clusters of glowing eyes—drones fused into the infrastructure, their bodies twitching, half-melted, still functional.

Hunter cursed. "They’re merging with the system!"

Cain drew {Eidwyrm}, its surface reflecting the flickering light. "Then we purge it."

The first wave struck fast. Drones surged from the walls in a tide of fractured metal and blue fire. Cain swung, his blade carving through them in arcs of molten energy. Sparks rained across the chamber as the team scattered, returning fire.

Steve threw a charge, blowing apart a cluster of drones that had fused into a pillar. Roselle fired in controlled bursts, aiming for their cores.

But the system adapted. The drones shifted shape, folding and merging into larger, grotesque forms.

Cain drove {Eidwyrm} through one of the abominations, wrenching it free just as it exploded in a bloom of plasma. The blast threw him backward, but he landed in a crouch, breathing hard.

"Cain!" Hunter shouted. "They’re sealing us in!"

Metal roots snaked upward, closing the shaft they’d entered from.

Cain glanced around, eyes cold and deliberate. "Then we go deeper."

Susan stared at him. "You can’t be serious."

"Always am."

They charged forward, through fire and collapsing metal, toward the pulsing light in the distance—the heart of the Deep Root.

Each step carried them farther from the world above, and closer to whatever truth had been buried beneath it.

The last of the drones screeched, their bodies melting into the floor as the chamber ahead opened wide, glowing with a dull, crimson hue.

Cain’s voice was low, almost reverent. "We’ve found the heart."

Roselle looked at him sharply. "Then let’s see if it still bleeds."

The walls trembled again, the pulse quickening—like something vast awakening after a long, unwilling sleep.