CHAPTER 136: BURDEN OF ORIGINALITY

The screen on the wall still showed the two patterns side by side.

On the left was the Divine Serum: a messy, powerful, but flawed web of energy.

On the right was his own: a pure, perfect, unwavering star.

Jonah stared, unable to look away. The workshop suddenly felt like a cage. The truth, instead of setting him free, had locked him in a prison of one.

SIt was all you.

The words echoed in the silence. He wasn’t a product of the system. He wasn’t a copy of a dragon. He wasn’t even a hybrid. Every other Awakened in the nation, from the weakest Rank One to the Headmaster himself, shared a common thread. They were all branches of the same dying tree.

But he wasn’t. He was something else entirely. A different kind of life that grew in the cracks of their world.

He was an alien. An anomaly in the truest sense of the word. And for the first time since he’d left the Undercroft, he felt a fear so deep and cold it seemed to freeze the blood in his veins.

"What am I?" he whispered, the question escaping his lips before he could stop it.

Vanessa had been staring at the screen, deeply amazed. She immediately turned her head. The amazement vanished, replaced by sharp concern. She saw the panic in his eyes, the deep dread of a man whose whole world had just been crushed.

She took a half-step toward him, her voice firm and clear. "You’re our advantage, Jonah. That’s what you are."

He just shook his head, a bitter laugh escaping him. "I’m a freak, Vanessa. That’s what I am. A mistake."

"Don’t be an idiot," she snapped, her tone instantly cutting off any self-pity. Surprisingly, her sharp reply was more comforting than gentle reassurance, as it was so uniquely Vanessa. "You’re thinking like a victim. Start thinking like a Weaver."

She pointed a decisive finger at the screen. "Look at it. The Bureau has a sample of your blood. Right now, in some hidden lab, their best minds are hunched over it, trying to figure out the recipe."

She started pacing, her energy returning. "But they are working from a completely wrong idea! They think you’re a serum-hybrid. Their entire research model, every test they run, every theory they have, it’s all based on a lie."

She stopped and looked at him, her eyes bright with a sharp plan. "They are trying to solve a complicated equation, but they’ve written down the wrong numbers to start with. They can work on it for a hundred years and they will never get the right answer."

As he listened, her logic slowly cut through his fearful thoughts. She was right. He had been so caught up in the loneliness of the discovery, he hadn’t seen the weapon it had just handed them.

"So they’re chasing a ghost," he said, his voice finally steadying.

"Exactly!" Vanessa confirmed, a triumphant grin on her face. "They’re trying to figure out how to make a better lightbulb, but they don’t even know what electricity is. But we do."

She gestured back to the glowing star on the screen. "And more importantly, your source code is now identifiable. This pattern... it’s a magical signature that has never existed before in this world. It’s unique."

The burden of being an "original" began to lighten. It was still a heavy responsibility he could barely comprehend. If his power fell into the wrong hands, what could they do with it? The Headmaster’s vision of a soulless army of Weavers flashed in his mind. The thought was still horrifying, but now, it wasn’t inevitable. It was a future they could fight.

"So, if their research creates even a small trace of that signature..." Jonah started, the strategic implications clicking into place.

"We can find it," Vanessa finished for him, her mind clearly already miles ahead. "We’re not looking for the Bureau anymore. We’re not looking for labs or soldiers. We are looking for a whisper. A faint, corrupted trace of you."

She practically ran back to her main console, her fingers flying across the holographic interface. Schematics and runic equations began to swirl in the air above the keyboard.

"A standard runic detector won’t work," she muttered, thinking out loud. "It’s designed to find known frequencies. This is... new physics. It’s like trying to catch a radio wave with a butterfly net."

"So we build a new net," Jonah said, standing beside her now, his fear completely replaced by a cold resolve.

Vanessa looked up at him and smiled. "Now you’re thinking like a Weaver."

She pulled up a fresh design schematic, a blank, glowing grid. With a few swipes, she began to draw the core components of a new device. It was shaped like a compass, with a complex, multi-layered crystal at its heart.

"I can design a new kind of runic sensor," she explained, her voice alive with the thrill of creating something new. "Not a broad-spectrum scanner, but something highly specialized. A ’Resonance Compass’."

She drew the central array. "It’s not designed to find a power source. Its only function will be to listen. To detect the unique vibration of your non-serum energy signature."

Her hands moved faster, weaving complex runic patterns that flowed from her mind onto the screen.

"It won’t be able to find you," she clarified. "Your signature is too pure, too stable. But any attempt to artificially replicate it? To splice it? That process will be messy. It will create instability. It will give off corrupted traces."

She completed the final circuit on the blueprint and leaned back, admiring her work. The design on the screen glowed with a golden light. It was elegant, powerful, and more than a little bit miraculous.

It was their tracking device. Their first, real weapon in the Genesis War.

"And those traces," Vanessa said, turning to him with a look of absolute confidence. "This compass will hear them from a mile away."