Chapter 33: The Sovereign’s Dark Dawn

The Alpine valley greets the dawn with a expanse of thin mist hugging the green slopes. In an isolated secret residence on the outskirts of Geneva, the sound of soft exhales from a tiny baby, now named Gabriel, plays peacefully inside a room adorned in walnut wood.

Genevieve sits beside the bed, her fingers gently caressing the cheek of the baby, who radiates a dim golden glow. In the corner of the room, Ethan and Stella sleep soundly wrapped in thick blankets, exhausted after enduring the consecutive traumas plaguing their lives.

Alexander Rington stands near the tall window facing the lake. His military cloak has been replaced with a plain black shirt, yet his posture remains as upright as a steel wall ready to withstand any storm.

He gazes at his own reflection in the glass. The slash mark on his chest has faded into a fine silver line thanks to cellular regeneration, but the vigilance within his silver irises has not waned in the slightest.

"You haven’t slept since we landed, Alex," Genevieve’s voice breaks the silence of the room.

Alexander turns his body, stepping closer to the bed while carving a thin smile. "Someone has to stay awake so the nightmare doesn’t find a gap to creep back into this house."

Genevieve sighs softly, reaching for Alexander’s hand and squeezing it tightly. "Elias fell along with the Valhalla station. Julian sacrificed himself. There are no clan leaders left to pursue our children’s blood, are there?"

Alexander stares into his wife’s hazel eyes. His tactical logic dictates that the destruction of Valhalla should mark the total annihilation of the old leadership faction. However, the presence of the emergency launch capsule detected by the shuttle’s radar prior to atmospheric entry remains a sharp thorn in his mind.

"We are safe here, Genevieve," Alexander says gently, choosing to provide the certainty her soul requires. "Daniel has deployed the entire Obsidian Legion unit to guard a fifty-kilometer radius perimeter."

A soft, rhythmic knock three times on the wooden door disrupts their conversation.

Alexander signals Genevieve to stay beside the bed, then steps toward the door and opens it slightly. Daniel stands outside the corridor in all-black attire, his face drawn in a heavy line of tension.

"There’s something you need to see in the emergency monitoring room, Alex," Daniel whispers in a hushed tone.

Alexander nods briefly, steps out into the corridor noiselessly, and then proceeds down the spiral staircase toward the residence’s underground command facility.

Inside the monitoring room enveloped in the blue glow of computer monitors, three Obsidian Legion intelligence analysts work rapidly processing lines of encrypted data.

"What did you find, Daniel?" Alexander asks directly as he stands before the main projection screen.

Daniel presses a navigation button on the control console. "Fourteen hours after the destruction of Valhalla, weather monitoring satellites belonging to the European space agency detected a low-frequency signal transmission anomaly emanating from deep underground along the border of Finland and Russia."

A three-dimensional topographical map appears in the air, displaying a taiga forest area covered in perpetual ice. In the center of the isolated area, a red dot blinks in a steady rhythm, exactly sixty times per minute, resembling a giant heartbeat.

"A Cold War-era underground base?" Alexander guesses, his eyes narrowing as he studies the coordinate lines.

"Not just a base," Daniel cuts in while zooming in on the graphic display. "This is Facility K-12, the most classified biological genetic experiment site ever built by Elias Rington before he founded The Black Sun. The facility is powered by an independent geothermal reactor and shielded from standard satellite radar scans."

Alexander plants both hands on the edge of the console table. "What signal is being broadcast from there?"

The intelligence analyst beside Daniel plays an audio recording cleaned of static interference.

The echoing sound of a low-frequency thrum fills the monitoring room—a massive dual biological vibration echo triggering a microscopic resonance in the water glass atop the laboratory table!

Alexander feels it instantly. The blood vessels in his neck suddenly pulse, synchronizing their rhythm with the sound! The pure golden glow in his eyes blazes reflexively, triggering an Immunological Chain Reaction within his own blood cell tissues!

"That’s not a mechanical signal," Alexander hisses, his voice shifting into a cold, dual articulation. "That is a biological heartbeat."

"Not just one heart, Alex," Daniel adds, his face pale. "Biometric spectrum analysis shows two giant blood circulation systems beating within a single main organ. Someone is growing an artificial organism inside that base at a cellular maturation speed a hundred times beyond normal limits."

Alexander clenches his fists until his knuckles crack loudly. "Elias."

"The escape capsule from Valhalla indeed landed at those coordinates thirteen hours ago," Daniel states firmly. "Elias never intended to win the battle in space. Valhalla was merely a distraction to buy time so he could extract a pure blood sample from you!"

Suddenly, all monitors in the monitoring room shut off simultaneously!

Red emergency lights flash wildly along the laboratory walls. The air conditioning system abruptly stops blowing, replaced by a scorching heat rushing through the ventilation circulation!

"Someone hacked our internal communication network!" the intelligence analyst shouts while attempting to type recovery commands on the keyboard. "Perimeter control access is severed!"

Alexander draws a heavy-caliber tactical pistol from his belt, racking the weapon in one precise motion. "Daniel! Secure Genevieve and the children in the evacuation helicopter now!"

"What about you?!" Daniel screams amidst the roar of the danger sirens.

"I will hold off whatever tries to break through the front door!" Alexander asserts absolutely.

The Swiss residence’s outer steel gate, twenty centimeters thick, explodes violently inward!

A blast of shockwaves and red flames sweeps the outer parking lot clean! However, unlike previous attacks launched by helicopter fleets or armored vehicles, no sound of roaring engines or assault rifle fire is heard.

There is only a single set of footsteps.

Footsteps so heavy and slow, treading on the gravel ground with pressure strong enough to trigger local seismic tremors around the mansion!

Alexander steps out from the underground facility door, standing tall amidst the billowing black smoke rising from the destroyed gate. The bio-electric sword in his right hand ignites brightly, emitting a burning golden flash that slices through the darkness of the night.

From behind the swirling smoke of the explosion, a form steps out that causes the blood in every vessel of Alexander’s soul to freeze instantly.

The figure stands over two and a half meters tall, encased in a pitch-black biological protective shell resembling a chitinous armor that emits a burning red glow from the gaps in its joints.

Its body possesses perfectly symmetrical proportions with actively throbbing muscles. However, most terrifying of all is its facial feature.

The creature’s face lacks human eyes, nose, or ears. There is only a dual jaw structure lined with sharply pointed blackish claws, as well as a golden dragon-shaped birthmark pattern carved and burning in the center of its chest!

Subject "Deus"—Elias Rington’s giant creation.

The organism halts its steps ten meters in front of Alexander. It holds no firearms or steel swords.

From the gaps of its slowly opening dual jaw, toxic chemical vapor spews out, instantly burning the surrounding green grass into black ash!

"Alexander Rington."

An immensely heavy, dual-articulated voice echoes directly inside Alexander’s brain through absolute biological telepathic induction—a combined voice of thousands of mutation frequencies specifically designed to damage the central nervous system!

Alexander raises his golden sword, positioning himself in the highest combat stance. "You are Elias’s artificial monster."

The creature does not deny it. It raises its right hand, which features five thirty-centimeter-long blackish claws.

With speed completely illogical for its giant body size, the creature charges forward!

A single swing from the creature’s claw strikes Alexander’s bio-electric sword!

The kinetic energy blast generated from the impact is so catastrophic that it hurls Alexander’s body across the courtyard, slamming into the marble pillars of the mansion until they shatter into pieces!

Alexander falls face down upon the marble ruins, vomiting fresh blood from his mouth. The bio-electric sword in his hand cracks in a thousand places, losing its golden glow in an instant! The pure physical strength of the artificial creature surpasses all limits of combat capacity Alexander has ever faced in his entire life!

The creature steps toward Alexander slowly, unhurried, like an executioner enjoying the seconds before the execution.

From atop the mansion roof, Daniel fires a heavy-caliber rocket launcher directly into the creature’s head!

A blast of fire envelops the giant body. However, as the smoke thins, the black chitin shell on its head is not even scratched in the slightest! The creature merely turns its head slowly toward Daniel, then flicks its left hand.

A wave of kinetic air pressure bursts from its palm, shattering the mansion roof and throwing Daniel sliding down into the rubble!

"DANIEL!" Alexander shouts, trying to rise to his feet despite his severely cracked ribs.

The creature stops its steps directly above Alexander’s body. It grips Alexander’s neck with its giant hand, lifting the man hovering a meter in the air effortlessly!

Alexander grips the creature’s wrist with both hands, channeling all remaining bio-electric energy from his pure blood directly into the creature’s shell skin!

A golden glow burns the skin of the creature’s hand. However, instead of suffering cellular damage, the creature actually absorbs all of Alexander’s biological energy into the golden dragon glow on its chest!

Alexander’s eyes widen in pure horror as he feels his strength drain drastically and suddenly!

"Your body is our nourishment," the creature’s telepathic voice echoes coldly inside Alexander’s head.

At the same time, the destroyed main door of the mansion creaks open.

Genevieve steps out with a face consumed by absolute terror, holding baby Gabriel tightly against her chest while Ethan and Stella hide behind their mother’s robe.

"ALEXANDER!" Genevieve screams hysterically upon seeing her husband choked helplessly in the giant creature’s grasp!

The creature turns its head slowly toward Genevieve and baby Gabriel.

The golden dragon glow on the creature’s chest ignites with the deepest burning intensity, responding to the presence of baby Gabriel’s pure blood from a distance of ten meters!

From behind the darkness of the forest behind the destroyed gate, Elias Rington steps out with his gold-plated staff, carving a smile of absolute victory upon witnessing a helpless Alexander.

"A very simple choice, Alexander," Elias says in a tone of voice that multiplies the soul’s agony. "Surrender the baby to be integrated into Deus’s body... or watch this creature crush your neck right in front of your wife and children’s eyes right now!"

The giant creature tightens its fingers around Alexander’s neck.

A fine cracking sound from Alexander’s neck bones rings clearly amidst the silence of the night, while pure golden blood spews heavily from his mouth, soaking the monster’s black shell as it now points its left claw straight toward baby Gabriel’s heart!

Through his consciousness, which grows increasingly blurry and fades toward darkness, Alexander looks into Genevieve’s eyes one last time, while the giant creature whispers one f

inal telepathic word that shreds all hope.

"Your evolution ends tonight."