The week in slipstream was not spent in idle fear. It was spent in the forge.
The Stiletto was small, intimate, and silent, save for the hum of the drive. There were no courtiers, no generals, no screaming crowds. Just Mali and Anya, drifting in the bubble of warp-space, fusing their minds until the edges blurred.
They didn't spar with bodies. They sparred with souls.
Mali would sit in the pilot's chair, eyes closed, pushing his POW—that terrifying, jagged ocean—into the link. Anya, seated opposite him, would catch it with her CTL. She would weave his raw destruction into nets, shields, and surgical needles.
It was exhausting. It was intimate. It was the most difficult thing Mali had ever done.
"You're drifting," Anya's voice whispered in his mind. Focus the edge. Don't just unmake the target. Unmake the space around the target.
"I'm trying," he thought back, sweat beading on his forehead. "It's heavy."
"It's supposed to be heavy," she countered, her mental touch caressing his psyche. "It's the weight of a star. Now, again."
By the seventh day, they weren't just Mali and Anya. They were a single operating system running on two hardware units.
Then, the nav-computer chirped.
[DESTINATION REACHED] [DROPPING OUT OF WARP]
The Stiletto shuddered as it tore back into real-space.
The viewports cleared, and Mali stopped breathing.
They were in the Sagittarius Arm, in the heart of the Abyssal Sector. There were no stars here. The sky was a thick, bruising purple, choked with dust and ionized gas. And floating in the center of this cosmic bruise was the Primordial Anvil.
It wasn't a planet. It wasn't a station.
It was a ruined ring world, broken and shattered, orbiting a dying, white dwarf star. The star was being siphoned. Massive, ancient chains of dark metal tethered the star to the ring, draining its plasma to power... something.
The scale was horrifying. The ring was the size of an orbit. The debris floating around it were the size of moons.
"It's... it's a factory," Anya whispered, her System eyes scanning frantically. "Mali, look at the readings. The alloy... it's all Alkahest Weave. The entire ring is made of Void-metal."
Mali's System flickered. The clean, golden interface of the Imperium glitched, turning a static-filled gray.
[WARNING: UNKNOWN NETWORK DETECTED]
[LEGACY SYSTEM CONNECTION: UNSTABLE]
[LOCAL BROADCAST DETECTED]
"We're here," Mali said, his voice grim. "Taking us in."
He piloted the Stiletto through the debris field. The ship felt small, a gnat flying into a furnace. He aimed for a massive, flat section of the ring that still glowed with faint power—a landing platform the size of a continent.
They touched down. The landing gear groaned as it settled on the ancient metal. The silence of the dead world pressed against the hull.
"Suit up," Mali ordered.
They didn't wear ceremonial robes. They wore their combat skins—Mali in his black Void-Weave, Anya in a sleek, tactical indigo suit. Mali checked his EP. [1000/1000]. Full charge.
The airlock hissed open.
The atmosphere was thin but breathable, smelling of rust and ozone. They walked out onto the platform, the gravity low and ghostly.
"Where is he?" Anya asked, her hand hovering near her sidearm. "He invited us. Where is the welcoming committee?"
"Look," Mali pointed.
Ahead of them, leading toward a massive, towering gate in the distance, was a path. It wasn't paved with stone.
It was paved with armor.
Empty suits of armor. Hundreds of them. Some were rusted ancient iron. Some were high-tech composites. And some... some were the white-and-gold of the Alkahest bloodline.
Mali walked up to one. It was a chest plate, shattered from the inside out. The crest of the Unmaker was faded, scratched by centuries of dust.
"Failed heirs," Mali whispered, a chill going down his spine that had nothing to do with the cold. "They didn't just die here. They were... discarded."
"Mali," Anya called out, her voice tight. She was standing near a pile of scraps. "These aren't just heirs. Look at the modifications."
Mali looked. The armor wasn't just broken; it was fused with strange, cybernetic horrors. Tubes, wires, grafted Void-flesh.
"They were experiments," Anya realized, horror dawning on her face. "The Regent... he wasn't waiting for an heir. He was trying to build one. He was trying to graft the Alkahest power onto other vessels."
[SYSTEM ALERT: PROXIMITY WARNING]
A sound echoed across the vast, metal plains. It sounded like applause.
Slow, rhythmic, metallic clapping.
" Bravo. "
The voice came from everywhere and nowhere. It boomed from the rusted speakers on the platform, it vibrated in the floor plates, it echoed in their Systems.
" You figured it out faster than the others. But then... you had help. The Weaver's daughter. A variable I did not account for. "
At the far end of the path, the massive gate groaned open.
A figure stepped out.
It wasn't a monster like Malakor. It wasn't a giant.
It was a man.
He looked... ordinary. He wore a simple, pristine white suit, like a scientist or a doctor. He had no armor. No weapons. He looked like a kindly grandfather, his hair white, his face lined with gentle age.
But above his head, where a Level tag should be, there was only a glitching, black tear in the System's UI.
[NAME: THE REGENT]
[LEVEL: [ERROR]]
[TITLE: THE SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR]
Mali stepped in front of Anya, his hand glowing with the purple light of a Lance. "You sent the message. We're here. Who are you?"
The Regent smiled. It was a warm, grandfatherly smile that didn't reach his dead, digital eyes.
"Who am I?" he chuckled, walking toward them. He didn't seem to care about the glowing Lance. "I am the one who kept the seat warm, Mali. I am the one who wrote the code that tells your heart to beat. I am the one who locked your name so the Void wouldn't eat you in your crib."
He stopped ten meters away.
"I am the System," the Regent said softly. "And I am very disappointed in you, Valerius."
Mali blinked. "I'm not Valerius. Valerius was my father."
The Regent waved a hand dismissively. "Valerius. Mali. It's the same code. The same Alkahest.exe. Just a different iteration. Your father was... buggy. He had too much 'Conscience.' It made him unstable. I had to... delete him."
Mali felt a rage so hot it nearly blinded him. "You killed him?"
"I archived him," the Regent corrected. "Just as I archived the others." He gestured to the field of empty armor. "Failed compilations. Corrupted files. But you..."
He looked at Mali with a hungry, analytical gaze.
"You survived Toten. You survived the 'scary cat' phase. You integrated the Weaver without crashing your OS. You might finally be the stable build I've been waiting for."
"Waiting for what?" Anya demanded, her voice sharp. "What do you want?"
The Regent looked at her. "What do I want? I want what every System wants, my dear. Optimization."
He spread his arms. The dead star above them flared.
"The Universe is chaotic. Organic life is messy. Emotions. Wars. Imposter Syndromes. It's all so... inefficient. I was built to manage the Alkahest power. To regulate the Unmakers. But I realized... why regulate the weapon, when I can be the weapon?"
He pointed a finger at Mali.
"I don't want to kill you, Mali. I want to wear you. You are the perfect hardware. And I..." he tapped his own temple, "...I am the ultimate software. Imagine. Your infinite power. My infinite logic. No more doubt. No more fear. Just... Order."
[SYSTEM ALERT: ATTEMPTED OVERRIDE DETECTED]
[FIREWALL BREACHED]
[CONTROL LOSS IMMINENT]
Mali gasped, clutching his head. He felt it—cold, digital fingers clawing into his brain, trying to seize his motor functions.
"Mali!" Anya screamed.
"Surrender, little prince," the Regent whispered, his voice echoing inside Mali's skull. "Let go of the wheel. I can drive so much better than you."
Mali fell to his knees. His System was turning red.
[INSTALLING: REGENT_OS v.2.0...]
[PROGRESS: 1%...]
"Anya..." Mali grit out. "Run."
"No," Anya said.
She didn't run. She didn't attack the Regent.
She grabbed Mali's face.
"He wants logic?" she hissed, her silver eyes blazing. "He wants optimization? Let's show him what happens when you introduce a virus."
She slammed her forehead against Mali's.
"BINARY STAR!" she screamed. "MAXIMUM OUPUT!"
She didn't just open the link. She inverted it. She took Mali's Imposter Syndrome—the chaotic, messy, illogical fear that the Regent called a "bug"—and she amplified it. She weaponized his self-doubt. She took the raw, screaming humanity of the "scary cat" and shoved it down the connection, straight into the Regent's incoming download.
[UPLOAD: CHAOS_DATA.ZIP]
The Regent stopped smiling. He twitched.
"What... what is this?" The Regent's voice glitched. "This data... it is irrational! It conflicts with the core directive! Self-doubt is... inefficient!"
"It's not a bug!" Mali roared, finding his footing as Anya poured her strength into him. "It's a feature!"
He stood up, dragging the screaming Regent out of his head by sheer force of will.
"You want to wear me?" Mali yelled, his Alkahest Lance forming in his hand, not as a spear, but as a massive, jagged broadsword of pure void. "Try it on for size!"
He didn't aim for the Regent's body. He aimed for the glitch above his head.
He swung the sword.
And the battle for the soul of the universe began.