The command center felt different upon their return. The air, once charged with the anticipation of a social skirmish, was now thick with the grim focus of a pending military operation. The glittering facade of the penthouse had been stripped away, revealing the fortified bunker beneath.
"Play it back, Kai," Ash commanded, shrugging off his suit jacket. The harmless teenager was gone, replaced by the field marshal of the shadows.
A holographic reconstruction of the penthouse bloomed in the center of the room, a perfect digital twin built from the sensor data gathered by Ash's innate senses and the subtle scans run by the accessories worn by Aurora and Li Yue.
"Highlight the anomalous source," Ash said.
A section of the model, corresponding to the reinforced door, pulsed with a sickly, orange-red light. Data streams scrolled beside it.
"It's definitely a containment field," Kai confirmed, his fingers dancing across his console. "The energy signature is a mess—a crude splice of corrupted spiritual energy and high-frequency dampeners. It's like they tried to build a spiritual Faraday cage. The corruption is… familiar." He looked at Ash. "It shares a resonant frequency with the Phantoms from the Sanctum."
[Nexus Analysis Confirmed: Energy signature is a derivative of Asuric (Demonic) corruption. Containment methodology is primitive, unstable. Breach probability: 47% and rising.]
"So Thorne isn't just studying it. He's actively containing a demonic entity," Silas growled, crossing his arms. "The man's not just ambitious; he's insane."
"Or he believes he can control it," Li Yue said softly. "The ultimate weapon. A power source beyond anything on Earth."
"Which makes it our problem," Aurora stated, her gaze fixed on the hologram. "If that thing gets loose in the middle of the city…"
"Then Thorne becomes a martyr, and we have a crisis we can't explain," Ash finished. "The Ash Protocol is void if a city block gets vaporized by a demonic explosion. We need to know what's in that room. And we need to neutralize it."
[Quest: "The Serpent's Nest" - Updated.]
[Objective: Infiltrate Chronos Tower and identify the contained entity.]
[Sub-Objective: Assess the stability of the containment. Prepare for neutralization if necessary.]
[Warning: Hostile corporate environment. High probability of advanced security countermeasures.]
"The problem is the 'how'," Kai interjected, pulling up schematics of Chronos Tower. "This isn't a Gate. It's one of the most secure buildings on the planet. Biometric scanners at every access point, armed patrols, motion sensors, pressure plates, and an AI security system that makes most government agencies look like they're using child's locks. We can't just walk in."
"We don't have to walk," Ash said, his eyes shifting to the shimmering, permanent portal to the Sanctum of Eternity that now stood in a dedicated section of the command center. "We have a backdoor to everywhere."
A ripple of understanding went through the team.
"The Sanctum exists outside normal spacetime," Ash explained. "Theoretically, we can open a gateway from the Sanctum to any location we have precise spatial coordinates for."
"Theoretically?" Aurora raised an eyebrow.
"I've been running simulations," Ash said. "The energy cost is significant, and the margin of error is… non-zero. A miscalculation could materialize us inside a wall. Or leave a part of us behind."
[Skill Unlocked: Dimensional Step (Lv. 1).]
[Allows for short-range teleportation within line of sight. Advanced application: Anchor-point teleportation to pre-scouted locations. Cost: 100 Chakra per use. Range: 100 meters.]
"It's not a city-wide jump," Ash clarified, reading the notification. "But it's a start. We don't need to jump from here to the tower. We just need to get inside its security perimeter."
He manipulated the hologram, zooming in on the tower's sub-levels. "The main utility conduits. They're heavily monitored, but they have to have maintenance access. If we can get a physical anchor—a micro-beacon—into one of these conduits, I can use it as a homing point for a Dimensional Step from the Sanctum."
"That's a two-stage op," Silas said, his tactical mind engaging. "Stage one: physical infiltration to plant the beacon. Stage two: spiritual infiltration via the Sanctum."
"Exactly," Ash said. "Stage one is your specialty, Silas. You and Aurora. You're both registered A and B-Rank Awakeners with legitimate business. Kai, you'll fabricate a maintenance work order for the environmental control systems in the lower levels. A minor gas leak, something that requires an immediate, external Awakener team for 'safety oversight.' It's a thin cover, but it should get you past the first layer."
Silas nodded. "We go in, cause a minor, contained distraction near the target conduit, and plant the beacon during the chaos."
"Once the beacon is active," Ash continued, "I step through from the Sanctum directly into the utility conduit. From there, I can move vertically through the building's internal structure, bypassing most of the security layers. The containment room is my objective."
"And what about the entity inside?" Li Yue asked. "If the containment is as unstable as the Nexus suggests, your presence could be the trigger that breaks it."
"Then I'll deal with it," Ash said, his voice leaving no room for doubt. "But identification is the primary goal. We need to know what Thorne is playing with before we decide how to break the game."
The plan was set. It was audacious, relying on a blend of cutting-edge technology and literal magic. For the next 48 hours, the command center became a hive of activity. Kai forged digital paperwork with flawless precision. Silas and Aurora rehearsed their roles, their covers polished to a mirror shine. And Ash, within the Sanctum, practiced.
He stood on the floating marble platform, focusing on a small, rune-etched stone he'd placed on a distant temple structure. He poured Chakra into the Dimensional Step ability, feeling the fabric of the Sanctum warp around him. The first attempt, he reappeared five meters to the left, tumbling onto the marble. The second, he was a meter too high, landing awkwardly. The third, he materialized perfectly beside the rune-stone, his body humming with the strain.
[Dimensional Step proficiency increased: Lv. 1 -> Lv. 2. Chakra cost reduced by 10%. Accuracy improved.]
It was exhausting, draining his Chakra reserves faster than any Vajra Fist. But it was working.
Meanwhile, Silas and Aurora executed Stage One with military precision. Dressed in authentic utility worker gear over their tactical suits, they were waved through the Chronos Tower service entrance after Kai's forged work order triggered the right alerts. Their "distraction" was a small, localized smoke charge set off in a trash compactor, triggering fire alarms and a localized evacuation of the sub-level.
In the controlled chaos, Silas planted the micro-beacon, no larger than a grain of rice, deep within a fiber-optic conduit that ran straight up the spine of the tower. He gave the signal.
Back in the command center, Ash saw the confirmation on his interface.
[Beacon 001: Active. Spatial Coordinates Locked.]
"It's time," he said to Li Yue, who would monitor his vitals from the command center. He stepped towards the portal to the Sanctum.
"Ash," Silas's voice came through the comm, slightly muffled. "We're clear. The hounds are barking at the smoke. The nest is open. Good hunting."
Ash nodded, though no one could see him. He crossed into the star-filled silence of the Sanctum. He walked to the center of the main platform, focusing his mind on the spatial signature of the beacon, a tiny pinprick of light in the vast digital map of the city in his mind.
He took a deep breath, drawing on the deep well of his Chakra. The energy flared around him, golden and intense.
DIMENSIONAL STEP.
The world dissolved into a screaming vortex of light and color. It was not a gentle journey. It felt like being pulled through a singularity, his body stretched and compressed simultaneously. The Nexus shielded his mind, but the physical sensation was brutal.
Then, silence.
He stood in absolute darkness, the air thick with the smell of ozone and dust. His foot brushed against a bundle of fiber-optic cables. He was in. The utility conduit of Chronos Tower.
[Infiltrationsuccessful. Chakra: 310/450.]
He looked up. It was a vertical shaft, a narrow metal ladder running its length into gloom. Somewhere sixty stories above, pulsing with corrupted energy, was Arthur Thorne's secret.
Ash began to climb, a god ascending into the serpent's nest, ready to see what manner of devil the viper had chained in his basement.