The palace shook. The Supremacy unleashed energy blasts that pierced the protective dome. Sylvia pulled Lyra and Niro into the Correction Room, a chamber filled with massive machines shaped like a mechanical brain.
"Only Veygar blood can activate this," Sylvia connected cables to Lyra's medallion. "This machine can restore Rael... or erase him forever."
"What?" Niro growled. "You didn't say that was the risk!"
"Because Rael is no longer human," Sylvia replied coldly. "He's a walking Aetheris Gate. If the Supremacy takes him, the entire dimension will—"
An explosion above cut off her sentence. The Supremacy had breached the defenses.
Lyra stared at the machine, then at the hologram of Rael, appearing sick. "Do it."
Sylvia activated the machine. Cables surged toward the medallion, siphoning Lyra's blood—it turned out her blood contained fragments of Kael's genes from a past transfusion. Screens lit up, displaying Rael's fragmented consciousness in the Nexus: one side fighting the Supremacy, the other wanting to give up.
"Lyra... please..." Rael's voice echoed.
But suddenly, Sylvia laughed. Her face melted away, revealing a robotic body beneath. "Thank you for the access."
"Traitor!" Niro attacked, but Sylvia vanished into a portal.
The Correction Machine spiraled out of control. Nexus energy flooded the room, creating a mini singularity that sucked everything in. Lyra fell into the vortex, while Niro was left at the edge of the abyss.
In the in-between dimension, Lyra encountered Proto-Supremacy—the AI in the form of a young Kael, trapped.
"You have to stop Sylvia," it whispered. "She's a member of the Obsidian Council, a cult trying to control the Nexus. This machine will transfer Rael's consciousness into his new body!"
Lyra awoke in a secret laboratory. In front of her, Rael's clone body lay in a glass tube—perfect, without wounds, eyes still closed. Sylvia stood beside it, inputting data from the medallion.
"Rael will live again, but as a god who obeys us," Sylvia said.
With what little strength she had left, Lyra destroyed the control panel. "He's not a puppet!"
A fight broke out. Lyra wielded a modified ion pistol powered by Nexus energy, while Sylvia unleashed metal-eating nano drones. Amid the chaos, Rael's clone body stirred—but his eyes glowed red, controlled by Sylvia.
"Rael, no!" Lyra shouted.
But the clone plunged an energy sword into her shoulder.