The coral reef cast shadows like vertebrae under the searchlights. Lu Chen stared at his mechanical arm, submerged in seawater—his skin was surfacing with the same barcode as Xiaoyu's.
The corpses of the Deep Divers floated inside the chamber, each with a crucifix-shaped neural plug embedded in the back of their necks.
"Your cells are resonating with the Sanctuary." Anastasia's voice echoed from all directions, her holographic projection hovering in the crimson seawater. "Fifteen years ago, I created the first X-23 in this underwater laboratory. Back then, it was humanity's last hope for curing ALS."
Lu Chen shielded the unconscious Xiaoyu behind him. His cybernetic eye pierced through the projection, revealing the true form behind the console—a brain, suspended in nutrient fluid. Mycelial tendrils extended from the neural tissue, weaving into the circuitry of the sunken facility.
"Bai Jin was my student… and the first volunteer to merge with the infection." The brain quivered in its cryogenic chamber. "What she split was not only her genes—but her guilt."
The hologram abruptly switched to surveillance footage of a Mexico City slum: Lu Chen himself was strapping a five-year-old Xiaoyu onto an operating table. Her terrified screams overlapped with her weak breathing behind him.
His mechanical arm suddenly pierced through the console's protective casing, and he heard his own voice sneer—a voice that didn't belong to him.
"Finally found the master server."
His vision forcibly switched to raw data streams. He saw countless versions of himself across different timelines—slaughtering, betraying, pressing the gas valve. Each memory bore Black Tower's encrypted watermark.
"No!" Lu Chen drove a dagger into his thigh, the pain momentarily breaking the neural override.
Anastasia's brain erupted with searing light. The entire underwater lab tilted violently as the crystalline girls in the incubation pods opened their eyes—simultaneously.
Xiaoyu's crucifix burned in the deep water, but the flames were an icy, ghostly blue. Lu Chen clutched her as they crashed into a ventilation duct. Behind them, it wasn't seawater that pursued them—it was thick, coagulating blood. The Ashen's Neurovore warheads had contaminated the entire ocean.
His mechanical arm flashed endless error warnings. His cybernetic eye displayed a new reading: his DNA similarity to Xiaoyu had reached 42%.
"Brother…" The girl in his arms suddenly spoke, her pupils shifting into golden streams of data. "Escape Pod Three requires retinal authorization."
She tore off a piece of her own fingernail and jammed it into the interface of Lu Chen's mechanical arm. The pain was worse than the Neurovores gnawing on his nervous system.
As the escape pod door hissed open, Lu Chen saw someone curled up inside—Tang Jiu. Or rather, the upper half of Tang Jiu.
Below his waist, his body had fused with a Breeder's neural tendrils. His fingers were typing furiously on a floating virtual keyboard.
"Surprised?" Tang Jiu's electronic eye flickered red. "From the moment you entered the chapel, seventeen versions of me have been observing you in sync."
He yanked open his shirt, revealing his chest cavity—inside were twenty cloned Xiaoyu brains wired directly into his nervous system.
"Black Tower's Ark Project isn't just about survival. It's about uploading all of humanity into a cloud-based consciousness like me."
Lu Chen slashed through the tendrils, severing the connection. Black blood sprayed across the pod walls, revealing a hidden map beneath the splatter.
Tang Jiu laughed and spat out a magnetic keycard.
"Go to the reactor. Detonate the purification bomb—it's the only way to kill the master brain."
Before he could say another word, his head exploded.
Lu Chen's mechanical arm moved on its own, seizing the keycard and driving it straight into his own temple.
Agonizing pain sent him crashing to his knees. His retinal display filled with a countdown in blood-red digits:
[ARK FUSION: 00:15:00 REMAINING]
Xiaoyu was drawing a circuit pattern using her own blood.
A sudden impact shook the escape pod.
Through the observation window, Bai Jin's mutated form clung to the glass.
With her untainted left hand, she traced words onto the surface—
[Mommy's here to save you.]
The reactor core was filled with human skeletons, each frozen in a posture of prayer. As Lu Chen stepped forward, a brittle skull cracked beneath his boot, emitting the sound of a crying infant.
Instantly, fungal tendrils surged from the ground, wrapping around his ankles.
Xiaoyu's crucifix vibrated at a high frequency, sending an electric pulse through the air. The tendrils recoiled violently, revealing a membrane-like display embedded beneath the bones.
"Welcome home, X-23-7."
On the screen, Park Chang-ho's face flickered into view. His body had fully fused with the Master Strain.
"Final synchronization is now commencing."
Lu Chen's mechanical arm twisted against his will, slamming Xiaoyu onto the authentication platform.
Thin data cables extended from between her ribs, latching onto the reactor's control pillar.
A tsunami of memories crashed through Lu Chen's mind.
—He saw Anastasia carving into Bai Jin's brain on an operating table.
—He saw himself leading Black Tower forces in a massacre of the Silent Church's congregation.
—And then, Tang Jiu's final message before uploading his consciousness:
"The true Ark is—"
"STOP!",Bai Jin's mutated tendrils ripped through the blast doors. Half of her face was already overtaken by fungal growths,"Don't trust the Master Brain!",But it was too late,The reactor had already activated.From the depths of the ocean, Xiaoyu's clones emerged, swimming toward the core.
They began to form a biological matrix, encircling the reactor like a ritual.
Lu Chen's mechanical arm moved on its own, inputting the detonation sequence,Only then did he realize,The purification bomb had already been swapped out,In its place was a fusion catalyst,The Master Brain's voice thundered in his skull:"The New Humanity shall be reborn from these bones!"Tendrils impaled his spine,Xiaoyu's body was crystallizing,And across his own skin, the same iridescent scales as Xiaoya's began to emerge.
In the final second before his consciousness faded,Lu Chen severed his left arm's neural link with a dagger,His rogue mechanical limb slammed into the reactor,A white-hot explosion consumed everything,As the ocean pressure dragged them into the abyss, Lu Chen held onto Xiaoyu, letting the deep swallow them whole,Beneath the crushing darkness,countless golden eyes flickered open,A new species had begun its pilgrimage.