Zarkus stepped forward.
Kaiden didn't see him so much as feel him — a shape of mana so dense, so perfectly aligned, it was like running face-first into a fortress carved from gravity.A presence that didn't echo back.It absorbed the pulse.
The Core reacted instantly.
THUM-THUM-THUM-THUM.Too fast, too heavy. A war-drum trapped under Kaiden's ribs.
Kaiden's breath stuttered. His remaining skin paled to near-translucence as every nonessential function shut down. His servos tightened. His cooling vents clicked and snarled.Perspiration began to bead along his synthetic dermal plates — useless, human reflexes firing through a body no longer human.
Fight.Or flight.
His muscles primed for both, jittering under the strain.
Heat rose through the plating. His reactor channels glowed. His fingers curled into hooked, lethal shapes without him meaning to.
Sylen flinched."Kaiden— you're overheating—"
But he couldn't hear her.He could only feel that presence in front of him.
Zarkus.
Not a man.A damn wall.
A shape in the mana-field with no weak points, no openings, no seams. And the Core interpreted it as one thing only:
A predator.
Kaiden's pulse erupted outward in a panicked shockwave.
The fortress reacted instantly.
Mana sirens blistered the hallways.Runes along the ceiling flared white.And then the air cut open — thin black lines slicing the space around the room like cracks in reality.
Elite mana-strike units.
They dropped into the chamber with soundless precision, blades ignited, sigils burning down their arms. They surrounded Kaiden in a perfect circle, every one of them staring at the violet flare thudding from his chest.
"Stand down!" an officer barked, voice shaking.
"Don't get closer— the core is unstable—"
Kaiden saw all their mana signatures at once.Too many.Too close.Suffocating.
The pulse started spiraling, becoming a high-frequency, panic-driven thrumming.
Sylen stepped in front of the nearest strike mage, shielding him with her body.
"STOP!" she yelled. "He's not attacking— he's reacting—!"
Zarkus finally spoke.
One word.
"Still."
The sound carried weight.
Not a shout.
A command.
A wave of Zarkus's own mana exploded outward — silent, invisible, but it hit like a collapsing mountain. Engineers collapsed instantly, clutching their heads. Tools clattered to the floor. The strike units staggered as their runic armor dimmed. Sylen grit her teeth, digging her claws into the floor to stay upright.
And Kaiden—
Kaiden froze.
Not because he chose to.Because something in Zarkus's command resonated directly through the Core, locking it into a stunned, heavy pause.
The thundering heartbeat became a low, forced hum.His vision re-centered.The temperature inside his frame dropped just enough to stop the warning flicker along his spine.
The room trembled in the aftermath.
Zarkus didn't look at the strike units.Didn't look at the engineers.Didn't even look at Sylen, who was panting and shaking.
He looked only at Kaiden.
"Better," he said quietly. "But not enough."
He stepped closer — slow, deliberate — and placed a gloved hand on the rail of the examination platform.
"We still need a plan B for you," Zarkus said, voice calm, almost conversational."As long as your fear can endanger an entire wing… we can't deploy you safely."
Kaiden's pulse gave one more, faint THUM.
Zarkus turned his back to him, unfazed.
"Bring him to the testing chamber. If this core wants to react to emotion…"He glanced over his shoulder."…then he'll learn to control emotion."
Sylen exhaled shakily, finally steadying herself.Zarkus walked toward the door, elites dissolving back into space-wounds around him.
"it begins with calibration," he said.
The door sealed.
Kaiden stood alone in the trembling silence, and the Core whispered a slow, uneasy echo against his ribs.