Kharz'Vora's skies shimmered like veins of molten copper, each streak of light reflecting off the towering mineral spires that dotted the bleak surface. Deep beneath its crust, the Charym'Zul High Brood convened. The oldest among them, Priest-Devourer Kroll'Vann, stirred in his stone chamber — feeling a ripple.
"A new presence," he hissed through a mouth riddled with obsidian teeth. "Gaian minds… curious and blind."
Their sensors had finally picked up the interdimensional emissions from a human exploration ship orbiting a mineral-rich moon within the forbidden quadrant.
Meanwhile, aboard the expedition cruiser Odys-Vex, Captain Lys Renholm stood before the observation deck, arms folded as she watched the strange star pulse below.
"It's alive," said Shale, the team's xeno-mineralogist. "The entire structure—it's not just metal. It's a living organism... or was."
Renholm nodded. "Scan it. Everything. No samples unless I approve. We don't know what we're touching."
As her crew worked, Lys's mind drifted. To her father. A pioneer. A casualty of the first interdimensional rift. She still remembered the funeral—empty casket, no remains. No answers.
He was obsessed with the unknown, just as she was. She wasn't here just for discovery. She was here to finish what he started.
Hours later, alarms sounded.
"Unidentified warp signature. It's coming from the planet below!"
"They've seen us," Lys whispered. "Back away. Immediately."
But it was too late.
A massive spike tore through subspace—a gravitational lash fired from Kharz'Vora itself. The ship jolted, instruments fried, and half the crew was thrown into disarray.
"We're caught in a pull!" yelled Ensign Reva.
Back on Kharz'Vora, Kroll'Vann's voice echoed through bone halls.
"Gaia opens her eyes. Let her see... her death."
The humans attempted an emergency jump, but just before they could escape, a beacon was launched from the fallen star—coded in dimensional dialect. A message.
"They're not just warning us," Shale murmured. "They're marking us."
"They've declared war," Lys replied, her eyes cold.
Back on Gaia, news of the failed expedition spread like wildfire. Lys barely returned with half a crew and a scrambled message in the Codex dialect of the ancient Charym'Zul. The Senate of Gaia debated their next move.
"We cannot allow another loss. They knew we were coming. They targeted us," Lys testified. "And this wasn't random. They've been watching us far longer than we thought."
General Orven, head of Gaia's planetary defense, stood up. "Are you suggesting a preemptive strike?"
Lys clenched her fists. "I'm suggesting we prepare. Because they already have."
In the following days, military fleets mobilized. Researchers decrypted fragments of the beacon's code, uncovering symbols tied to the mythical Codex of Zenthir — a lost record said to predict the fall of civilizations through dimensional convergence.
Lys spent her nights alone, haunted by dreams of her father's voice and the bone-covered ruins from their mission. He had once warned her: "If you stare long enough into the void, daughter... the void sends something back."
Meanwhile, on Kharz'Vora, the Brood celebrated. Their machines drilled deeper, fueling their world with stolen matter and life. But a new order was issued:
"Let Gaia burn last. Let them watch. Let their knowledge rot in regret."
War was not coming.
It had already begun.