Chapter 4: Forbidden Archives
The Codex Vault was no longer silent.
As the last sparks faded from the wreck of the Soulcage, the chamber's center console came alive—holographic data streams unfurled into the air like glowing serpents. Rose stood shakily, still reeling from the fight and what she'd done. The data streaming across her HUD was dense, alien, but her mind absorbed it with unnatural clarity.
It was as if the Black Gene was decoding for her. Adapting her to understand.
"Welcome, Genetic Host.""Codex Delta — Prime Archive Node: Online.""Query: Black Sequence — Confirmed. Displaying."
The air shimmered, and a holographic figure appeared—female, ageless, eyes like twin galaxies. Her voice was velvet over static.
"This is Codex Archivist Virae-7. If you're seeing this, then the Black Sequence has returned. That... shouldn't be possible."
The First Revelation
Rose leaned closer. "What is the Black Sequence? What am I?"
The projection paused, scanning her.
"You are the carrier of an ancient, adaptive gene-cipher originally developed not by the Syndicate, but by the pre-collapse civilization known as the Prima Vitae. They called it: the Helix of Singularity."
"Unlike modern supergenes—limited, categorized, programmed—the Black Gene evolves itself. It is not synthetic. It is sentient code. It chooses its host."
Rose felt chills crawl down her spine.
"It was sealed after the Cataclysm War. Too dangerous. Too... unpredictable. The Syndicate erased all trace, or so they believed. Only fragments remained, scattered, hidden."
"If you carry it now... then war is coming."
The projection faded.
"Codex Access unlocked: Sub-Archive 'Tomb of Origins.' Location: Buried beneath Virelia, 2.3 km depth."
Decision Point
She exhaled. Her brain felt like it had just run a marathon.
Sentient gene code? Prima Vitae? She'd grown up thinking supergenes were miracle tech—something engineered in labs. But this... this was older than science. Older than the Syndicate.
"Why me?" she whispered.
Her HUD blinked.
"Target Approaching. High-energy signal detected."
Cursing, she ducked behind the console and looked up at the collapsing vault ceiling.
A new figure had entered.
Enter: Kyros the Outwalker
He was tall, armored in ragged blue gene-fiber, with a long coat stitched from desert predator skin. His hair was silver—not from age, but overload. And his eyes were mismatched: one human, one glowing like a plasma core.
He stood still, hand on the hilt of a double-length blade across his back. His voice was quiet thunder.
"Didn't expect to see you here," he said.
Rose tensed. "Do I know you?"
"No," he said. "But I know you. The Codex is never wrong."
She drew her Phase Claw instinctively—her fingers now partially digitized, able to manifest the black-vein energy from within.
He didn't flinch.
"I'm not here to fight. I'm Kyros. Outwalker. You activated the Sequence. That makes you a target. The Syndicate will burn this zone to the ground for you."
"I can handle myself," she snapped.
He smirked. "You barely survived a Soulcage. You're untrained, unstable, and glowing like a flare to everything with a gene scanner. Come with me. I can get you out of here."
"And why would I trust you?"
"Because," he said, holding up a medallion—etched with the same helix symbol on her palm, "I'm one of you."
Below the Surface
As the two began their cautious alliance, deep beneath Virelia, seismic activity stirred.
In the Tomb of Origins, containment seals flickered. One by one, lights blinked red.
Within an ancient pod, something shifted.
It whispered through dust, ancient code whispering across forgotten circuits:
"Host detected… inheritance may proceed…"
And something woke.