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Chapter 28 - Graviton Collapse

The tremor began as a hum—a low vibration that crawled up through the tires and into their bones.

"Is that… seismic?" Caleb muttered.

Noah's pupils dilated. "No. Not natural. It's… a graviton field."

Before anyone could react, the hum deepened, vibrating through metal and flesh alike.

Then the pulse hit.

It wasn't magic.

It was pre-Cataclysm defense tech—a magnetic–gravitational wave built to scramble radar and crush any vehicle that crossed its perimeter.

Dormant for decades, it woke the moment their truck breached the line.

The world detonated.

The reinforced frame—steel ribs meant to survive explosions—folded like wet cardboard.

Bolts snapped, beams twisted, the welded bars turned into blades.

Gravity spiked tenfold.

Everything made of metal screamed as it tore free and slammed toward the ground.

Seat frames groaned, floor plates buckled, and the roof dropped toward them—grinding down on Damian and Adrian with the force of a collapsing tower.

Enough pressure to crush a human body to pulp in seconds.

Damian didn't think.

Adrian was still in his arms, breath ragged against his chest.

Instinct roared louder than thought.

He pulled the boy closer—and unleashed everything.

Flame erupted.

It wasn't orange or red, but white—a burning light that stripped the world to black and white.

The temperature soared past steel's melting point, yet every atom of heat obeyed his will.

The seatbelt, the buckles, the shrapnel that should have torn them apart—all liquefied mid-air, falling away like silver rain.

The cabin blazed molten gold, pressure yielding to heat.

Damian's aura flared brighter, the air around him warping; molten metal hissed beneath his boots, pooling into a shining lake.

Then silence—only the crackle of cooling steel.

When the fire dimmed, Damian stood in that lake of liquid metal, Adrian unharmed in his arms.

That was control—ten years of battle carved into instinct.

He exhaled, eyes burning faintly red.

He tightened his arms around the boy, murmuring softly—as if to steady himself as much as the one he held.

"Stay with me."

Across the wreck, chaos raged.

The graviton pulse hadn't faded; it was still dragging everything metallic down—armor, buckles, weapon sheaths turning into anchors.

The others hit the floor hard, fighting the pull.

Every fragment still clinging to Noah trembled violently, drawn down by the pulse that refused to die.

Then the real pull came.

The soft metal lining of his armor convulsed—ripped toward the ground as if it wanted to tear through him to reach the earth below.

His body jerked with it.

The weight tripled, then doubled again.

Noah hit the floor, choking.

The armor shrieked against bone, plates buckling inward.

Blood burst from his nose, his ears, the corners of his mouth.

For an instant it felt as if his ribs were being folded one by one, his spine grinding against the steel.

He tried to scream, but no air came.

A psychic, not a soldier—his body wasn't made for this kind of pressure.

The graviton field didn't care. It only knew one command—down.

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