A low hum echoed in the war chamber of Station Argon—a newly fortified orbital base that hovered just outside the outer rim of Gaia's atmosphere. The room pulsed with blue lights and the steady chirp of AI interfaces. Maps of the galaxy spun in holograms across the walls, and in the center stood Lys Renholm, her arms crossed as she listened to the General Council debate.
"We can't go to war with a species we barely understand!" barked Admiral Kael Lorin, slamming his cybernetic fist into the table. "We don't even know how many of them there are!"
"And what if they attack again?" countered Minister Halea. "Three outposts gone, eighty-seven confirmed casualties. Are we supposed to wait for them to knock on Earth's door?"
Lys remained silent, but her eyes were locked on a datapad showing satellite images of the planet Kharz'Vora—the jagged, mineral-rich world where the Charym'Zul dwelled. Rivers of molten ore split the land like veins of living blood. Towering, insectoid machines—clearly not built by human hands—moved with eerie synchronicity. The planet reeked of hunger. Of intent.
Across the system, probes had gone dark within moments of entering the atmosphere. The only signal received back was a string of binary—a countdown.
The First Encounter
Weeks earlier, before the final probe died, it transmitted three seconds of footage. It showed an enormous Charym'Zul warform devouring a satellite whole, its mandibles clicking as it hissed a guttural chant. Scientists deciphered the chant as an ancient dialect of Zeroth—language of extinct celestial entities.
Translation: "The Children of the Hollow shall rise again."
Lys's Past - Fragmented Flame
As the council broke into further argument, Lys's mind drifted—pulled back into her memories.
She was sixteen when her father disappeared. Commander Juno Renholm had led the first survey team to the ghost world of Nurex-4. His ship returned without him. Only a single message had been retrieved from the ship's logs:
> "The gate bleeds knowledge. I go willingly. Do not follow."
Since that day, Lys had chased answers in every shadow Gaia's science couldn't explain. She trained as a xenolinguist, then as a riftwalker. She was the first human to return from a collapsed dimension without being psychotically broken. Her mind was a fortress. Her curiosity, a weapon.
And now, here she stood, on the edge of another unknown—a species more dangerous than anything recorded.
On Kharz'Vora: Birth of Rage
Across the stars, beneath the crimson skies of Kharz'Vora, High Matron N'zoth'Kar of the Charym'Zul watched the humans from afar through her mind-linked seers.
"They dare send eyes upon our skin," she hissed.
An advisor slithered forward. "They hunger for what we hold, Matron. As we do."
N'zoth'Kar's crown of fused bone shimmered under the heat of the core-forges. "They have tasted a fragment. If they seek more, they will taste the fire."
With a motion of her clawed fingers, she activated the Codex Shard—a forbidden relic infused with void essence. A tremor rippled through the planet as ancient dread engines awakened.
Preparing Gaia
Back on Gaia, in a mountain city overlooking the Equinox Spire, Lys met with her old mentor, Dr. Akil Reyes.
"You still carry his necklace," he said, nodding to the obsidian shard around her neck.
"It's all I have left of him."
"And do you think he's still out there? In some dimension—some... pocket of forgotten time?"
"I think he knew more than anyone about what lies between worlds. And I think this war isn't new. It's old. Something he saw coming."
Reyes placed a vial on the table—a glowing fluid extracted from the heart of Fragment Theta.
"We've started synthesizing weapon cores with this. The energy signature is... unstable. But it could match their tech. Maybe even surpass it."
"And the risks?"
"We're tearing holes just holding it. If we use it, we're playing with forces the Codex itself tried to contain."
Lys closed her eyes. "Then let's learn to contain them better."
Earth's Decision
One week later, Gaia's leaders convened in a private satellite assembly. The vote was held under the veil of secrecy.
The verdict: preemptive defense initiative.
A multi-planetary alliance was formed. For the first time in recorded history, the various colonies of humanity, the Hyrelian Archive, the Synth-Traits of Mars, and the Lunar Clans unified under a single banner.
Lys Renholm was named Commander of the Edge Vanguard.
"If they come for our light," she said during her appointment speech, "they'll learn the stars burn brighter when we burn together."
Final Scene – Echoes in the Void
Back on Kharz'Vora, deep beneath the crust, the First Brood began to stir. Old blood. Pure essence.
The Charym'Zul High Matron whispered to the cocooned titans:
"Gaia awakens. We will show them what it means to hunger."
And in the skies above Gaia, a rift opened—unseen. A message whispered across dimensions.
> "They've touched the Codex. Now it watches back."