While the crowd was hypnotized by the beautiful light of the Regulator, Valerius and Elara were moving quickly through the dark and narrow service tunnels beneath the Exhibition Hall. The air here was cool and smelled of damp stone and ozone. Using the schematics Kaelen had provided, they navigated the maze of pipes and wires. Finally, Elara stopped and pointed. "There," she whispered.
In front of them was a small, unassuming power conduit. It was a thick, brass-plated tube with a series of glowing blue crystals set into its side. To anyone else, it was just one of thousands of such conduits in the city. But Valerius knew its secret. This was the lifeline. This was the direct connection to the heart of Corvus's stolen masterpiece.
Valerius took a deep breath. This was the culmination of all his planning, all his anger. This was the moment of his revenge. He stepped forward and placed his bare hand firmly on the cold brass of the conduit.
"Corrupt," he commanded under his breath.
He did not send a small pulse of energy. He unleashed a torrent. He poured all of his pain, all of his hatred, all of his dark, entropic power into the machine.
Up above, in the Grand Exhibition Hall, Master Corvus was just finishing his speech. "And so, I promise you a new era of endless prosperity!" he boomed.
At that exact moment, the Regulator began to change. The warm, steady hum of the machine became a low, sick groan. The beautiful, stable sphere of Aetherium at its core flickered. The glowing blue crystals in its tubes sputtered and turned a corrupted, angry purple. The smoothly spinning brass rings began to wobble and grind against each other with a horrible screeching sound.
The crowd's applause died. People began to murmur in confusion. Corvus stared at the machine, his confident smile frozen on his face. "A minor fluctuation!" he announced, trying to sound calm. "Perfectly normal!"
But it was not normal. Thick, black smoke began to pour from the joints of the machine. The beautiful light at its center collapsed into a dark, unstable void. With a final, deafening bang, the main crystal at the top of the Regulator cracked, and the entire machine went dark. The great invention, the key to the future, was dead. It stood on the stage, a smoking, broken piece of junk. The grand unveiling was a grand, humiliating failure.