The 0500 briefing was a tense, quiet affair. The Genesis World, designated Kaleidos, was a volatile soup of raw reality, its physical laws still settling. The Corrupted sought to infect it during this formative stage, creating a permanent, chaotic bastion.
Kaelen delivered the facts with icy precision. "Intel confirms a Corrupted Architect—a Tier 8 entity specializing in reality manipulation—is already onsite, guiding the corruption. Dawn-Class entity providing security detail. Our mission: eliminate the Architect before the corruption becomes irreversible."
She assigned the team: Echo, Leyla, Mira, and two others from the Mycelia Prime mission—the Zephyrian squad leader Korvax, and the surviving Tech-Adept, Ryn, whose cybernetics had been upgraded after the last betrayal.
As they prepped their gear in the armory, Ryn approached Echo. Her face was partly synthetic, one eye a glowing blue lens, but the other was still human, brown and intense. "Your blood trick on Mycelia Prime… it saved my unit. Thank you."
Echo nodded. "We look out for each other."
"Do we?" Her human eye held his. "I've seen the way the higher-ups look at you. Like you're a tool they're afraid might cut them. Be careful, Echo."
There was a sincerity there, an empathy that went beyond squad camaraderie. Echo's blood sense picked up on her pulse—steady, but quickened slightly in his presence. Not fear. Something else.
Leyla, sharp as ever, noticed the exchange. She gave Echo a look that was half-warning, half-curiosity.
Before launch, they had six hours of downtime. Echo went to the Crimson Archives for a final lesson with Kassius.
The old Hemokinetic was waiting with a grim expression. "A Genesis World. The blood there will be… primordial. Unformed. Your power may react unpredictably. Remember: you are the Sovereign. Even chaos must obey the law of the blood."
He placed a hand on Echo's shoulder, a rare gesture. "And boy… don't die. The bloodline is too precious to lose."