146 THE MANUFACTURED META
"Are you serious? You're not going to save Eryn?" Dorin asked, shock clear in her voice.
Damen paused.
Of course, they had to save her—but doing so without implicating himself or his friends was another matter entirely.
"Don't worry about the surveillance," Kail said quickly. "I can loop the feeds with an AI-generated overlay. No one will even notice you're gone."
Damen shook his head. "No. We're dealing with a professional hacker. He'll spot any loop or digital artifact in seconds. If they catch even a trace of tampering, it'll look worse than if I just disappeared on my own."
Kail frowned. "Then what do we do?"
Damen crossed to a metal cabinet and swung it open.
Inside stood a life-sized android—identical to him down to the smallest detail.
"We give them real footage," Damen said, a faint grin tugging at his lips. "This body double will appear in the surveillance feeds at random intervals. They'll never suspect I left."
Damen and Zaairgid had earlier built several android body doubles for themselves. They were decoys sent out to fool assassins trying to harm them.
They became useful now.
Dorin eyed the android skeptically. "You really think it can pull that off?"
Damen nodded, "It'll work. Most of the time I would be in my room where there is no camera. All the android have to do is walk out once in a while for the camera. The chance of being found out is low."
Kail stared at the android, impressed. "All right, but how are you going to get out without being seen?"
Damen smirked. "Let's just say my superpower got an upgrade."
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[The Zetheris Industry HQ- sometime before the assault on Veyran Residence]
Exoren Atheris sat silently before four towering tanks filled with shimmering blue liquid. Inside floated the lifeless bodies of four meta-humans — his fallen heroes.
The room hummed with the low thrum of machines as a masked man in a white coat adjusted the controls with steady, clinical precision.
"How did my precious subjects die so easily?" the masked doctor asked, his voice calm but edged with fury.
"Dr. Revive," Exoren began carefully, "witnesses say it was a new hero — someone called Black Halo. He killed all four of them."
Dr. Revive froze mid-adjustment. "What about Umbros?"
"He vanished. Not even his body was recovered," Exoren replied.
The doctor turned sharply, his voice rising. "Impossible. Umbros and Acyros working together are unstoppable — their symbiotic link made them untouchable!"
"They split up," Exoren explained grimly. "That's when Black Halo took them down — Umbros first, then Acyros, and finally the rest."
"Idiots," Dr. Revive hissed, slamming a fist against the console.
"Do you have any idea how many years and resources went into perfecting these artificial metas? How many times I warned you never to deploy them recklessly?" he added.
Exoren lowered his gaze. "It's our fault. I'll explain everything to Godfather myself."
Dr. Revive exhaled slowly, his tone softening at the mention of Godfather. "Still… it's not a complete loss. Their deaths exposed flaws in their training. We can use their data to refine their instincts and improve their synchronization."
An assistant entered, pushing a trolley loaded with glowing containment pods. Inside each, a core pulsed faintly with raw meta energy.
Dr. Revive opened the tanks and began inserting the artifact cores into the bodies.
"I still don't understand," he muttered. "Even in death, their cores should have remained. But there was nothing …. not even fragments were left."
"You're saying someone stole their cores?" Exoren asked.
Dr. Revive nodded slowly. "That's the only explanation."
As he sealed the tanks, the liquid inside began to churn violently. Electric arcs crackled across the surface, lighting the room in flashes of blue and white.
Then, one by one, the eyes of the fallen metas snapped open.
The heroes of Atheris were reborn.
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The transport carrying Eryn Veyran appeared over a sprawling, windowless complex — the Zetheris family's private military compound.
Steel walls, drone swarms, perimeter shields surrounded the facility. Four Rank-B meta-heroes patrolled its courtyards.
This was the kind of place that would chew through a battalion and still ask for more. This wasn't just a fortress, it's an executioner's killing zone for intruders.
"This place is merciless, Big Brother," Kail said, his voice tight over the line.
Damen had slipped out of GenSyn under the cover of his upgraded Invisibility — no camera registered him leaving.
He ghosted through alleys and followed Kail's tracer to the unmarked facility. Up close, the defenses were worse than he thought. The air smelled of ozone and machine oil and standing sentinel beneath the floodlamps were the four faces he had seen die not long ago.
"Acyros… Thrynn… Orya… Nymeris," Damen breathed, each name in his mouth. "I'm bloody sure I killed them."
He stared at the motionless heroes, "Is this… resurrection?"
"How do we even get Eryn out of a place with that kind of security?" Kail asked.
Damen's jaw tightened. He watched the patrols move with unnerving precision.
"We don't," he said finally.
"But what about Eryn then? Didn't you go there to save her?" Kail asked.
"I came to rescue Eryn, but I don't have to do everything myself…Send these coordinates to Valtor Veyran. He would bring an army and tear the place down. I'll just wait here until he does."
"You are a genius."
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[The Veyran HQ]
"What happened to my daughter?" Valtor demanded, fury burning in his eyes as the news played before him.
Eryn's kidnapping was already flooding every channel before the report had even reached him directly.
"We don't know yet," Belgore said carefully. "Everything happened too fast. You were away dealing with the assassins when the residence was attacked. That's when Eryn was taken."
"Where is she now?" Valtor snapped. "I must know."
"We're searching everywhere," Belgore replied.
Valtor paced the room, each step heavy, and controlled…barely. Minutes stretched into an hour. No one returned with news or further updates.
Then Belgore suddenly straightened and activated the holo-screen. "Brother—this just came in from an anonymous channel."
The footage flickered to life.
Eryn was bound, struggling as she was shoved into an armored military transport. The feed cut, then resumed with the vehicle passing through massive, reinforced gates.
Valtor froze at the scene.
"I recognize this place," he growled. "It's a secret Zetheris compound. Even from beyond the grave, Garius… you still won't leave me alone."
The drone feed shifted, revealing the full scope of the fortress: layered walls, roaming patrols, aerial drones sweeping the sky. Above it all hovered four figures—meta humans—silent, and watchful.
"How do we get her back?" Belgore asked. His voice was flat, grim. "This is impossible?"
"We will get her back, impossible or not," Valtor said, each word ironclad.
Belgore studied the feed again, the reality settling in. "Brother… we can storm the place with soldiers and equipment, yes. But those four—by the way they're floating, are they Rank-B, or stronger? How do we deal with that?"
Valtor slammed his palm into the table. The edge creaked under the force.
"This isn't just about Eryn," he said coldly. "It's the Veyran name. If we allow ourselves to be humiliated like this, who will ever respect us again?"
Belgore met his gaze. "What do you propose?"
Valtor resumed pacing, his eyes narrowed, his thoughts racing—until they stopped.
"There's no choice," he said at last. "We activate Project Hermes."
Belgore stiffened. "Project Hermes? The mecha project? It isn't battle-ready."
Valtor's voice cut through the room like a blade. "It's ready enough. It just hasn't been tested."
"That's—"
"This is the test," Valtor interrupted. "Real combat with Real enemies. What better time than now for it to prove its worth?"
Belgore hesitated. "Brother—"
"There is no time for hesitation," Valtor said. "We deploy every asset we have. If we don't strike now, we lose more than Eryn."
He turned back to the holo-screen, watching his daughter's frozen image.
"If we lose," he said quietly. "We lose everything."
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