Chapter 7: The Anchor's Scream

Tunnel Stand - off: The Game of Data and Fangs

The werewolf elder's fingernails scratched a bloodline on Elena's neck, and the ticking sound of Cain's mechanical heart echoed in the tunnel. The crystal memory image displayed by Maggie was still flickering in the air: a ten - year - old Cain curled up in the drainage ditch of the Holy See laboratory, with the bar code "NT - 07" branded on his neck, and mechanical tentacles were being drawn out from his spine.

"The Silver Claw Alliance doesn't accept mongrels!" The elder's sharp claws stabbed towards Cain's mechanical heart, but were flung back by the recoil force the moment they made contact. Cain's chest suddenly sprang open, revealing the precise structure of interlocking gears. A holographic projection shot out from the core: [Symbiotic Anchor Protocol Activated, Host Health: 72 hours].

The thorny pattern on Elena's forehead flickered with the countdown, and her Nightborne power was draining away like sand in an hourglass. She suddenly tore open her collar, revealing the same bar code brand between her collarbones as Cain's. "Who's the mongrel now?"

Cain's Perspective: A Drowning Man in the Consciousness Deep - Sea

Cain was constantly falling in the data torrent. Lane's nanoworms nested in his memory corridors, repeatedly playing the scene of Lillian's death three hundred years ago. Every time the silver claws pierced through Lillian's heart, the crying of the infant Elena would transform into an electronic synthetic voice: [Protocol 07: Eliminate Failed Products].

"You are Lillian's most perfect creation." Lane's phantom emerged from the sea of blood, with the tampered - with memory film of Cain flowing between his fingertips. "She transformed you into an adapter for werewolves and vampires, just for today—"

Suddenly, the film displayed a laboratory file: [NT - 07 (Cain) Gene Source: Bone Marrow Extract of the Nightborne Queen]. Cain's pupils dilated in shock, and Lane's laughter set off a data tsunami. "Surprised? You are the direct descendant of the first - generation Nightborne. Elena is just a replica of you... a substitute."

In reality, Cain's mechanical heart suddenly overloaded. He woke up in excruciating pain and found that his fangs were uncontrollably piercing into Elena's wrist!

Selena's Side - Story: The Riot in the Mechanical Womb

Selena's abdomen had bulged with metallic veins, and the mechanical core of Lucifer II was growing in her womb. The body of the cloned Lane was floating outside the liquid - nitrogen chamber. She gnawed on the inverted cross tattoo on his arm, and the nanoworms burst out blue blood between her teeth. When the Holy See chip tried to take over her brain, the Blood Moon Stone fragment suddenly released a pulse wave.

"You want revenge, and I want to resurrect my mother." Lillian's phantom stepped out from the core projection, and her fingers penetrated Selena's abdomen to gently caress the mechanical embryo. "Cooperate with me, and I'll give you true Nightborne power."

Selena's bone spurs suddenly mutated into barbed metal whips, shredding all the culture chambers. She swallowed the eyeball of the cloned Lane, and the database unlocked by the retina showed that the Holy See had hidden the coffin of the Nightborne Queen in the Himalayan ruins.

"First condition," she chewed the eyeball and sneered, "Teleport me to Elena's side."

The wolf pack in the tunnel mutinied upon learning the truth, and the elder - faction and the reform - faction were caught in a melee. Elena dragged Cain back to the ventilation shaft. The thorny pattern had spread to her right eye. Every time Cain's mechanical heart beat, her wolf ears degenerated a little.

"Kill me..." Cain wrapped the cable of his severed arm around his neck. "The protocol is bound to the heartbeat, not survival!"

Elena suddenly bit through her tongue and injected her Nightborne blood into Cain's mouth. "Have you forgotten? We are the same kind of experimental subjects." The moment their blood blended, the protocol data stream became scrambled - their gene sequences were originally mirror images of each other!

Lane's phantom distorted in Cain's pupils. "How is it possible... Unless you are..."

"Gemini." Maggie threw a sealing crystal. "Lillian cultivated both of you with the same Nightborne gene, just like a key and a lock that must exist in pairs!"

Cain's mechanical heart suddenly went out of control, while Elena's thorny pattern invaded the control system in reverse. When their palms overlapped, the tunnel dome was pierced by a laser cannon - Selena's mechanical bone wings spread out in the dust and smoke, and the embryo in her abdomen opened its blood - red electronic eyes.

"Game upgraded." Selena's voice, mixed with the sound of metal friction, said as she threw down a holographic memory device. "Lane left a big gift at the Antarctic base - three hundred clones of us."

The memory device automatically played a video: The ice coffin of the Nightborne Queen was entwined with plasma chains, and the names of Elena and Cain were engraved on the coffin lid. Lillian's voice came from the depths of the glacier: "Dear children, guess who is the real first - generation vessel?"

On Cain's retina, the countdown was suddenly reset: [Host Health: 300 hours], and Elena's thorny pattern began to grow towards the blood vessels in her neck.

Next Chapter:

When Selena's mechanical embryo spits out Cain's DNA chain, and when the clone army under the Antarctic ice opens their eyes; "Every time you kill one of yourselves," Lillian's phantom laughs wildly in the blizzard, "My power revives a little more."