The Iris Specimen in the Forbidden Archives

The forbidden archives reeked of moldering secrets. Ayla's fingertips trailed along the shelves, collecting bioluminescent dust—parliament's hallucinogenic security spores. She pressed her sakura necklace's fang into her palm, pain cutting through the creeping delirium. Moonlight sliced through stained glass, illuminating the embossed iris on the original Bloodline Codex, its petal edges worn smooth in patterns mirroring Lucas' ocular calibration marks.

"Article 207: Hybrids prohibited from land arbitration..." She peeled apart the vellum layers. A desiccated iris specimen fluttered onto her lap. Cerulean lubricant stains smeared its underside—identical to the droplets she'd found near Lucas' maintenance bench three nights prior.

(Hearth embers crackled. The specimen curled under heat)

Adolescent script bled from the flower's veins: "I am original sin — L·N, 1988.3.17". The inked date seared her fingertips—Lucas' mechanical heart activation day, twelve years before her birth. Ayla snapped the codex shut, its metal corner slicing her hand. Blood dripped onto the iris, sizzling into pine-resin fumes.

"Predictable." Selena's voice coiled up the spiral staircase. Moonlight fractured through her wolf-head brooch. "Snooping through confessionals, little sister?"

Ayla stumbled backward, toppling a shelf. Ancient tomes erupted in a dust storm. Her boot caught a chained grimoire—the gilded Wolf Succession Records fell open, Lila's mother's portrait fading into Selena's image wearing the Neumann iris pendant.

(Lucas' overheating heart whined through stone walls, syncing with archive alarms)

"Surrender it." Selena crushed a codex page under her stiletto. "You think he led you here by choice? That mechanical brain follows protocols, not conscience."

Ayla clutched the iris. Lubricant tendrils sprouted from its edges, coiling around her wrist. Memory shards flooded her—fifteen-year-old Lucas kneeling in labs, mechanical spine piercing flesh, his bone marrow being siphoned into codex inkwells.

"He even calculated pain..." She braced against shelves, throat burning with hydraulic fluid bitterness.

Selena's nail traced her collarbone: "Pathetic. Even your hatred is programmed. Know why they used irises?" Her brooch split open, revealing a micro-syringe. "Every inspector's essence makes perfect anti-forgery ink."

(Temperature plummeted. Lucas' shadow fell across the codex, his prosthetic crushing the syringe)

Ayla slammed the iris against hearthstones. Heat revealed more text: "Vessel No.21 memory overwrite complete. Initiate emotional lockdown." The specimen oozed mucus, mapping Neumann's subterranean labs on the floor.

"You lunatic!" Selena's roar shook shelves. "That'll activate his purge protocol!"

Lucas' mechanical pupils contracted. Coolant steam swirled into vampiric runes— "RUN" He seized Ayla's bleeding hand, smearing hybrid sigils on walls. The burning iris's ashes coalesced into a half-charred birth certificate—wolf crest merging with Neumann gears, dated the night of Lila's attack.

As archive doors slammed shut, Ayla glimpsed the countdown on Lucas' neck implant—digits matching Selena's vault combination, ticking toward zero.