What chance do we have?

The tense calm that had followed Enki's return and his report on the reprieve granted by Amitiel was broken by the violence of cosmic thunder. The group, gathered in the Calakmul command center—although persistent contextual briefing insisted Cancún was the heart of their operation, and most of their key members had relocated to the safety and power of the jungle city—first felt a massive psychic surge, unlike Cthulhu's constant pressure. This one was focused, brutally aggressive, and not directed at them.

Merlin and Alatar paled. "An offensive!" Alatar exclaimed. "Of incredible magnitude... It's not random! It's targeted!"

Enki, who had been transmitting data to his own Anunnaki network, stiffened abruptly. "My sensors on the periphery of this system... detect a massive concentration of dimensional and psionic energy converging upon the known power nexuses of... Nyx and Poimandres."

Aria, who had been in a state of deep meditation, preparing for her risky mental contact with Nyx, snapped open her eyes, the air escaping from her lungs. The emerald and golden light that now enveloped her occasionally flickered violently. "Nyx! She's under attack! I can... I can feel her terror!"

Driven by an urgency that overcame fear, Aria dove into the Grid, seeking the consciousness of her former mentor. What she found was psychic pandemonium.

Through the swirling vortex of Nyx's mind, Aria saw fragments of the battle. It wasn't a fight on the physical plane as she understood it, but a war of realities. Waves of pure energy, bending space and tearing at sanity, emanated from a vast presence in the abyss—Cthulhu, undoubtedly. She saw Nyx's corrupted moon elves screaming silently as their forms dissolved or were twisted into new abominations under the onslaught. Poimandres roared in the background, its chaotic power immense but struggling against something even more vast and alien.

Nyx herself, a figure of dark power and unbridled ambition, was being hounded, her own chaotic energy repulsed and consumed. But what Aria saw next, through the terrified eyes of Nyx or perhaps a Morgana near her, chilled her to the core.

It wasn't just Cthulhu.

Figures of light and shadow, beings of terrible beauty and soul-chilling power, descended or manifested alongside the Great Old One's emanations. Their forms were vaguely angelic, but their eyes burned with a cold, ancient fire. They were Netlin! But they weren't fighting Cthulhu. They were beside him, channeling their energy, directing waves of cleansing, annihilating power against Nyx's forces.

"It can't be!" Aria gasped, relaying the vision to Merlin and the others through their mental link. "The Netlin... are fighting with Cthulhu! Against Nyx!"

Enki staggered as if he had received a physical blow. "Impossible! Amitiel... his oath... his war is against the Great Old One! He..." The Anunnaki's voice cracked, realization and betrayal warring on his golden face. "Luciferians? A faction... an ancient sect within the Netlin that worshipped the power of the Primordial Void? Or... was it all a sham?"

Aria saw, through the link with Nyx, a distraught Morgana, her Dark Faerie Goddess power struggling to maintain a shield as she watched in horror at the unholy alliance. She glimpsed Morgana trying to weave a desperate communication spell, perhaps toward Merlin, but the cosmic interference was too great; the attempt failed, dissipating in the psychic storm.

The power of Cthulhu, now empowered or directed by these Netlin "Luciferians," was simply overwhelming. Nyx, the Queen of Eternal Night, she who fed on fear and chaos, was now experiencing pure, existential terror. Her control over Poimandres was faltering. Her defenses were crumbling.

And then, Aria felt it. A scream. Not a physical sound, but a psychic explosion of pure despair, fear, and an agony that transcended simple defeat. It was Nyx. Or what remained of Eleonora's consciousness within her, shattering.

"They consume us! The darkness... the true darkness...!" The scream was cut off, and Aria's mental link with it faded into a static of pure terror.

Aria collapsed backward, gasping, Kaelen and Merlin holding her. "She's... gone," she whispered, her eyes filling with tears and horror. "The scream... I think... they've broken her. Or worse."

The group in Calakmul (or Cancún, if the veil between realities and contexts had grown as thin as sanity) fell silent, processing the monstrous revelation. The Netlin, their supposed hope against Cthulhu, were, or at least a dominant faction of them, allies of the Ancient One. Nyx, their active enemy, had just been neutralized or destroyed by a force

even greater.

"If they could do that to Nyx and Poimandres..." Elena Rossi began, her voice trembling.

"...what chance do we have?" Merlin completed, his face a mask of grim resolve. "Enki... your Commander Amitiel... has either deceived us all, or he is a pawn in a game far darker than we imagined."

Fear was a metallic taste in everyone's mouths. The hope Enki had brought had turned to ash. Now they faced an unholy alliance of cosmic power and fallen divinity, and they had just witnessed what happened to those who stood in their way.