The medical bay within the Warden safehouse, "White Dove Nest," smelled of antiseptic and medicinal herbs. Soft, milky-white light from the ceiling panels cast a deliberately soothing glow, attempting to calm nerves frayed by their escape from hell. Alan lay on a pristine med-bed, face pale, breathing shallow but steady. Thin tubes monitored his vital signs and Anima fluctuations. A Warden medic, clad in their uniform, chanted low, soothing incantations, fingertips trailing gentle verdant light over the worst of Alan's acid burns and Anima depletion.
Next door, in the analysis room, the atmosphere was starkly different. Oppressive, tense, heavy with post-battle exhaustion and the gravity of the unknown.
Lena, Fenrir, and Simon sat around a sturdy metal table. Scattered reports, fuzzy satellite images, and most crucially—the small, silver data chip retrieved from Vita Tower's ruins, still faintly warm to the touch—lay on its surface. The chip sat securely in a shock-absorbent, rune-inscribed reader connected to Simon's portable terminal, its casing scorched and screen cracked.
Simon's fingers flew over the virtual keyboard, a blur of motion, sweat beading on his forehead. His eyes were glued to the rapidly scrolling, partially decrypted code and data fragments on the screen.
"Data corruption is catastrophic… Physical damage plus Victor's remote wipe protocols… It's a mess inside a mess inside a dumpster fire," Simon rasped, voice thick with exhaustion and frustration. "Most files are fragments, filenames scrambled by encryption like someone shredded a forbidden book then fed it through the shredder again… twice. Maybe three times."
"Salvage what you can, Simon," Lena's voice was low and firm. She wore clean black tactical gear, but the tension in her frame and the bandage on her arm spoke of the recent ordeal. "What Victor shouted… 'Prime Glyph,' 'Loom of Life,' 'Key'… and 'Mimir's Forge'! Those aren't just random ravings. The chip must hold clues!"
Fenrir occupied most of a chair, his massive frame wrapped in bandages oozing with medicinal salve. The wounds from acid and Victor's life-drain were stark and angry. He silently polished a new set of alloy claws, his expression fierce and wary, occasionally glancing at the scrolling gibberish with undisguised impatience. "Believe the rantings of a lunatic? Might just be smoke blown up our arses!"
"No, Fenrir," Lena shook her head, eyes sharp. "His fanaticism… that look… wasn't faked. He saw Alan as a 'Key,' that 'Prime Glyph' as the ultimate prize. This chip was the core of his work. Even damaged, it has to point towards his next move."
"Got something!" Simon hissed suddenly, jamming the enter key! The chaotic code vanished, replaced by a forcibly parsed data packet window displaying several fragmented documents, distorted charts, and a recurring, heavily encrypted phrase highlighted in bold.
"Keyword indexing forced a correlation! Patched together a few critical fragments!" Simon's voice held a tremor of excitement. "Look!"
He opened one fragment. The title was mangled, but the opening words were clear:
"…'Loom of Life'… Theoretical Framework… Degraded Application… Forced Morphological Fusion… Entropy Catalysis… Stability… Below Expected Thresholds… Source Template… Missing…"
Beside it was an immensely complex, mostly blacked-out dynamic molecular model, showing glimpses of distorted DNA helixes entwined with runes pulsing dark crimson.
"Loom of Life…" Lena whispered the name, a chill crawling down her spine. "Forced fusion of lifeforms… Catalyzing entropy… Those abominations he created in the lab…"
"And this!" Simon opened another fragment. A partial log entry, date obscured, signature replaced by a twisted serpent sigil (Ouroboros mark).
"…'Mimir's Forge'… Location Confirmed… London Leyline Convergence Point… Deep Structural Scan… Matches Description of 'Philosopher's Stone Brotherhood' Ultimate Atelier… Energy Inertia… Requires 'Prime Resonance' Activation… 'Loom of Life' Final Stage… To Be Conducted at Crucible Core…"
Below the log were several grainy, noise-riddled underground scan images. The shapes were distorted, but hinted at vast, unnatural geometries buried deep beneath London's labyrinthine underbelly, seemingly… beneath a stretch of the ancient Thames riverbed east of Tower Bridge?
"Mimir's Forge… Philosopher's Stone Brotherhood…" Lena's pupils contracted. She knew the name of the legendary medieval alchemist cabal, thought lost to myth. "Victor found their ultimate workshop? He plans to complete his… 'Loom of Life' there?"
"Wait! There's more!" Simon's voice shot up an octave, thick with disbelief. He opened the third, smallest fragment. No charts, just a few short, recurring phrases locked behind extreme encryption. Simon's brute-force cracking and specific keyword triggers had forced a glimpse:
"Ultimate Objective: Acquire 'Prime Glyph' Authority."
"'Loom of Life'… Merely Path to the 'Prime'…"
"'Key'… Harmonizing Trait… Observed 'Prime Frequency' Fragment Resonance… Confirmed…"
"'Prime Glyph'… Not Power… But Permission… Blueprint to Touch World's Source Code…"
Silence descended on the analysis room, thick and suffocating. Only the hum of server fans and the glow of Simon's screen pierced the stillness.
Silence descended on the analysis room, thick and suffocating. Only the hum of server fans and the glow of Simon's screen pierced the stillness.
"Prime Glyph…" Lena breathed the words. They carried an indefinable weight, as if uttering them brushed against a forbidden truth. "…Not power, but permission? Blueprint to touch the world's… source code?" She jerked her head towards the med bay, Alan's sleeping form a blur behind frosted glass. "Key… Harmonizing trait… Resonance… Victor believed Alan could touch this?!"
"Blueprint? Permission?" Fenrir scowled, thick fingers drumming a heavy rhythm on the table. "Makes no sense! But if that nutter wants it bad enough to die for it… it's gotta be worse than the shite in that tower! Underground… in some bloody forge… Sounds like a right tomb waiting to happen!"
At that moment, the heavy alloy door to the analysis room slid open silently. An invisible, mountain-like pressure of Anima instantly filled the space, replacing tension with a breathless solemnity.
"The White Tower," Oliver Thorne, entered. He wore his usual immaculate deep grey robes, silver hair perfectly combed, expression serene, as if his agents hadn't just escaped a deathtrap. But his eyes, deep and cold as glacial pools, were now sharp as honed blades, instantly locking onto the lines about the "Prime Glyph" on Simon's screen.
He didn't acknowledge Lena or Fenrir, walking straight to the table. His gaze lingered on the silver chip for a heartbeat, then settled on the parsed keywords: "Loom of Life," "Mimir's Forge," "Prime Glyph," "Key," "Permission," "Blueprint"…
The air seemed to congeal. Thorne didn't speak, but the pressure made even Fenrir sit straighter, his ferocity momentarily subdued. Lena found herself holding her breath.
Thorne raised a hand, not touching anything, merely tracing a finger in the air above the lines about the "Prime Glyph." A wisp of icy blue arcane light, faint yet soul-chilling, coiled around his fingertip.
"'Prime Glyph'…" Thorne's voice was low, measured, devoid of inflection yet heavy with knowledge. "One of the legendary Nine Prime Glyphs… or perhaps, their source and collective name. Beyond magic, beyond ability. Fragments of the 'Source Code' that underpins reality's foundation. To possess one… is to hold 'Administrator Privileges' to alter local 'Reality.'"
He lowered his hand, the blue light fading. His gaze finally shifted to Lena, fathomless. "Viktor Kovach… he never sought mere crude life-alchemy. The 'Loom of Life' was but a crude ladder he attempted to climb towards understanding, mimicking, or even stealing the power of a 'Prime Glyph.' And Alan Shaw…"
Thorne's gaze seemed to pierce the wall, fixing on the youth in the med bay. "…His 'Harmonizing' trait, which Viktor called the 'Key'… appears not to be baseless. It disrupts, neutralizes, even… briefly resonates with the 'Prime' frequency? This explains Viktor's obsession, his willingness to expose 'Mimir's Forge' to acquire him… or study him."
"Sir Thorne," Lena took a steadying breath, pushing down the shockwaves inside, "Victor said… he'd be waiting underground. The location of 'Mimir's Forge'…"
Thorne gave a slight nod, his eyes returning to the distorted scan images. "'Philosopher's Stone Brotherhood'… zealots chasing forbidden knowledge, seeking to steal divine authority, ultimately consumed by their own avarice. Their 'Mimir's Forge' atelier is said to lie buried beneath London's oldest, darkest foundations, connected to core leyline nodes… possibly intersecting with even older, more perilous ruins."
He pointed to the blurred geometric outline's edge, where faint, almost noise-lost lines resembling ancient masonry were visible. "Cross-referencing Simon's parsed coordinate fragments with historical archives… Target zone is locked east of Tower Bridge, south bank of the Thames, beneath St. Katharine Docks… a deep sector sealed under multiple wards and modern structures. There, beneath Roman foundations and medieval plague pits… lies the entrance to 'Mimir's Forge.'"
Thorne raised his head, his gaze sweeping over the three, finally resting on Lena. The calm tone delivered an order that brooked no argument.
"Mobilize all resources. Historical archives, geological surveys, Anima leyline cartography… I want everything known about that sector. Every legend, every secret beneath every stone. Contact the Arcanum's historical texts division, the Wildheart's earth-singers… Spare no expense. Find the exact entrance to 'Mimir's Forge.'"
His eyes turned lethally sharp, like unsheathed swords aimed at the impenetrable darkness below.
"Viktor Kovach and his Ouroboros must be eradicated… before they truly touch a 'Prime Glyph.' What sleeps beneath London… is older and more dangerous than we comprehend. We cannot allow a madman to play with fire in its heart."