[Master Control Zone · Herta Space Station Standard Time 18:27]
The ambient hum of the Master Control Zone shattered.
A blinding crimson strobe washed over the pristine holographic consoles, accompanied by a klaxon that rattled the reinforced glass.
Before the automated warning system could even process the anomaly, the highest-priority communication channel was forcibly hijacked.
Herta’s voice blasted through the station-wide broadcast.
It wasn’t the flat, disinterested drawl of her usual puppet bodies.
This was her true voice—laced with raw, unvarnished urgency, every syllable carrying the weight of absolute command.
“Asta!
Evacuate all personnel on the station immediately!
A Starcrusher Swarm King has awakened in the Seclusion Zone!
The Propagation’s pollution is spreading!”
Asta had been resting her chin in one hand, idly scrolling through her phone.
At the word ‘Propagation,’ her pupils constricted.
The relaxed curve of her eyes vanished into a sharp, terrifying focus.
Her stylus clattered against the console deck, but she didn’t spare it a glance.
Her body was already lunging over the main control panel, her fingers flying across the holographic keys fast enough to leave afterimages.
In a fraction of a second, she bypassed standard protocols and seized absolute administrative authority.
The shrill buzz of the alarm threatened to deafen the room, yet when Asta spoke into the comms, her voice was a blade of pure ice cutting through the chaos.
“This is Lead Researcher Asta!
The station is now under a Level 1 Emergency Response!
All staff, drop your current tasks and proceed to the docking bays via your designated evacuation routes!
I repeat: evacuate immediately!
Security Department, take your positions; your absolute priority is the safe extraction of the researchers!”
Even as the orders left her lips, her hands never stopped.
She slammed the lockdown override, instantly sealing all seventeen heavy blast doors between the Seclusion Zone and the civilian sectors.
With a final swipe, she dragged the warning threshold for The Propagation’s pollution to its absolute maximum.
Only when the automated defense grids hummed to life did she snap her head up to look beside her.
Arlan was already standing between her and the corridor.
One hand rested heavily on the hilt of his greatsword, while the other manipulated a floating projection of the Seclusion Zone’s internal feeds.
The footage was a nightmare.
Churning, pulsating insectoid eggs coated the walls.
The heavy energy shields vibrated violently under the strain, while the ambient hazard gauges spiked toward catastrophic failure, threatening to shatter the peak of the monitoring panel.
Arlan’s usually gentle eyes hardened into chips of flint.
He didn’t waste breath on pleasantries.
He just tilted his head, his voice low and immovable.
“Miss, I will lead the Security Department to establish a defensive perimeter outside the Seclusion Zone.
You need to evacuate.”
“No!” Asta’s eyes went wide.
Panic flared in her expression, but her posture remained rigid.
“Madam Herta is inside managing the situation!
Your previous injuries haven’t even healed.
If you are exposed to the Swarm’s pollution, you’re dead.
Going down there is suicide!”
She reached out, her trembling fingers clamping down over his wrist to stop him from drawing the blade.
Despite the tremor in her hands, her voice carried the crushing weight of her station.
“I have already locked the blast doors.
The Security Department will hold the checkpoints on each level to cover the retreat.
Arlan, you will guard the Master Control Zone and ensure everyone boards the transport ships safely.
That is an order.”
Arlan stared at the fierce, unyielding light in her eyes.
His jaw tightened.
Finally, he gave a heavy nod, turning his back to her and planting himself squarely at the entrance of the Master Control Zone, turning his body into a living shield for the command deck.
Down in the lower corridors, the crimson emergency strobes painted the white walls in blood-red flashes.
A junior researcher, fresh from logging star rail telemetry, violently flinched.
His data tablet shattered against the floorboards.
He stared up at the holographic banners flashing the Propagation hazard warning, his face draining of all color.
Everyone in the galaxy knew the horror of the Swarm.
Nobody wanted to become an incubator for insects.
“Don’t just stand there!
Move!” A senior researcher grabbed him by the collar, shoving a heavy emergency hazard kit into his chest.
The older man’s voice shook, but he forced himself to keep moving.
“Masks on!
Do not touch anything growing on the bulkheads!
Keep your eyes on the person in front of you and do not break formation!”
A tide of white coats flooded toward the docking bays.
Some clutched hard drives containing decades of research tightly to their chests; some dragged paralyzed interns by the arms.
Many cast terrified glances back over their shoulders toward the sealed Seclusion Zone, but the panic never devolved into a stampede.
Security Department officers anchored every intersection.
Rifles raised, safeties off, they barked orders to keep the flow of traffic moving, their fingers white-knuckled on the triggers as they stared into the empty hallways behind the retreating scientists.
Meanwhile, in the Supply Zone, the Astral Express Crew was abruptly grounded by the wailing sirens.
Just a moment prior, March 7th had been practically buzzing around Stelle, shoving a camera in her face to show off a newly snapped photo.
Himeko had been leaning gracefully against a terminal, sipping coffee while discussing spatial anomalies with a passing technician.
Welt was adjusting his glasses over an Intelligentsia Guild report, and Dan Heng stood by the viewport, eyes closed in silent meditation.
When the klaxons screamed, March nearly launched her camera across the room.
“Whoa!” She leaped backward, instinctively grabbing Stelle by the sleeve and pulling her behind her.
Frost crackled in the air as a thick, translucent shield of ice materialized in her grip.
Her wide eyes darted around the corridor.
“Level 1 Emergency?
Propagation pollution?!
That sounds completely awful!”
Dan Heng’s eyes snapped open.
His ears twitched, filtering the distant, chaotic stampede of boots from the deep, rhythmic thrum of hostile energy.
He summoned Cloud-Piercer to his hand, his voice dropping into a deadly calm.
“The energy spike is originating from the western Seclusion Zone.
It is the power of the Path of The Propagation.
The infection rate is absolute.
Do not let any unknown biological matter touch your skin.”
Welt tapped his cane against the floor plating.
He frowned, his gaze shifting toward Himeko.
“The Swarm’s corruption spreads exponentially.
If containment fails, this entire station will mutate into a hive within seconds.
Lead Researcher Asta is coordinating the retreat.
We cannot simply walk away.”
“Of course we can’t.” Himeko set her ceramic cup down on the console.
The relaxed, elegant curve of her eyes sharpened into a predator’s focus.
She reached up, tucking a stray lock of crimson hair behind her ear.
“March, you and Welt secure the evacuation routes.
Make sure the staff reach the docks alive.
Dan Heng, stay with Stelle.
Keep her from rushing in blindly, and watch out for the corrosive spores.
I am going to the Master Control Zone to assist Asta.”
“Don’t worry, Himeko!
I’ve got this!” March hoisted her ice shield higher.
Despite the lingering dread pooling in her eyes, she puffed out her chest with a brave, reassuring smile.
Welt offered Himeko a curt nod.
He struck the floor lightly with the Star of Eden.
A dense, localized gravitational field rippled outward, priming the space around him for immediate combat.
Up in the Master Control Zone, Asta’s finger hovered millimeters above the Seclusion Zone’s self-destruct trigger.
Her knuckles were bone-white.
The containment shields on the monitors were buckling.
Then, the air itself seemed to vibrate.
A clear, impossibly solemn chant washed over the Herta Space Station.
It didn’t broadcast through the speakers.
It echoed directly within the depths of every living soul aboard, carrying a gentle, overwhelming majesty that demanded absolute reverence.
“The existence of all things is but a tracing of my form.”
“The final chapter of the universe shall eventually return to my name.”
Asta froze.
The breath hitched in her throat.
On the surveillance feeds, the frenzied swarm of insectoid horrors violently ramming the blast doors suddenly halted.
They hung suspended in mid-air, as if the universe had simply pressed pause.
The nauseating, suffocating stench of The Propagation’s filth was instantly obliterated by a blinding wash of silver-blue starlight.
The catastrophic pollution metrics on Asta’s console plummeted.
In the span of a single breath, the hazard gauges zeroed out.
She stared blankly at the monitors.
The Seclusion Zone was now bathed in a radiant, inverted galaxy of light.
“This…” Asta murmured, her voice barely a whisper.
“What kind of power is this?”
Arlan whipped his head around to stare down the corridor.
The heavy greatsword in his grip slowly lowered to the floor.
The crushing, oppressive dread of the Swarm was gone.
In its place was a pure, unassailable holiness that swept through the station like a cool ocean breeze, smoothing away the terror in his chest.
Down in the Supply Zone, Dan Heng’s white-knuckled grip on Cloud-Piercer finally relaxed.
He watched the fragmented silver starlight bleed through the reinforced bulkheads.
“It is the power of the Path of Beauty,” Dan Heng murmured, his usual stoicism cracking.
“To think it could completely suppress the filth of The Propagation.”
Stelle lowered her baseball bat.
She stared into the blinding, beautiful radiance flooding the hallway, her golden eyes wide with quiet awe.
“So pretty.”
March 7th blinked, completely stunned.
She lowered her ice shield, letting the gentle warmth of the starlight wash over her skin.
The creeping, skin-crawling disgust from moments ago vanished entirely.
“Wow…
That voice was gorgeous!
And that gross feeling is just…
gone?”
Welt pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose.
He closed his eyes, analyzing the sheer, unadulterated purity of the energy wave.
The deep lines of worry on his forehead smoothed out.
“The Path of Beauty…
I never realized its purification capabilities were this absolute.”
Himeko, who had just reached the heavy blast doors of the Master Control Zone, stopped in her tracks.
She looked up toward the sealed western wing, a deep sense of wonder and understanding blooming in her amber eyes.
[Elysian’s Note:
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