Chapter 1278: The Machine Wore Her Wings
Seraphina was limited by her size. In this shattered, cramped space, she couldn’t fully unfold her dragon body, so she stayed in the rear—guarding the downed Elira and anyone else who needed time to recover.
Idra didn’t have that problem.
The moment she flew out of Ethan, her body stretched longer in midair, scales racing across her skin. Her compact dragon form weaved between the constructs, so nimble it was almost impossible for their infrared targeting to lock onto her.
She snapped up a mechanical bug.
Crunch.
Metal shell shattered between her teeth.
She whipped her head and bit down on another mechanical snake—chewing straight through it, weapon and all.
One bite per kill.
Crunchy. Clean.
Namyanna lifted her trident.
Water surged from the tip, spiraling around her body once—then blasting forward, expanding into a violent waterspout shaped like a dragon.
The spinning column hugged the outer edge of Andona’s shield as it punched into the mechanical ranks, yanking humanoid constructs, swarms of bugs, and mechanical snakes up into the air.
Metal bodies slammed into each other inside the torrent.
But the noise coming out of that vortex wasn’t all machine-screech.
Mixed in was a human scream.
Short. Sharp. Clear.
Everyone snapped their heads up, staring at the constructs being flung higher.
The next second, the water dragon lost its upward drive.
Everything caught inside dropped back down, smashing into the ruins and the ice.
And right then, Elira—who’d been unconscious—opened her eyes.
She popped up off the ground in one clean motion.
Too fast. No groggy recovery. No wobble.
Elira turned toward the nearby mechanical snakes, and fear flooded her face instantly. She pulled her arms tight to her sides, pupils shrinking, feet sliding backward like she couldn’t stop herself.
The moment the others saw it, anger flared in unison.
These things had obviously done something to Elira.
Catheryn raised her hand.
A deep-black aura spilled out from under her feet, flowing past her allies and washing over the area outside Andona’s shield.
The darkness didn’t creep.
It swallowed.
In less than a second, the mechanical army, the bug swarm, the snakes, even the scattered weapon wreckage on the ground—everything was dragged into a bottomless black abyss.
All sound cut off.
All red lights died.
Everything on the perimeter vanished.
The others immediately crowded toward Elira.
Only Ethan stayed where he was, watching her in silence.
Elira being afraid of mechanical snakes wasn’t strange.
What was strange was how she’d woken up.
No change in breathing.
No return of strength.
Not even that brief lag a body always has when it goes from unconscious to alert.
Ethan’s gaze fixed on her eyes, her wings, the way she was standing.
That wasn’t Elira.
But when had she been swapped?
Ethan lifted a hand.
The "Elira" in front of him didn’t even get time to react. White lightning shot from his palm and punched through her chest and skull.
The white light detonated inside.
The shape of skin and clothes tore apart—what scattered wasn’t flesh and blood, but a storm of silver-white machine parts.
Gears. Fine wiring. Fake bones.
They clattered across the ground inside Andona’s shield, covering it in a hard rain of metal.
Everyone’s expression changed at once.
That thing had been a mechanical duplicate.
So where was the real Elira?
Their line of sight lifted past the pyramid’s torn-open top, up into higher sky.
Above the clouds, several floating islands hung in the air.
Thick chains linked them together, every chain pulled taut, faint mechanical light flowing along their surfaces.
The largest island was fully enclosed by a circular "sand table."
Fine golden sand rotated around it, forming a stable boundary.
The real Elira was inside that sand table.
She’d been brought into a bright laboratory, her body suspended quietly in a central apparatus.
A group of researchers in white lab coats hustled around the room.
They weren’t truly human either.
Mechanical prosthetic legs clicked against the metal floor—ding, ding, ding—while some adjusted instruments, some carried parts, and others repeatedly checked the battle data coming up from below.
The anxious, rapid footsteps soon drew the guards outside.
Someone in a black guard uniform shoved the door open and swept the lab with a cold look.
Every researcher froze mid-motion.
They turned toward a screen playing a video feed.
On it was the full invasion process recorded by Rhazek and Neisemann.
How Ethan’s white lightning entered the brain structure. How it extracted memory. How it slipped around the core after it was frozen—every step displayed with brutal clarity.
No one spoke.
But a voice appeared directly in everyone’s mind.
"Attempt containment."
Only four words.
The researchers moved immediately.
From a distance, the massive barrier around the floating island began to contract. The circular sand table spun faster, and the island’s outline started to fade with it.
A few breaths later, the entire island vanished from its position.
Down on the battlefield, Andona was still standing guard by the seal.
The white smoke inside had thickened until Rhazek and Neisemann’s shapes were completely invisible.
She stared into the barrier, and a sharp sense of danger rose in her chest.
Leave.
They had to leave right now.
Andona had just started to retreat when Ethan appeared beside her.
He grabbed her arm and yanked her toward the front line. At the same time, Seraphina raised a hand, layering a second shield outside the original seal.
A new deep-gold barrier snapped shut.
Rhazek and Neisemann were completely isolated behind them.
Inside the shield, the white smoke started to thin.
No.
It wasn’t dispersing.
Something in the center was absorbing it.
All the white vapor spiraled inward, pouring into a humanoid outline that was taking shape. When the last thread of smoke was swallowed, two pairs of blood-red eyes lit up inside the shield.
Rhazek and Neisemann opened their eyes at the same time.
Their bodies began to melt.
This time, the silver-white metal didn’t collapse into mindless sludge—it streamed along the ground toward a single point. Arms, torsos, heads lost their forms, becoming a pool of continuously flowing liquid metal.
The molten metal merged.
A new skeleton rose from the center.
Legs. Waist. Ribcage. Shoulders. Arms—forming one after another. Ten pairs of wings unfurled from its back, golden structure spreading outward over a silver-white frame.
A mask formed over its face.
When the transformation ended, a mechanical Andona stood at the center of the shield.
This wasn’t the earlier gray-white shadow that could only crudely mimic an outline.
This could copy completely.
Height. Wings. Mask. The way power flowed through the body—حتى even Andona’s stance—replicated with chilling precision.
The only things it might not be able to copy...
Were combinations with other powers.
And emotion.
Rhazek and Neisemann had merged into a single entity.
To be absolutely thorough, the golden mask covered everything—hiding any trace of the dog-face silhouette that might’ve remained.
The mechanical Andona began to grow.
Its metal frame expanded layer by layer, its power climbing with it. Ten pairs of wings stretched to the edges of the shield, and its body quickly exceeded normal proportions.
Bigger.
Stronger.
Forge new glory.
Until it broke past the old limit.
That was ascension.
Flesh is weak.
Mechanical ascension!
A gravity field burst out of the mechanical Andona.
Loose stones, leftover ice, and scattered metal parts were all shoved outward at once. It lifted one foot and slammed it down on the pale-gold shield trapping it.
Boom!
The barrier—and the ground beneath it—caved inward.
Cracks spiderwebbed across the golden surface, but it didn’t fully shatter.
The mechanical Andona didn’t care.
It straightened, red eyes peering over the shield as it locked onto them.
Machinery above all.