Location; Svalbard Global Vault, Norway
The cold bit into Damien's skin despite the thermal lining of his coat. The air here carried a silence unlike any other—thick, ancient, and laced with the breath of secrets buried beneath permafrost. The Svalbard Global Vault stood like a monolith of isolation, housing the DNA of the planet—seeds, data, contingency codes—and now, perhaps, the last remaining clue to his family's survival.
Beside him, Nora adjusted the security badge given to them by an anonymous contact simply known as "Valen." Her gaze darted across the frozen horizon, sharp and wary.
"I still can't believe Archer had the audacity to store encrypted biomaps here," she muttered. "Right under the world's nose."
Damien remained silent. His mind was still processing the message from his cousin, Cassandra—hidden in an old video recording retrieved from their family's lost estate in Tavara. She spoke of an imminent purge: a global cleansing orchestrated by Archer Grey using nanite-laced vaccines and a neural override system secretly embedded into major population centers.
The vault's biometric scanner flashed green, granting access.
Inside, the temperature dropped further. Rows of cryo-stabilized servers lined the walls like graves of forgotten civilizations. Nora pulled up her tablet and activated a holographic interface. Blue light flooded the corridor.
"Server block 7A," she directed.
They moved quickly, boots crunching on the frost-covered floor. The data crystal they recovered in chapter 108 contained an access key. When Damien slotted it in, a panel lit up with cascading symbols.
An old video flickered to life.
Onscreen: Archer Grey in a military-style bunker, flanked by international scientists. He spoke in chilling calm.
> "If they survive, it won't be by luck. It will be because we gave them a future built on correction. The corrupted lines must be reset… and Damien Thorne's bloodline? It's the original anomaly."
Damien's jaw clenched. "He's targeting my family—not just me. My lineage."
Nora's fingers flew across the interface. "I'm extracting what I can. Backup logs, personnel identities, satellite drops. This entire project... It's code-named Project WipeRoot. And it spans three continents."
Suddenly, sirens blared.
Unauthorized breach.
"How did they—?" Nora started, but a thunderous blast cut her off. The entrance imploded.
Smoke filled the vault.
Damien yanked her behind a row of cold storage units just as bullets ripped through the air.
Footsteps—precise, tactical.
"Blackridge shadow agents," Damien hissed. "We were followed."
Two grenades rolled in, but Nora activated an electromagnetic pulse. The vault's localized systems went dead. Lights cut out, followed by the disorientation of total darkness.
Gunfire danced through the dark.
Damien fired twice, then tackled a figure lunging at him. The struggle was short, brutal. The assailant fell with a choked gurgle.
"We need extraction," Nora whispered into her comms. "Now."
A voice answered—it was Nora's mother, Elena.
> "A snowmobile convoy's waiting at the western ridge. But hurry. They've dispatched a VTOL gunship from the Russian Arctic fleet."
"Of course they did," Damien muttered, gripping Nora's hand.
They ran through service tunnels, breaking through emergency hatches into the blizzard outside. Overhead, the silhouette of a drone gunship sliced through the snowstorm.
The chase had only just begun.