29: Chapter 29 The Pledge of Allegiance in the Spine

The sound of turrets charging came from above the shaft—clack, clack. In the low-light filter of Rat Eye's right eye, three indigo spheres of light were rotating and contracting. Eighty-seven seconds. THRONE-02 would not give him any buffer.

"Choose."

The voice squeezed out of Rat Eye's throat, carrying a non-human reverb. Chen Duo's mechanical eye flickered frantically; his hand reached for his holster but stopped. Energy at 2.1%. The STC interface at the edge of his vision glowed red, offering no negotiation suggestions.

Refuse directly, and he'd turn into mush within 0.3 seconds. Give a false promise, and the logic audit would see through it instantly.

Lin Yuan's thumb rubbed the burn scar of the mark. The mark of THRONE-01 was responding to a homologous signal. He needed a fulcrum. His gaze moved past Rat Eye and landed on the back of Chen Duo's neck. Traitor of the Anvil King. THRONE-02 had just used that term.

Eighty-three seconds.

"I refuse," Lin Yuan said.

Chen Duo's pupils contracted. The sound of the turrets charging suddenly became shrill.

"But I don't refuse a deal." Lin Yuan took a step forward, his boots making a dull thud on the metal grating. He pointed at Chen Duo. "You just said he's a traitor to the Anvil King. Do you know what he took with him when he defected?"

Rat Eye's head tilted at an unnatural angle, that right eye staring fixedly at him. The sensation of THRONE-02's prying was like slimy tentacles slithering across the inside of his skull.

"The raw data of project ark," Lin Yuan's voice echoed in the shaft. "The original chip. It's embedded in the third joint of his spine, right?"

Chen Duo's expression changed. His right hand instinctively reached for the back of his neck, where there was an almost invisible suture line.

"You want me to join because I share a homologous gene with you. You want a stable adapter, not an experimental subject that will explode. But an adapter needs data support; they need the Ark's underlying protocols to calibrate integration."

Seventy-five seconds. The sound of the turrets charging did not stop, nor did it accelerate.

"Kill us, and you get nothing." Lin Yuan took another step forward, now only an arm's length away from Rat Eye. He could smell the sickly sweetness of leaking coolant in the other's breath. "Let us in, give me control over the middle section of the shaft, and let me see the chip in his spine. After I see it, I'll decide whether to join or burn a stick of incense for you."

The corner of Rat Eye's mouth twitched. THRONE-02 was simulating a fluctuation of emotion akin to pleasure. "You are very interesting, bearer of THRONE-01. You are trying to hijack my recruitment protocol."

"I'm trying to stay alive," Lin Yuan corrected. "And incidentally, help you verify the secret the Anvil King wants to know most. What Chen Duo stole wasn't ordinary data; it was the original records regarding the 'twin keys,' right? Otherwise, you wouldn't have locked onto his position so quickly."

Chen Duo's Adam's apple bobbed. His fingers remained at the back of his neck, but there was no longer any need for concealment.

Sixty-eight seconds. The frequency of the turrets' charging sound suddenly dropped.

"I can directly read his neural signals," THRONE-02 said through Rat Eye's mouth.

"You can try." Lin Yuan slowly raised his right hand, the STC mark on his palm glowing with a faint golden light. "But his spinal implant has an anti-cracking protocol. Once an unauthorized read is detected, the chip will self-melt. The Anvil King's people are always so cautious."

This was a lie. At least partially. Lin Yuan was gambling that Chen Duo's mechanical modifications followed the Anvil King's standard security protocols.

Sixty seconds.

"You have been granted temporary permissions for the middle section of the shaft," THRONE-02 finally said, the voice seeming to come from all directions. "The airtight doors will open. But the turrets will remain in standby; my surveillance will not be withdrawn. If you refuse to join after seeing the data, I will turn you into two abstract paintings on the wall."

Lin Yuan turned to look at Chen Duo, his gaze calm. "Take it out."

Chen Duo's lips pressed into a pale line. His mechanical eye flickered three times. "You knew all along."

"I guessed," Lin Yuan said. "Now, take it out. Or we die together."

Chen Duo's finger pressed hard on the suture line at the back of his neck. The third joint of his mechanical spine clicked, and a biological chip the size of a fingernail slowly pushed out from under the skin. The chip's surface was covered with a translucent organic membrane, beneath which were dense nano-circuits. Chen Duo pinched the chip and pulled it out, a few drops of pale yellow lubricant trickling down his neck.

"It contains Su Wanqing's early experimental records," Chen Duo said hoarsely. "The Anvil King has been looking for this. They believe it relates to the original flaws of project ark."

Lin Yuan took the chip. It was cold to the touch. He didn't check it immediately but looked up toward the top of the shaft. "Open the door."

The rumbling sound of machinery operating followed. The airtight door slid open slowly, revealing a deep passage behind it. Dim amber emergency lights flickered on both sides of the passage. The barrels of the three turrets slowly lowered, their charging glow extinguishing, but their positions remained unchanged—like three predators feigning sleep.

"Coordinates for the Sector B terminal."

"They're in the chip," Rat Eye's voice carried a trace of fatigue. "Go forward three hundred meters, then turn left. But remember, Lin Yuan, you and I share the same genetic source. You can't escape."

Lin Yuan turned and walked toward the airtight door, with Chen Duo following behind. The moment they crossed the threshold, the airtight door closed slowly behind them with a heavy thud. The indicator light on the door turned from red to a flashing yellow.

The passage was very quiet. Lin Yuan walked about fifty meters, and only after confirming the turrets' line of sight was blocked by a corner did he stop. He leaned against the cold wall and took a deep breath.

Chen Duo stood opposite him, leaning against the other wall. Their gazes met in the dim light.

"You were gambling just now," Chen Duo said.

"Yes," Lin Yuan took out the chip and twirled it between his fingers. "Gambling that THRONE-02's desire for the twin keys was greater than its intent to kill me. And gambling that you were indeed carrying something of value."

"And if there was no chip in my spine?"

"Then you would be a corpse right now," Lin Yuan's tone was devoid of emotion. "And I would be looking for other things of value on your body."

Chen Duo was silent for a moment, then let out a short, dry laugh. "Our relationship has changed now. You hold the evidence of my betrayal, and I hold the clues to your mother. Co-conspirators bound by interest."

"Temporarily." Lin Yuan inserted the chip into the Wanderer's external port, and a parsing progress bar popped up on the STC interface. The 2.1% energy made the progress bar move extremely slowly. As he scanned the first line of code, his pupils contracted slightly.

It was Su Wanqing's code annotation style, a programming habit unique to the Ark Laboratory. His fingers tightened unconsciously, but he quickly regained control.

"twin keys," he whispered the title on the screen.

There was a schematic in the data showing the core structure of the Sector B terminal. It wasn't an ordinary computer terminal but a biological neural interface that required two independent, genetically homologous adapters to connect simultaneously to activate. One was labeled THRONE-01, and the other THRONE-02.

Lin Yuan looked up at Chen Duo. "This is why it didn't kill me. It needs my genetic sequence as a stable anchor to fully control that terminal."

Chen Duo nodded, his face still pale, but his eyes had regained the calmness of a utilitarian. "The Anvil King has been searching for a second adapter. They thought creating THRONE-02 solved the problem, but that specimen is unstable. It needs homologous gene resonance to maintain its consciousness projection; otherwise, it will collapse."

Lin Yuan closed the data interface, pulled the chip out, and tossed it back to Chen Duo. Chen Duo caught it instinctively, surprise showing on his face.

"Keep it safe," Lin Yuan said. "Now it is our common property. You hold it, and I hold your life. If you inform the Anvil King, I will trigger the self-destruct device in your spine first. If you try to run away alone, THRONE-02's turrets will turn you into a sieve. We are tied together, Chen Duo."

Chen Duo looked down at the chip in his hand and was silent for a long time. Then he tucked the chip back into his spinal slot, which locked with a click. "Ninety minutes," he said. "The Anvil King's main force arrived at the perimeter ahead of schedule. THRONE-02 intercepted the intel just now and deliberately compressed the countdown to apply pressure."

"I know." Lin Yuan pushed open the door at the end of the passage, behind which was the transfer platform in the middle of the shaft. In the center of the platform was a massive elevator shaft leading deeper into Sector B. A red lock symbol flashed on the elevator control panel, but the moment Lin Yuan approached, the symbol turned yellow, then green.

The temporary permissions had taken effect.

Lin Yuan's finger hovered over the start button. He could feel a faint burning sensation from Rat Eye's right eye—evidence that THRONE-02 was still observing him through the neural link.

"Let's go down," Lin Yuan pressed the button, and the elevator let out a heavy mechanical rumbling. "Let's see what our mother actually left behind."

Chen Duo's mechanical eye flickered, but he didn't correct Lin Yuan's choice of words. The elevator platform began to descend, going deep into the heart of Station Zero. Above their heads, the three turrets silently rotated their barrels, aiming in the direction they had disappeared.

And at the edge of Lin Yuan's vision, the energy indicator on the STC interface remained stubbornly fixed at 2.1%.

The elevator descended about thirty meters when it suddenly jolted violently. Lin Yuan grabbed the handrail, feeling a powerful electromagnetic pulse coming from below. A sudden sharp pain erupted from Rat Eye's right eye, transmitted back through the neural link, making his temples throb.

"It's awake." Chen Duo grabbed the other handrail, his face deathly pale. "The thing in Sector B. THRONE-02 isn't the only resident."

The lights in the elevator flickered a few times and then went out completely. In the absolute darkness, Lin Yuan heard a massive, metallic breathing sound from below. It didn't sound like a machine, nor did it sound biological; it was like some existence between the two was waking up.

The sensation of THRONE-02's surveillance suddenly vanished at that moment, as if shielded by a more powerful signal. Lin Yuan's fingers gripped the handrail tightly, feeling that the elevator was still descending, but its speed had become unstable, sometimes fast and sometimes slow.

In the darkness, he heard a rapid beeping from Chen Duo's mechanical eye—an alarm detecting a high-energy reaction.

Then, the elevator came to a sudden halt. The doors didn't open, but they could feel that something was standing outside, separated by the thick metal door panels, waiting quietly.