The sky looked the same.
But I no longer trusted it.
My system chimed persistently, a silent siren only I could hear.
[ORBITAL ANOMALY – WATCHER PROBE ACTIVATED]
Class: Precursor Sentinel
Status: Dormant... now Awakening
Response Timeframe: 72 Hours Before Signal Reaches Outer Relays
Recommendation: Engage or Terminate Before Contagion Spread
I stood atop the Spire of Silence, the tallest point of the Sky Citadel. From here, the stars bled their secrets. With my upgraded ocular lens—a blend of mana sight and quantum scope—I could see it.
A tear in black.
Motionless… and yet alive.
The Watcher.
A relic from the Fall.
"It's not sending a distress signal," Vel'Sarei told me later that night in the War Hall. "It's sending a confirmation. That you exist. That the Heir still breathes."
"How many could be listening?" I asked.
She didn't answer at first.
"...every lost empire. Every void-touched remnant. Every dimensional leech or surviving god-construct that feared your bloodline's return."
The room went silent.
I turned to General Daruun.
"How long until the Genesis Fleet's first wave is battle-ready?"
"Two weeks minimum for basic deployment. Full firepower in three months."
Too late.
I had 72 hours.
I returned to the system and activated the experimental directive unlocked through my bloodline's resonance.
[PROTOCOL: CHAINFIRE AWAKENING]
Grants partial override of Precursor tech using Starforged DNA
WARNING: May trigger a hostile counterlink
Activate? Y/N
"Yes," I said.
For a moment, nothing happened.
Then—
Pain. My mind split into spectrums of light and data, as if my consciousness had plugged into an ancient god's dream. Images slammed into me:
Cities orbiting black holes.
Thrones built of dying suns.
A war so vast it could only be told in gravitational echoes.
A final decision: seal the Watcher, bury the last of the Infinite Heirs.
And then a voice.
"Heir Detected. Authority Confirmed. Initiating Memory Stream."
I collapsed. When I woke, I was in the stasis recovery pod. Alis and Reina were beside me, worried, but quiet.
"I saw them," I whispered. "All of them. Every ancestor who built this world. Every battle they lost. Every enemy they locked out."
Reina looked confused, but Alis understood.
"You woke it, didn't you?"
I nodded.
"It wasn't just a probe. It was a vault. A seed. A backup of everything we once were."
The council reconvened that evening. A giant holographic projection of the Watcher hovered above the table.
"Inside that thing," I said, "is knowledge we were never meant to access again. Blueprints, weapons, even fleets. But if we don't take it… someone else might. And they will burn everything to get it."
Zephyra leaned forward. "Then we take it."
"We don't have the forces," Alrik argued. "It could be a trap."
"It is," I said. "But it's my trap now."
[MISSION UNLOCKED: STORM THE SKYVAULT]
Objective: Board the Watcher before its outer signal reaches the Deep Echo
Time Remaining: 67 Hours
Risk Level: Cataclysmic
Reward: Precursor Class-Σ Starforge Database
Companions Suggested: 3–5
Confirm Boarding Team?
I looked at them—my closest, most loyal.
"We go now. Vel'Sarei, Alis, Daruun, Zephyra. Suit up."
Vel'Sarei smiled for the first time. "Now you sound like the Infinite."
That night, Reina handed me a piece of paper before I left.
A drawing.
A boy standing on a star, holding hands with a girl and a fleet of dragons flying behind them.
"Don't forget," she said softly. "You promised me a dragonship."
I knelt, hugged her close.
"I'll bring you back a galaxy."