The light-projected projector at the center of the Precursor Archive hummed to life with a clean, azure glow.
Lines of ancient pre-Cataclysm code cascaded across the floating display in dense sharp-angled columns. Toby Mallow’s fingers flew across the silver-steel keyboard. His eyes reflected the blue light as the decryption protocols dismantled decades of cultist security wrappers.
ACCESS GRANTED: LEVEL NINE CLEARANCE. PROJECT GENESIS: UNREDACTED HISTORICAL LOGS. Starting ARCHIVAL PLAYBACK...
Arthur Vance stood motionless before the console, his Monocle Type-list Loupe recording every frame. Beside him, Dr. Morrigan Calder leaned against the workbench, her breath catching as the true history of modern great realm unfurled before them.
A grainy video log flickered into focus.
The recording showed a massive underground drilling platform, branded with the logos of a 21st-century global energy conglomerate. Giant high-pressure drill rigs were grinding into deep dark rock, while scientists in white protective suits monitored ground-shaking monitors spiking into red thresholds. The timestamp in the corner read: NOVEMBER 14, 2082 - 03:42 UTC. LOCATION: ANTARCTIC DEEP BOREHOLE.
A sharp, cultured voice echoed through the archive’s speakers—the voice of a younger, arrogant man: Chief Geneticist Dr. Osric Malveaux.
“Core depth: twelve thousand four hundred meters,” Malveaux’s voice narrated. “We believed we were tapping into an overload earth-heat underground water bed to provide limitless energy for the northern hemisphere. But the drill has breached an anomalous crystal-clear shell. Material thickness exceeds diamond by three orders of size. The drill bit has burst the holding barrier.”
