At this moment, Lila's gaze was fixed intently on the black iron badge that Kairos displayed on the screen.
She had naturally seen that symbol of interlocking gears and lightning before.
If memory served, about a decade ago at a top-secret project initiation meeting, this symbol had appeared on the cover of Chief Science Officer Miles's private terminal files.
And she naturally knew quite clearly what identity this symbol represented.
Mason Hart!
That legendary engineer who, according to legend, had saved Miles's life in the great disaster over a decade ago, but who later vanished without a trace. This person was actually from the Lower City and still alive?
And why would Kairos know him?
Countless questions and enormous shock left Lila feeling her mind go completely blank, and what Kairos had just said made it impossible for her to ignore.
Tearing apart the ley lines, extracting energy from the entire surface world, causing the Lower City to collapse?
This sounded far too terrifying. If it really happened...
If the Genesis Engine she designed truly would lead to such consequences...
She didn't dare continue thinking further.
She knew very well in her heart just how terrifying the Genesis Engine's energy was. A reaction triggered by that level of energy running wild would absolutely cause countless people to instantly vanish from this world.
Also, was the surface world truly already habitable now?
If this were really the case, wouldn't that mean the Alliance had been deceiving everyone all along?
For a moment, Lila truly found it somewhat hard to believe what Kairos was saying, because if what he said was true, then she had become the Alliance's accomplice. As a researcher, she had always possessed a sense of responsibility she took pride in.
And this sense of responsibility made it absolutely impossible for her to accept such a thing.
In truth, regarding the true purpose of the Genesis Engine, she had never thought much about it. The orders from the Alliance's upper echelons had always made her feel she was working hard for the greater good, but now...
Her fingers clenched and released on the control panel.
What should she do now?
If what Kairos said was true...
Should she help Kairos?
That would mean betraying the Alliance, betraying the organization she had worked for all these years.
Not help?
If such a situation truly existed, what about the tens of thousands of Lower City residents and that surface world that had already returned to normal but was being covered up by the Alliance?
"I..."
For a moment, Lila fell into tremendous hesitation, appearing quite conflicted.
"What you're saying—I need some time to process."
"You can have time, but we don't have much left."
Kairos shrugged.
"You may not believe me now, but I'll show you more concrete evidence next. Right now I just need an identity to facilitate my actions, preferably one that can grant access to areas related to the Genesis Engine. I want to investigate some information."
Upon hearing this, Lila's internal scales swayed violently before she finally made her decision.
No matter what, she couldn't watch the engine she had cultivated with her own hands become a dangerous thing that would destroy the world.
She took a deep breath and spoke with difficulty.
"Alright..."
"I can give you the identity of a data cleaner. These people are normally responsible for daily maintenance of databases in the outer areas of the research district, with relatively low clearance. So this identity can only access non-core databases and some abandoned databases. I don't know if that will be enough for you..."
Her fingers operated rapidly on the keyboard.
"I'll send the identity information over now... This identity is named Lynn, but it won't withstand deep investigation."
"This identity will only let you operate in the outer areas of the research district. You absolutely cannot go to the core area. Also..."
She paused, her tone carrying a tense note.
"Security checks in the research district are very strict, with three levels of verification: biological scanning, energy fluctuation detection, and finally identity recognition. Any abnormality in any step will trigger an alarm, so you must be very careful."
Kairos nodded in understanding.
At this moment, Dr. Lila's information stream had already transmitted to the screen before him, and a card fell directly out of the machine. He glanced at the identity information for someone named Lynn and picked up the card.
"Alright, thank you."
"Wait!" Lila hurriedly called out to him, hesitating for a moment.
"Director Miles has been very mysterious lately, under tremendous pressure. I don't know what he's thinking..."
"If possible, please deliver a message for me. Tell him I want to know what he truly thinks about the Alliance."
Having finished speaking, the communication was cut off and the screen went dark.
On the other side, in the laboratory, Lila leaned back in her chair, her face pale and body still trembling slightly.
This time, had she truly done the right thing?
With the identity of Lynn, Kairos no longer lingered.
He quickly left the Lower City and boarded the only channel to the surface world—the public rail train to the city where the Alliance's core district was located. The carriage was packed with weary workers and citizens with numb expressions, the air mixed with the smell of sweat and cheap cleaning agents.
The train traveled through darkness, then suddenly climbed upward.
When the train burst out of the underground tunnel and entered the Alliance main city area, the intense light made Kairos squint slightly.
A massive transparent dome covered the entire city, beams of sunlight filtering through special materials, bright but lacking some of the sun's warmth. Clearly, this was an artificial sun. When he first arrived, he hadn't noticed, but now it was clear to him.
Towering metal buildings reflected cold luster, aerial tracks crisscrossed like a spider web, and small aircraft shuttled silently through the air. The streets were clean, pedestrians dressed smartly, wearing smiles on their faces that Lower City residents would never have.
Kairos also noticed that on the roads, patrolling mecha squads constantly surveyed the streets, blue and white searchlights sweeping every corner. When he first came, there hadn't been such patrolling machines.
Clearly the recent events had put the Alliance on alert.
Soon, the train arrived at the station—this was the Alliance's core area.
After Kairos disembarked, he headed directly according to the route Lila provided, toward the security checkpoint at the outer area of the research district.
The checkpoint entrance was a massive alloy gate, with several guards wearing fully armed powered exoskeletons at the door.
Kairos wasn't nervous. He simply stepped forward and inserted Lynn's identity card into the recognition slot.
At the same time, Chandelure had already followed Kairos's instructions to hide in the shadow beneath his feet like Gengar had done before, avoiding detection by the energy scanner.
For an Elite Four level Ghost-type Pokémon, this wasn't particularly difficult.
A green scanning beam swept over his body, confirming his biological information.
The identity card popped out, displaying: Lynn - Data Cleaner - Level 3 Clearance.
"Level 3 clearance? Outer area?"
A guard glanced at the screen, then looked over Kairos wearing the iron mask with suspicion. "Are you new?"
"Yes, just transferred. I'm responsible for the abandoned database." Kairos's voice came through the mask, sounding somewhat muffled.
The guard looked carefully at the information on the screen again, confirming there were no errors.
Although he found this masked fellow a bit strange, the clearance was valid, and he had no reason to stop him, so he simply didn't bother.
"Go on in. Since you're new, remember to pay attention to area markings and don't wander around."
The heavy alloy door opened.
Kairos stepped into the research district.
Everything before him was different from both the Lower City and the prosperous district outside. White was the main color scheme here.
Walls, floors, and ceilings were all very clean, the air filled with the distinctive smell of disinfectant. Researchers in white coats hurried about, conversing in low voices, most wearing anxious or focused expressions on their faces.
Honestly, this place gave Kairos an initial feeling somewhat like a hospital.
He didn't carefully observe his surroundings but went directly according to his identity clearance to first enter a non-core database area that Lila had mentioned. This place stored large amounts of historical operation logs, equipment maintenance records, and some data content marked as outdated or redundant.
There was no one in the room. Kairos made a show of opening a data cleaning terminal, and a light screen popped up.
His fingers tapped a few times on the virtual keyboard, selected a batch of useless data, and initiated the deletion program.
This world's technological level was indeed quite high—machines could even directly link with human consciousness.
At this moment, massive information fragments flooded into his mind through the terminal: energy consumption records from routine engine maintenance, malfunction reports from certain energy overloads, early data from surface environment monitoring, and the like.
During this process, Kairos keenly caught some anomalous points in different logs.
He searched for the keyword Genesis Engine and then found an early engine test run report that had been archived.
The report clearly mentioned that to maintain the current scale of energy supply for the Lower City, the engine only needed to output 15% of its designed power, which would be sufficient. However, in the operation test logs from the past year, the engine's average output power had been increased directly to 25%.
This power level clearly exceeded the needs for stable energy supply...
From this perspective, the Alliance wasn't using this thing to maintain the normal operation of the underground city?
Just then, the communicator he had obtained when he first arrived in this world vibrated slightly in his pocket.
He picked it up and looked—an encrypted message jumped out, sent by Lila:
[Lila: Go to abandoned database E-743, folder in section 18, all documents related to the Genesis Engine. Clearance is temporarily open to you for five minutes now. Be careful, there's tracking data inside. Delete the access records immediately after viewing. Hurry!]
Scanning the message, Kairos immediately took action. He quickly went to that abandoned database and, using the temporary clearance Lila had granted, found that folder. Inside were several drafts marked as erroneous.
And the signature on the drafts... was actually a familiar name.
The Miles that Old Smokestack had mentioned!
[Document Title: Project "Genesis Engine" High Power Operation Risk Assessment (Draft)]
[Author: Miles Kafka, Chief Science Officer]
[Date: ?]
[Classification: Top Secret//Olympus-Level Clearance Only//—Not Finally Approved]
This was the document's header, with a dense mass of content below.
Kairos quickly read through it once. To summarize briefly, the information this document mentioned basically stated that if the Genesis Engine continued to operate at higher power, not only would it not bring more energy to the Lower City, it would instead trigger some dangerous problems. At the end of the document were two lines in red text.
[Document Status: Archived in E-743 Abandoned Database—Section 18 Folder]
[Archival Reason: "Theoretical model contains major uncertainties, conclusions overly pessimistic, inconsistent with project's final strategic direction."—Archival directive issued by [Authority Above Olympus Level].]
Seeing this, Kairos already had a general understanding.
From this perspective, the Alliance had probably known very early on about the side effects that would come from fully activating the Genesis Engine. They simply didn't care at all.
But at the same time, this document also made Kairos realize one thing.
Perhaps when the Genesis Engine was first researched, its initial purpose wasn't what it was today?
To find other clues, he would probably need to approach that Chief Science Officer Miles more directly.
With this thought, he deleted all access records and left the database area, heading toward the core office district of the Science Department building. According to Lila, Miles's office was on the top floor.
Kairos rode the silent magnetic levitation elevator upward. The good news was that he was the only one in the elevator.
When he arrived at the floor where the director's office was located, a female secretary in a black uniform stopped him.
"Stop. Who are you looking for? Do you have an appointment?"
"I'm looking for Director Miles." Kairos spoke. "Mason asked me to bring something over."
The secretary frowned, clearly having no recollection of this name.
"The Director is in seclusion at Test Area Zero and refuses any disturbances. If you don't have an appointment, please leave."
Kairos wasn't anxious. He simply remembered the name Test Area Zero and turned to walk toward the public rest area nearby to sit down.
Several researchers there were leaning wearily on sofas, conversing in low voices.
"...The load exceeded standards again this time. If this continues..."
"The higher-ups are pushing too hard. The deadline is almost here. Director Miles's hair has gone much whiter..."
"The key is still that Star Stone! We can't find a replacement. Forcing activation will definitely cause problems, but those idiots above don't care about any of this. Speechless..."
"...I heard General Quinn's faction is the most anxious... Really can't understand what they're trying to do..."
Star Stone?
Kairos caught this keyword.
It seemed this was what the engine needed for stable operation, and the Alliance was frantically searching for a replacement...
He turned and left this place, sending a message to Lila.
Test Area Zero—that name sounded like the most core area. Finding it on his own would be too slow.
Fortunately, Lila's reply came quickly, also accompanied by a series of images, roughly showing the method to reach Test Area Zero.
Following this guidance, Kairos traversed through the building for a while, took a separate elevator, and finally arrived at the entrance to Test Area Zero. Just as he had predicted, the security level here was clearly much higher.
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~ Push the story forward with your Power Stones