The sky remained calm after the Transcendent entity vanished.
Too calm.
Kael stood at the ridge's edge, staring upward.
Lyra stood beside him, but not close enough to touch.
Not distant enough to be strangers.
A precise distance.
Calculated.
[System Notification: Transcendent Observation Marker Applied]
[Growth Acceleration Increased by 12%]
Kael blinked.
"So it marked us… and boosted us?"
Lyra's gaze shifted slightly.
"Likely to observe long-term scalability. Faster growth produces faster data."
He laughed quietly.
"So we're experiments."
"Yes."
No emotion in her answer.
Just clarity.
Kael turned to look at her fully.
"And you're okay with that?"
Lyra paused.
Her system flickered faintly in her irises.
"Acceptable risk."
There it was.
Kael didn't argue.
But he stored that answer away.
A distant tremor rolled across the land.
Not natural.
Spiritual signatures—dozens of them—approaching rapidly.
Lyra narrowed her eyes.
"Outer Domain enforcers. They felt the distortion from our fight."
Kael smirked.
"Let them come."
She shook her head slightly.
"That would be inefficient."
"In what way?"
"In every way."
Before he could respond, five massive warships broke through the cloud layer—floating constructs powered by spiritual arrays. Golden insignias burned along their hulls.
The Virelith Dominion.
Elite enforcers.
They descended slowly.
Kael felt their pressure.
Heavy.
Organized.
Disciplined.
[System Scan: Multiple Level 25–30 Signatures Detected]
Higher than both of them.
Lyra stepped slightly forward.
"Do not escalate."
Kael glanced at her.
"You're giving orders now?"
"I am preventing premature exposure."
Fair.
The largest warship halted overhead.
A voice amplified through spiritual resonance echoed across the land:
"Unknown system anomalies. Identify yourselves."
Kael raised an eyebrow.
"They can detect systems?"
"Yes," Lyra replied quietly. "Advanced factions can measure growth irregularities."
Interesting.
Kael stepped forward just enough to be visible.
"Just travelers."
A beam of scanning light descended.
His system flickered in response.
[Warning: Deep Analysis Attempt]
Lyra's voice was calm beside him.
"Suppress output to baseline cultivation signature."
Kael focused.
The Infinite Ascension System dimmed its visible fluctuations.
The scanning beam lingered.
Then retracted.
Silence.
Finally, the amplified voice responded:
"You are ordered to report to the Virelith Dominion for registration."
Kael blinked.
"Registration?"
Lyra nodded faintly.
"High-growth cultivators are monitored."
He looked at her sideways.
"You've done this before."
"Yes."
Of course she had.
Always optimized.
Always ahead.
The warships began ascending again.
"Report within three days," the voice concluded.
Then they were gone.
Kael exhaled slowly.
"Well. That complicates things."
Lyra looked toward the distant floating capital of Virelith.
"No."
She corrected him.
"It accelerates them."
He studied her expression.
"You want to go."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because large factions hold information."
Her eyes met his directly.
"And we need to know who is hunting system hosts."
He smiled slowly.
Now that… was interesting.
She wasn't just surviving.
She was planning.
They began walking toward the distant capital.
Wind moved between them again.
Not hostile.
Not friendly.
Calculated coexistence.
After several minutes, Kael spoke without looking at her.
"If that entity comes back stronger…"
"It will."
"You'll still stand with me?"
Lyra didn't answer immediately.
Her system likely ran probabilities.
Finally, she said:
"If cooperation remains optimal."
Kael nodded once.
Honest.
Cold.
But honest.
And for now—
That was enough.
High above the world, unseen by both of them—
A circular formation rotated silently in orbit.
Inside it, dozens of shattered system cores floated in containment fields.
A shadowed figure observed two growing energy signatures on a projection sphere.
One chaotic.
One precise.
The figure spoke quietly:
"Prepare Phase Two."