Necromancer Dreams of Mechs Chapter 64: Chapter 70

Read chapter 64 of Necromancer Dreams of Mechs by Magic on NovelPedia.

Chapter 64: The Architect and the Anchor Inside the nursery wing of the estate, the world had died. The transition was so absolute that it felt like a physical blow to Ciara’s equilibrium. One moment, she was standing in a room filled with the warm, dusty scent of old wood and the lingering violet glow of the celestial tear; the next, the very concept of color had been stripped away. The deep mahogany of the cradles, the crimson velvet of the curtains, and even the flushed heat in her own cheeks bled into a stark, clinical greyscale. The dust motes in the air froze mid-drift. Seraphine stood by the window, a perfect, unmoving statue in shades of charcoal and ash. She was frozen in time, a victim of the same temporal lock that had gripped the rest of the world. Ciara’s breath hitched, coming out as a puff of grey mist. She spun around, her hand instinctively reaching for a dagger she didn't have, only to find herself facing a woman who shouldn’t have been there. The Goddess Rngallia didn't manifest with a flash of light or a thunderclap. She simply materialized . One moment the center of the room was empty; the next, a woman slowly appeared standing there with a presence that felt like the foundation of reality itself. She was beautiful, but it was a haunting, familiar beauty—the kind that lived in the back of a foggy memory. Her eyes weren't the glowing orbs of a machine; they were deep, tired, and full of a mother’s fierce, desperate love. “Ciara,” the Goddess spoke. The voice wasn't the booming resonance of a deity. It was the voice of Lillian Voss—soft, melodic, and layered with a weight of sorrow that made Ciara’s knees tremble. “I’ve been waiting for you. I’ve seen the way you hold him when the world gets too loud. Thank you for that.” Ciara’s mouth felt like it was filled with wool. She looked at the woman, then at the frozen, grey Seraphine. “You... you’re her. The System. The one Allen talks about.” “System? You mean my creation, the Architect? He is the one that protected you from your father, who planned on keeping you away from Allen and forcing you to marry a man of his choosing,” Lillian said, stepping forward. The greyscale world seemed to ripple around her, as if her very presence was too much for the simulation to manage. “I designed the Architect to be like a guiding older brother to Allen—a mentor in my absence. But a brother’s love is different from a mother’s. The Architect knows that for Allen to survive the 'Good' Gods—and soon, your father—he has to harden. He has to become as cold and unyielding as the iron my Squires carry.” Ciara had a thousand questions, but the air felt too heavy for them. She stayed silent, listening to the ghost of the woman who had built this world. Lillian reached out, her hand hovering near Ciara’s face, though she didn't touch her. “The Architect will push him. It will try to strip away the boy I loved to make room for the King the world needs. That is why you are here, Ciara. You are the heartbeat. The anchor. If he loses his humanity in the pursuit of his army, he won't be a savior—he’ll become something much worse, and this reality will become warped. You have to be the one to remind him why the living are worth protecting. But I don’t think the time is now. He must gain more power first.” Ciara took a shaky breath, her awe slowly being replaced by the sharp, protective instinct of a girl who had just marked her man. She looked at Seraphine, still frozen like a marble carving by the window. “And what about her ?” Ciara asked, her voice gaining a sharp edge. “Seraphine. She calls herself his wife. She acts like she owns this place... like she owns him. If I’m his anchor, what is she?” Lillian’s expression didn't shift into anger. Instead, a look of profound, weary pragmatism settled over her features. She looked at Seraphine—her "daughter" of code and circumstance—and then back at Ciara. “You are sixteen, Ciara. You see the world through the lens of a girl who wants her firs