All Chapters of Marked From Birth: Chapter 91 - Chapter 100

Ten years had passed since the sky broke over the Sea of Salt. The "Rainbow Fall" was no longer a terrifying memory; it had become the central epoch of the new calendar. In the year 10 A.R. (After Radiance), the world did not look like the one the First King had envisioned, nor the one the Golden Queen had policed. It was a world of Movement.Audrey stood on the balcony of the High Command, which was now situated on the 14th level of the Aethelgard-Prime. The city was no longer a singular vessel; it was the flagship of the Union Fleet—a nomadic nation of five massive land-crawlers and three submersible "Levellers" that roamed the continent.She looked different now. Her hair was shot through with streaks of silver, and her violet scars had settled into deep, metallic ridges that hummed when she was near the engines. She wore a coat of heavy, oil-treated wool, but beneath it, she still wore the simple leather tunic of a worker."The scouts from the West have returned," a voice said.Au

The clearing at the center of the West was not an open space, but a pocket of impossibly clear air held within a dome of petrified white wood. In the center sat the Amber Cathedral—a structure that looked less like a building and more like a gargantuan, calcified heart. It rose a thousand feet into the canopy, its walls translucent and glowing with a deep, internal heat that made the surrounding "Green Death" seem pale by comparison."The resonance here is off the charts," Mara whispered, her eyes fixed on the cathedral’s shifting surface. She wasn't using her meters anymore; the air was so saturated with energy that the brass needles had literally melted. "It’s not light or shadow, Mother. It’s Pure Potential. It’s the energy of a seed magnified by a million."Audrey stepped off the boarding ramp of Aethelgard, her boots sinking into a floor of soft, white sand that was actually ground-up bone and silica. Beside her, Lucas held his iron-and-silver arm steady, though the gears were cl

The transition from the world’s surface to the "Void" was not a silent glide; it was a mechanical agony. As Aethelgard tore itself from the gravity-anchors of the West, the atmosphere inside the city became a battlefield. The pressure-stabilizers, designed for deep-sea depths and mountain heights, screamed as they fought the sudden, thinning air of the upper thermosphere."Hull integrity is fluctuating!" Vane’s voice was strained, her mechanical fingers flying over a console that was literally smoking. "The bronze-wood is expanding too fast in the vacuum! If the 'Shadow-Bubble' doesn't hold, the internal pressure will pop this city like a blister!"Audrey stood in the center of the Bridge, her feet braced against a floor that felt like it was trying to fall away from her. The "Synthesis" energy was no longer just a power source; it was their only lifeline. She could feel the "Siren"—the planet below—tugging at the city’s iron soul, a jealous mother refusing to let her children leave t

With the Master Link secured, Aethelgard began its ascent toward the "Great Chain"—the ring of orbital platforms that circled the world’s equator. As they climbed, the temperature inside the city became the primary enemy. Without the planet’s atmosphere to insulate them, the sunny side of the city baked at 200°C while the shadow side plummeted to -150°C."The thermal stress is cracking the bronze-wood!" Vane reported. She was overseeing a team of "Hull-Crawlers"—volunteers in thermal suits who were painting the sunny side of the city with a white, reflective lead-slurry. "We’re literally splitting in half, Audrey. We need a way to distribute the heat."Audrey looked at the "Life-Pulse" from the West. The white-wood fibers in the hull were alive, but they were dormant in the cold. "The forest didn't just grow; it circulated," she said. "We need to turn the city’s water supply into a 'Thermal-Blood' system."The engineering challenge was immense. They had to reroute every pipe in the ci

The breaking of the drill-bit was a herald of a new kind of engineering crisis. The Union had mastered the heat of the North and the solar-fire of the South, but Novus presented a Thermal Vacuum. The blue sand was merely a thin insulating layer over a crust of "Solidified Nitrogen" and "Super-Cooled Water.""The city is losing heat through the floor!" Silas’s successor, a young engineer named Kael, reported from the drive-pits. "The heat-sink effect of the crust is pulling the thermal energy out of our boilers faster than we can generate it. If we don't insulate the base, the geyser-core will seize in six hours."The suspense of the "Thermal Drain" was a race against the clock. The citizens of Aethelgard had to dismantle the interior bulkheads of the upper levels—non-essential housing and decorative spires—to create a "Thermal Buffer" beneath the city’s treads."We need to use the 'Synthesis' to create a heat-loop," Audrey said, her brow furrowed as she looked at the schematics. "We c