The "Crown" of the Spire, the fused remains of the black needle-ship, was no longer a tomb. It was a furnace.Leo stood at the center of the ship’s bridge, his boots magnetically locked to the pearl-grey floorboards that were now threaded with glowing, emerald roots. The sound inside the chamber was a constant, low-frequency thrum that made the air shimmer with heat-haze. Outside the reinforced view-ports, the green canopy of the "Republic of Cinders" looked like a vast, mossy carpet, but Leo wasn't looking down.He was looking at the sensor-array, where a single, pulsing red icon was descending through the exosphere."The Siphon-Platform is locking onto the Spire’s neural signature," Sophia’s voice came through the audio-grid, her tone sharp with clinical anxiety. "Leo, they aren't just positioning for a drain. They’ve deployed the 'Pulse-Decay' beacons. If those hit the ionosphere, the radiation will start the 'Rot' before the platform eve
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