Cryptomining Supervillain

Chapter 183 183: 183 THE FINAL CONSPIRACY

183 THE FINAL CONSPIRACY

Everything happened in an instant.

The roof of the train station collapsed, exposing the sky … or what should have been the sky. Instead, hulking silhouettes of Meat Heaps loomed above, their monstrous forms blotting out the horizon.

"Damnit… Meat Heaps. Why didn't I sense them sooner?" Damen muttered as panicked people fled.

Then, through the chaos, two familiar figures approached … a woman and his silver-haired brother.

It was Sienna and Argent.

"Sienna…," Damen whispered.

Sienna's eyes scanned the destruction. "I would hate to demolish this place… it holds memories. But you chose to leave. This place had no reason to exist anymore."

Damen frowned. "What do you mean? What does your plan have to do with me?"

Her smile was cold. "Everything…. You're the key to my plans."

Damen's gaze flicked to the surrounding Meat Heaps. He had suspected Sienna's hand in the corrosive uprising, but now it was undeniable.

"I don't understand," he said cautiously.

Sienna's voice was calm but cutting. "Our oracles predicted you… You are the bringer of doom to this city."

"Lies. I have nothing to do with your bloody schemes," Damen snapped.

"It's true," she insisted. "Once you awakened your powers, every step you took brought this destruction closer."

Damen didn't reply.

Reasoning with her was pointless.

She continued, her tone was almost clinical. "Do you remember GenSyn? If you had never gone there to buy medicine… we would never have found our Eternal Monarch."

From the shadows, a woman emerged.

"Stacy… GenSyn?" Damen whispered.

It was Stacy Qiltera, the Eternal Monarch.

"Hi, Damen Dark… we meet again," Stacy said.

Her body rose from the ground, shadows stretching like ink across the platform. Octopussian tentacles unfurled, forming the shape of a butterfly behind her. Horror clung to each movement …. at the tips of her tentacles were living people.

Among them, Damen recognized Kaiser Qiltera, Stacy's father.

"What the hell are you?" Damen demanded, scanning her stats.

Name: Stacy Qiltera [Erythos]

Strength Rank: BB  Meta Rank: BBB

Strength: 1053 | Charm: 492 | Meta: 2324 | Command: 2325

"I had nothing to do with this… monstrous creation!" Damen shouted.

Sienna's voice was eerily calm. "If Stacy had never received part of your blood, she wouldn't have evolved into this form, and she would have never discovered the creation of the Corrosivers."

Damen's mind raced.

He remembered the blood transfusion at GenSyn … Stacy had taken his blood. He hadn't known what she had done with it, and now the truth was terrifying.

His blood was the reason for her current mutation. She infused his blood into her system. At the same time, she used mutated blood to create mutant Corrosivers.

"I didn't know… my blood…," he gasped.

Sienna's smirk widened. "There's more. When you purchased GenSyn Industry and made enemies of the major families, you did us a favor. While they fought among themselves, the city tore itself apart in internal conflict instead of pursuing us..."

That part was also true.

Damen caused both the Veyran and Zetheris family to fight among themselves. If the major families were united, Sienna's plot may not have succeeded.

She laughed lightly, a sound that grated against the chaos. "And your friend Lander, the genius investigator… it was you who removed him from the SIA. Had he remained, he could have uncovered our plans long before Prom's night."

"Lander… was part of your calculation too?" Damen asked, stunned.

In order to save Kail, he involved Lander in the rescue causing him to be suspected by the SIA and eventually removed.

Sienna's gaze held no malice … only certainty. "Lander Strong was a risk to us. With the SIA behind him, your little city might have survived."

If Lander was still in the SIA, he would have more resources at his disposal to discover the plots behind the missing persons. Now, even if he discovered the plot there wasn't much he could do.

Damen's jaw tightened.

Every move he had made, every so-called "coincidence," now tied into their grand design.

"What do you want from me?" Damen asked, his gaze sharp.

"It's simple… join us, nephew. Join the Alliance of Psyche and rule Melrose City," Sienna said, her tone calm but commanding.

"No… why would I want to rule a dead city?" he replied.

"Only temporarily," she continued. "The city will be rejuvenated after we destroy every trace of the sins that caused its fall … the unjust rulers, the oligarchs."

"You've killed millions… just to save them? Who's left to be saved?" Damen countered, his voice edged with disbelief.

Sienna smiled and waved her hand.

Stacy reacted instantly.

More tentacles emerged from her shadowed form, each holding a person suspended at the tip.

"What… does this mean?" Damen asked, his eyes widening.

Stacy released Kaiser Qiltera from her grasp.

Damen realized something shocking: Stacy wasn't absorbing people into herself. She was carrying them, preserving and protecting them until the moment they could be safely released.

Sienna explained, her voice calm as ever. "Stacy has a unique power. She can save thousands of people within her space … even the ill can recover inside her."

Damen's mind raced. "So… all those missing people weren't gone? They were inside Stacy?"

"You catch on fast," Sienna said. "Over a hundred thousand lives have been preserved. Once the city is cleansed, they will return to the world, free."

"If that's true… then what about the Corrosivers? Where did they come from?" Damen asked, narrowing his eyes.

"They come from many places — the Zetheris, Veyran, Snow… even Melrose itself. They were made from people working for the evil houses. They are not saints. They deserve what they became," Sienna said, her tone sharp but matter-of-fact.

Damen thought carefully. "Even if the Corrosivers were created from those who deserved it… some of the people they killed must have been innocent."

Sienna's gaze didn't waver. "Even the ancient biblical texts from before the Armageddon only prophesized to save a limited few in the end. Many innocent people will still die. It is the nature of the world."

Damen remained silent. He could not deny her vision, even if her methods horrified him.

Reflection soon struck him: he was no saint either. He had never claimed to be a hero. His methods were not always glorious.

"Why do you need me?" he asked, his voice low. "There are thousands out there. Make them… not me?"

"Because you are the foretold one. Our revolution will only succeed if you stay here and fulfill your destiny," Sienna said firmly.

"Bull shit," he spat. "I don't believe in fortune-tellers."

"Then we'll have no choice but to keep you here," Sienna threatened, her voice icy.

The Meat Heaps slammed into the building from every side, surrounding Damen. Instantly, he rose into the air, his body transforming into Black Halo.

But even in his fearsome form, fighting the Meat Heaps was pointless. He couldn't kill them all …. there were too many, and every strike only slowed the inevitable.

Then an idea struck him.

He dashed straight for the Eternal Monarch.

If the corrosivers had been created by her, then killing her might stop the plague at its source.

The silver halo on his chest spun and flared as plasma coalesced. He unleashed it in a blinding stream of beams directly at Stacy.

"Halo's Judgment- Echo Out!"

The beams struck one after another with devastating force … yet, to Damen's shock, it had no effect.

"Those beams could have destroyed the major families' powerful force fields…why can' it hurt you?" he asked.

From one of Stacy's octopus-like tentacles, a figure hung in midair.

He was a powerful meta, his aura flaring as he conjured a force shield that absorbed the plasma completely, stopping it from reaching Stacy.

"Its because of me… my power is to create force fields", the man said.

Damen's eyes narrowed. The fight had just become far more complicated than he anticipated.

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