While the humans retreated into the verdant "Techno-Forests" and the Mimics migrated toward the silicon-cold of the Arctic, the sky began to change. The Moon, which had been a featureless, gray marble since the "Eraser" swept past it in Chapter 86, was no longer silent.
A rhythmic pulsing—a heartbeat made of light—began to emanate from the Mare Tranquillitatis. It wasn't a distress signal. It was a hatching.
The Anatomy of the Lunar Shell
Elara, monitoring the long-range sensors from the Sovereign Spire, was the first to realize the scale of the transformation. The "Smoothing" effect of the Eraser hadn't just deleted the Moon's features; it had turned the lunar regolith into a semi-permeable membrane.
"The Moon isn't a rock anymore," Elara said, her voice trembling as she projected the
