Ten years after the Architects' judgment.
Chen Wei had thought peace would last. That defeating the Purists and securing recognition from the Architects meant the revolution was complete. He was wrong.
The message arrived during a routine Alliance council meeting. Not digital. Not physical. It appeared directly in every transcendent being's consciousness simultaneously. Chen Wei. Elder Yun. Kenji. The three others who had achieved one hundred percent. All six received it at once.
"Attention System bearers of Earth. We are the Kashari Collective. Transcendent species from the Andromeda galaxy. We detected your evolution signatures. You have been judged primitive but promising. We claim Earth as cultivation resource. All System bearers will be harvested for study. All cultivation knowledg
