After Anne's golden shockwave forced the entity to shrink, the banquet hall was left in a stifling silence. The smell of sulfur mingled with the scent of hot oil. Caine immediately approached the cracks in the floor, aiming his portable frequency scanner at the remnants of the still-pulsing mist.
"Don't get too close, Caine," Harold warned, his sword still held in a ready stance.
"I need the data, Harold. If we want to build the 'Mechanical Seal,' we have to know what we're locking away," Caine replied without looking away from his rapidly flickering monitor. "Look at this... this entity isn't a living being in our biological sense."
Entity Detail: The Shadow Pathfinder
Caine projected his scan results into the air so they could be seen by Anne and the Emperor. The entity they had just fought wasn't a random demon, but a manifestation of Amduscias, one of the dukes recorded in The Lesser Key.
Physical Composition (Semi-Material): Its body consists of 40% solid carbon particles and 60% negative resonance energy. This explains why an ordinary blade passed right through it, yet Caine's iron steam could cause harm. The iron steam disrupts the cohesion of those carbon particles.
Sound Frequency: This entity emits constant ultrasonic waves. The screams Rainnes heard were actually the creature's attempt to "tune" the frequency of the surrounding space to align with its home dimension.
Adaptability: "Look at the pattern," Caine pointed to a fluctuating graph. "Every time Harold slashed, this thing altered its energy structure within milliseconds. It's learning from our attacks."
Connection to the 'Key': This entity acts as a Pathfinder. It didn't come for random slaughter, but to mark the living "Key"—Anne—so that larger entities could lock their coordinates onto this world.
"It said I was its vessel," Anne said, her voice calm but cold. She stared at her palm, where thin silver lines still glowed faintly. "Silas, explain what you know about The Lesser Key beneath this tower."
Silas, looking far older and more fragile now, coughed up thick black blood. "Beneath Aethelgard's foundations... there are seventy-two isolation chambers. Each chamber holds a frequency of darkness captured by our ancestors. Your mother... she was the conductor who ensured all those frequencies remained in a static phase."
"And now that she's free," Anne interrupted, "all those frequencies are starting to move, searching for a new harmony."
"We can't rely solely on steam to hold back seventy-two entities like that," Harold sheathed his sword roughly. "If just one almost brought down the palace, what about the rest?"
"That is why we need the Solomon Protocol," Caine answered, his eyes glinting behind his spectacles. "We are going to turn the entire capital into one giant circuit. We won't use prayers or obsolete ancient spells. We will use the laws of thermodynamics and the resonance of steel."
Anne gazed out the window toward the city of Aethelgard, now illuminated by the orange glow of Isfellan steam. "Caine, begin the construction of transmitter towers at every corner of the city. Harold, mobilize the Catalyst forces and the remnants of the Imperial soldiers. We will meet them at the gate before they even have a chance to step out."
The battle for Aethelgard was no longer about who held the crown, but about whether human civilization could survive against frequencies that were meant to stay forgotten.