Apocalyptic Rebirth: With a repairman system space, she rises again.-Chapter 586: Cracks in the dome.

The entire dome shuddered a little. Sunshine felt the vibration in her teeth. The walls sparked like they were being electrocuted. Sounds of cracking filled the air.

"They are trying to get in," the Princess whispered, her voice breaking. "This is bad. This is... this is a catastrophe. We must protect the little ones! We have to get to the nurseries!"

What nurseries?" Nine shrieked. He was officially in full-blown panic mode now. He reached out blindly, snagging the Princess’s royal robes and pulling them so hard she nearly stumbled as the dome tilted again. "This is the time to hide first and save our own lives. How are we supposed to save anyone if we are dead? Sunshine and I are just repairmen, we should not even be here."

"Let go of Her Highness, you disrespectful creature!" the lead guard roared, leveling his blade at Nine’s nose.

"I have a name!" Nine yelled back, though he quickly let go and raised his hands in a gesture of frantic apology. "It’s Nine Rathunn! And I’m not a creature; I’m the victim here. If I had known that your mythical mysterious enemies were real, I would not have agreed to stay."

Sunshine pulled on his antennae. He was not helping.

"You are a slow-witted creature regardless of your name," the Princess snapped, regaining her footing. "Does that look like a myth to you? Does that look like a bedtime story?" She pointed up. Above the Burner, something else was moving. A massive, multi-tentacled shadow drifted into view, its skin a mottled, bruised purple. It began to spit out clouds of dark ink that glowed with a sickly green bioluminescence.

"Great," Sunshine muttered, tightening her grip on her hammer. "Looks like more than the Burners were invited to the party. Who’s the big octopus guy?"

The Princess looked up, her eyes widening. "A Velkryss. It’s a trench-dweller from the Gorge. They haven’t come to this side of the sea for in centuries. It seems like every rebel creature and bottom-feeder in the sea has decided today is the day the Glacian territory falls."

Suddenly, the floor beneath them lurched violently to the right. Gravity became a suggestion rather than a law. The entire Southern part of the dome tilted at a sickening thirty-degree angle.

"Protect the Princess!" the guard captain screamed, stabbing his blade into the floorboards to anchor himself. "Don’t let her fall!"

Nine, surprisingly, was the fastest. Having several legs finally paid off. He braced himself against a structural pillar and extended a long, spindly limb, catching the Princess by the waist before she could slide into a pile of shattered display cases.

The dome groaned and slowly stabilized, but the sound that followed was worse than the tilting. It was a soft, rhythmic drip... drip... splash. Near the base of the wall, water was bubbling up through the floor vents. Cold, salty, and very, very real.

"Why is it doing that?" Nine asked, his voice dropping to a terrified whisper. "You said this place was invincible! You said it was a masterpiece of engineering!"

"The dome is shaking because the Burners didn’t just wake up," the Princess said, helping a dazed Glacian citizen to their feet. "When they forced their way out of the ice tombs, they caused massive seismic shifts_ deep trenches. Those tremors are hitting the power cores that maintain the pressure seals."

"So, in other words," Nine said, his eyes bulging, "this whole bubble is about to become an aquarium, and we’re the decorative plastic divers?"

"Yes," the Princess said solemnly. "If the cores are not stabilized and the leaks aren’t plugged, the pressure will crush us. And worse... the little Glacians. Our infants. Their gills don’t fully form until they are three cycles old. They still breathe air. If the dome fills... they will all drown...and die."

Sunshine looked at the water rising around her ankles. She looked at the Princess, who, despite her fear, was already shouting to people to hurry towards the transport pods. Outside, she could see the chaos_ hundreds of pods darting through the water like panicked minnows, trying to reach the Iron Reef vaults where the safe exit out of the sea was.

But the Burners were there, above breathing fire, their heat turning the water into a boiling cauldron.

Nine leaned closer to Sunshine, his voice urgent. "Sunshine. Look at me. I know that look. I know the ’hero’ look. Don’t you dare. Do not offer our services. We are two people and one of us is currently vibrating with fear. We cannot fight fire-breathing sea dragons!"

Sunshine looked at him, then back at the Princess. She saw a mother clutching her child near the exit, the terror in her eyes reflecting the orange glow from above. Guilt ate at her, because she had triggered the beacon.

It was her fault.

She had brought destruction to the Glacian empire. All the deaths that would happen from this incident were on her. How could she just run?

She gave him a small, determined smile. "Whatever you say." In her mind, she was already wondering how to fix the situation as a repairman or mutant.

Nine let out a long, theatrical growl, throwing his head back in frustration. "I hate you. I hate this planet. I hate water. Why couldn’t our punishment have been on a nice, dry desert planet with a simple heat problem?"

Despite his complaining, he didn’t run. He stayed right at her heels as they followed the Princess toward the lower levels towards the iron reef vaults where the nurseries were.

Outside the glass, the scene had devolved into a literal war zone. The Burners were no longer just attacking the dome; they were fighting other creatures. It seemed they didn’t want to share the "prey" with the Velkryss or any other scavengers from the Gorge.

The Glacian Army was out there too, their agile star-fighters-turned-submersibles firing beams of concentrated fire at the beasts.

Sunshine’s heart beat faster and faster. Her body trembled with every step that she took. This level of destruction was unexpected. The creatures that had been summoned were as strong as watchers.

Were they meant to find their way to earth once these beacons were activated? Was that the Watchers new plan or a simple accident from messing around with a device whose technology was beyond any that she understood?