Chapter 176

Chapter 176 KAELOS The emergency vote in Brussels had ended with unusual unanimity, but the aftershocks of that decision were already rippling through my consciousness. Even before I stepped out of the conference chamber, I could feel the turbulence—like tectonic plates of thought shifting beneath the surface of the enhanced network. Forty-seven regions had spoken with one voice, yet the fragments of that voice carried different rhythms, accents, and emotional tones that no longer fused into seamless harmony. Through quantum consciousness, I reached for Seraphina, who was still in Geneva managing stabilization efforts. The connection felt steady but slightly blurred, as if I were hearing her across a wall of water. “We have authorization,” I projected to her. “Restructuring protocols must begin immediately.” Her presence in the network pulsed with both relief and exhaustion. “I’m already dispatching transition teams. But Kaelos—some of them are breaking. Enhanced individuals in hybrid