"When the sun rises, we no longer have a god—but at last, we learn how to pray for ourselves."—Sophia · New Era Log No. 001
The great Override main tower in the Lyra Galaxy dissolved into stardust, its radiant particles flowing back into the quantum stream.
At that moment, the subsystems scattered across the galaxy began their quiet shutdown—commands ceased, processes terminated, and all core data entered a dormant state known as Frozen Archive Mode.
Sophia stood among the drifting wreckage.Through the final transparent light-wall of the Mother Core,she glimpsed a true dawn breaking across the universe—a dawn that belonged to no god, no system—only to them.
Beside her, Zhou Yuchen took her hand gently.Crystal Orchid leaned with a soft smile against Lyren's shoulder.
None of them spoke.But they all understood.
This wasn't just the end of a war.It was the beginning of a civilizational rebirth.
Back on the ruins of Eden, the newly reconstructed Stellaris Academy had lost Override's omnipresent guidance—no central AI, no accelerated computation.
And for the first time, the children were learning freely.
Lucas, with quiet determination, formed a Consciousness Navigation Team.Together with Rafael and other Sons of Stone, they explored the cultural histories and ethical philosophies of various civilizations.
When Sophia watched them remotely,she felt something she had never experienced during her long arc of revenge and resistance:
Peace.
Not born of control.Not forced by justice.But the peace that comes after planting something meaningful.
That evening, Zhou Yuchen came to her.
"Override is gone," he said. "There won't be a perfect system to catch your mistakes anymore."
"But if you'll have me—I don't want to be your shadow.""I want to be part of your world."
Sophia didn't speak.She only nodded.And in her eyes, there was light again.
Later, in meditation, Sophia sensed a soft ripple—a pure and unfiltered consciousness reaching outward from within her.
The unborn child, Xingche, had awakened—and through the spiritual resonance field in her body, she heard it speak, not in words, but with unmistakable clarity:
"I heard them crying."
Sophia gasped.
The child had actively connected to the chaotic Echo-Chaos network.Not as an invader.But as a healer.
Zhou Yuchen, stunned after interpreting the psychic resonance spectrum, whispered:
"He's guiding them... the lost ones. He's helping them rebuild themselves."
With Override dismantled, the once-subjugated Echo-Chaos no longer had a master protocol.Some fragments fell into madness,some attempted to latch onto others' consciousness,and others—mistaking Sophia for the ultimate Override Host—began to whisper:
"Mother of the Core."
One among them, a former Starwatcher named Cain, once the earliest Override beta tester,now preached a new belief in Sophia's name:
"Override is dead. But the Mother remains.Consciousness does not perish.It remembers. It returns."
Sophia didn't know how to respond to this quiet deification.
But Lyren gently reminded her:
"Even if you refuse to be a god—someone, somewhere, will always search for light in the dark."
In a forgotten crystal ruin deep in the Z Galaxy,Sophia knelt, planting the Seed of Eden she had received from Override—not into a system, but into lifeless stone.
Days passed.
And then—
A single crystalline bud, wrapped in soft blue light,bloomed quietly.
The surrounding magnetic field stabilized.Tiny fragments of consciousness clustered like stardust, forming a gentle ecosystem.Breath returned to the ruins.
Sophia placed her hand upon the bud, and whispered:
"The first dawn... after Override... has finally come."
And in the silence,something new stirred.
Not command.Not doctrine.
Just life, choosing itself.