The air inside the subterranean isolation chamber suddenly transformed into a miniature hell. The screeching hum of hauling machinery forced far beyond maximum capacity tore through the air, deafeningly loud. In the center of the room, the gargantuan main drilling rig—which should have been completely dead—blazed to life, casting a searing red glow from its burning circuit panels.

"Damn it! Who forced this rig online?!" Zulfa shouted, leaping backward as an overwhelming wave of heat swept across the concrete floor.

Before him, the floor where he had been bound and restrained began to fracture with a glowing orange light. The metal beneath his soles melted slowly, venting a thick stench of burning iron and suffocating sulfur smoke. The heat bled through his boot soles, making his skin feel as though it were roasting on a iron skillet.

Ring!

The dedicated phone in his tactical vest pocket vibrated violently. Without losing a second, Zulfa snatched the device amidst the rising billows of steam. Naya’s face instantly materialized on the small screen, looking intensely stressed from her remote satellite control station. Her hair was a mess, and the sound of keyboard clacking in the background fired off like machine-gun fire.

"Zulfa! Are you okay?!" Naya cried out, her voice nearly drowned out by the increasingly savage roar of the drilling rig. "The central defense system just bypassed local encryption and triggered an overload protocol on that drill rig! They're deliberately trying to melt down your entire sector!"

"I know, Nay!" Zulfa panted back, coughing slightly from inhaling a wisp of smoke. He ducked a blast of incandescent steam that suddenly hissed from a hydraulic pipe to his left. "If I don't move in the next two minutes, I'm going to end up baked like a roast dinner in here! What can you do from your end?"

"I'm trying to break through their master firewall, but the security is layered!" Naya answered swiftly, her fingers dancing across her holographic touchscreen. "Listen to me, Zulfa. Beneath the rig's main console is an orange junction box. That's the manual bypass for the emergency hydraulic valve. If you can open it, I'll take over the rest remotely!"

"Orange box? It's five meters away from my position, and the floor is already molten slag, Nay!" Zulfa groaned, though his eyes locked instantly onto the target box behind a glowing red iron grate.

"You have the best mechanical skills in this squad, don't sell yourself short!" Naya yelled encouragement, her tone half-demanding. "Use whatever's around you! Fast, before the temperature in that room hits melting point!"

Zulfa snorted softly, taking a deep breath to steady his racing heartbeat. In this modern fantasy landscape, where advanced technology melded with compressed mana energy, a single tiny mistake meant instant death. He spotted a snapped iron pipe lying near a wall that wasn't yet searing hot. Without hesitation, he grabbed it, using the pipe as a vaulting pole to clear the widening pools of liquid metal.

Boom!

A pipe joint overhead ruptured, venting a blast of scalding fluid that nearly stripped his jacket away. Zulfa growled in suppressed pain, throwing his body forward until he slammed to a halt right beside the wildly buzzing rig console.

"I'm at the box, Nay! Patch in!" Zulfa yelled, prying open the junction box cover with the tip of the iron pipe. Sparks lashed across his hands, but his insulated tactical gloves saved him from a high-voltage shock.

At the end of the video link, Naya was seen wiping sweat from her brow. "Good! I'm picking up the signal. Plug the emergency data cable from your device into the black port inside that box... Now!"

Zulfa wasted no time jamming the connection cable from Naya's phone into the shuddering rig system port. Instantly, Naya's phone screen flashed a brilliant green.

"I'm in!" Naya shouted with palpable relief. "The main hydraulic system is under my control now. Hold your breath, Zulfa—I'm going to release the safety clamps manually in three..."

"Hurry up! The floor in here is turning into volcanic lava!" Zulfa cut her off, staring wildly at his boots, which were beginning to smoke heavily.

"Three... two... one... Unplug!"

Clang-shhh!

The thunderous sound of massive metal shearing echoed loudly as the primary hydraulic safety clamps snapped free of their grip. The gargantuan drilling rig lost its balance instantly. Violent tremors surged through the walls, sending dust and concrete chunks raining down like a stone storm.

"Got it!" Naya yelled from the screen. "But wait... Zulfa, there's a pressure anomaly! The thermal exhaust system is jammed!"

Before Zulfa could reply, the drill let out a deafening, high-pitched mechanical howl. The thermal steam trapped within the massive cylinder swelled exponentially in a single second.

"Run, Zulfa! That machine's going to blow!" Naya screamed in panic.

Zulfa didn't hesitate. He scrambled to his feet and lunged through the emergency vent door just as the main drilling rig in the center of the room erupted in a blinding, high-pressure white steam blast. The explosion generated a ferocious shockwave that tore through the isolation chamber's concrete walls, hurling Zulfa's body through the evacuation corridor.

He gasped for air as he slammed onto the floor of a safer corridor, but the chaos showed no signs of stopping.

From deep within the earth, a subterranean rumbling began to echo, followed by a chest-rattling, low-pitched mechanical alarm.

Woo... Woo... Woo...

Zulfa's phone vibrated violently once more. Naya's face on the screen was bleached white, her eyes wide as she stared at the city sensor data appearing before her.

"Zulfa... do you hear that siren?" Naya's voice trembled violently. "That explosion... it triggered a horrific chain reaction. The Main Valve beneath the central district... it just suffered a total fracture!"

Zulfa forced himself up with immense effort, staring down the corridor where red emergency lights began flashing in unison. Full-scale city evacuation sirens wailed across the night, signaling an unstoppable catastrophe crashing down upon the metropolis.