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Melbourne's Southern Cross Station had become a chrono-schizophrenic nightmare. Platform clocks displayed 42 conflicting time zones, their hands morphing into DNA helices that dripped temporal paradoxes onto commuters fused with train seats. Chen Mu stepped through the quantum turnstiles, his NecroPestle carving reality anchors to resist the station's metamorphosis into the Spore Primordial's gestation chamber.
**
**Reality Cohesion: 11%**
**NecroPestle Charge: 63%**
**Memory Entropy: 28.9% (Cascade Imminent)**
The air vibrated with Blackmoor's final gambit—a fractal announcement repeating *"All trains now departing for 7/7/2024"* in 88 languages. Commuters' faces melted into train timetable displays showing apocalyptic destinations:
- **Platform 1**: Heat Death of Universe Express (Non-stop)
- **Platform 7**: Blackmoor Corporate Singularity (First Class Only)
- **Platform 13**: Aboriginal Dreamtime Reclamation Service (Ghost Passengers Welcome)
"Tickets please!" A conductor with the Jester's smile and Night Owl's golden eye blocked Chen's path. Its ticket punch extruded spinal fluid-drenched needles. "You're overdue for termination."
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#### **Carriage 9: The Bone Rail Network**
Chen's NecroPestle shattered the conductor into temporal shards. Each fragment revealed hidden truths:
1. **Shard α**: 1854 Melbourne-Sydney rail workers mutated into flesh tracks
2. **Shard β**: 2077 bullet trains harvesting commuters' life spans
3. **Shard Ω**: The Spore Primordial birthing itself through rail networks
The station warped into a living engine powered by stolen histories. Victorian-era steam locomotives fused with cybernetic maglevs, their wheels grinding ancestral bones into quantum fuel. Chen's golden eye decrypted the tracks' true purpose—they formed a continent-sized Taoist energy grid siphoning Australia's temporal essence.
**
**Temporal Lacerations (4 Charges Remaining)**
Slicing through a ticket barrier, Chen entered Carriage 9—a bone ossuary where:
- Seats were rib cages wired to EEG monitors
- Windows displayed passengers' death dates
- The intercom recited their last thoughts as slam poetry
A child's ghost tugged his sleeve. "The driver's gone mad. He's taking us to the Neverwhen."
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#### **The Driver's Madness**
The engine cabin pulsed with the Spore Primordial's embryonic light. The driver's seat held Chen's kindergarten photo fused with Night Owl's NecroPestle clone.
"**We've always been the conductor,**" the hybrid entity hissed. "**This is our seventh reset.**"
Controls morphed into instruments of temporal butchery:
- The throttle lever made from Chen's severed arm (Memory #17)
- Brake handles of fused Aboriginal sacred stones
- A speedometer counting down to 7/7/2024 in base-13 math
**
**14:88:88 - Temporal Hijack Attempt Detected**
**NecroPestle Synchronicity: 77%**
Chen's weapon screeched across the control panel, unleashing:
1. **Timequake 1**: 1788 British invasion reversed, First Nations warriors armed with AI
2. **Timequake 2**: 2024 Melbourne dissolved into pre-Big Bang plasma
3. **Timequake Ω**: The Spore Primordial's birth/death in endless loop
The station screamed in 11-dimensional agony.
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#### **The Passenger's Choice**
Reality stabilized at Platform 0—a Klein bottle platform where beginnings and endings kissed. The Jester awaited atop a throne of fused train tickets, his new form a hideous amalgam of:
- Federation-era stationmaster's uniform
- Aboriginal body paint algorithms
- Cyberpunk neural interface tendrils
"Final boarding call!" He tossed Chen a ticket printed with his mother's DNA sequence. "Choose your terminus: Godhood... or *this*."
The ticket mutated into a fetus-shaped NecroPestle—the Spore Primordial's true vessel.
**
**A. Ascend as Timeless Conductor (Merge with Primordial)**
**B. Derail Reality (Risk Personal Erasure)**
**C. Accept Jester's Offer (Rewrite Universal Code)**
Chen chose D.
The NecroPestle pierced the platform, birthing a new timeline where:
- Trains ran on tracks of solidified PTSD
- Passengers paid with traumatic memories
- The Spore Primordial became the eternal commuter
**
**NecroPestle Evolution: Chrono-Savior Protocol**
**New Ability: Paradox Fare Collection**
**Cost: 6.6% Memory Loss per Use**