Chapter 160: Love in the Face of Corruption

The shimmering nebula shimmered with a sickly green glow. Amelia, her heart pounding against her ribs, steered her ship through the swirling clouds. Anya, her brow furrowed in worry, monitored the ship's instruments. "Readings are off the charts, Amelia," she said, her voice tight. "This place is…wrong." Amelia gripped the control panel, her gaze fixed on a colossal space station nestled within the nebula's heart. Its once gleaming metallic surface was now marred by grotesque, organic growths, pulsating with an unnatural luminescence. "This is Zephyra Prime," Amelia said, her voice grim. "A once-thriving research station, now corrupted by the Verdant Strain, a bio-organism that consumes and twists everything it touches." Their mission was a delicate one – to infiltrate Zephyra Prime and locate Dr. Silas Vance, Amelia's estranged uncle and the Federation's leading expert on the Verdant Strain. Vance, consumed by ambition and a twisted sense of scientific curiosity, had go