Apocalyptic Rebirth: With a repairman system space, she rises again.-Chapter 662: The indestructible core.

Sunshine sat on the edge of the couch and pulled a small, button-sized device from her pocket. The invisibility tech Carson had confiscated after the incident with Ice Hood. To date, she had not met the boy, but Hades had and he had ended that Chapter of the boy’s life.

There was no more ice theft in the fortress. Of course, now that the heat was gone, the ice was not a necessity anymore. If the rifts were not closed, the heat would return in the fourth year.

"I wanted to talk about this." Sunshine said.

Ala wanted to vanish, she could tell that she was going to be in trouble and if her parents heard of this. Her father was easy to coax but her mother...! "Am I in trouble?" She lowered her eyes, asking in a small sad voice.

Sunshine sighed. That little voice was very touching; she didn’t want to make it any sadder. "I know you were trying to help your friend, Ala, and I know you don’t like rich, bad-mannered people_ none of us do but...."

Ala crossed her arms, looking slightly defensive. "I don’t regret it." She raised her eyes, interrupting. "He was doing something good, at first I was going to do nothing, but when Mrs. Cumber’s greasy hair caught fire and Mrs. Kingsley and her friends laughed and took pictures, I knew I had to help the less fortunate with the heat, starting with proper distribution of the ice!" She stomped her foot. "They are mean aunt Suni, really mean." They had even made fun of Mrs. Long legs! They were in her blacklist forever.

Sunshine nodded slowly. "I get that. Truly. But you can’t go around giving kids, or anyone else devices like this without talking to me first about it. It’s dangerous for them and for the base. We have rules for a reason. What if it lands in the hands of a bad person?"

Ala slumped slightly, her bravado dipping. "Okay I won’t do it again. Is that all? Am I grounded from the lab? What is my punishment this time round?"

Sunshine shook her head. "Ala, punishments do not work all the time, sometimes knowing that you did something wrong and not doing it again is enough. It helps that your intentions were not bad."

"So, you will not tell mom and dad?" Ala asked, voice dripping with worry.

Sunshine shook her head. "Not this time. Actually, I’m here because I need your help. I need devices like this_ or similar_ for a mission tomorrow. Give me something that will not malfunction." She felt like a hypocrite for stopping the little one from using her tech as she pleased and then turning around and asking for it.

Ala’s eyes brightened instantly. She reached inside her dimension space and pulled out several small, neatly packed boxes. She rested them on the table with a proud thud. "These are all my blinding buttons; I do not have more." Ala explained. "One press on the skin and you become sightless. They function for only two years sadly, or so my grandfather said."

Sunshine stared at the boxes, impressed but also slightly unnerved by what else was in Ala’s space. She really needed to find a way to take a walk in there. "Thank you Ala."

Aside from Wilbert, no one she knew or understood the Prime Core energy better than Ala. Considering how knowledgeable the girl was, asking her was not a disadvantage. "Ala," Sunshine called, her voice dropping to a more serious, hushed tone. "Do you know how to destroy the Prime Core?"

The room went silent. The playful energy vanished. Ala’s eyes went wide. "Why would you ask that?"

"To destroy it, of course," Sunshine said simply.

Ala looked genuinely shocked. She was used to everyone clawing for its power, people killing for it and betraying each other just for a scrap of Prime Core energy, here was a leader asking how to turn it into dust instead of making weapons from it or using its power to conquer!

"You really are a good adult aunt Suni," Ala whispered, her voice trembling slightly. "If you destroy it... your home won’t be destroyed like mine was. The greed won’t eat you from the inside out."

Sunshine looked at the girl with a wave of pity. "This is your home too." She reached out to squeeze Ala’s hand, but the girl continued, her expression turning grim.

"But," Ala said, "it cannot be destroyed aunt Suni."

Sunshine felt a drop of cold sweat roll down her spine. "That can’t be possible. Everything can be destroyed if you hit it hard enough or burn it at a temperature high enough."

[The alien young female is right, Host,] the System’s voice rang inside Sunshine’s head, sounding unusually somber. [I, too, could not find any method or weapon in the known databases that could destroy it completely. Not even in Wilbert’s files.]

Ala nodded as if she could hear the frustration in Sunshine’s silence. "My mother tried. She tried everything after she realized my grandfather was going insane from its influence. She used high-frequency lasers, molecular disruptors, even black-hole compression. Nothing worked. It’s... it’s not just a physical stone. It’s like an energy."

"Dammit," Sunshine breathed, leaning back. "I can’t just keep it in my space forever; I don’t know if the Xylos will be able to track it in there. This is bad. If I can’t get rid of it...."

[Wait, Host,] the System chimed in again. [While it cannot be destroyed, it can be neutralized. It can be weakened and made useless_ rendered into a dormant state where it no longer emits any energy or a signal]

Sunshine let out a massive sigh of relief, her shoulders finally dropping from her ears. "You could have led with that, System." She said quietly.

She stood up, gathering the boxes of blinding buttons and tucking them into her storage space. She looked at Ala and offered a small, grateful smile. "Thank you, Ala. Truly. You’ve given me exactly what I needed."

"Anytime aunt Suni." The little girl replied. "Can I go back to Professor Chloe now? We are working on something very important."

Sunshine nodded. The little one skipped away, singing loudly ’who lives in a pineapple under the sea?’

It made Sunshine laugh. As she walked out of the lab and back into the main corridor, she spoke to the system. "Okay, System," she thought privately. "Explain. How do we make this thing ’useless’ before it destroys my world? Do not worry about the money, I am an heiress, I have a lot of alien money and gold now."

The system chimed, [I have come to one possible solution. Using thermal shock, whether hot or cold. Either apply heat or cold at extreme levels. It will develop internal fractures and weak points. It will not melt and you cannot shatter it but it’s energy will be distorted.]

Sunshine made finger guns, smiling gently as she whispered, "Boom."