Dallas tears the service panel free, and the monument answers with a hard red pulse. Inside is no shrine, only a compact transmitter, its casing etched in the same occult symbols as the ledger.

Across the field, the agents stop pretending to hesitate. They lock into a perfect line, shoulders squared toward the hill, waiting like men drilled for a signal.

Dayton’s face goes flat with defeat, the look of a man watching a lie finish its job. The transmitter inside the monument brightens again, ready to send.

Murderbone holds low at Dallas’s heel, hackles raised toward the field, every muscle tight as the hill waits for the next command.

Dallas probes the transmitter casing, but finds only a sealed, solid block of circuitry with no external toggle or manual override.

Dallas brings the revolver up and drives the butt into the transmitter housing. The sealed block cracks with a sharp metallic snap, and the red pulse stutters hard beneath the stone.

A panel seam spits dust and hot wiring. The monument answers with a deeper click, like a lock losing its grip.

The casing splits wider, exposing a wrapped bundle of cable and a stamped service plate tied to the city grid. The broadcast source is not mystical, it is built, routed, and fed.

Below the hill, the distant red pulse from the ruins flickers once, then steadies somewhere farther inland. The choice hangs in the cold air, destroy what remains here, or chase the broadcast to its source.