Chapter 1528: Searching for The Code II

Zhao Li Xin and Jay approached the quiet lab in long, steady strides, their expressions unreadable behind their masks. Through the glass window, the room looked almost empty, with only two technicians inside, both hunched over their stations, completely absorbed in their work.

They paused beneath the surveillance camera, waiting for the lens to swivel away. The instant its gaze drifted to the opposite corner, Zhao Li Xin swiped the stolen access card. The door clicked open. They slipped inside, silent as shadows, before the camera could sweep back.

As expected, the two technicians were too immersed in their tasks to notice the newcomers. Jay scanned the room with a quick, practiced sweep, and a moment later spotted a laptop tucked into the far corner.

He moved fast. Chair pulled back, fingers already flying across the keyboard as lines of unfamiliar code streamed down the screen. Behind him, Zhao Li Xin stood guard, eyes locked on the technicians.

Then he shifted his gaze to Jay’s hands. His ten fingers moved with startling speed—precise, rhythmic, almost mechanical. Each keystroke produced a steady staccato of soft clicks.

Lines of unfamiliar code streamed across the monitor, cascading faster than Zhao Li Xin could follow. A beat later, the display flashed to a new screen.

Access Granted.

Jay continued without hesitation as the interface populated with countless files. He selected them rapidly, file after file opening under his command. Once all the relevant files were marked, he set his phone beside the computer. A faint pulse of light flickered across the phone’s screen.

Download...

Soon, every file he accessed transferred automatically to his device, then instantly relayed to Fredhardt and N.I.M.S. back in Herriond.

Zhao Li Xin watched with quiet intrigue as Jay moved through layers of security with almost lazy ease. Lory had once mentioned in passing how Jay was a talented hacker feared by many countries, the kind of ghost in the system only a handful of people in the world even knew existed. Seeing it up close, Zhao Li Xin finally understood why. ℯ𝕝.

"Let’s go." Jay hit the escape key, he grabbed his phone, and began to rise from the chair, but all of a sudden, a voice abruptly cut across the room.

"Hey! You two—can you help me with something?"

Jay and Zhao Li Xin exchanged a razor-sharp glance. Jay swiveled in his chair, slouching just enough to look convincingly irritated.

"Yeah? What do you need?"

"Can you check the latest progress on Subject Thirteen? I’m swamped," one of the technicians said without lifting his eyes.

"Uh... yeah, sure. Let me see." Jay turned back to the laptop, tapped around aimlessly, then let out a perfectly timed groan. "Da*n. Something’s wrong with this computer."

"What?" The technician snapped his head up, glaring.

"I don’t know, man. I think it’s error or something." Jay complained.

"AGAIN? Seriously?" the man barked. "Twenty billion Rohm budget, and they can’t maintain a basic system? Forget it—call IT. Let them fix their own mess!"

"Yeah, I’m calling them now," Jay replied, tapping his phone as if dialing.

With a frustrated mutter, the technician spun back to his work.

The second their attention was buried in their tasks again, Zhao Li Xin gave a slight nod, and they slipped out as quietly as they had entered.

As they strode down the corridor, Jay murmured under his breath, "The machine to disable the code is on the fourth floor."

Zhao Li Xin’s brows pinched faintly. "Are we taking the stinky path again?" He meant the dumbwaiter shaft.

Before Jay could answer, three technicians turned the corner and stepped into the elevator. Jay nudged Zhao Li Xin with a subtle elbow. "No. Let’s not waste any more time, let’s take the elevator, remember to keep your head low."

They picked up their pace, sliding into the elevator right before the doors sealed shut. The technicians didn’t spare them a glance, too busy with their own conversation.

"Hey, did you hear what happened to Lucia Viora?" the man on the left whispered, a little too eager to spill gossip.

"No. What happened to that sexy girl?" the man in the middle asked.

The first technician leaned in conspiratorial tone. "I heard she lost both her arms."

"What?!" both men gasped in unison.

"Yeah... apparently someone did it to her. Don’t know who’s cruel enough to do that to such a pretty girl," he muttered, half-horror, half-fascinated.

"Damn... that’s insane," the man on the far right breathed.

The whisperer nodded solemnly. "They flew her to Dolza for further treatment. My guess is they will ask the Saintess to regrow her limbs."

The elevator chimed, and the doors slid open. Jay and Zhao Li Xin stepped out, leaving the three men behind as their voices were swallowed when the doors shut again.

Jay glanced sideways at Zhao Li Xin, eyes narrowing with suspicion.

"So... what happened to Lucia? Was that you?"

"She laid her hands on Lory," Zhao Li Xin replied—tone flat, utterly unbothered, as if the consequence were perfectly reasonable.

He wouldn’t have gone that far himself, but he didn’t blame Zhao Li Xin either. He had read what Lucia had done over the past few years; the list of her victims was long enough to fill a short novel.

That woman deserved whatever was coming to her. "Can’t argue with that," Jay chuckled. "Unfortunately, the Saintess will regrow her limbs."

He still found it unbelievable how the Saintess could restore a body in ways Lory couldn’t.

"On the contrary... I think that’s a good thing," Zhao Li Xin said suddenly.

Jay frowned. "Oh? Why?"

Zhao Li Xin’s voice dropped into a coldness sharp enough to chill bone. "Because burning off that woman’s arms once was letting her off far too lightly. Thanks to the Saintess, I’ll have the chance to burn them off again."

Even behind the face mask, Jay could feel the eerie smile stretching across Zhao Li Xin’s expression. He could only offer a silent prayer for Lucia.

____________________________

__ Few minutes ago___

Samuel and Clift dove into the vast ventilation shaft like bullets fired into a cavernous abyss.

The space around them wasn’t narrow, on the contrary, it’s quite wide. A cylindrical chamber so wide and deep it felt like falling through the throat of a metal giant.

High above, the upper turbine dwarfs everything else, each blade the size of a helicopter rotor. As it spins with a seismic thump, its entire shaft vibrates.

The blast of air wasn’t just strong; it felt like it was a force of nature. The gust slammed into them from behind, accelerating their fall into a near-free-fall sprint.

Their bodies streaked downward, clothes snapping violently, cheeks pulled tight from the sheer pressure. Samuel’s heart lurched. Clift’s pulse roared in his ears. The platform far below was a shrinking dot.

And beneath that platform, they saw the lower turbine, an enormous steel flower of spinning blades, waiting in ominous stillness. Soon, it grew rapidly larger as they dropped, and the images became clearer, a giant blade stretching across the entire width of the shaft. Even motionless, it radiated threat.

"Come one—Come on—Come on!" Samuel’s jaw tightened.

They shot past the dormant blades at rapid speed. The instant their boots hit the platform, they didn’t hesitate; they bolted sideways, sprinting along the catwalk like men chased by the devil himself.

Then a sound rose behind them as the turbine let out a deep mechanical growl. A split second later, the blades roared to life, creating a cyclone that sucked the air into a violent spiral, tugging at their clothes and hair.

Samuel felt his body being dragged backward by the pull. Luckily, he managed to grab the handle. He forced the door open, and the moment Clift leaped through, Samuel slammed the steel door shut, throwing his shoulder against it until the lock clicked. He sucked in a ragged breath.

"That—" he gasped, "—was way too close."

Clift let out a long exhale, then shot Samuel a crooked smirk.

"Quite exhilarating, don’t you think?"

"No!" Samuel snapped.

"Oh well." Clift shrugged and swept his gaze across the area.

Then—without a shred of warning—he seized Samuel by the collar and yanked him behind a massive pipe, forcing him down into a crouch. "Get down—there’s a camera over there," he hissed in a low, wary tone.

Samuel peeked through the gaps between the giant steel pipes beside him. The underground tunnel stretched ahead of them, long and claustrophobic, its concrete walls pulsing with dim neon strips that flickered like dying fireflies. The air hummed faintly with the low rumble of machinery buried deep in the facility’s bones.

Two figures appeared at the far end of the tunnel, their shadows stretching unnervingly across the floor. They walked toward them with heavy, deliberate steps.

Samuel’s eyes narrowed. "There’s a Dragxtarn here," he muttered under his breath, one of the elite guards, unmistakable in the way they carried themselves.

"Let’s move," Clift whispered. He bent low at the waist and slid out from behind the pipe with fluid precision, his silhouette gliding through the neon-washed shadows. Samuel followed close behind, mirroring his steps, each footfall placed with painstaking care to avoid even the faintest echo.

The tunnel ahead narrowed into a rough-hewn passage reminiscent of a mining shaft, with tight walls, a low ceiling, and jagged stone braced by old metal beams. Dim neon strips flickered unevenly along the edges, casting jittery pulses of light that made the shadows dance.

Thankfully, the passage was short. But before they could reach the exit, the sharp rhythm of approaching footsteps echoed down the tunnel.

Clift and Samuel exchanged a split-second glance and immediately dove for cover, slipping behind stacked crates, ducking behind an excavator parked against the wall, and wedging themselves between heavy machinery and scattered tools. The air smelled of dust, oil, and cold electric current.

The guards’ footsteps passed, close enough that Samuel could make out the clink of their armor and the faint hiss of their visors. Only when the echoes finally faded did Clift signal him to move again.

They slipped out of the narrow tunnel and into a large space. It was then that Samuel’s movements suddenly stopped, his eyes widened, and his mouth dropped open.

"What the..." Samuel’s breath hitched.

Before them, row after row of capsules towered up to the cave ceiling, arranged with terrifying precision. Steel beams framed each unit, and narrow staircases snaked up the structure like the backbone of a metal creature. Platforms branched off at each level, forming walkways connecting one capsule to the next.

There is also an industrial elevator clung to a rail system bolted to the cave wall. Its barred doors and exposed cables made it look more like a cargo lift than a passenger elevator, the kind used to move technicians and heavy equipment.

The capsules themselves resembled small residential pods, each marked by a large glass window that stared out like a still eye. Cold fluorescent lights overhead cast a sterile light on their surfaces, making their reflections shimmer in the glass like restless ghosts.

Dominating the heart of the room stood a giant cylindrical machine.

Its steel frame towered like a giant pillar driven into the ground, thick cables coiling around it like veins feeding a living creature. A buzzing energy pulsed deep within its unfinished core, sending faint vibrations through the latticed floor beneath Samuel’s boots.

Its steel skeleton rose like a slumbering titan, reaching all the way to the cavern roof. Thick cables wrapped around its frame like mechanical serpents, pulsing with energy as they fed into its incomplete core.

Samuel’s breath caught in his throat. "Is that..." His voice failed him.

Clift didn’t take his eyes off the machine. His voice dropped to a low, grim murmur. "Aetherion Spear."