Volume 1, Chapter 21: Three Forty
3:27 a.m.
Shuichi still wasn't asleep.
The bedroom light was off, and the curtains were open only a crack; the late-night city light came through it and cut a long gray-white line across the floor.
His phone screen had already gone dark.
He'd read that temporary road-closure notice again a dozen or so minutes ago.
【Parts of the Northern Old Industrial District and North Bridge in Linjiang will undergo temporary road maintenance from 3:00 to 5:00 a.m.】
The reason given was very ordinary.
So ordinary that if the business with the black core hadn't just happened, Shuichi probably wouldn't even have tapped on it.
But it had to be today.
Yesterday Nexus had suddenly stopped any further examination of Yusei.
And then a road closure early this morning.
On top of that, the core had been kept at the Linjiang Security Technology Center the whole time.
Stringing it together wasn't hard.
"..."
Shuichi lay in bed and closed his eyes for a while.
Then opened them again.
He didn't actually know why he was still awake.
He didn't have the morning shift tomorrow.
Normally, by this time, he'd be so deeply asleep that even Yusei kicking the door might not get a reaction.
But ever since the evening, there had been a very faint discomfort in his body that wouldn't go away.
Many years ago, standing in a mission waiting area, with nothing having happened yet and no equipment sounding an alarm, his body had already known something might be about to happen.
Tonight probably wasn't going to be peaceful.
Shuichi cut the association off.
He rolled over.
Turned his back to the window.
"Not my problem."
His voice was very soft.
Said to himself.
The best thing would be for Nexus to haul that thing as far away as possible tonight.
Dump it in the mountains.
Dump it in the sea.
Or just lock it away somewhere he'd never see it again for the rest of his life.
Any of those.
As long as it didn't stay in Linjiang.
As long as it didn't stay near Yusei.
At that thought, Shuichi finally closed his eyes again.
On the nightstand.
The time on his phone jumped to—
03:31.
***
The Linjiang Security Technology Center.
Basement level two.
As the last passive lock clamped shut, a low mechanical bite sounded inside the isolation chamber.
No networked identification.
No wireless signal.
Even the standard electronic locator had been removed.
The fist-sized black core was fixed in the center of a silver-gray transport case about 1.2 meters long, held in place internally by a purely mechanical suspension structure and surrounded by multiple layers of energy-inert cushioning material.
Outside the transport case was a second, impact-resistant frame.
And outside that was the securing slot of the dedicated transport vehicle.
Kamiya Risa stood to one side, watching two staff members finish the final check with torque tools.
"Primary lock."
"Confirmed."
"Secondary mechanical fixing."
"Confirmed."
"Inner pressure."
"Normal."
"Casing temperature."
"21.4."
"No abnormal energy reading."
"Confirmed."
Once every item was done, the staff stepped back.
Saeki Soichi stood at the back of the monitoring room.
Tonight the old man had changed into a very dark coat. He had no cane in his hand, yet his mood was clearly heavier than it had been during the day.
"Go over the route again."
The on-site supervisor in charge of transport picked up the paper route sheet.
"The main vehicle leaves the Center by the north exit, takes Binggang Road to North Bridge, crosses the river into the outer ring of the Old Industrial District, then turns northwest onto a closed logistics route."
"No public navigation for the entire trip."
"Intersections will be guided by two vehicle teams positioned in advance."
"North Bridge will be temporarily sealed off from 03:36 to 03:52."
"The first escort team withdraws after crossing the bridge."
"The final destination is known only to the lead driver, the co-driver, and you, sir."
Saeki nodded.
"Radio?"
"Independent short-range channel."
"Recording equipment?"
"Stored locally in the main vehicle, no real-time upload."
"What about civilian surveillance along the way?"
"Temporary maintenance requests have been filed for the key stretches. Three sections of North Bridge surveillance will go into maintenance mode during the transfer window."
When Kamiya heard that, she couldn't help glancing at Saeki.
This no longer resembled an ordinary sample transfer.
To put it a little dramatically.
Even if someone knew in advance that something was being moved tonight, it wouldn't be easy to work out the route through network means alone.
Not to mention that hardly anyone at the entire Linjiang Center actually knew what was in the case.
Saeki clearly hadn't relaxed because of these preparations.
"If anything abnormal happens, what's the first principle?"
The on-site supervisor answered fast.
"Stop moving."
"Second?"
"Evacuate personnel to a safe distance."
"Third?"
"No one opens the transport case without authorization."
"And if the case itself is damaged?"
"On-site personnel must not touch the core; establish an isolation zone immediately."
Only then did Saeki nod.
"Move out."
The time.
03:39.
The heavy gate of the underground garage slowly rose.
Three ordinary-looking dark-gray transport vehicles drove out one after another.
The one in the middle was slightly heavier than the ones in front and behind.
Other than that, there was no visible difference.
Kamiya stood in front of the monitor screens until the last vehicle disappeared through the exit, and only then let out a soft breath.
"Do you think something will go wrong?"
Saeki didn't answer.
He just watched the time ticking in the bottom-right corner.
03:40.
After a long while.
"I have that feeling. I hope I'm overthinking it."
***
At the same time.
Linjiang City's Northern Wholesale Market.
Tanaka Makoto yawned and rolled his car window down a little.
Cold air rushed in.
It woke him up somewhat.
Since the Mother Hive incident, several of the supermarket's fresh-produce logistics lines had never fully recovered. The original supplier still had two warehouses under inspection, and the batch of vegetables due on the shelves this morning had been switched to a different channel at the last minute.
That kind of thing wasn't really right to hand off to an ordinary employee.
So Tanaka had come himself.
The back seat was stacked with empty crates.
On the passenger seat sat a convenience store coffee that was already mostly gone.
The navigation warned that some entrances to North Bridge ahead were closed.
Tanaka frowned.
"Road work again..."
Wasn't this city fixing a few too many things lately?
A few days ago monsters had burrowed up out of the ground.
Yesterday a whole street was still being paved with temporary steel plates.
Today the bridge was under maintenance.
He glanced at the time.
If he took the long way around, he'd probably get back to the store twenty minutes late.
Tanaka clicked his tongue.
And followed the temporary traffic signs toward the open north side road.
***
About three kilometers from him.
In a different taxi.
Takahashi Misaki was dozing against the back-seat window.
Last night she had really meant to go back to Nanting.
But two co-workers from her old store found out her support stint was over and dragged her off to karaoke.
The singing went on until three.
Misaki was so sleepy she didn't want to talk.
Her phone was still in her hand.
In the group chat, someone had just posted a photo of her asleep halfway through a song, hugging the microphone.
She replied with only two words.
【Delete it.】
The reply came instantly.
【Nope.】
Misaki kept her eyes closed.
She decided the murder could wait until tomorrow.
The taxi driver glanced at her in the rearview mirror.
"Miss, looks like there's temporary traffic control on North Bridge, we might have to go around a bit."
"Mm..."
"You in a hurry?"
"No."
She answered vaguely.
"As long as I get there alive."
The driver laughed.
"That's bad luck to say at this hour."
Misaki was almost asleep.
"Then... get there safe."
"That's more like it."
The taxi drove onto the outer approach road to North Bridge.
Nobody paid any attention to the yellow temporary signal light that had just come on ahead.
***
03:44.
The Nexus convoy entered Binggang Road.
Everything was normal.
Inside the middle transport vehicle, the case's securing pressure was normal.
Vibration normal.
Temperature normal.
No energy fluctuations.
The escort monitoring the data had even started to think that Director Saeki really was being overly cautious this time.
He had been staring at those few numbers for over ten minutes.
They had barely changed even in the first decimal place.
"Two minutes to North Bridge."
The driver said.
The co-driver looked up ahead.
The bridge entrance had already been partially blocked off by traffic vehicles.
Nexus's own lead vehicle went through first.
The short-range channel crackled.
【Team A through. Road surface normal.】
【Copy.】
The middle transport vehicle started onto the bridge.
The black core still showed no reaction at all.
03:46.
The convoy was fully on North Bridge.
The river was calm.
The night wind wasn't strong.
The red aviation warning lights of the riverside warehouses could be seen in the distance.
The escort lowered his head and wrote:
【Entering North Bridge section.】
The pen had just left the paper.
When a sound suddenly came from inside the transport case—
CRACK.
Very soft.
So soft it sounded like a stone slab splitting as it expanded in the heat.
The escort looked up.
"What was that sound just now?"
The man beside him had heard it too.
They both looked at the case.
The external indicator structure hadn't changed.
The mechanical locks were normal.
The temperature was normal.
"Stop?"
"The data's not abnormal."
"Report it first."
The escort reached for the communicator.
Before he could press it.
CRACK.
A second one.
Clearer this time.
As if something inside the transport case had lightly bumped against the inner wall.
Both of their expressions changed.
"Lead driver, slow down."
The driver up front immediately eased off the accelerator.
"Anomaly?"
"Possible sound inside the case."
The co-driver quickly opened the short-range channel.
【All units slow down, prepare to stop.】
The vehicles in front and behind lit their brake lights in sync.
The whole convoy began to lose speed.
Everything was done according to the plan.
No panic.
No operator error.
A third sound never came.
Instead, everyone in the vehicle had an extremely strange feeling at the same time.
Their stomachs suddenly dropped to the left.
The driver's first thought was that the vehicle was skidding.
But there was no feedback through the steering wheel.
No squeal of tires slipping either.
The next second.
The paper route sheet lying on the dashboard suddenly flew off sideways.
BANG!
And stuck flat against the right-side window.
"What?"
The driver hadn't even finished speaking.
When the entire transport vehicle, over ten tons, shifted sideways to the right without any warning.
All four tires still pointed forward.
Yet the body moved as if some huge invisible force had shoved it from the side.
BOOM!
The transport vehicle slammed into the bridge's side guardrail.
The sound of deforming metal instantly tore open the night.
The vehicles behind braked hard.
Tires shrieked piercingly against the bridge deck.
【Main vehicle anomaly!】
【Stop! Stop!】
【Lead vehicle, open the gap!】
The driver clung to the steering wheel.
But his whole body was being pulled to the right by his seatbelt.
"The center of gravity's wrong!"
The co-driver grabbed the door handle.
"No, it's not the center of gravity!"
He watched with his own eyes as the ID badge hanging on his chest.
Didn't hang down toward his feet.
But floated off to the right, almost horizontal.
Just two seconds.
Maybe three.
The anomaly suddenly vanished.
Everything dropped back into place at once.
SLAP!
The route sheet fell to the floor.
The ID badge smacked back against his chest.
The heavy transport vehicle also slammed down hard once under its own momentum.
"Report!"
The driver shouted.
In the rear compartment, the escort had already thrown himself beside the transport case.
The first-layer mechanical securing frame was visibly deformed.
"Securing structure damaged!"
"Core case intact!"
"Stop the vehicle now!"
The transport vehicle braked to a halt.
The escort vehicles in front and behind had already stopped too.
Well-trained personnel got out quickly.
No one touched the transport case.
They began sealing off the area around the main vehicle.
The short-range link sent the information back to the Linjiang Center at the same time.
***
03:47.
By the time the alarm first sounded, Saeki Soichi was already on his feet.
"What anomaly?"
The communications officer spoke very fast.
"Suspected brief shift in the direction of gravity, lasting about two to three seconds."
Kamiya thought she'd misheard.
"Gravity?"
"The site is double-checking."
Saeki asked directly:
"The case?"
"Outer case intact, securing frame slightly deformed."
"Stop the transport."
"It's already stopped."
"All personnel get clear."
"In progress."
Kamiya turned to look at the live data.
Part of the transport case's local recording had just come back over the short-range link.
Energy readings, temperature, and electromagnetic values showed no anomalies at all.
Only, less than 0.2 seconds before the event.
The pressure sensors had recorded a bizarre moment when every direction dropped to zero at the same time.
Then recovered.
Kamiya stared at that line.
"What is this?"
No one answered.
Saeki had already picked up the communicator.
"Do not move the case any further."
"Wait for us to—"
He didn't get to finish.
The on-site channel suddenly exploded.
【Second anomaly!】
***
North Bridge.
This time there was no warning whatsoever.
The change in direction was even more violent.
Everyone on the bridge deck staggered toward the river at the same time.
The transport vehicle stopped in the middle lurched sharply toward the guardrail.
A staff member who had just moved away was flung clean off the ground.
His safety line snapped taut instantly.
The colleague beside him threw himself over and grabbed him.
But the real danger was the transport case.
The first impact had already slightly deformed the securing frame.
This time.
That completely unreasonable sideways "gravity" bore down directly on the entire nearly one-ton frame.
CRACK!
The first locking bar snapped.
"The frame!"
"Hold it down!"
No one dared touch the core case directly.
But the outer support was already starting to slide toward the side of the compartment.
The second locking bar burst.
BOOM!
The whole silver-gray transport case slammed into the inner wall of the compartment.
The outer metal panel bulged straight out.
The driver saw it in the rearview mirror, and his face changed instantly.
"It's coming out!"
The third impact.
Didn't come from the core.
It came from an ordinary overnight freight truck behind them that had lost control because of the gravity shift.
The driver had already been stomping on the brakes with everything he had.
But the whole truck was dragged sideways by the abnormal direction, and in the end its front slammed into Nexus's rear escort vehicle.
The rear escort vehicle then hit the main vehicle's tail.
In the roar of the crash.
The transport vehicle, already close to the side of the bridge, slid several more meters forward.
Its right front wheel hit the deformed guardrail.
The body tilted.
The last securing structure inside—
Broke.
"The case is loose!"
The silver-gray transport case smashed through the side wall of the compartment.
Several hundred kilograms of metal structure slid sideways across the bridge deck.
Sparks exploded along the ground in a long, glaring line.
A Nexus staff member was just about to move closer.
The person in charge on site roared at him directly:
"Don't touch it!"
The transport case kept sliding toward the edge of the bridge.
It wasn't going especially fast.
Under normal circumstances, a few people with equipment would have had plenty of time to block it.
But the next second.
The abnormal direction suddenly returned to normal.
The case's own weight pulled downward again.
The transport case, already halfway over the broken guardrail, sank abruptly.
"..."
Everyone saw it.
It paused at the edge of the bridge for an instant.
And then—
Fell.
No one had time to say a word.
The silver-gray case tumbled toward the river.
Thirty-plus meters.
Twenty meters.
Ten meters.
And finally.
BOOM!
A huge spray of water exploded in the night.
The transport case vanished completely.
***
03:48.
Shuichi's eyes snapped open.
The room was still completely dark.
North Bridge was still far from here.
An ordinary person couldn't possibly have felt anything.
But he'd woken up all the same.
Not the half-asleep, half-awake state from before.
But completely awake in an instant.
His heart gave one heavy beat in his chest.
Shuichi didn't move.
His eyes stared into the dark.
For one instant just now.
He had felt it.
Very weak.
Weaker even than the lowest-grade lab equipment starting up many years ago.
But the structure was far too familiar.
Something, from very, very far away—
Had switched on, once.
"..."
Shuichi slowly sat up.
The time on his phone:
03:48.
And then.
The first low rumble finally reached him from the distance.
Something was collapsing.
Right after that.
There was the sound of something falling to the floor next door.
Yusei was awake too.
***
03:48:17.
Beneath Linjiang North Bridge.
The transport case had already sunk into the water.
The person in charge on site rushed to the broken guardrail.
"The beacon!"
The person beside him looked down at a device.
"No signal!"
"Backup locator?"
"Nothing either!"
"Depth of the case?"
"Unknown!"
"How long until the underwater team gets here?"
"At least fifteen minutes!"
Saeki's voice came through the communicator.
"Secure the bridge deck first."
"Don't let anyone go into the water after the core."
The person in charge gritted his teeth.
"Understood."
But his attention was soon pulled away from the core.
Because someone suddenly said:
"The river..."
"What about it?"
Everyone looked down.
At first no one understood what they were seeing.
Until one person realized what was wrong.
The water level.
Was dropping.
Not across the whole Linjiang River.
Only around the spot where the transport case had fallen in.
With that spot as the center.
Dozens of meters.
A hundred meters.
Two hundred meters.
The river surface looked as if some huge invisible force were pressing it downward.
In the middle of the formerly flat water, a shockingly wide depression slowly formed.
Yet there was no whirlpool, and no drain.
The water just sank, all of it at once.
A small cargo ship passing under the bridge visibly tilted, and its crew ran out onto the deck in a panic.
The water-level monitors on the riverbank all went off at once.
"What is this?!"
No one knew.
The depression grew deeper and deeper.
In the dark, the wet black concrete of the bridge piers that had long been submerged even began to show.
Saeki stood in front of the screen at the Technology Center.
Watching the footage that had just come back.
For the first time, his face changed completely.
"Get everyone off the bridge."
Kamiya turned her head.
"What?"
"Now."
"The core hasn't been—"
"Forget the core!"
The old man's voice rose sharply.
"Get everyone off the bridge deck!"
The on-site channel went off immediately.
【All personnel evacuate!】
【Repeat, all personnel evacuate North Bridge!】
But it was already a little too late.
After the depression in the river reached a certain limit.
It stopped.
Half a second.
One second.
As if the entire Linjiang River had briefly lost all sound.
And then—
The water that had been pressed down began to come back.
It rebounded instantly.
BOOM!!!!!!
The entire river surface heaved upward.
The cargo ship was lifted clear of its waterline like a leaf.
The people on the bridge looked up.
And saw a wall of black water growing taller.
Ten meters.
Twenty meters.
Thirty meters.
Still rising.
People standing on the bridge deck even had to tilt their heads back to see the top.
Moonlight fell on that almost vertical face of river water.
Through the screen, Saeki watched the river water that almost seemed to be standing up, his whole body tense.
"This is a nightmare."