Keran pressed his back against the cool metal of the cabin wall.
This heavy transport was bigger than he’d imagined.
It wasn’t the twin-rotor light patrol craft common in the Federation.
It was an industrial behemoth custom-built by Undercurrent Armaments, with three separate decks, each for a different purpose.
The top deck held the boarding ramp and command area.
The cockpit, communications room, and Zevran’s temporary command post were all up there.
The middle deck was the utility level.
An armory, a records room, and a small interrogation room lined the hallway.
Just looking at that door told you it wasn’t a place for friendly conversation.
Keran was secured in the rear cargo hold on the bottom deck.
It was the coldest, loudest part of the entire plane.
Black sealed crates were stacked on the shelves, each marked with Undercurrent’s insignia and sealed shut, arranged with military precision like some kind of ritual.
The smell of grease and metal hung thick in the stale, enclosed air.
From where he sat, he could see a nearly twenty-meter-long central alloy corridor stretching out ahead of him.
Guards patrolled up and down constantly.
An elevator on the left side of the corridor connected to the upper decks.
Several small observation windows were set into the right hull.
Outside, the sky was a dull gray.
Clouds churned hundreds of meters below, and the ground was nowhere to be seen.
The power cuffs on his wrists locked him to a metal ring beside his seat, giving him less than half a meter of movement.
The two Operatives guarding him sat on fixed chairs halfway down the corridor, about five meters away.
The younger one on the left still had a hint of boyishness about him.
He leaned back in his chair, rubbing his neck now and then.
The older one on the right was silent, his cap pulled low over his eyes.
It was impossible to tell if he was resting or asleep.
Zevran sat on a fixed chair at the far end of the corridor, an open data pad in front of him.
His back was to Keran, so his expression was hidden.
“Senior Inspector Zevran? Want to head upstairs for a bit?”
The young Operative rubbed his neck and jerked his head toward the elevator.
The upper deck had the crew quarters and the command conference room.
It had climate control and soft seats.
It was definitely more comfortable than this cargo hold full of metal crates and oil.
“Stay here,” Zevran said, his voice unquestionably cold.
“Three hours out from the city is the danger zone. Mutated avians out in the wasteland love targeting headquarters’ transport routes.”
“It’s just a routine transport. Is all this caution really necessary?” The young Operative’s voice was barely a whisper, but there was no background noise in the cargo hold to muffle it.
Keran heard every word.
Still, intimidated by Zevran’s authority, he settled back into his chair obediently.
The entire transport felt like a sealed, flying iron coffin.
Keran leaned against the hull, keeping up his vacant, staring expression like he didn’t care about anything around him.
Only his eyes moved occasionally, silently mapping out the corridor, the guards, and the positions of the security cameras.
Rumble.
A low, distant rumble of thunder came suddenly from outside, like something snapping far away.
The plane shook slightly.
The crates on the shelves rattled against each other, then fell silent.
Keran looked out the observation window.
The sky had darkened noticeably in the last few minutes.
The pale gray clouds had turned lead-black, their roiling tops pressed low by the upper atmosphere winds.
Faint, irregular flashes of light flickered deep inside the cloud bank.
Zevran stood up and cast a cold glance around the cargo hold.
“Looks like we’re heading straight into a thunderstorm. You two stay here and watch him. I’m going up to the cockpit to check on things.”
With that, he turned and walked toward the elevator, not sparing Keran another glance.
Once Zevran was gone, the two guards started chatting idly, bored out of their minds.
They didn’t even bother lowering their voices around Keran.
It gave him the perfect chance to gather information.
Playing the useless idiot really was the smart move.
“Hey, why did Zevran personally come to Azure City anyway?”
“You’re new. It makes sense you don’t know.”
“Know what?”
“Senior Inspectors rarely leave headquarters.”
“Undercurrent has dozens of outposts and hundreds of projects. Who knows how many reports cross their desks every year.”
“Then what’s he doing here?”
“Who knows. Maybe headquarters really does care about this Otherworld Lifeform.”
Keran lowered his eyes.
Senior Inspector.
At least from the title, the man was primarily an investigator and interrogator.
That wasn’t the worst possible news for him.
A deafening crack of thunder exploded right outside the plane.
A blinding white flash of lightning lit up the entire cargo hold for an instant, casting twisted, menacing shadows from the crates.
Just then, a notification popped up on his System Panel.
[High concentration of natural lightning energy detected]
[Current environment: Thunderstorm cloud. Energy density rising rapidly]
The plane lurched violently to the left.
A sealed crate from the top shelf came crashing down, hitting the alloy floor with a thunderous bang.
Sirens wailed shrilly, and red emergency lights began flashing wildly, bathing the entire cargo hold in a sickly, blood-red glow.
The pilot’s panicked voice came over the intercom, distorted by static that made his ears ring.
“WARNING! Imminent thunderstorm contact!”
“All personnel brace for impact!”
Chaos was the perfect cover.
Keran surged with sudden force.
The power cuffs around his wrists screamed under the strain, then snapped cleanly in two with a sharp crack.
He dropped into a crouch at the same moment, his right hand flashing to the hidden sheath on his calf and drawing the tactical knife he’d hidden the entire trip.
He grabbed the young Operative’s wrist before he could even lift his arm.
The sharp crack of bones wrenching out of joint was completely drowned out by the sirens.
The knife in his other hand moved without hesitation, stabbing upward at an angle through the older Operative’s jaw and straight through the base of his skull.
The dull thud of the blade sinking into soft tissue traveled clearly up the handle.
Warm blood splattered across the back of his hand, thick and sticky.
The older Operative’s eyes flew wide.
His mouth opened, but not a single sound came out.
He slumped forward limply.
Keran released the knife and whipped his left arm around, locking the still-stunned young Operative’s head in a textbook cross choke.
The Operative gurgled and clawed frantically at Keran’s arms, but they might as well have been forged from iron.
The next second, Keran twisted his hips and snapped his wrist hard.
Crack.
The sharp sound of breaking vertebrae was swallowed by another clap of thunder.
The man in his arms went completely limp, collapsing like a rag doll.
Neither guard had even had time to raise the alarm.
[You have struck a fatal vital point! Normal attack converted to Fatal Strike!]
[You have killed an Undercurrent Operative. Gained 500 experience points.] x2
Keran lowered the two bodies gently, propping them up against their chairs so they looked like they were still sleeping from a distance.
He leaned back against the cold hull, breathing hard, his chest heaving.
He’d run through that exact sequence of movements in his head at least a hundred times.
From the exact moment to break the cuffs to the angle of the knife strike.
Every detail was perfect.
Killing hadn’t bothered him at all.
Not even a single tremor.
Keran stared down at his bloodstained hands, a strange, cold sense of absurdity washing over him.
Back on the farm, he’d hesitated for ten minutes before killing a chicken.
His biggest “kill” had been stepping on a few mice stealing grain.
Now he’d just ended two human lives, and his heart was beating steady and strong.
Like he’d just snapped two twigs.
“Am I actually turning into a psychopath?” he muttered quietly, wiping the blood off his hands quickly.
“I need to find a therapist when I get out of this. Preferably a hot female one.”
[You have looted the Operatives’ corpses: Standard Issue Pistol x2, Pistol Magazine x4, Compressed Ration Bar x2, Undercurrent General Access Card x2, Communicator x2]
Good thing they didn’t search me before boarding, Keran thought with a dry, self-deprecating laugh as he tucked the pistols into his waistband and slipped the access cards and communicators into his inner pocket.
To those arrogant Undercurrent researchers, an Otherworld Lifeform who couldn’t even awaken wasn’t even worth considering a threat.
He quickly stripped the black combat uniform off one of the Operatives and pulled it on over his own clothes.
Then he dragged the two bodies over and stacked them behind three heavy sealed crates.
Only when that was done did he straighten up and wipe the sweat from his forehead.
Keran checked his gear quickly, tucking one pistol in the small of his back and the other on his thigh. You are reading on g.com, the official source.
He slid the knife back into its hidden sheath on his calf.
Plenty of people in Undercurrent knew he was being held in the rear cargo hold.
He couldn’t show his face just yet.
Luckily, the only people who would have recognized him on sight were Zevran and the few Operatives who’d been on his personal escort detail.
Now that those escorts were dead, he was safe for the time being.
As long as he didn’t run straight into Zevran.
The elevator door had an access lock.
It wasn’t particularly strong, but you couldn’t open it without a key card.
Thankfully, the security clearance wasn’t high.
A basic guard-level card would work.
And Keran had exactly two of those.
Lifted off the two Operatives.
Next step.
Take out the comms.
He’d considered destroying the main power supply first, but the access system ran on its own independent power.
Cutting the main power would shut everything else down, but it would lock all the elevators and hatches.
Trapping him inside.
So the comms had to go first.
If no one on the ground could reach the plane, Undercurrent wouldn’t know what had happened when they landed.
That would give him time to run.
The communications transmitter was in the records room on the middle deck.
He’d noticed the low hum coming from behind that door while he’d been waiting down here.
It was the distinctive sound of a signal amplifier.
He’d taken apart dozens of identical devices back in the maintenance bay.
Get in, find the module, cut the wires.
Two minutes tops.
But first, he had to get past the elevator.
There was a guard on duty by the elevator.
Everyone on the bottom deck probably knew each other.
Keran was wearing a black combat uniform with his cap pulled low.
He looked passable from a distance, but anyone who looked closer would see something was wrong.
There was an emergency lockdown button right next to the guard post.
If he was spotted, the elevator would lock.
He’d be trapped between decks with nowhere to go.
If he just strolled up and swiped the card, a single shot from Undercurrent’s standard high-powered rifle would take out most of his HP.
If they concentrated fire on him, he might last a whole second if he was lucky.
Yeah.
Real heroic.
Great way to go, Keran thought dryly to himself, filing the stupid charge idea under “Suicide Options”.
The guard was the problem.
But the guard was also the solution.
He needed a reason to make the man leave his post.
Even just for a few seconds.
There were hundreds of sealed crates on the shelves in the bottom cargo hold.
He’d noticed earlier that one of the latches on the last row on the right was loose.
One good push and the whole shelf would come crashing down.
The sound would be deafening in the metal hull.
The guard would have to go check it out.
That was more than enough.
Keran walked over to the last row of shelves.
He flipped the loose latch open and kicked the bottom support hard with the side of his foot.
CRASH.
The entire shelf and all the crates on it came tumbling down, hitting the metal floor with a deafening roar that made his ears ring.
“What the hell was that?”
The guard at the elevator jumped to his feet and ran quickly toward the sound.
Keran pulled his cap lower and walked straight toward the elevator.
“Hey! Who’s there—” a voice shouted from behind him.
Keran didn’t look back.
He stepped into the elevator, and the doors slid shut quickly behind him, sealing out all the noise.