Chapter 134: Terrible Dialogue, I Love the Company!

If Victoria were undergoing some apocalyptic upheaval—say, the sudden revival of a Behemoth, the abyssal return of Ishar-mla, a rogue Lumberjack casually passing by, or Amiya spontaneously mutating into a monstrous Lord of Fiends—then 0325 laying out a grand, multi-layered contingency plan in advance would actually carry some weight. But right now? The world was annoyingly peaceful. Was this cryptic bastard seriously suggesting that because he foresaw my impending bankruptcy, he specifically carved out time on his precious last day on Terra just to notify Muelsyse to drop off some cash?

‘Are you kidding me?’ You knew better than anyone when you were digging your own grave.

Muelsyse definitely brought a massive headache with her. And the worst part? It was a headache you couldn’t dodge.

Right on cue, Muelsyse dropped the act. Realizing her pitiful, played-the-victim routine wasn’t landing, the faux innocence melted from her features, replaced by the sharp, calculating gaze of a Rhine Lab Director. With a casual flick of her wrist, a thin, iridescent film of water rippled into existence at the edge of the table. It cascaded downward, forming a perfect, invisible dome that isolated their quiet corner from the bustling noise of the room.

The ambient chatter vanished instantly.

“I have no idea how you managed to learn about internal Rhine Lab secrets of this clearance level,” she murmured, her voice echoing softly within the water barrier. “But I did find traces of the anomaly you mentioned… I had to copy a file purely from memory. This project is directly under the Director, and it’s been quietly running for over four years. Kristen kept it buried from all of us. This is the absolute limit of what I could dig up.”

Muelsyse slid a few blurry, heavily creased photocopies across the table. The pages were marred by dark stains and erratic printing errors. In the center of the top sheet sat a heavily degraded image—a vague, inverted geometric shape that barely registered to the naked eye.

[Relic Investigation 214 — Tentative Codename: “Anchor”]

[Appearance: A colossal regular dodecahedron lacking any visible seams or interfaces. Existing industrial tools cannot inflict surface scratches. Excavated from Pit No. 3 in the Sami Hollows. Compared to other archeological findings from the same geological strata, the artifact is far too new ■ ■ ■ ■… This anomaly has caused severe unease among the research staff. We are formally applying to seal off ■ ■ of Pit No. 3.]

[Approval: Risk Assessment ■ ■ ■ ■ Rejected ■ ■ Permitted ■ ■ ■]

The subsequent pages were in even worse condition, covered in massive ink blots and deep, jagged creases. It looked as though someone had violently crumpled the reports, tossed them into an incinerator, and then desperately fished them back out to smooth them over.

[“Feasibility of Restarting the Anchor Project to Advance the Initiative”]

[“Application for Personnel Secondment from the Loken Water Tank Project”]

[“Analysis of the Anchor Project’s Material Transformation”]

Muelsyse had even painstakingly reconstructed the torn edges of the final page, piecing it together from fragmented files like a morbid jigsaw puzzle.

The following sheets read like standard, painfully dry Terran archeological restoration logs. The descriptions were infuriatingly vague, leaving the reader with only the distinct impression that the object giving the researchers so much grief was simply a massive, indestructible iron box.

You impatiently skimmed to the final page:

[Due to severe funding deficits, this initiative has been transferred to the Director’s Construction Department. The initiative has been officially renamed from the “New Hebrew Project” to the “Anchor Project.” The central database has been updated accordingly.]

Muelsyse lowered her gaze, a flash of genuine apology crossing her face. “This is everything. The Director’s Construction Department operates on a closed-loop server. Their files aren’t accessible to me…”

At some point, the founding members of Rhine Lab had grown so deeply estranged that she had been forced to swipe Dorothy’s security card just to sneak into the archives for these scraps.

You rested your chin on your knuckles, your eyes lazily scanning the spread-out photocopies with an air of feigned indifference.

To the untrained eye, these papers seemed packed with dense, terrifying scientific revelations. But in reality? Given the primitive technological ceiling of these little Terran creatures, over ninety percent of their ‘analysis’ was absolute garbage. If it weren’t for the fact that there was literally no other reliable data available, you would have ruthlessly dismantled their methodology from top to bottom. You would have questioned whether they even understood magnetic levitation, whether the artifact was actually metallic, whether their outdated X-rays could even penetrate a dodecahedron, and finally, whether they could manage to string together a grammatically correct sentence.

The only piece of data worth a damn was a single word: Anchor.

“Anchor Project.” The new designation assigned after the artifact was handed over to the Director’s Construction Department—meaning it went straight into the hands of Director Kristen Wright. If this regular dodecahedron was significant enough for 0325 to specifically flag it in his grand design, then Kristen was likely the only person on Terra capable of cracking its secrets.

Behind Kristen stood the “Preserver” project, another relic of the previous civilization. Compared to the little blonde girl who received a raw knowledge infusion from the ancients, the water-elf Muelsyse who only knew how to cultivate plants, the battle-crazed Saria, the corporate shark Justin Jr., the slow-witted Professor Papi, and the madman Parvis who just wanted to turn the entire world into a giant Loken Water Tank… Kristen was the true successor. The orthodox academic.

‘Ahem. I’m getting off-track. I still haven’t figured out what “Anchor” actually means.’

If taken as a metaphor, did the codename imply stability? A fixed point in space? A dimensional marker?

And the location… why was it always Sami?

It was glaringly obvious. 0325 was deliberately laying a trail of breadcrumbs, guiding you straight to Columbia to meet the Preserver. It was a trap so blatantly illuminated it might as well have had neon signs pointing to it, yet… you were completely powerless to refuse.

‘Damn it. My gamer curiosity is completely out of control!’

Across the table, Muelsyse watched the subtle shifts in her young collaborator’s expression. She caught the dark, surging emotions swirling in the depths of your eyes. Assuming you had just uncovered some terrifying, world-ending implication in the files, she panicked. She reached across the table, her cool, soft fingers wrapping tightly around your hand, giving it a desperate shake.

“Doctor! Doctor? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine… I just zoned out for a second,” you replied smoothly. You snapped back to reality, effortlessly slipping your hand out of her grasp to maintain the professional distance. “I was merely pondering some unrelated trivial matters. Please excuse my lapse in focus.”

Muelsyse nodded cooperatively, her face perfectly arranging itself into an expression that screamed, Whatever you say, Boss. She tactfully dropped the subject. “I failed to fully meet your request this time, and I take responsibility for that. Let’s ensure a pleasant cooperation. Is there anything I can do to compensate you?”

“As long as it’s not an excessive request, anything is fine~” she added, her tone turning dangerously sweet.

“Really?” You narrowed your eyes, a calculated glint flashing in your pupils. “Then what exactly qualifies as an excessive request?”

‘Does having Rhine Lab cover the exorbitant tariffs for my seed trade with the Ecology Section count?’

Muelsyse smiled—a sly, knowing curve of her lips. “Of course, a request like having Rhine Lab cover your trade tariffs would be terribly excessive~”

You exhaled a quiet breath of deep disappointment. She really was a wicked woman. For a fleeting second, you had genuinely believed you could save a massive pile of LMD.

Meanwhile, Muelsyse’s heart was hammering against her ribs. She knew this enigmatic mastermind wasn’t nearly as benevolent as his calm exterior suggested—he had casually thrown out a heart-stopping financial demand the second he opened his mouth!

To dare ask for a profit margin as massive as full tariff coverage right to her face… how utterly shameless!

Fine. Without the promise of sweet, sweet LMD, your interest in teasing Muelsyse plummeted. You listlessly raised your hands, signaling a tactical surrender. “Fine, let’s just keep a tab open for now. Head back and find Saria; I’ll have her assist you with your end of the board. Also—if it isn’t too much trouble, could you help me smuggle two people into Rhine Lab? I have some… personal grievances with a few operators that require a hands-on approach.”

This time, Muelsyse agreed without a second thought. “That’s no problem at all.”

With a flick of her wrist, the iridescent water curtain slowly dissolved into the air. The lively, chaotic chatter of the operators outside instantly flooded back into their corner.

‘Whatever. I’ll leave tomorrow’s problems for tomorrow.’

Outside, the sky had bruised into a deep, unforgiving purple, and the city streets grew increasingly hostile.

Nightshade was forced to crawl into the damp, reeking confines of the sewer just to escape the biting wind. A fat, cow-print cat huddled beside her, rubbing its shivering body against her trembling hand.

‘It’s so cold…’

Nightshade exhaled a puff of warm, white breath onto her frostbitten, violently purple fingers, desperately trying to thaw the agonizing chill that had seeped into her very marrow.

Her vision blurred. She was gradually losing the ability to distinguish whether the searing pain tearing through her body was a byproduct of the freezing temperatures, or the relentless march of her Oripathy.

Suddenly, her pointed ears twitched.

From the surface above, muffled voices drifted down through the grate. It sounded like… two middle-aged men engaged in a hushed, intense discussion.

‘People are actually out walking in this godforsaken weather?’

Nightshade forced her aching body to move. Hunching her shoulders against the damp chill, she stood up and began to slowly, agonizingly crawl toward the iron manhole cover above.

[Rhodes’s Note:

Enjoying the operation so far, Doctor?

(This daily grind literally pays the landship’s rent! 🙇‍♂️):

Massive thanks for reading and supporting the operation!]