Chapter 53: North Research

The car arrived at a facility, the building was large and stretched out for a long distance, a massive compound surrounded it.

"I keep seeing places that I didn’t even know existed at all." Leon said as he stepped down from the car.

The facility was crawling with people in lab coats.

They walked across the courtyard in twos and threes, holding tablets and thick books, talking in low, quick voices. A woman rushed past with a tray of glowing vials. Two men argued over a diagram, tapping it with their pens. It looked like the kind of place you were only allowed into if you were a genius.

A large signboard stood above the entrance.

North Research Center.

Leon read it and frowned.

"This doesn’t look like your place," he said to Kate. "Are you renting out a part of it?"

"No." She shook her head. "My family started the North Research Facility. Later, we made it public, so that people could buy shares. But we still hold the majority, so in a way, we still own all of it."

Leon blinked.

’How deep are her family’s pockets?’

He did not ask. He only followed her through the front doors.

They had barely stepped inside when a man in a lab coat came rushing across the lobby. He had a bald spot, round glasses sliding down his nose, and a goofy air about him that made him look like an overexcited student.

"Miss Kate!" he said, in a semi-joyous voice. "It’s so good to see you! Is it here? Did you bring it?"

He looked around her, searching for the containment unit that should have been carrying the core. He checked behind her, then behind Leon, then at the empty hands of the assistant. There was nothing.

His face fell.

"Uhm, Miss Kate, where is the core?"

She pointed at Leon with her thumb.

"He has it."

The man turned and stared at Leon in confusion.

"Where? I don’t see any..."

"Don’t worry about it," Leon said with a wave. "Just take us to wherever you want to keep it, and I’ll show you there."

The man hesitated. Then, still confused, he nodded and led the way.

They walked through a long white corridor and into a massive containment room. A tube-like device stood at the center of the floor, tall and glass-walled, with thick cables running from its base. Around it, dozens of other gadgets were arranged in a wide ring, each one blinking with small lights. A few more people in lab coats were already waiting, including several who were around Leon’s age, a girl and a boy, holding notebooks.

"We are ready," the man said.

"Good," Leon said. "Get everything on. I’ll be bringing it out now."

The man gave him a puzzled look, but he signaled to the others. Machines hummed to life one by one, and the room filled with a soft electric buzz. The containment unit lit up.

Leon spread his hand forward.

His shadow stretched across the floor, wide and dark. Then something rose out of it, lifted gently by a slow tendril of black. It was the core.

Its glow filled the room at once. Warm golden light poured over every wall, and the energy coming off it was so thick that it made the hairs on everyone’s arms stand up.

Nobody moved.

Every scientist in the room froze, their pens hanging in midair. The man’s mouth opened, and nothing came out. Even Kate was stunned, her eyes wide.

The man shook himself first.

"Please," he said, almost whispering. "Put it in the containment. Carefully."

Leon nodded. He guided the core across the room with his shadow and lowered it into the tube. The glass sealed with a hiss. Locks clicked into place, and the light inside settled to a steady glow.

The room exploded into motion.

Everyone started writing at once. Pens scratched, tablets beeped, and people called out numbers to each other. The man ran to the nearest machine and began reading from its screen with shaking hands.

"The mana it’s generating and controlling is one of the best I have ever seen," he said, "among all the golem cores that have ever come out of a gate. This is incredible."

He turned to Leon and the others and began to explain.

"Golem cores are extremely useful. The base of one is used to create autonomous golems that attack humans, but we can harness them too. We can use them to create weapons, autonomous robots, all kinds of things that can be used in the fight against monsters, and in other parts of the world as well."

Leon waved it all aside.

"What would be the cost of this?" he asked.

The man paused. The man thought for a moment, rubbing his chin.

"The last one that came even close to this sold for roughly eighty million credits."

Leon’s eyes widened. He kept his face still, but his heart began to pound.

"And nobody has safely removed one at this size in years," the man went on. "So this could easily cross a hundred million."

He turned to Kate.

"Miss Kate, would you like the core? I could simply sell it to you for eighty million, if you want."

Kate shook her head.

"No," she said. "When it comes to business, you shouldn’t do things like that."

"But..."

"I have the liberty of giving things away when I want to, because I’m already made. You are just starting off." She looked at Leon. "If my father, or my father’s company, wants the core, they will have to buy it at the auction like everyone else, and outbid the rest. I have already told him that I found someone who might have something he is interested in, and that it will be going up for auction soon. He should get ready."

Leon was stunned.

She had turned down a free discount, for his sake. After a few seconds, he nodded.

"The auction is the best way forward," he said.

The man stepped toward her eagerly, hands clasped.

"Miss Kate, please. Whatever it takes, our company should be the one to buy it. If it comes here, we can study it for a while before it’s turned into any product."

"I make no promises," Kate said. "But I will hope that my father bids for it. I can set up the auction between now and tomorrow. In the three days after that, you and the others can study it, as much as you can without harming it or putting it at risk. If you win it, it will stay here for a month before any production begins."

The man’s eyes lit up.

"Yes, yes, absolutely!" He spun around. "Everyone! We have work to do! Get the instruments ready, and clear the schedule!"

The room broke into noise again.

Kate walked over to speak with him in a lower voice, and Leon was left standing alone beside the containment unit.

He watched the core glow.

Someone stepped up beside him. It was a girl, about his age, with bright pink hair tied back, a white lab coat, and a notebook covered in tiny pink stickers and pins. Even her pen was pink.

She looked at the core for a moment.

"You must be a strong hunter to find something like this," she said.

"Nope, I just got lucky," Leon replied.

She smiled. "I don’t really care about the core. I’m more interested in the shadow that brought it out."

Leon turned his head. She was still smiling.

She wrote something on a page of her notebook, tore it out, and held it out to him. It was a phone number.

"Call me when you have the chance," she said. "I’d like to talk a bit."

He took it. She winked and walked away.

A minute later, Kate finished her conversation and came back. She glanced at the girl’s back as she left and frowned, but she did not ask.

"Let’s go," she said.

The two of them left the facility, leaving the core behind.