Chapter 70: Inspection

His hands trembled slightly as he flipped through the pages, each one documenting another transaction. Another life bought and sold like cattle. Some of the entries were marked with small symbols he didn’t recognize, but the pattern was clear enough. Triangles for adult females. Circles for children. Squares for males.

There were a lot of triangles. Not many squares.

They’re targeting women specifically. Why?

The answer came to him a moment later, ugly and obvious. In a world where Siren males were rare, the women were the ones who maintained the population. Remove them, and the species would slowly wither. It wasn’t just slavery. It was genocide by attrition.

He photographed every page with his enhanced memory, the new ability from Mind Fortress allowing him to capture perfect images that he could recall at will. Then he replaced the files exactly as he’d found them and moved toward the door.

Voices in the hallway. Two people, approaching fast.

"—told you to have those numbers ready by noon. Thorne doesn’t like excuses."

"I know, I know. But the warehouse inspection took longer than expected. The new arrivals are restless."

"Restless? They’re cargo. Cargo doesn’t get restless."

"These ones do. One of them bit Gareth when he tried to move her. Drew blood and everything."

A laugh, cold and humorless. "Sounds like she needs proper breaking. Tell the handlers to take care of it before the buyers arrive. No damaged goods."

The voices faded as the speakers continued down the hallway, leaving Nacho frozen in place with his hand on the door handle.

New arrivals. Restless. Handlers.

The shipment Vance mentioned. They were here, somewhere in this building. Not being held at a separate location, but right under Mirela Thorne’s direct supervision.

He cracked the door open and slipped into the hallway, following the direction the voices had come from. His Combat Precognition painted a map of the building in his mind, predicting guard positions and patrol routes based on the information he’d already gathered.

The basement. That’s where they’d keep people they didn’t want anyone to see.

A service stairwell at the end of the corridor led down into darkness. He descended without hesitation, his eyes adjusting instantly to the lack of light thanks to his Siren physiology. The air grew colder as he went deeper, carrying the scent of mildew and something else.

Salt water. The faint tang of the ocean, trapped far from the sea.

The basement opened up into a network of storage rooms and service corridors, most of them filled with legitimate cargo. But one section was different. Newer walls, recently constructed to partition off a space that hadn’t been on any building plans. A heavy door reinforced with iron bands.

Two guards stood watch outside, their posture relaxed but their eyes sharp. Both of them carried weapons openly, swords at their hips and crossbows leaning against the wall within easy reach.

Nacho studied them from the shadows of a nearby corridor, calculating his options. He could take them both out quickly, but that would raise an alarm. He could try to charm them, but two targets at once was risky, and if one of them resisted even for a moment, the whole operation would go sideways.

Or he could be patient.

He settled into a crouch and waited, his enhanced hearing tracking every sound in the basement. The guards talked in low voices, complaining about shift rotations and bad food. Somewhere behind that reinforced door, he could hear other sounds. Quiet sobs. The clink of chains. A voice, female, singing softly in a language he didn’t recognize.

Twenty minutes passed. Then thirty. The guards were getting restless, shifting their weight and checking their weapons more often.

Finally, one of them groaned and stretched. "Gonna hit the privy. Watch the door."

"Yeah, yeah. Just hurry up. I don’t want to be alone with those things any longer than I have to."

The first guard walked off down the corridor, disappearing around a corner. Nacho moved the instant he was out of sight.

His Sovereign Tentacle wrapped around the remaining guard’s throat before the man had time to react, pulling him backward into the shadows with a smooth motion that barely made a sound. The Charm effect hit immediately, flooding the guard’s nervous system with sensation that wiped away his ability to resist.

[Sovereign Tentacle effect activated. Charm multiplied by 15x. Current effective Charm: 2,145.]

[Target’s receptivity: 78%.]

"Sleep," Nacho whispered. "You’re very tired. You’re going to take a nap right here, and when you wake up, you won’t remember anything unusual."

The guard’s eyes rolled back. His body went limp. Nacho lowered him gently to the floor and turned his attention to the door.

The lock was more complex than the one upstairs, designed to resist both physical force and magical manipulation. But it wasn’t designed to resist someone who could reshape his tentacles to match any keyhole perfectly.

The door swung open on silent hinges, revealing a space that made his stomach clench.

Cells. A dozen of them, arranged in two rows down the length of the room. Iron bars, stone floors, no windows. And in each cell, huddled against the back wall or lying on thin pallets that provided no protection from the cold, were Sirens.

Women, mostly. Young and old, beautiful and plain, all of them wearing the same expression of hopeless terror. Their clothes were torn and dirty, their skin marked with bruises that spoke of rough handling. Some of them had chains around their ankles, connecting them to rings set into the floor.

One of them looked up as he entered, her eyes widening with a mixture of hope and fear that cut through him like a knife.

"Please," she whispered. "Please, whoever you are. Help us."

He crossed to her cell and crouched down, meeting her eyes through the bars. She was young, maybe nineteen, with the same pale emerald hair he’d seen on Lizbeth. Her face was gaunt from hunger, but there was still defiance in her gaze. Still fight.

"I’m going to get you out of here," he said quietly. "All of you. But I need you to stay calm and do exactly what I say. Can you do that?"

She nodded, tears streaming down her cheeks.

"Good." He stood and turned to address the room, pitching his voice to carry without being loud. "Listen to me. I’m here to help, but we don’t have much time. When I open these cells, I need you to follow me quietly. No screaming, no running. We move fast and we move together. Understand?"

Murmurs of assent rippled through the room. Some of the Sirens were too weak or too drugged to respond, but those who could managed to climb to their feet, helping the others up with them.

Nacho moved down the row of cells, his tentacle making quick work of each lock. The women emerged hesitantly, clustering together for protection, their eyes darting toward the door like they expected guards to come pouring through at any moment.