Chapter 16
Checkpoint.
Its official name was the Zero Descent Gate, the only official access-control facility separating Magitera's surface and underground levels.
Managed by Gardin Security Corporation, it was known as the second-most heavily guarded facility in Magitera.
It was equipped with countless surveillance drones and automated turrets, and because a considerable amount of supplies passed through it each day, it was considered a major client by defense-industry corporations.
If this had been an airport, there would have been a VIP line, but nothing of the sort existed here.
There was no reason for any VIP to come here in the first place.
Most people passing through this gate were heading down.
Prisoners, tax delinquents, lower-class residents who had lost their residential rights, or people discarded by corporations.
Finally, those deemed no longer useful to society.
Of course, they said people sometimes came back up.
But the employees of the Zero Descent Gate treated such stories as nothing more than urban legends and mocked anyone who believed them.
People who went down never came back. No, they couldn't.
At least, none of them had ever seen anyone come back up during their time working there.
So they did not treat the people passing through this place like human beings.
If a reasonably attractive woman passed through, sexual harassment was a given, while any man who looked easy to push around was met with punches and kicks. They were nothing more than stress-relief punching bags.
That day was no different.
A male employee was holding onto a gaunt man.
Another employee snickered as he flipped through the man's documents.
“Removal of food slated for disposal?”
A colleague beside him approached and skimmed the document he was looking at.
“What is it?”
“Take a look. They wrote ‘dug through the trash’ in such a pretty way.”
The colleague burst out laughing.
“Corporate-asset theft.”
“Exactly. Even the trash belongs to the corporation.”
The two took turns mocking the man, but the gaunt man kept his head lowered and could not say a word.
The employee gave him a shove on the shoulder, and the man fell weakly to the floor.
“Get up.”
When the man tried to rise, the employee stepped on the back of his hand.
“No, take it slow. The inspection isn't over yet.”
The man's face twisted with pain.
That was when it happened.
A low engine hum was approaching from far away.
Several luxurious black vehicles came into view.
Faced with this unusual situation, the male employee lifted his foot from the gaunt man's hand.
“What is this?”
His colleague muttered.
“That looks like a pretty high-end car.”
“Why would they come here?”
It happened occasionally.
Someone important would have to descend to the underground levels.
Whenever that happened, the checkpoint employees considered it their lucky day and enjoyed themselves.
The upper-level people who usually looked down on them like insects had to wait for their permission at this gate.
Suppressing a laugh, the male employee walked toward the vehicles.
As several automated turrets turned toward the approaching vehicles, they stopped before the checkpoint line.
The male employee deliberately knocked on the window at his leisure.
Tap, tap.
“Checkpoint inspection. Lower the window and prepare your identification for verification.”
There was no response from inside the car.
The employee frowned.
“Can't you hear me? This isn't a place you can just pass through.”
He gestured for them to lower the window.
“I said, lower the window.”
Whirrrrr.
As the window slowly descended, the employee was rendered speechless.
Because what appeared beyond the window was not a face, but a gun barrel.
In that instant, all the composure he had shown moments ago vanished completely.
“Uh….”
He barely swallowed and looked past the gun barrel toward the back seat.
An old man with silver-white hair was sitting there.
“Uh, uh….”
It was a face he saw everywhere.
Sometimes on the corporate promotional screens in the checkpoint lobby, sometimes on the economic news of public-information broadcasts.
The employee recognized Adrian Arclight, CEO of Seraph Industries, and the blood drained from his face.
He realized whose window he had just arrogantly knocked on and whose identification he had demanded.
The realization hit him.
Adrian did not even look at him. He merely said,
“Open it.”
One word.
That was enough.
The employee staggered backward and shouted,
“O-open it!”
A flustered voice came from the control room at his words.
“But the procedure….”
The employee screamed,
“It’s Arclight! Open the gate!”
***
The hidden elevator descended without a sound.
Inside it, Adrian Arclight stood with both hands clasped behind his back, simply watching the floor indicator.
[Underground Level 12]
[Underground Level 13]
[Underground Level 14]
Each time the indicator descended by one level, it felt as though something inside his chest sank along with it.
He was anxious.
But he did not let it show.
He was Adrian Arclight, CEO of Seraph Industries and current head of the Arclight family.
He could no longer afford to show himself wavering before his subordinates.
Then one of the bodyguards standing beside him asked cautiously,
“Sir, are you all right?”
Adrian answered without turning his gaze.
“I'm fine.”
Of course he wasn't.
He could not stop thinking about what might have been done to Lin Arclight, his granddaughter, during the days she had spent in the underground levels.
[Arrival at Underground Level 20.]
A soft announcement sounded inside the elevator.
When the doors opened, the underground levels came into Adrian's view for the first time.
Even the air was different.
And above all… so were the people.
Adrian was briefly rendered speechless by the shocking reality of the underground levels.
‘Lin is in a place like this….’
He had known from the reports, but all they had done was offer vague confirmation in the form of numbers.
“….”
As Adrian's worry deepened,
“Sir.”
the head of the security team said cautiously.
“Stay behind us.”
Adrian slowly nodded, and the bodyguards immediately moved.
Two went ahead, two took the left and right, and one covered the rear.
The rest stayed beside Adrian.
As they passed, the people of the underground levels moved out of their way on their own,
but anyone who foolishly blocked their path was thoroughly punished.
Adrian said nothing as he watched, but one corner of his heart grew heavier.
Had Lin walked through a place like this? While being chased by someone? Unable to trust anyone?
Every time that thought surfaced, Adrian wanted to kill Pale all over again.
Before long, the head of the security team raised a hand.
At the signal to stop, the group halted at once.
Underground Level 20, Unit 1409.
Adrian's heart pounded like mad.
One person pressed against the door while two others took the left and right.
The head of the security team sent a hand signal, then—
Bang!
One of the team members kicked the door open and entered.
“Left clear!”
The second followed immediately.
“Checking the right!”
The third and fourth members entered in succession.
Gun barrels swept across the room.
“Target confirmed!”
“Two adult males!”
“No weapons detected!”
Adrian looked into the room from behind the bodyguards.
It was a narrow, dark, dilapidated room.
And in the center of it stood two people.
One young man with black hair and black eyes, and one old man with a magnifying lens fitted over one eye.
Both had raised their arms to show that they were unarmed.
The old man was sweating profusely, while the black-haired young man was unnaturally calm, as though he had known in advance that they would come.
Even with several gun barrels pointed at him, he did not so much as blink.
Adrian's gaze stopped on the young man.
At that moment.
When a very faint sound of breathing came from behind the old cloth,
one of the bodyguards immediately turned his gun toward the hanging cloth.
“Someone's behind there!”
Adrian's heart dropped.
And then.
“Don't shoot.”
He shouted reflexively, without even realizing it.
The old cloth swayed slowly, and a small figure emerged from behind it.
She was far thinner than she had been several days ago, but she was alive.
Lin Arclight was there.
For a moment, Adrian thought his breath had stopped.
“…Lin.”
At the sound of his hoarse voice, Lin's blue eyes trembled.
At first, she could not say anything.
Then she finally opened her mouth.
“Grandfather….”
At that moment, the mask fell from Adrian's face.
The CEO of Seraph Industries, head of the Arclight family, the man feared by countless people on the surface—
none of those names meant anything in that moment.
He was simply an old man who had nearly lost his granddaughter.
Adrian moved forward past the bodyguards.
Lin also took a cautious step, then ran toward Adrian.
“Grandfather!”
When Adrian took Lin into his arms, he felt her small body trembling.
His hands tightened without him realizing it.
To confirm, again and again, that his granddaughter was alive.
“It's all right.”
Adrian continued in a slightly trembling voice,
“It's all right now. I've come.”
Lin could not answer. She only clutched Adrian's coat tightly.
As though the breath she had been holding finally burst free, a sob escaped her.
“I was scared….”
At those words, the corners of Adrian's eyes hardened.
“Yes.”
He gently stroked Lin's hair.
“I'm sorry.”
Lin shook her head.
“No. I… I did it on my own….”
“No.”
Adrian spoke firmly.
“It wasn't your fault.”
He held Lin by the shoulders and checked her face.
To see whether she was injured or hurting anywhere.
“Pale.”
Lin's face stiffened.
From that reaction alone, Adrian could tell a great deal.
The girl bit her lip, then continued speaking as tears fell.
“He… tried to kill me.”
Adrian closed his eyes for a moment.
He had already suspected as much, but hearing it directly from his granddaughter left him feeling something beyond description.
“I understand. You have nothing to worry about now.”
Lin buried her face in Adrian's arms again.
Adrian held her without saying anything for a while,
and then.
A voice that was far too calm for the situation cut into the room.
“Sorry to interrupt this touching scene, but….”
Adrian's gaze slowly turned toward the owner of the voice.
The black-haired, black-eyed young man was still standing there with both hands raised.
He calmly asked, apparently not particularly concerned by the several gun barrels pointed at him,
“Is there no reward?”