Chapter 5
“It wasn’t completely impossible.”
Kael’s eyes narrowed.
“You just told me to wake up from my dream.”
“It’s not a dream. It’s a nightmare.”
Harun took a small metal bottle from inside his clothes and drank.
The heavy smell of alcohol began to waft up.
“It’s impossible to go up to the upper levels, but I sometimes go near the ground level.”
“How?”
“Waste backflow.”
Kael quietly repeated the words.
“Waste backflow….”
“Waste from the upper levels doesn’t only come down to the underground. Sometimes, things sorted underground go back up. When they have recycling value, contain parts a corporation needs to recover, or are equipment that was discarded by mistake.”
“A recovered-goods transport route?”
“That’s right.”
Harun pointed at the underground ceiling.
“Underground Level 15, Waste Magitech Device Processing Plant No. 17. There’s a recovered-goods liftway leading upward there. Of course, people can’t ride it. It’s exclusively for recovered goods.”
“What about inspections?”
“Naturally, there are a damn lot of them.”
“Then how can we get through?”
“Wouldn’t we just need to register as official recovered goods?”
When Kael looked at Harun, he merely shrugged.
“Funny, right? People can’t go up, but scrap metal can. In this city, expensive parts have a higher status than humans.”
“That’s Magitera for you.”
“You’re practically a local now.”
Harun lowered his voice further.
“There are people with recovered-goods registration rights. Processing-plant supervisors, corporate subcontractor managers, and recovery brokers. Some of them will tweak the scrap lists a little if the price is right.”
“You’re not suggesting I register as recovered goods, are you?”
“I didn’t realize you could say something that stupid. It wouldn’t take long to catch someone disguising a person as a box.”
Harun pointed at Kael.
“You’re not going up. We’re sending up the things you repair.”
Kael fell silent, lost in thought.
It didn’t take him long to grasp what that meant.
“You want us to repair something connected to the upper levels?”
“That’s right.”
Harun grinned.
“Something the people upstairs would want to recover. Something expensive, rare, dangerous, and costly to lose.”
“Bait.”
“We understand each other, as expected.”
Harun rummaged through his pocket again and pulled out an old piece of metal.
It looked like an ordinary scrap of metal, but a faint inscription was engraved on its surface.
[Seraph Industries]
It was a corporate logo.
“This came in a few days ago. A high-grade medical circuit component. It shouldn’t have ended up all the way underground.”
“Was it discarded by mistake?”
“Or someone threw it away on purpose.”
Harun tossed it to Kael.
Kael caught it and examined its surface, revealing traces of circuitry.
“….”
It was unlike anything Harun had thrown him so far.
“Why are you only showing me this now?”
“There was no reason to show it to you before you brought up the ground level.”
The corner of Harun’s mouth twisted.
“And honestly, I didn’t want to show it to you. This smells less like money and more like… blood.”
Kael didn’t take his eyes off the piece of metal.
Most of the circuits had been severed, but they weren’t completely dead.
And within them, there was a gap that seemed strangely familiar.
Kael’s fingertips stopped.
“This isn’t an ordinary medical device.”
Harun’s expression hardened.
“What?”
Kael turned the piece over and showed him part of the engraved circuitry.
The lines were so tiny they were nearly invisible without a magnifying lens, but Kael could see them.
“The exterior looks like a recovery-type circuit, but the internal structure is different. It’s closer to a container that preserved something than one used for healing.”
“Preserved?”
“You said they sell things like organs here.”
Seeing the color drain from Harun’s face, Kael spoke quietly.
“This is just my guess, but… it seems to have been a container for preserving an organ—specifically, a brain.”
Harun closed his mouth as if he understood, then muttered a curse.
“The brain?”
“That’s right.”
Seraph Industries. A high-grade medical circuit. And a component that shouldn’t have made its way underground.
This might be the first piece of the path upward that Kael had been searching for.
Harun glanced around before speaking quietly.
“Can you bring it back?”
Kael didn’t answer for some time, tracing the faint mana residue with his fingertips.
The damage was severe, but it looked repairable.
Kael raised the corner of his mouth slightly.
“I can bring it back, but—”
Harun’s eyes lit up at his words.
“But?”
“Simply repairing it won’t be enough.”
“What are you talking about now?”
“If we only repair it, they’ll just recover it. And we’ll get nothing.”
Kael looked down at the piece of metal.
“If we’re going to use it as bait, we need to attach a fishing line, too.”
Harun stared blankly for a moment, then slowly began to laugh.
At first, it was low.
Then it grew louder and louder.
“Ha.”
He laughed, baring his teeth.
“You’re a real lunatic.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“It is a compliment.”
Harun leaned forward.
“What are you going to attach?”
Kael tapped his fingertip against the piece of metal.
“A tracking formula.”
Harun’s laughter stopped.
“You’re going to embed a tracking formula in recovered goods?”
“Yeah. More precisely, a recording-type formula that will let us read its route the moment it’s recovered.”
“What if we’re found out?”
“You’re asking me that?”
“….”
“But if we succeed.”
Kael raised his head.
“We’ll gain the first path leading to the upper levels.”
Harun said nothing, then finally spoke.
“We’ll need materials.”
“Good crystal powder. Fine silver wire. Insulating fluid. And a stable mana source.”
“Expensive.”
“That’s fairly cheap for a staircase to heaven, isn’t it?”
Harun clicked his tongue.
“That sounds like you’re telling me to pay for it.”
“Correct.”
“What about the profit split?”
“This isn’t profit this time.”
Kael continued evenly.
“Information.”
Harun stared at Kael, then sighed.
“Fine. I’ll get the materials.”
“By when?”
“Three days.”
“One day.”
“You get them.”
“Two days.”
“…I really don’t like you.”
“When did you ever say you did?”
Harun ground his teeth, then nodded.
“Two days. But if you fail, I’m deducting it from your share.”
“And if I succeed?”
“We’ll get our hands on an upper-level recovery route.”
“Anything else?”
“What else do you want?”
Kael thought for a moment, then continued.
“Everything you know about Seraph Industries.”
Harun’s expression twisted.
“Don’t mention that name carelessly anywhere.”
“That’s why I need to know more.”
“The moment you start digging into something… No, even before that, they eliminate anyone they view as a potential threat. That’s how megacorps operate.”
“I’ve hidden long enough.”
“Ha. It’s only been a year, you know?”
Harun spoke firmly.
“I don’t know what you’re hiding, but anyone who stands out on the underground levels doesn’t live long. The corporate bastards from the upper levels are even faster than that. They track their prey more relentlessly.”
When no answer came, Harun clicked his tongue and continued.
“Seraph Industries is a megacorp that controls medicine, healing, and biological circuits. Basically, they handle hospitals, restorative drugs, artificial organs, and circuit stabilizers.”
“What’s the bad news?”
“Unauthorized biological experiments. Organ trafficking. Abductions of people compatible with circuits.”
Harun continued glancing around as he spoke.
“They’re just rumors. Officially, there’s nothing. As always.”
Kael looked at the piece of metal again.
“Hmm.”
If research into mana circuits, or biological circuits resembling them, was being conducted somewhere in this city.
The answer would be above, not underground.
“All right.”
Kael tucked the piece into his clothes.
“Let’s call it a day.”
“Already?”
Harun furrowed his brow.
“Are you going to pay me overtime?”
“You’re probably the only person on the underground levels who says things like that.”
“That’s why I’ve survived this long.”
“You certainly have a silver tongue.”
Harun clicked his tongue but didn’t try to hold him back.
Kael raised a hand briefly and left the stall.
***
Ruuuumble.
The sound of iron, glass, and waste flowing together had become a familiar noise.
Kael started walking toward his residence on Underground Level 20.
That was when it happened.
Grrrrrroooan.
When a tremendous roar erupted overhead, Kael reflexively looked up.
A transport pipe was opening.
The people nearby scattered, cursing, and Kael took a step back as well.
It was the sound of waste falling from the upper levels. Then, with another roar, the waste poured down.
Kael watched the scene impassively.
It was no different from any ordinary day, but he caught sight of a small shadow amid it.
‘Is that a child’s corpse?’
But even as it fell, it was struggling to keep its body balanced.
Kael’s eyes narrowed.
His body moved before his judgment. Kael kicked off the ground. He couldn’t use mana, but—
Kael’s body had been honed by rolling across battlefields and facing the Demon King’s army countless times.
Kael leaped into the falling waste.
A metal fragment grazed his shoulder. Pain flared, but he didn’t stop. The small mass was falling quickly.
The distance closed.
One step.
Two steps.
Kael threw himself forward and reached out at the last moment, but—
His fingertips brushed a damp scrap of cloth.
They slipped.
He gritted his teeth and stretched his arm farther.
‘Got it!’
Kael pulled the small body into his arms and twisted, but a steel box fell behind him and smashed into the floor.
Bang!
Fragments flew.
Kael let the impact flow through his knees and landed.
“Hoo….”
He looked down at what was in his arms.
A small body. Probably a child. But it was impossible to tell its exact age, sex, or facial features. It was covered in filth, making it impossible to see not only its appearance but…
Because the stench was so severe.
Every foul odor had melded together and stabbed at his nose.
Kael frowned.
“….”
It was alive. Faintly, but it was definitely breathing.
Kael looked at the child for a moment, then carefully set it down on the floor.
It was better not to get involved any further.
This was the underground levels.
A mysterious child who had fallen from above. Thinking about the problems that would logically follow made his head ache.
Kael already had more than enough problems.
His mana circuits that refused to recover, and the path leading to the upper levels.
He was currently in a state where even looking after his own body was difficult.
That alone was enough. In any case, hadn’t he prevented the child from being smashed into pulp on the floor? That was how Kael judged it.
He rose when he felt the gazes around him.
In the meantime, someone was already checking whether the child had anything on them.
Kael saw those gazes, but turned away.
If he got involved any further, it would never end. Living that way, he would accomplish nothing.
Kael took a step.
But.
Tug.
His clothes were pulled.
The child was holding onto his hem with its head bowed.