The Gate Monitoring Centre for Area 5’s northern and western sectors occupied the fourteenth floor of a building that had no signage on the exterior and a very small elevator that required a ring scan to operate.
The room itself was long and low-ceilinged, curved slightly at the far end to accommodate the main display wall — a semicircle of overlapping screens showing live feeds from the northern district’s gate sensor network, the atmospheric mana density readouts rendered in real-ti as color gradients that shifted from cool blue at baseline to amber at elevated and red at critical.
There were one hundred fourteen cara feeds. Sixty atmospheric monitors. Three dedicated lines to the Ergency Dispatch Units stationed at intervals across the district.
This place was divided into four workstations, out of which, two were occupied on night shift.
Len was at the left one.
His night shift started at 9:30 PM, which ant it was currently 9:52 PM, and the previous twenty-two minutes had been, by any objective asure, the least eventful twenty-two minutes of his day so far.
He had his communicator under the desk.
The screen showed a conversation that had been going for most of the day, intermixed with several photos that he had been looking at with a private smile for the better part of an hour.
He smiled at the communicator screen.
His girlfriend had sent a sleeping emoji at 8:40 PM.
He sent back a yawning face.
’shouldn’t you be working?’
I am working... Smug Emoji
But, you’re on your phone
Its only surveillance
She sent a laughing emoji and then went quiet, which probably ant she had actually gone to sleep, which was deeply unfair given that she was responsible for his current state.
He put the communicator face-down on the desk and stretched both arms above his head. The chair was good — the monitoring center had invested in the right chairs, he had to give them that, but good chairs couldn’t fully compensate for the fact that he had not slept in approximately twenty-one hours and was now expected to watch several cara feeds.
The northern district was quiet.
He yawned, eyes watering slightly at the edges. He pressed the back of his hand against his mouth and blinked until the watering stopped.
He thought about coffee, when suddenly the main display went red and the alarms started.
Len’s communicator hit the floor as he startled out of his mind.
ARIA, the AI system announced from the ceiling speakers.
"Anomalous gate formation detected. Northern sector. Primary formation point: Grid 8. Atmospheric disturbance radius: Grid 7 to Grid 6. Formation type: unregistered. Formation ti: 21:51:43. Current gate status: active and stable. Mana density at epicenter: 847 particles. Recomnd imdiate Ergency Dispatch notification."
Len looked at the epicenter readout with gritted teeth.
847 particles.
The baseline for the area around grid 8 was 291, normally at least.
He pulled up the cara feed for the Grid 8 comrcial delivery route and found the gate, visible in the feed as a vertical tear in the night air between two buildings, its edges doing the characteristic slow inward curl, the area around it lit faintly by its own mana output against the dark of the decommissioned district.
ARIA had already reached for the Ergency Dispatch line and Captain Rol picked up after two rings.
He was a large man whose voice on a comm line arrived ahead of him the way. "Yes, Captain Rol here."
"Its a gate report sir." Len stated.
"Give the details."
Len had his eyes on the display as he talked, reading from the ARIA output. "There was an unregistered gate formation in Grid 8 just now. The formation type is unspecified. Atmospheric disturbance radius covers Grids 6 through 8 and the epicenter mana density currently is 847 and stable."
A pause. The sound of sothing in the background on Rol’s end that could generously be described as a drink being set down.
"Send the technical team, I am on my way." Rol cut the call and stood up.
"Co on boys, we have an ergency." He announced and took one last sip from his bottle.
"But I am a girl, captain." One of her squad mbers comnted and all seven mbers laughed.
Rol too laughed and all of them sat in the two cars specified for their squad. They reached the gate in thirteen minutes. Thankfully there was no resident for so distance here, so there were no chance of imdiate casualties.
Furthermore, when they reached there. They didn’t see a single beast out there.
Rol let out a sigh of relief and stood against the car, two of his squad mbers ca out and stood besides him.
"There are no beasts captain." One of them said in a relieved tone.
"Yeah." Rol agreed. "This is either a Loop Gate or a Dungeon Gate. I hope its a Loop one."
The technical team arrived soon after.
There were four vans of them. The lead was a woman, wearing a long white coat over what appeared to be ordinary clothes, purple hair pulled back in a bun and she looked at Rol from under her spectacles.
"Are you drunk, captain Rol?" She asked, pushing the spectacles up her nose.
She had a portable analysis unit in one hand — a flat device about the size of a case, which unfolded when she set it on the road into a tripod-mounted sensor array that she began calibrating before she had fully straightened from placing it.
Rol stood up and walked up to her.
"Dr. Senne." He put his hands in his pockets. "I am not drunk at all, more importantly. What are we looking at?"
"Give a mont, mister clearly not drunk."
Rol laughed and stepped back, ordering his squad to be ready.
The analysis unit ran its first cycle. The screen at the unit’s base populated with data, that provided the rough details about the gate without needing to step inside.
Senne looked at the data and then called Rol.
"Its a Dungeon gate," she said.
"Ah, Those are a pain in the ass, you know." Rol complained with a wince.
"It has a Three-Star rating." She pushed her spectacles up. "Interior formation is complete." She turned to the gate and looked at it for a mont. "The Dungeon master is a D-Rank most likely, but there are chances of it being a C-Rank as well."
"C-Rank Dungeon Master," Rol repeated in amazent.
A C-Rank Calamity beast was no longer a beast, but categorized as a lesser Calamity Lords. If the worst case was really going to happen than his squad was not appropriate for it.
He was a B-Rank warrior with a four star talent. A prodigy, they called him, he for sure could fight the beast one on one, but it would be a close call.
"We can’t wait any longer, I will go in with my squad." He didn’t like the idea but they could not wait too much. The gate must be cleared within 24 hours.
Senne’s second team mber turned from the unit.
She was younger than Senne by at least a decade, and pretty active for soone who worked with the technical team.
"Dr. Senne," she said.
"What is it?"
"The second test results just ca in." She looked at the unit. Then at Senne. Then, briefly, at Rol. "It’s a Spot Dungeon."
Rol straightened, he had been a reasonably relaxed captain for eleven years and in his entire career he had only seen one spot Dungeon. And it was not a pretty experience.
"How many spots?" he asked, seriously.
"Five total." The junior tech looked back at the screen and was quite for a second. "But..."
Both Senne and Rol turned to her with narrowed eyes and she flinched under their gaze.
"Two of them are already occupied."
"What?!" Rol slamd his hand on the car, making a bump. "What the fuck you an two are already occupied? How can that be? No one ca here."
The junior tech looked down and was silent.
"Fuck Sideways." Rol grunted. "Hues and Shigo, co on. You both are going in with ."
"Wait..." Dr. Senne tried to stop Rol. "Have you gone mad? Its dangerous."
"Thanks for your work woman." He said smiling at her. "But, I don’t take orders from you..."
Rol and his two squad mbers stepped into the gate and were swallowed by it. As soon as they disappeared... the gate suddenly lost its movent and beca still like a painting.
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