Despite the Vanguard raid topside, the black market was still fully operational down below, rchants screaming prices over the noise of grinding machinery.
Zen walked directly to a high-end tech scavenger stall.
"I need a GE-700 burner drone," Zen told the rchant, leaning over the glass counter. "Military-grade encryption, completely scrubbed serial numbers, and a localized signal cloaker."
The rchant raised a scarred eyebrow. "That’s heavy Vanguard hardware, kid. That will run you fifty thousand credits. Upfront."
Zen didn’t flinch. He tapped his public terminal against the paynt scanner. Thanks to Nyx’s massive, unsolicited donation to his Ghost Scrapper account yesterday, the credits cleared instantly with a cheerful chi.
The rchant’s eyes widened, but he silently handed over a small, sleek silver box.
"Now the weapon," Valeria said, pulling him by the jacket toward a weapons dealer in the back corner of the market.
Zen scanned the racks of glowing, enchanted swords. Most of them were flashy garbage ant to impress novice adventurers.
"Show the unrefined tals," Zen ordered the dealer. "No enchantnts. No modern mana-conductors. I need pure density."
The dealer grunted, reaching under the table and pulling out a heavy, dull-grey straight-sword.
He slamd it onto the counter. "Solid tungsten-alloy. Weighs eighty pounds. Nobody buys it because it’s too heavy, and you can’t weave modern magic through it without busting a blood vessel in your arm."
"I’ll take it," Zen said, grabbing the hilt.
"Are you sure?" Valeria asked, eyeing the plain blade. "It’s ugly."
"My last cheap E-Rank blade shattered under my output during the Midterm," Zen explained, testing the weight. "Tungsten is dense enough to hold the raw pressure of my Imperial resonance without snapping in half."
Thirty minutes later, they were standing miles outside the city limits, the smog of District 7 fading behind them.
The unmapped zone was located at the base of a jagged, desolate mountain range.
There were no Vanguard warning signs. There were no teleportation extraction beacons. It was just a massive, ancient crack in the side of the mountain, leading down to a set of towering stone doors covered in faded, dead runes.
"This is it," Valeria said, pointing at the massive doors. "My private stress-testing zone."
"Good," Zen said. He opened his bag and tossed her a dark bundle of fabric. "Change."
Valeria caught it, unfurling the clothes. It was the dark tactical scavenger gear she had worn during their very first encounter in the dungeon weeks ago.
"You want to wear this?" Valeria asked, tilting her head.
"Take off the academy uniform," Zen instructed, pulling out a plain black cloth mask. "And put this on."
"Why do I have to wear a mask?" Valeria complained, glaring at the cloth. "We are in the middle of nowhere."
"Because I am streaming this," Zen reminded her, booting up the new GE drone. "The public watches Ghost Scrapper. The Vanguard watches Ghost Scrapper. If they see the Goddess of War casually fighting alongside an anonymous strear, it will cause... I don’t know. Just put the mask on."
"I hate hiding," Valeria muttered. "Turn around."
"I’ve seen you unclothed before," Zen said dryly.
"Turn around anyway, Emperor," she demanded, her cheeks flushing slightly.
Zen rolled his eyes and turned his back. He tapped the side of his terminal, linking it to his new drone.
"System," Zen commanded. "Interface with the drone. Mask my IP, scramble the local Vanguard satellites overhead, and initiate the Ghost Scrapper broadcast."
[SYSTEM PROTOCOL INITIATED.]
[SIGNAL ENCRYPTED. IP SCRAMBLED.]
[BROADCAST LIVE.]
The small silver drone floated into the air, its cara lens glowing with a faint, steady blue light.
Zen didn’t even have to wait a full minute. The mont the notification hit the global network that Ghost Scrapper was online, his viewer count violently skyrocketed.
1,000 viewers.
3,456 viewers.
16,980 viewers.
The chat feed on his terminal blurred into a waterfall of frantic text.
ScrapRat: YOOO THE GHOST IS LIVE! HE LIVES!
talHead: Wait, look at the background. Where is he? That doesn’t look like a registered Vanguard zone.
User_992: Are those Imperial ruins?! Bro is diving an unmapped fracture zone!
Zen watched the numbers climb, his eyes scanning the data logs. He was looking for one specific footprint.
[SYSTEM ALERT: ANOMALOUS PING DETECTED IN VIEWER POOL.]
[THE OMNI DOMAIN ALGORITHM IS ACTIVE. THE SPYMASTER IS WATCHING.]
There it was. Nyx was here.
Zen looked directly into the drone’s cara. He pulled his own Ghost Scrapper half-mask up over his face, letting the voice modulator activate.
"Welco back," Zen said, his voice dropping into a heavy, tallic distortion. "I had a busy week. We are diving an unmapped Imperial vault today."
The chat lost its collective mind.
VanguardFan1: UNMAPPED? Are you insane?! You can’t call for a dical extraction if you die in there!
"I won’t be dying today," Zen announced casually. He reached over his shoulder and gripped the hilt of his heavy tungsten straight-sword. The tal scraped nacingly against the scabbard as he drew it. "And I won’t be diving alone."
Zen gestured to the side.
Valeria stepped into the cara’s fra. She was dressed in her dark, form-fitting tactical gear, her face obscured from the nose down by the black mask.
She held her massive, blood-red broadsword resting casually on her shoulder. Even through a digital screen, the suppressive, murderous aura rolling off her body was palpable.
The chat froze for a split second before exploding.
User_992: WAIT A MINUTE. I recognize that gear! Is that the psycho girl from his debut stream?!
ScrapRat: Holy shit, it is! The one who basically soloed the boss!
talHead: Look at the size of that sword. I can feel the killing intent through my monitor.
Zen ignored the scrolling text. He turned away from the drone and faced the towering stone doors.
"Let’s get to work," Zen said.
He placed both hands on the heavy stone and pushed. The ancient hinges groaned violently in protest before giving way. The doors swung inward, revealing a pitch-black, cavernous chamber.
Suddenly, hundreds of glowing, violent yellow eyes snapped open in the darkness, followed by screeches that shook the ground beneath their feet
The air suddenly turned freezing cold as the scent of ancient, rotting mana flooded out of the doorway.
[SYSTEM ALERT: HOSTILE ENTITIES DETECTED.]
[THREAT LEVEL: HIGH E-RANK TO LOW D-RANK.]
[PROBABILITY OF E-RANK BREAKTHROUGH UPON CLEARING CHAMBER: 99.9%.]
Zen didn’t step back. He lowered his stance, his newly stabilized High F-Rank core flaring to life, pushing his heavy Imperial mana directly into the tungsten blade.
He glanced sideways at Valeria.
"Don’t kill them too fast," Zen ordered quietly, a dark smirk hiding beneath his mask. "I need the Heart-Stones intact... and we have a very important guest watching. Let’s put on a show."
Valeria let out a low, psychotic laugh, her own aura erupting into a violent golden blaze that illuminated the entire mountain side.
"I will leave you the scraps, Emperor."
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