The Lead Auctioneer stood on the stage, his mind entirely blank as he stared at Specimen Fourteen inside the pod.
He looked at the massive Apex Bio-Transfer Pod beside him, and then at the specimen inside, its body coursing with the Obsidian Neural Weave.
The hand gripping his gavel trembled uncontrollably.
God!
Stop asking him!
Could someone, anyone, please tell him what the hell A.W.S-14 was?!
...
Inside the main control room of Project Zero-Transit.
Dozens of monitors glowed simultaneously, broadcasting every angle of the auction hall in crystal-clear definition.
At the command console, Toby Adler and his team of technicians were already sweating bullets.
The frantic clatter of keyboards echoed like rapid gunfire across the room.
"No good, we still can't retake The Oracle-Alpha Auction Core."
"Manual override was rejected again!"
"Same here. Backup terminal connection failed. The primary auction sequence is running on autopilot, and I can't overwrite the current protocol!"
"The elevator shaft is locked down. Forced interruption failed."
The relentless stream of bad news made the atmosphere in the control room suffocatingly heavy.
Everyone was desperately trying to wrest back control.
But no matter how many commands they punched in, or how many backup ports they accessed...
The screens only spat back the same damning results.
[Access Denied.]
[Termination Failed.]
[Special Asset Showcase in Progress.]
They could only watch helplessly as that massive transfer pod ascended through The Logistics Artery and emerged onto the auction block.
They watched as the specimen inside—a creature they knew absolutely nothing about-was exposed to every elite buyer in the room.
Cold sweat rolled down Toby Adler's forehead.
He hit the enter key one more time.
The screen flashed that blinding red warning once again: [Override Rejected.]
Toby's hands froze over the keyboard.
His face drained of color. With stiff, robotic movements, he turned his head toward the deepest, darkest corner of the control room.
The shadows there were thick and impenetrable, barely outlining the silhouette of a figure seated in the pitch black.
The lighting was oppressively dim, obscuring the man's features and expression.
Yet, even sitting there in absolute
silence, the sheer invisible weight of
Presence made the rest of the room terrified to breathe too loudly.
"C-Commodore..."
Toby swallowed hard, his voice tight. "We've tried every possible override method in the book."
"As of right now... there's still no way to regain control of the main auction sequence."
Having delivered the news, he didn't dare look up.
The control room plunged into dead silence for two agonizing seconds before a synthesized, genderless voice broke the quiet. "Investigate. Find out exactly what Specimen Fourteen is, and find out who smuggled it aboard. I want its entire file."
FindNovel.net
The voice was flat, devoid of any emotional fluctuation.
But the moment The Commodore spoke, a cold chill soaked through the clothes of everyone present.
Trembling, Toby scrambled to pull up a verified cargo manifest, his voice strained. "Commodore, we already ran a check."
"Specimen Fourteen isn't listed anywhere in the registered inventory for this voyage."
"There is no standard entry log, no authorized consigner, and... not even a legitimate intake serial number."
Toby magnified the investigation files on the main screen. "So far, this is the only trace we've found."