Chapter One Hundred: Two Ways Out

"All right, since we've come this far, I'll add one more piece of information."

Yuxing raised a hand. When he saw everyone turn to look at him, he went on, "The red crystal you're talking about, the one that may be a core, could be something called a Demon Fragment. It's usually only this big."

He held his hands apart to show about twenty centimeters.

"The one on Starport Tower was much larger."

When Zero had surveyed Starport Tower, he had carefully recorded the crystal's dimensions: roughly one meter high, about thirty-five centimeters wide, irregular in shape, with fresh chisel marks from tools on its surface.

"That thing is a cell from some living organism. It still has a degree of activity. As far as current outside research has determined, its effect is this: it drives living beings into ferocity."

At that, Baleru began to write the information down. Combined with his earlier suspicion that monster weapons were being mass-produced, the clues now linked together.

He drew a heavy circle on the page, enclosing the three lines: Demon Fragment, ferocity, and the manufacture of monster weapons.

Yuxing continued, "And because the Demon Fragment is a living cell and still active, I suspect that under the right conditions it can proliferate in a way similar to cell division, just like a living creature. Otherwise, those people trying to use Demon Fragments to make monster weapons would just be living off their stock. How big can one fragment be? It couldn't last very long."

Then he summed up: "We already suspected that Arsenal was after conflict, chaos, and death—things that are useless for rule and run completely counter to it. So if they're the ones actually in control here, the only reason they'd do it is because they gain something greater from it. Maybe... it's the key to the Demon Fragment's proliferation. Perhaps it's the fear and unease of the city's residents, or the souls of the dead, or both."

In truth, Yuxing leaned more toward fear. In the Ultraman universe, fear really was a kind of energy. For example, in the universe where Ultraman Nexus was active, there existed creatures that fed on fear: Space Beasts. They even deliberately butchered their prey, not for amusement, but simply so they could eat more fear.

"Active... is it?"

Zero repeated the words under his breath. His Plan B was to destroy the core. If it truly was the key to suppressing energy, then destroying it might restore his original power.

In that case, they wouldn't need to seize the ship at all; Zero alone could destroy everything here, including the hundred little birds.

The ability to fly was meaningless in space.

But after Yuxing's explanation, he rejected that plan. If it was active and capable of multiplying, then unless he could vaporize it in one strike, all he would do was shatter it, turning one piece into countless fragments that could fall into some crack or corner...

That would be disastrous. Just thinking about it made his scalp tingle.

Yuxing was about to say something, but stopped himself.

He had suddenly thought of something: even if the Demon Fragment had the effect of suppressing energy, there had to be a range limit. If he took the Demon Fragment with him and teleported away, wouldn't that solve the problem? After that, Zero and the others could do as they pleased, and everything would be over.

But there was a problem: the only available destination right now was the home base of the interstellar black market, Earth.

The transmission route was the black market's exclusive light-screen network, so direct teleportation would work. Yuxing could even choose the back kitchen of the Black Star Cafe as the landing point.

But he did not voice that plan, because the Demon Fragment was too dangerous, and Earth's situation was too complicated. Especially in the Taiga world, where aliens were everywhere and monsters were as common as dogs, Earth was basically a field of walking powder kegs. Yuxing had no desire to bring that ticking bomb back to Earth.

There was another route, but Yuxing rejected it outright: the signal line built into the bracelet the captain had given him, which led to the Land of Light, the Land of Ultramen.

That world certainly had enough fighting power, but for Yuxing it was a dead end.

He could not remember the exact figures, but he vaguely recalled that the gravity on the Land of Light was several hundred times Earth's, and that the planet's surface was covered with high-energy Diefaleta rays, lethal to almost all living things.

If he had the Infiltration skill equipped, he should be able to ignore the radiation damage from the supergravity and the Diefaleta rays. But right now Yuxing had only one skill slot, so he had to choose between Gate and Infiltration.

If the environment on the Land of Light were not so harsh, perhaps it would still leave Yuxing a few seconds of opportunity, enough for him to switch to Infiltration. But with gravity hundreds of times Earth's and radiation intense enough to turn a person to ash in an instant, either one would kill him on the spot, leaving him not even a second.

Seen that way, Baleru and the others' plan to seize the ship, though crude, really was reliable.

After that, Baleru gave a rough explanation of their plan. Now that there were more people, some details would have to be adjusted.

"...We attack the armored vehicle returning from the secret factory to Starport Tower, get inside the tower, then use staff ID cards to break into the sixth floor and force our way to the top floor, and from there to the ship. There are mechanical structures and sliding rails hidden in the rock walls at the top of Starport Tower; the roof can be opened to both sides. If the dome opens, the outside should be the planet's surface. We've also found the control console, right here on the north side of the seventh floor."

Baleru circled a spot on the hand-drawn floor plan of the seventh level.

"They set our fifth battle for next Wednesday, but we're moving out tomorrow."

For all they knew, the production crew had scheduled the fifth battle for next Wednesday precisely to keep Baleru's group pinned here, so the hit squad would have an easier time making its move. Baleru decided to strike first and catch them off guard. The day after the fourth battle ended, they would slip away.

"So," said Baleru, naturally taking command of the room, "we only have today to recover. Rest well, all of you. There are seven of us now, so we need to adjust the plan."

"One person on watch for two and a half hours each. I'll start, and we'll go clockwise. Figure out your own time slots. Everyone not on watch should rest."

At his words, everyone began checking their assigned watch times and order. One full rotation of this planet took only sixteen hours, so seven people were enough to cover the watch for a whole day.

"Please wait. Sorry, but I still have one more thing."

Yuxing stopped the group just as it seemed about to disperse. He tapped a few times on the black market's light-screen, brought up the bounty notice on the auctioneer, then enlarged the man's headshot to fill the entire screen and showed it to everyone present.

Especially to the trio standing with Baleru.

"Have any of you seen this man before?"