Wace didn''t even have a chance to enjoy Miya''s song as he was bombarded by Avalon''s notifications.


    ''Who would dare?'' Wace was truly caught by surprise with this sudden attack on his property.


    ''Who did I offend now?'' He quickly tried to think of anyone he had offended during the past months and only thought of few. That would be Chalice, from the Z-Company, but he should have perfectly removed the traces of his trip. He used his trustworthy Void Phase after all. Did they somehow connect it with my few days of disappearance in Bluefields City? That actually made some sense. Are they trying to continue their failed assault within the hotel? But why would they attack now that I''m not present in the house?


    ''Sigh, it probably means I''m not their target, maybe a warning, or they might even be trying to unveil something within my workshop.''


    Wace shook his head and thought of other possibilities.


    ''Is it perhaps somepany where I declined selling my Float Drive System. Err... That''s quite offending since I sold them to other trustworthypanies'' Thinking up to this point, there are probably severalpanies who was denied in his sales.


    He had to make sure that the same issue where it was sold to the wrong hands must not be repeated.


    But he still felt that it''s not enough to harbor some intention to directly intrude his property. They even destroyed the 1st Emergency Defense System quite easily.


    It only managed tost for half a minute before it was destroyed. That was surely impressive.


    ''Anyway, the first defense system was those provided by Golden Trident Group. They should be rmed by now.''


    He was referring to the Level B3 package that they provided him. It was supposed to be a package the was capable of protecting a medium-sizedpany. And that was at least 10x of his property.


    It was quite embarrassing that it didn''t even manage to hold for a minute.


    The package contains 5bat automatons, 8 customized mini defense turrets, 3 Mana pulse barrier, and some other assistive tools to repel and monitor the enemies.


    Luckily, he wasn''tcent in terms of his security so he was sure that even if his 2nd Defense System waspromised again. His 3rd one would surely end everything.


    Wace was tempted to watch the surveince of his property so he found an excuse to visit thefort room.


    He asked one of the staff for assistance and was brought inside to the hallway.


    "Walk straight from here and turn left. You''ll see a sign so you won''t get lost."


    "Thank you."


    "Alright, make sure to quicklye back and don''t loiter around. Don''t enter other rooms."


    "I understand. Don''t worry." Wace answered as he followed the given directions. He didn''t dare to enter other rooms as he was also well aware of the surveince that the Veritas Group ced within the airship.


    As Wace found a safe ce and made sure that no one was monitoring him, he opened his mobile device and quickly operated it to show the current situation of his house.


    ***


    It has been a peaceful day within Tanza City for the past few months.


    The Golden Trident Group, one of the local powers in this prospering city, has enjoyed dominance within their trade. Theirbat automatons were highly acimed and manypanies tried to make contracts with them even with their a bit expensive fees.


    Their reasoning was simple, cheaper fee means lesser and weaker security. They imed that their expensive fees were fitting to the absolute security they could offer.


    And because there were several high-profile criminals recently that were easily arrested by the automatons they rented, it added to their prestige making the prices of their automatons even more expensive.


    Yes, even with criminals that sometimes pop out within the city, they can still call it a peaceful time as they don''t have a powerfulpetition within their trade.


    Unfortunately, it seems that these peaceful times were about to end. Rumors about a nearing full assault that wasing to their city were going around.


    It is not baseless rumors as the main source was the rumored Sealed Artifact, Hallowed Eye.


    "What was thetest news?" President Eun asked one of the board of directors. Currently, an urgent meeting with high-ranking officers of the Golden Trident Group was being held.


    "We still couldn''t get concrete information."


    "What do you mean?"


    "Several sources mentioned that Hallowed Eye was still being kept by the military and the criminal org wouldunch a full assault to rob it. But recently, some sources say that it was already within the hands of a criminal organization and they nned to activate the Hallowed Eye within this city."*


    "What? Don''t we have trusted sources within the military? Can''t you make them talk? Are they asking for some---"


    "No, president. It''s not that they don''t want to give us the intel. It seems that the handling of that Sealed Artifact was handed over to a special task force. It happened three months ago."


    "Special task force?"


    "That''s right. Even our friend, Sir Marvin, could no longer give us urate intel. He was transferred to a different region."


    "Sigh... In any case, it doesn''t change the fact that we have to strengthen our forces. Especially if some of our contracted clients were affected by this uing storm."


    "I suggest that we ept the offer of cooperation with the local government units and prepare for the worst." Hanzo, of the board of directors, said.


    "That''s right. Even though this will highly affect our current ie, we will ensure the safety of our clients."


    "I agree on this, it will cost a lot more to us if ever our automatons had to be repaired due to this."


    Some of the directors stated their agreement with Hanzo''s statement. They were all fully aware that even though their automatons were capable products, it wasn''t up to the point that could defeat organized criminals with fully armed heavy armaments. They wanted their automatons that were rented by severalpanies, families, or organizations within the city to not be involved with these criminals.


    "It seems that you guys are really being cautious about this, huh." President Eun said smilingly after she heard their suggestions.


    "O-of course. We heard that it''s no longer the Z-Company that was having eyes on it. We have to think for the sake of the wholepany. We can''t afford several repairs for our automatons. It''s would be fine for the barriers and defense turrets but the core of our automatons was something we couldn''t take risk of losing." One of the directors exined. Their automatons weren''t simple at all. He then further exined so the other members of the board realized the seriousness of this case.


    "Everyone knows that the core material that we possess for a single automaton was so expensive that it could easily be sold for 15-20 million credit. I even heard that it was purchased for 30 million in a ck market in Virgan."


    "Thirty million? So our Solidified---"


    "Hanzo, We agreed not to mention its name." President Eun reprimanded one of the directors as he was about to name the material.


    "I''m sorry. I was just caught in surprise. Anyway, we have to make sure that no automatons will be damaged and any of them that activated their defense must be quickly informed to us to ensure their safety within the city."


    Yes, their automaton''s core material was so expensive. The B3 package that Wace had purchased for 40 million credit includes 5 of these automatons and other Mana Artifacts, but why would it be so expensive?


    It was simple, aside from it being an extremely rare material that they couldn''t even maximize its usage, it was a material that could no longer be reproduced.


    Yes, their technology couldn''t find a way to pull out even a quarter of the material''s full potential. So although these core materials can probably be used to operate battleships, it was only being used for boats.


    It took them 5 whole years before they found a way to somehow use the material for automation. It can still be used but it was being wasted due to their limited abilities. They also couldn''t put a high price due to various reasons. So they had to always monitor them and make sure that their automatons were always kept safe and weren''t in very dangerous situations.


    This is also the main reason that their contract includes the prohibition of studying their automatons. Anyway, they don''t want to sell these limited resources and they don''t want to let these items just gather some dust. It''s still better to earn some profits even with some risk.


    Wace had also respected this prohibition but his Divine Sense still had to make sure that there''s no hidden danger within the automaton. So he had studied this humanoid artifact for a while already and found this core material. But he only thought of this as something as quite interesting. After he confirmed that these don''t spy automatons, he no longer bothered with it.


    "So as I was saying----" Eun stopped after noticing that one of her officers outside was trying to do an emergency call. She had to stop everything and answered the call without hesitation.


    "President, I''m sorry to interrupt your meeting."


    "Get to the point."


    "The life signal of the five automatons that were stationed within the property of Traceless Hands had disappeared."


    "Did he break the contract?!"


    "No Ma''am. An attack from an unknown group of individuals had infiltrated the ce. Oh, wait… Eh?"


    "What happened? Have you sent people for reinforcement?! Also, make sure that the police were informed."


    "Uhmm... Actually, it seems that those intruders were neutralized... already."