The moment Michael walked into the luxurious lobby of the ArtTech conference building, thin streams of blue and green lights emerged from the marble floor and entwined themselves intricately around Michael's feet like a beautifully woven footwear, and the rays keep on extending and curving around Michael's legs and then up onto his torso. Michael knew that this was just a combination of biometric sensor and photon coordinators, but it still resembled magic to him. Real, fantastical, beautiful magic.

After Michael and the rest of the team walked to the end of the lobby, the streams of luminescence had already covered them fully. After a few seconds, a crevice appeared in the middle of the walls, and the gap is getting wider and wider. Michael took a closer look and saw that it was in fact the walls moving apart from each other, revealing a small room behind. The built-in mechanism of this whole procedure flowed so smoothly that it put Michael in awe.

To even further shock Michael, a gentle female voice sounded from the walls around him. "Level one security check complete."

Michael's heart accelerated for a few seconds then slowed down. On one hand, he held even more admiration towards the artistic taste of ArtTech and its architecture, but on the other hand, Michael was a bit terrified by how the beauty of the lobby distracted him from the consciousness on the security check. Not only was he unaware that these ornate glows of lights were in fact photon security scanners, but he had also completely forgotten about the presence of the security check. He cursed under his breath. He knew that one of his greatest flaws was that he could get misdirected by one thing and completely forget about his surroundings — just like how he walked into the abandoned and unlocked building a few weeks ago when it was so obvious that it was the government's trap.

Michael found some comfort after he glanced around. Everybody except for Jay seemed to also be shocked by this security check procedure. Michael's eyes met Alexandra's for a second, and a gaze of understanding and reassurance flowed between them. Nicholas' face was stoical, but Michael could see that he swallowed uneasily.

"Guys, act as if you belong here," Jay reminded them gently.

"Trying," Michael and Alexandra muttered simultaneously.

"Good thing that the government's weapons are good enough to hide from the AI security check," said Jay.

As soon as he said that, the walls closed again. The small room that they were standing in began to move. Michael could feel that the room itself was lifted upwards and sideways. It was an elevator.

The same voice came from within the walls again. It began with a welcome message and then talked about ArtTech. Then it said, "Level two east sector reached. Please proceed to level two security check."

The walls opened, and they walked out. A line of security barricade laid out about a hundred meters in front. There seemed to be a sharp divide among the people, people dressed in expensive suits and dresses and people wearing cheap shirts. Most of the people with cheap clothing also wore a blue armband with a white pen and white hammer forming a cross. That white cross was the symbol of all left-wing unionists, showing the unity between white-collar office workers and blue-collar factory workers, both of whom are the biggest victims of the unemployment and replacement caused by the AI revolution.

Just as Michael's team was walking towards the security, there was a sudden commotion. A security officer pointed at the unionist's watch and shouted something. Then four men dressed in dark suits immediately surrounded that unionist. Before they could enclose around the unionist, however, the unionist unstrapped the watch and spun it in midair. The steel watch straps bound to each other as a blade sprang from the side of the watch face. It was a very cheap version of a collapsable knife.

The unionist pushed the security guard away from him and ran towards Michael's direction. Michael's team and the other people immediately scattered to the sides to avoid colliding head-on with the knife. The four men in dark suits took out their bracelets and tapped something. Then the floor in front of the unionist raised up violently. Standing ten meters away, Michael could feel the force shaking him a bit off his balance. As for the unionist, he was completely thrown off his feet. That was... That was brilliant engineering! That was mystical sorcery! Michael could no longer differentiate between these two.

Seeing that the threat was neutralized, the security guard went back to check through this queue. Meanwhile, the four suited men walked over to the unionist. One of them simply raised his hand, and the knife escaped from the unionist's grip and landed safely in the suited man's palm. If it wasn't for the oriental electromagnetic embedded beneath the man's bracelet, Michael would have seen that move as telekinesis.

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The unionist was forcibly lift up by two men despite his screaming and pleading. They escorted him to the elevator, and as soon as the walls closed, the unionist's voice was completely cut off. The gathered crowd soon dispersed back to their security queues, though every single person had a pretty clear idea on the fate of the unionist.

"Shit." That was all that Michael could say.

The whole team looked at Jay. Their eyes already communicated what they wanted to say. They knew that the same fate would befall them if the government weapons were unsheathed in security check.

"Trust me. Act alongside my part," Jay said a few seconds before they reached the barricade.

Jay took a quick look at his bracelet before hurrying towards the barricade officer along with the team. His feet knocked the floor impatiently as he handed his blazer and belt to the security guard. Michael and the others did the same. 

The security guards used a scanner and went through every inch of the blazer detailedly. After the incident with the unionist, they were spending an unusual amount of time to check through every piece of attire.

"How much time have we got till the conference starts?" Jay turned and asked Michael. A faint tone of annoyance was beneath the words. Without bothering to turn his face, Jay's eyes looked towards the security guards for half a second before turning his gaze back to Michael.

"About three minutes."

Jay exhaled with a growing impatience as the security guards were now requesting all of them to take of their shoes. Having sensed Jay's irritation, the guards were speaking in an extra polite voice. They all understood that jobs were pretty scarce these days, and judging by Jay's attire, they could see that Jay had to be a wealthy person of the middle-high class, or worse, an individual with personal ties to the board of ArtTech. The people following Jay also looked extremely rich and powerful. One simple misdemeanor from the guard could result in an instant unemployment.

The guards proceeded to check Michael's blazer. No! Michael shouted inside his head. The disguised cuff-link was standing out prominently on the cuffs of the left sleeve. Shit. The guards were fumbling down the right sleeve already, and they were casting this suspicious look at the left sleeve. No, the plan would be blown. Michael's hands tightened tensely, and sweat was breaking out from his forehead. Fortunately for him, the guards were only paying attention to the clothing and to Jay.

Seeing that Michael's cover was in danger, Jay strode through the biometric scanner, and the scanner alarm began beeping. Michael's heart missed a beat. That couldn't be. Jay wasn't carrying any weapons. The weapons were disguised in his own cuff-link and Alexandra's hairpin. What problem could there be?

"I'm sorry sir, security protocols." The head security guard mumbled apologetically and looked down.

"Could you please hurry up? Earlier we stood in queue for ten minutes and it didn't move forward an inch!" Jay was referring to the incident with the unionist, which jammed the entire queue.

Alexandra was a lot better than Michael at acting this out. She looked at Jay and spoke with an intentional loudness, "Boss, we only got a minute left."

Jay snatched out his wallet from his pocket and flashed it in front of the security guard's face. "This! This is what is causing the beeping! What are you gonna do now? Check through my wallet for another ten minutes? Oh yes. It's such a dangerous item. I can potentially murder people with paper cuts. I can even suffocate people with the leather right?"

The head security guard was so terrified that he didn't even dare to put his hand on to the wallet. He just took a quick glance and let Jay pass.

"And what are you gonna do to my employees? Huh? Are you gonna inspect his shoelace? Or her hairpin? Or even the bandaid he had put over his injured hand? Are you going to inspect those too?" By mentioning the hairpin in the same parallel structured sentence as the irrelevant shoelace and bandaid, Jay had successfully misdirected the attention from the hairpin. Then Jay's voice turned polite again. "You let my team go in now, and if we get to the conference on time, I will pretend this didn't happen. Or else."

The head of security was completely frozen in place with cold sweat dripping from his forehead. After a full second, he grasped the situation and immediately signaled to the other security guards to let Jay's team pass.

When Michael was sure that they were out of the hearing range, he sighed a huge relief. Even Nicholas relaxed his face a little bit.

"Damn! Brother! That was amazing!" Michael slapped Jay on the back.

Jay laughed and said humbly, "Didn't expect that to work out so well either. It was a close shot."

"But what were you doing with a wallet? What kind of person still uses a wallet nowadays? I mean with all the e-pay and stuff..." 

"Oh, about the wallet, I forgot to tell you guys," Jay took out the wallet while slowing down his pace, allowing Nicholas and Alexandra to walk ahead. "I also armed myself a little bit, with some 'modified weaponry.'"

Jay opened the wallet up for a few layers, displaying a pack of playing cards on the innermost layer.

"Playing cards? That's all you have armed for yourself?"

Jay opened the box and fanned the cards out. He motioned for Michael to touch it.

Michael grabbed onto one of the cards, and his hands jerked in surprise. "Ouch. You never told me it's sharp."

"Shhh." Jay put his cards back into the box. "Keep it as a secret for now. Don't let the rest of the team know."

Michael was about to question why, but Jay's comforting gaze settled him down.

An elevator carried them to the conference floor. A combination of excitement, nervousness, and wonder filled Michael as the doors opened