Jay tries to call Zaud but no one is answering him at all. So in the meantime, he’s stuck down here with a mentally unstable girl.

Maybe I’m too paranoid?

Jay was thinking about his action, maybe he just overreacted about this whole thing and came down here for nothing. Originally he planned to use this place to hide from Franky’s gang, but when Josh threatened to kill him, he just reacted out of fear.

He didn’t want to die

Every time something threatens his life, he thinks back to that moment when his heart got stolen, and when his body turned cold in the junkyard. Jay doesn’t want to feel it again, no matter the cost.

Jay scrolled his smartwatch looking at a small dose of the clip that got delivered to him, from the net and the system reward. Looking through the video, Jay got the idea that he could try selling them for money like he did with his mech. They then post it on a clip-selling site without a price. See if anyone is interested in these clips.

After that, he had nothing much to do, he had been following the system after coming back to life, and he didn’t have anything to do right now. Maybe he could create the system himself. Not like the real one but an artificial one that would direct him to do something.

That is just a glorified to-do list

Jay began to write down what he needed to do. First, he needs to make more money, about 1,000,000 to cover his debt. Became a mech apprentice, this one is obvious since he needs to get better at building mech. Lastly, he needs a better plan or physis to stay alive. He is far too fragile if he gets into conflict. With that, he got a vague idea of what he needed to improve.

Jay looked to the corner and saw that the girl didn’t look any better. But upon a closer look, she did change her position. Jay is sure that she was just staying here for a moment.

“You’re going to stay?”

The girl didn’t say anything, afraid that Jay would kick her out. He felt a tang of pity in himself seeing a fellow human in need so he didn’t do anything.

“Then I’m leaving.”

Jay decides that staying here would be bad for himself. And he starts to suspect that Josh never really sent any guy after him. And more importantly, this place has nothing to do. Sure he could study more information about mech but with no hands-on experience, it wouldn’t be as good.

“Um…” Yellas said “You don’t have to… I could leave.”

“Just stay here, I’m not leaving because of you”

“Really?”

“I won’t be demoted soon, I just came here to hide from someone”. Jay said while his hand reached for the door and opened it. His head turned left and then right to see if someone had come for him. Nothing other than normal people on the lower floor trotting along.

“Thank you…” She said softly but enough for Jay to catch it. There might be some misunderstanding but Jay couldn’t be bothered to correct it. He left the complex and set his destination to a nearby elevator. He found one in 10 minutes and hopped back to his floor.

—--

Ector exited the elevator while reviewing his footage, after combing through many cameras of different floors he ended up here on the 1st floor. He takes out an air filter mask and wears it. His eyes glow and connects to a nearby camera to find that Jay did come by here.

He follows the trail to a rented room that has been paid for recently. Ector didn’t get any hack for the renter information but he’s pretty sure it was Jay.

Pretty good hiding place

If he were any other assassin it would have taken many days to locate Jay. He knocked on the door 3 times and ready his gun. A clean shot would do the job. Also, Ector wouldn’t need to cover much since it’s the first floor, security here is as low as it gets.

Surprisingly the door opened for him, however, Ector didn’t expect to see a girl there.

“Who are you?”

—--

“Hello?”

Jay could now reach Zuad. The voice on the other side of the smartwatch seems to be quite exhaust.

“Hello, Zuad is this how you treat your artist?” Jay said with an annoying tone, it felt like he just got a prank, a big one that ended him in panic mode.

“I don’t quite follow. What did I do? I can assure you that my offer is the best on the market for any artist.” Zuad asks with a curious voice.

“Your assistant doesn’t want me alive, that's what happened.”

“And you still live?” Zuad sounded shocked, making Jay even more confused. Jay almost choked his next word after Zaud's reaction.

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“He really sends someone to nap me?”

“Certainly,” Zaud said “It happened many times before, I’m surprised that you survived to tell the tale, How did you do it?”

“...” Jay is speechless, he didn’t expect Zuad to be so nonchalant and he even knew that this was happening. “Then why didn’t you warn me, No, better question, why didn’t you stop him yet?!”

“Calm down,” Zaud said “Your life didn’t matter much and it’s better to not show my hand, ya know?”

“And I have to die because of that!?” That doesn’t sit right with him. This could all have been avoidable if Zaud told him about it. He needs to punch Zaud right now.

“I already said that your life didn’t matter much,” Zaud said with a neutral tone “And if I tell you, I would let Josh know that I know. And I didn’t want that.”

“....” Jay grits his teeth not only because he’s angry but because Zaud's words go deep in him.

I didn’t matter that much…

Jay repeated what he heard in silence, the word grew louder as a second passed by. It made him piss. Even now, when he has a mech-building system, he still doesn’t matter. People like Zaud could throw him away for petty reasons and Jay didn’t, like that one bit.

“So what’s this about?” Jay said hiding his feelings but they seeped through and Zaud could tell.

“You don’t want to know unless you want me to kill you too.” Zaud said, “However, I have a better deal for you, more so than the art deal.”

“Is this related?”

“Very much so”

“Could I not take it?”

“You’ll be doing it either way, I just want to give you money as a nice gesture. Josh won’t stop until you’re dead after all” Zuad assured him and Jay believed it. There’s no reason for Zaud to lie and keep him on this perpetual Chase. A straight slave contract would be better than a violent motivation.

“Not even if I were to cut contact with you?”

“That would certainly work” Zaud mused “But would you?”

Jay grits his teeth, a chance like this is not as rare as his system but it’s a pretty low chance. Lower than him getting an S-rank item from the Gacha. A direct contact with Zuad, an A-rank individual presents many opportunities, not just in money but in connections. His emotional side wanted to say yes and be out of this mess but ultimately he couldn’t.

“No”

“Wise choice” Jay couldn’t see it but he was sure that Zaud was smirking “ You’ll get 100K upfront and another 1mil if I could get useful information from you, sound good?”

“What do I have to do?” Jay's heart almost skipped a beat. A 100K could easily rent him a new room and a mil would get him to B-rank just by earning it. Jay would be out in the junkyard again if he could earn that kind of money.

“Nothing much, Just stay alive until there’s another assassination on you. If I could get info on your assassin I would give you 1 mil. How’s that?”

That sounds like Jay is gonna die, 1 mil for his life. He ponders whether it is worth it and concludes that it would. After all, he doesn’t have anything to his name, and rising out of his status without the help of an A-rank is pretty hard. Jay could play safe and use the Iron Body game to earn money but… Sooner or later the debt from Fanky’s gang is going to catch up to him.

“Deal”

“100K sent, enjoy your steak”

The call abruptly cut and Jay walked out of his elevator with a grim face. The last part is a subtle “I keep tack on you” that makes Jay feel uneasy. He looks around and sees people walking about with no one looking in his direction. He rushed back to his room and locked the door, he double-checked his place to see if there was any spying device and found nothing. He heaves a sign of relived.

That must mean he tracks me outside…

There is nothing to confirm that but it’s a strong possibility. Thinking about it more he couldn’t really prevent anything. No information is secret forever unless you have an obscene amount of wealth or a good Cyber ghost. Which is almost impossible to achieve in this part of the Galaxy.

When he arrived at his room Jay looked out the window to see the orange hue shine through a dusty sky. A common sight in Conticus II. You would be lucky to see the real sun as an average citizen. The whole planet is covered in these dusty clouds making it unbreathable outside. It’s a miracle upon the miracle that he did survive.

He gets to the bathroom to wash out all his filth from the 1st floor. The bath filled with a voice command and he sank into the warm water. He relaxes his body and adds soup to the shower with a button press. He washes his body until he’s satisfied then he changes the soupy water out with a voice command. The old water lowers and clean water rises from below the tub and washes away all the soup.

Bath is the best

He touches his heart to make sure that it’s not broken then gets out of the shower. He moves to the mirror, which shows a dark-haired man with a slightly pointy chin. By old imperial standards, he would look good but after humans evolved to space humans there are no people that would seem ‘ugly’ anymore. But it has been incredibly normalized that it’s not special anymore.

He checked his bank account and smiled, since his parent gone missing, this was the first time he hadn’t felt so heavy. Before, he couldn’t let go of them, he was stuck and stagnant in place. but now, he needed to move, he realized that his mom would pinch his cheek and cuss him out if she was there.

—-----

“Danny thank you for the license! You’re a lifesaver!”

“....” Danny who sits at the bar looks quite confused. His arm left the shoulder of one girl and checked his inventory. His face morphs into one of more shock and quickly settles back to a neutral face. “When did I give it to you?”

“Aww you got alzimer now? Maybe I should call you old Dan instead.”

“Just answer my question” His voice has an aggressive undertone. The two girls beside him felt a bit startled.

“Yes sir! you gave it to me some days ago.” Snaky answers trying to look more cheerful. “Did you get hacked?”

“.....” Danny's head is running wild with possibility, he has many valuable things in this account. His hands work fast to open and check everything in his inventory. To his utter surprise, nothing has been missing other than the license.

“Sir?”

“It’s fine, what did I say back then?”

“I remember you not wanting to talk much and give me the license.”

“Then I must have been drunk..”

“Oh and your friend bot was good, I could almost reach gold with it!”

“My friend? who?”

“Jay!”