I had to clear quite a few piles of bones away before I could even think about unlocking the massive vault door. I couldn't help but feel giddy as I approached the dial lock, my klepto instincts tingling with excitement.
It took quite a while to crack the thing open. It was old, old enough that it had been literally buried with time, but it was probably quite something back in the day. Keyword, back in the day. Now? Now it was disconnected from any external systems and relied solely on the lock.
Unfortunately, age had worn away parts of the mechanism, so by the time I got the combination right, the thing popped open on its own. I’d have to look at fixing it or maybe changing it out entirely, though it would be a major pain in the ass regardless of what I decided.
The vault door whirled and clicked as the mechanism inside twisted and turned, pulling thick metal poles out of the wall. One after another, they clicked as they fell back into place inside of the door, unlocking the thing.
I pulled on the handle, feeling quite a bit of resistance for a few moments before something holding the joints of the vault door gave. A rush of stale air escaped the vault as the door lurched, nearly sending me to the ground as I slipped on a rogue rib.
I barely managed to catch myself as the interface popped into my view.
「Net - 2>3」
「Perception - 7>8」
Oh? Why now and not when the request was completed… ah, but it's always been based on achieving my goals. And I really like this spot aside from the mess, so did my goal of finding a stash count as complete? Interesting… Could I psychologically trick myself- ah, no that wouldn’t work. The eidolons were obviously watching me like I was some kind of streamer, so no amount of trickery would work… unless…
Still, not too much leveled up this time around. Better than nothing I guess. And I got another Perk point. It’s been a long time since I looked at Perception’s Perk list though. I can’t quite remember if I had my next one planned or not.
And it was about damn time Net leveled up. Honestly, it was the slowest Skill by far excluding the ones I never used like Brawling and Accounting- oh wait, there was also driving… I don’t think it's leveled even once since I got it, and I drive quite a bit…
I guess my dislike for Net was mutual… although I couldn’t help but feel the slow progress was partially my fault. I mean, I got some basics of Net, but the whole coding and hacking side of it never really meshed well outside of program manipulation. Maybe I just didn’t have any talent in it?
But that opened up another series of questions. Did that mean I was talented at everything else? Did talent really matter when it came to the interface… a horrifying thought flowed through my head. Net took a long time when I first learned it, like longer than the other Skills. Calming took half the time.
Added together, that meant the time frames weren’t set in stone. What if it took me so long to learn something that I died in real life? W-would I get kicked out of the interface before that happened? Or would I just fade into death never knowing what happened? A chill went up my spine.
A-anyway… there were more important things to do right now. I slipped the door open just enough to get inside. I gotta say, it was quite impressive. The vault was big. Like really big. Big enough to easily be a solid stash. And it was already a literal vault, so anything in here would be fairly well guarded once I shored up some of the defenses.
Before heading further in, I checked out the walls of the place. With the vault door moved out of the way, I got a good gauge of how thick they were. The walls, at least on the front side, were quite thick. They looked to be some kind of composite concrete, though I couldn’t tell exactly what kind. Whatever it was, the stuff was resistant enough to keep its shape even after it was swallowed by the ground and left without maintenance.
For the first time since entering the Underground, I clicked on a flashlight and shined it into the vault. The insides of the vault were quite something. Everything was entirely made out of smooth black marble. Rows and rows of deposit boxes reflected back toward me in a golden glow. Most hung loosely open, their contents long since taken away. A few remained closed, which I’d have to check out at some point.
After seven rows of marble and gold deposit boxes was a rather large space centered around several tables. Golden deposit boxes still lined the vault. The tables were piled high with bundles of paper money. Back in the day, this must’ve been a fortune, but now it was as good as kindling. Secure metal carts sat all around the place, each filled to the brim with money and loose bills.
One of the nine tables, the one in the back right corner, had been cleared off at some point. Noticing the oddity, I headed over. As soon as it came into better view, I spotted a skeleton slumped down behind it.
I cautiously moved forward, checking the scene out. The skeleton had several duffle bags scattered around, all of them empty. One of its arms was an ancient piece of chrome, seemingly only capable of being moved like a natural limb. It was a far cry from the enhancements and advancements of modern cybernetics, though it was probably quite the luxury back in the day.
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Clutched tightly in the skeleton's bony hand sat a snub-nosed revolver. Its grip seemed to be made from a black pearl of some kind with delicate silver engravings running up and down it. The rest of it was done in some kind of dark metal similarly engraved with silver, though most of the silver engravings were focused on the cylinder.
I felt a strange pull towards the revolver, enough so that I literally took a step back at the odd feeling. I flicked on Aetherial Perception, seeing a slight aura encompassing it.
After using Aetherial Perception for so long, I was finally starting to pick up on some clues. The revolver’s aura reminded me of the nomadic slaughterer and the box. After doing some research, I felt confident enough to say they were Remnants; relics of the past naturally infused with the Aether.
The jade dagger, which had been enchanted to have its effects, had a sense of organization to it. Most enchanted items I’d seen this far felt similarly organized. Remnants, however, had an underlying chaotic vibe to them such as the chaotic colors of the box’s beast.
This revolver didn’t necessarily have a color to it as much as it had a feeling. It was hard to put an exact emotion to it, but the sensation was close to a burning surprise. Of course, it similarly had a chaoticness to it, though it felt much weaker than the box.
I hesitantly picked up the revolver. The thing felt cold to the touch, and I couldn’t help but feel as though I was doing something wrong as I hefted it and looked down the sights. It was incredibly weird. Four shots were still in the chamber, which I promptly emptied before stuffing the thing into my bag. I could get it checked out later.
I eyed the rest of the skeleton, picking up on what killed it after a few moments. Its skull had several fracture marks on it, all centered around a hole on the back right side of the cranium. After shaking the skull out a couple times, a small bullet plopped out of it.
Did the person shoot themself? The bullet was a dead match in caliber to the other rounds in the revolver. Considering it was missing a bullet, it made sense… still, the way the skeleton lay on the ground didn’t seem like a suicide. I’d expect to see the arm crooked or at least signs it had been crooked to put the gun against their head before pulling the trigger.
Sure, the arm could’ve fallen out of position as the corpse dropped, but even the location of the bullet was weird. The person would’ve had to pull a feat of athletics just to get the gun into the right position to shoot. Weird… but ultimately not my problem.
I checked out the rest of the vault, walking around its perimeter and inspecting the bits and bobs all around. Honestly? I quite liked the place. Sure- a lot of things needed some work, but overall it had the basics down to be somewhere exceptionally useful.
I could probably remove the banks of safety deposit boxes- err, no, keep one. Yeah, I could keep one and turn it into a wall. Then set up three rooms in the vault. It would clear out a lot of space. Maybe turn one into a bedroom or something for if I needed to stay multiple days on end.
With the Canteen, I didn’t necessarily need to worry about running water or food down here. I’d have to run a wire down here though if I wanted access to the city’s node. It was a double-edged sword being so far down here, especially inside of the reinforced vault. On one hand, nothing I snagged would be tracked through electrical means. On the other hand, it would be impossible to get a connection onto my phone or decks.
That just left one other thing I would need to worry about, but even then not too bad. Electricity could be taken care of with a generator. Preferably a high-efficiency generator to charge up a battery bank. I had unlimited AE3 and gas, though the prior would probably be better to avoid carbon dioxide poisoning.
Speaking of poisoning, the air when I opened the vault was incredibly stale. Vaults of this size usually had a few built-in ventilation shafts as a safety precaution. I checked around the area, finding eight vents on the floor and four built into the walls near the ceiling.
They were held in by screws, so pulling off the cover wasn’t an issue. And yeah, I probably shoulda' seen this one coming. The ventilation shafts were all bashed to pieces and buried in rubble. I’d have to clear them out at some point.
As for the rest of the vault, the hundreds of deposit boxes, both large and small, would be the perfect places to keep various items. I could probably tear off the doors of most of them to create instant storage shelves. The rest would be handy for keeping high valuables on the off chance anyone actually found this place, though I’d have to overhaul the security.
I could shove the tables up against the walls to clear out some space. Maybe even toss a few of them. The carts…hmm… I might be able to disassemble them into parts. Some plans I had in mind might be able to benefit from them.
The same goes for the security. All of it was inactive after years without any kind of maintenance or power, but cameras sat in all corners of the vault as well as staring down the rows of deposit boxes. Several spots indicated a potential turret of some kind too, which would be interesting. There were even a couple of spots on the walls that looked as though something was supposed to pop out.
Of course, I’d need to dust everything off too, but that was low down on the list. Oh, I’d have to take care of the body… and the thousands of corpses right outside the door. It was a bit disrespectful of the dead, but I could probably shove them all down that chasm…
Definitely would need to set up some deterrents around here and reinforce the route back to the shaft leading up to the surface. I needed to cover up my tracks and some other things that might help hide this place even if someone followed me down into the Underground….
I could set up several false doors and try to blend entryways into the walls similar to the room Hope and I descended into. Obscuring my passage was probably the best thing I could do down here if I wanted to ensure my own safety.
Oh, and I needed to drag all my stuff down here. Especially the illegal bits. It would be nice to drop everything even remotely hinting towards Shiro Tsukuyomi and allow my real identity to just fade into obscurity… or at least fade into a position that wasn’t quite so illegal. It would be a good front for my other activities at least. Especially considering my favorite hobby, which was liable to make quite a few enemies.
Who knows? When I made enough money maybe I could even make the dream of buying the apartment building and turning the speakeasy into an actual speakeasy a reality. Distant dreams, but they might happen one day…
For now though, how about I get this place cleaned up the rest of the way?