“Serious trouble, huh?” I said as I thought what Roy’s message meant.

The twins were still around me, so when they saw my face change after reading the message, they confused my thinking face with one of worry.

They thought something wasn’t right.

“Khy, what’s going on?” said Cora worriedly.

“Yeah, we don’t usually see you flustered like this, so this is kind of a big surprise,” followed Yara.

It dawned on me that if I played my cards right, I could use this as an excuse to leave. I wasn’t going to tell them the truth, so I created a little white lie.

“Girls, I’m sorry, but I have to go as I have an emergency back home. One of the staff members with whom I have a good relationship found me some material for my skills project.”

“The only problem is that she only has it for a few hrs., so I need to go back right now if I want to study it.”

“I’m going to have to cut this trip short,” I said with a straight face.

“OH, OK,” said both the twins.

Eva, on the other hand, just stared at me in confusion.

“Do you need any help?” asked Cora.

“No, that’s ok. It’s kind of a secret; not even the Richies know about it. So, I hope you girls can keep this between us.”

“That won't be a problem,” Cora and Yara said.

“Alright, well, I’m off; oh, and by the way, I'm going to focus on this information as much as possible so I might be out of touch for the rest of the break,” I said loud enough for all three girls to hear.

I started to walk towards the venue exit. As I passed the twins, I could sense a feeling of bewilderment coming from them, but I was in no mood to find out why.

As I walked past Eva, she reached out to grab my arm.

“Khyrum, we still have some things pending,” she said in a low voice.

“I’m not sure what your real reason for leaving is, but I’ll respect it and give you some time to make up your mind,” she said determinedly.

“But know this: I’m a stubborn girl, so no is not a word I hear too often,” she whispered as she walked up to me and kissed my cheek.

That riled up the twins immediately.

“What the hell, Eva?” is all I heard from Yara as I walked out of the room. I would be stupid if I stayed to find out how that conversation went.

As I exited the venue, I quickly messaged Roy back. It was a simple, short message, “I’m on my way.”

Not even a minute later, Roy texted back, “Ok, get your ass back here asap.”

As I walked back towards the docks, I kept thinking of what could have Roy so worked up. It had been only 3 or 4 hours since I left his store. I was not expecting to hear from him for at least a day or two.

I spotted a familiar figure outside the front door as I turned the corner to his shop.

It was Roy.

“Finally, what took you so long,” he said as he approached me.

“Long? I came walking as fast as I could,” I said, a little peeved.

“What’s all the commotion about anyways?” I asked.

“Let's go inside before we start talking,” said Roy as he rushed me to the front door.

Once inside, Roy immediately closed the door behind us and locked it up. The lights were still off, so I expected him to turn them on, but to my surprise, he didn’t.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

“Khyrum, follow me to the back office; it's better if we meet there,” he said mysteriously.

As we walked to his back office, I thought all this was getting more ridiculous.

After we went in, Roy also locked the office door.

“Alright, Roy. What's going on?” I said visibly flustered.

He sat behind his desk while gesturing to me to sit on one of the other chairs.

“Khyrum, we have a problem. A big problem,” said Roy.

“We do,” I asked in a confused tone.

“You keep repeating this, but what does it mean?” I asked.

Roy exhaled before he started explaining.

“Remember when I said I had some friends in low places? Well, I reached out to them right after you left.”

“I told them that I had a friend who had a charm that he wanted to sell without too many questions. We set to meet one hour later at the house of the reputed Boss for the underground group Section 16 in Rayong, Mr. Jozz.”

“I’m very acquainted with Khun Jozz as he is an old acquaintance of my father, so I’ve had some dealings with him before.”

“I took the charm in a special security lock box with the tier one spell Unbreakable Shell. This made stealing the charm almost impossible. I then proceeded to meet up with them,” said Roy as he recanted the meeting.

“Khun was a little surprised by the security lock box, but other than that, everything was going smoothly.”

“I told him that before I proceeded to take out the charm, I needed certain assurances due to the nature of the transaction. I wanted to make sure he wouldn’t play me dirty.”

“After talking, we agreed on certain assurances for each other. It would only be him, his appraiser, and me in the room."

"I then unlocked the security box and took out the charm.”

As soon as the charm came out, there was complete silence.

“Good Lord, where did you find this?” said Khun with wide eyes.

His appraiser also was taken aback after seeing the charm. He almost lost his feet from the surprise.

“Like I said before, it's from a friend who wishes to remain anonymous.”

“A friend, huh?” answered Khun.

Roy nodded in agreement.

“Okay, let's go with that then. Duccio, get your ass over here, and let's get this charm tested,” said Khun.

Duccio was the name of his appraiser.

“Yes, boss.”

As Duccio proceeded to walk forward, he signaled for Roy to bring the charm to a UTF resting on a table in the corner of the room.

“Alright, please place the charm on the test table, and I’ll put the electrodes on it to get a precise reading,” said Duccio.

Roy placed the charm on the table, and Duccio wired it up. He then turned on the machine.

The machine came on with a series of clicks and low buzzing sounds. After a few seconds, the lights on the display panel started to flicker, and the word initializing came on.

The machine took about a minute to initialize. Soon after, it was ready for the test. This blinking icon on the display panel read, “Start Test.”

Duccio walked and pressed the Start Test icon, and the machine started ramping up.

All three men waited as the machine performed a series of tests on the charm.

“We all know this is a Tier One Charm; the question is, what skills does it have?” said Khun excitedly.

Roy pretended to play dumb since he already knew. But even if he said it, he did not think anyone would believe him.

“Well, hopefully, this machine can give us the answer,” said Roy.

After about 15 minutes, the test was complete. On the display panel, a new icon flickered, “Test Results.”

“Duccio went over and hit the icon immediately. In the next instance, the results were displayed on the holo-display on the wall.

Khun’s and Duccios's mouths went dry immediately, and their eyes seemed to want to pop out of their heads as they read the results.

“Holy Fuck!” said Khun in disbelief.

“I have never seen anything like this,” he continued.

Duccio was still staring at the results, mesmerized by what he was reading.

“This thing has to be above a Tier One Charm,” said Duccio after a moment.

“You are absolutely right, and that is how we will approach this,” said Khun.

Khun and Duccio then turned to Roy.

“You said your friend was to sell this charm, right? Does he even know what he has?” questioned Khun.

“I think he does; that’s probably why he wants to sell it,” answered Roy.

“Can you imagine the consequences of wearing this in public? Especially if you don’t have good backing,” continued Roy.

Duccio nodded in agreement after thinking briefly: “It makes sense. If you wear this charm out in public and people know what it can do, you probably will end up dead if you can’t defend yourself.”

“This might be the best item I have ever seen; we are going to make a lot of money on this item,” said Khun, trembling with delight.

“What do you think is a good price for this charm?” asked Roy.

“I can say with ease that It's easily over the one billion credit mark, but the final price will have to be determined at the auction,” said Khun.

“Alright, so we are doing this then?” asked Roy.

“Duccio, let's get the info to every auction site we own. Please put it on the hot release for the underground information center. Also, take the test video and release it along with the data. That way, it will be authenticated, and no one can say it's fake,” said Khun eagerly.

“Yes, sir, right away.”

Duccio got to work, and within 30 minutes, he had already uploaded the video and data to all the auction sites and information centers.

“It's done, sir. All we have to do is wait,” said Duccio.

“We still need to pick a date for the auction, but we can discuss this later,” Khun told Roy.

Just then, Khun’s CAD rang.

As he looked at the number, it was one that he remembered quite well.

“Why is the head of the Zigmis Group calling me,” he said.

He picked up the call,

“Hi Lord…” Khun started to say when he was interrupted by the voice on the other end of the phone.

“Listen good, Khun Jozz. I want that Charm and whoever brought it to you by tomorrow. I already have my people going over there to pick them up,” said the voice before hanging up.