Wormhole Cultivation [Book 2] - Chapter 65: Jackpot (Patreon)

The conversation at the tea table didn’t drag on. Kaluya didn’t praise me any further, nor did he announce any more plans to use or clone me. He and Novak quickly hit us with an information dump, filling in each other’s gaps and bringing us up to the required level of critical information.

They started with who had opened the door for the demons. The fake article had told the absolute truth: the demons had taken a pair of Threes prisoner on Drexin, wiped their minds and implanted demons who had trained as hackers. They might not even have been cultivators. Drexin’s brutal radiation had hidden any trace of tampering, and the bodies themselves had been damaged during the capture. We didn’t even know whether those two were the only ones, in every sense. Perhaps more than two implants existed; perhaps those two were all that survived dozens of attempts. That was only a theory, and there was no way to confirm it.

The possessed pair were patched up, treated for radiation and sent off to rehabilitation along with everyone else, where they struck up romantic relationships with portal technicians as quickly as they could. The Bureau was almost certain of their identities because, although the message text remained secret to them, and I still couldn’t believe the messaging system was really that anonymous, the timestamps matched. And there were records of dates beforehand.

Now every other rehabilitation centre and the private lives of the technicians were being checked. They had been ordered to report anyone who showed an unhealthy interest in them. That was probably nerve-racking. But the frayed nerves and mild paranoia of portal technicians were a small price for security.

The investigation into the site and the article with the Trojan had only just begun, while the one into the hidden pockets of the ‘half-dead Fours’ on Beta-Beta-Beta was still going on. And it hadn’t got any further than small artefacts near the core, the heart and in the horns. There were no bodies for an autopsy or study. Since the demons had seized our portals at that facility, we could assume they withdrew as soon as they did, and other groups carried out the general capture of the facility. It was their bodies, and parts of them, that had been floating among Jupiter’s Trojans.

On the bright side, we now had parity with the demons in Sixes: ten against ten.

The demons had lost half! It was an incredible result that couldn’t be explained by anything but luck. Adam and I had certainly taken down one Six by a stroke of great luck.

Unfortunately, we had lost four too. Three to the big bad’s sword. They had been at the tip of that wedge flying to rescue the rehabilitation centre. Ghaurzakh’s strength was frightening.

The fourth loss was Ma. The same Ma who had led the raid under the volcano against the praxi and cut off their leader’s hands. I remembered her as a Five. I hadn’t even known she’d broken through, though it was to be expected: she’d been entitled to a huge share of the spoils from that raid.

Ma had died on Drexin in a clash with the demons’ third Seven, the head of the daughter clan Drkhaal. It was very strange that he’d shown up there in person, considering the big bad kept him close in order to control him. Perhaps Ma had been a step away from exposing the plan to transplant souls into humans, and much suggested that it was the Drkhaal clan who had carried out that operation.

Our conversation took only about fifteen minutes: the time it took the technicians to find a small dormant utility in the system, which the Trojan I’d downloaded had tucked away deep in the drivers for incoming-signal testing.

It removed all the blocks on incoming dialling. In other words, the demons could easily dial this address from the compatible portals we had already cut off from the network. They had the address, but we didn’t know whether they’d tried anything of the sort, because the technicians had been testing in a virtual environment and the portals had been cut off from all networks entirely.

The longer the portals stayed disconnected, the greater the chance the demons would decide we’d switched them off for good. We didn’t want that at all. This was the perfect opportunity to set the trap Adam had suggested with the demonic portal.

“We evacuate immediately!” Novak ordered, getting up. “The technicians to Delta-Alpha-Two base, and the general and I and you three onto the Lightning Queen.” He looked around. “The bait has to look as though it was abandoned in a panic.” He turned to us. “Take whatever you want. And don’t try to be tidy about it. The more mess, the better.”

Lina froze like a pointer dog.

“Your study too?” she asked, turning her head towards the bar.

Novak nodded, and Lina practically teleported to the bar: a cabinet door banged, bottles clinked, and there was a waft of Space Qi.

Adam, less quickly but quite decisively, claimed the tea cupboard next to the bar.

Kaluya chuckled cheerfully; I, however, was displeased. Arseholes had grabbed the most valuable stuff!

But then I remembered the kitchen. The tea there wasn’t as valuable, and there was no collectable bourbon, but there was a lot of it.

And the workshop where I’d assembled the Trouble Generators. There were batteries and crystals there!

I stood up.

My legs felt like someone else’s, like cotton wool. The core under my breastbone still ached dully, and every step echoed in it like a blow on an empty barrel, but the craving for free loot was stronger than the pain.

“This doesn’t cover that demonic ring!” I said. “I demand that loot gets credited to me.”

“And thirty per cent is mine!” Adam said without turning round from packing the tea. “I’m the one who finished him off!”

“And twenty per cent to Adam,” I agreed. That was enough for him.

In the kitchen, I didn’t bother sorting things, making whole shelves vanish into my spatial pocket at once. Thanks to my well-developed Space, I had an advantage in high-speed mass looting.

I didn’t take the packets of pasta and grains, though; I tore one open and scattered it on the floor to leave at least a bit of mess, because it was coming out far too tidy.

In the workshop, I took only the most valuable things. After spending a few days here, I knew exactly where everything was.

Separately, I took everything that even hinted at my work on the Trouble Generators. Novak intended to destroy this place, but I didn’t want to risk it.

While I was looting, my master came into the workshop himself.

“Do you need something too?” I asked.

“Don’t get distracted,” he said, waving me off.

Novak went over to the big tool cabinet, raked everything out of it onto the floor, then reached out, and inside appeared a small metal barrel the size of a beer keg. Except kegs don’t usually have radiation hazard markings.

My master shut the cabinet and turned to me.

“Time’s up,” he said.

“And I’m ready!”

“Good, the Queen’s already waiting for us on the platform outside.”

The Lightning Queen waited on the landing pad behind the residence, and it was the first time I’d seen her since Novak flew me to Yellow Pine on Verdis.

A black dagger. Forty-three metres of matte graphene that swallowed light, so that the yacht seemed not so much a ship as a hole cut out of the landscape.

The ramp was down, and it led to a portal ring. Novak seemed inspired by the same idea of a mobile landing platform the praxi had shown us.

The ring was active; Novak sent the technicians through and deactivated it. Now it was just the yacht's entrance.

“Does it turn inwards?” I asked. “Does it work when the ramp is closed?”

“Not by physically rotating,” Novak said. “The polarity of the planes simply switches, and the front side faces inwards.”

I nodded, appreciating the idea. It made the ring a little more complicated than necessary, but it saved useful space that a physical rotation would have needed.

Novak went in first.

“Queen, you look wonderful,” he said.

“Thank you, sir! I’m glad to see you, and may I note that you are also in excellent shape and good spirits, considering events.”

“We have some fun ahead of us, my dear,” Novak replied.

“Which means the demons won’t be having any,” she translated.

She seemed to have become chattier than before. Had Artem improved her AI?

“General Kaluya,” the Queen continued her greetings. “Adam, Lina.” A pause. “Jake, you don’t look well.”

“Um…” I hesitated.

“He’s entitled to; he recently took down a Six!” Kaluya said.

“That’s… marvellous,” the Queen said.

The tin can didn’t believe it!

“He really did take one down,” Adam confirmed. “I helped.”

“Wow! That’s an incredible achievement!” the Queen responded, showing more trust in Adam’s words than in the general’s. At the same time, she somehow turned it into a compliment to Novak. “You have exceptional disciples, sir!”

“Thank you,” he said. “Take us up and over the northern peaks. We won’t land. Bear in mind that a five-kiloton nuclear blast could blow apart this base at any moment.”

“Wow! Executing,” the Queen said, raising the ramp.

Inside, everything was as I remembered it: Japanese minimalism, laboratory white, military functionality. Instead of two armour platforms, there was now only one; the other had been replaced with an extra cabin. The central hall with the holographic table was unchanged, and there were still only four chairs. I took one at once.

Lina, as usual, would fit on Adam’s knee.

The yacht lifted off the pad without the slightest jolt. On the fake windows, the residence slid down and to the side: stone walls, flat roofs, the panoramic windows of the small study, which still reflected the morning sky. Then the slope…

Novak didn’t let us enjoy the view.

“Put the feeds from the base cameras on the windows. Priority: the portal hall, the view from the hidden camera,” Novak pointed at one window and moved his finger to the next, “the workshop, the rest as a kaleidoscope.

“All that’s left is to wait,” Novak concluded.

“Master,” Lina reminded him. “Five kilotons? What about the nearby cultivator residences and the ski resort? They’ll be caught in it.”

The smile slid off Novak’s face. He shook his head.

“I don’t give a damn about cultivators hiding in residences, but the resort… Evacuating a place like that would be on the news immediately. We have a chance to get rid of a few more Sixes. We can’t risk it.”

Novak had made the same decision as the person who had struck a densely populated city to keep the demons from digging in. I didn’t know whether his conscience tormented him, but he did it quickly and decisively.

And he held Lina’s gaze; she was the first to look away.

We began to wait.

Unfortunately, the demons were in no hurry. Perhaps they’d already tried several times while the portals were disconnected and decided the portals were dead.

I gave up first and asked to check what beds there were on board.

They were wonderful. I slept as if on clouds, right up until the Queen’s voice lifted me off them.

“Jake, wake up. The demons have activated the ring.”

It didn’t sink in straight away.

Then I heard footsteps pounding beyond the wall, leapt out of bed, and tumbled into the corridor, colliding with Adam. Half asleep and jostling shoulders, we made it to the main hall. On the window showing the portal room, several demons were already leaping out and spreading out, meeting no resistance.

The other windows showed them moving through the base.

“Queen,” Novak ordered, “run cross-identification of the targets using the available intelligence.”

“Stage only!” Kaluya corrected him, and Novak nodded, confident the ship would pick up the command.

Yellow question marks appeared over the demons, quickly changing to: 6, 6, 6, 5, 5, 5…

Twelve in all! Nine Fives and three Sixes. Sixes: a third of what the enemy had left!

An extraordinarily bloodthirsty smile bloomed on Kaluya’s face. This was beyond our wildest expectations.

The group spread out through the residence. Two stayed in the portal hall. The rest went down the corridors in pairs, checking room after room. I watched them go into the kitchen, one step on the pasta I’d scattered, another kicking an empty tin. I watched them go into the study, and one of them stare at the empty bar for a long time.

They were searching and finding nothing. And with every empty room, they moved more confidently.

The workshop. Two went in and looked over the overturned table and the shelves I’d stripped of everything valuable.

The group stopped, clearly reporting what they'd found. And then one more stepped out of the ring. The two who had stayed in the portal hall dropped to one knee. The Queen drew a question mark over him, then replaced it with the number seven.

Kaluya’s smile vanished.

“Do it before he gets away!” the general blurted.