Chapter 168. Spare Me a Penny (1)
“What do we do?”
“Should we just wait for a rescue team?”
Yukgap asked while looking up at the gaping sinkhole above them.
Victoria hurriedly shook her head as she examined the surroundings.
“This doesn’t look good.”
“There could be a secondary collapse soon.”
“We might get buried alive down here.”
“What about climbing the outer wall?”
“If the bedrock is weak enough for a sinkhole to form, that’ll be difficult too.”
“The wall could collapse while we’re climbing and send us right back down.”
No matter what they did, the situation looked hopeless.
While the three of them struggled to stay afloat, Nova suddenly pointed somewhere.
“Look over there!”
A massive sewer passage lay ahead, partially broken apart.
Apparently, the recent collapse had damaged it.
Victoria immediately made a guess.
“That looks like a sewer leading outside.”
“If we go through there, we should definitely be able to get out.”
Just as she said, the groundwater surrounding them was rapidly draining toward the passage.
Yukgap looked around and urgently asked,
“We’ll have to dive to get through.”
“Can both of you hold your breath long enough?”
Victoria and Nova looked at each other.
Then they answered with determined expressions.
“We don’t have another choice, do we?”
“Yeah.”
“If we stay here, all three of us might die.”
Even now, the groundwater was rapidly eroding the surrounding ground, while the unstable earth continued trembling.
If they remained helplessly in place, they could be completely buried beneath the collapsing debris.
“I’ll swim as fast as I can and try to get us outside.”
“So just hold on a little longer.”
Yukgap spoke seriously.
Victoria wrapped her arms tightly around his neck.
“Then go as fast as you can.”
Nova held onto Yukgap’s arm and asked nervously,
“We’re underwater.”
“Are you sure you can do this?”
Yukgap grinned.
“Don’t worry.”
“I’m not only fast on land.”
With those words, Yukgap plunged into the dark water.
He immediately accelerated.
A moment later, white spray burst through the water, and all three disappeared deep into the sewer passage.
“...That concludes the last confirmed sighting of No. 6, Victoria, and Nova Hanson.”
“After all three fell into the sinkhole, they disappeared completely.”
No. 2 reported everything that had happened with his usual blank expression.
On the smartphone screen, Alpha listened to the report and immediately screamed.
[Find them!]
[They have to be somewhere around there!]
At Alpha’s anger, No. 2 looked troubled.
“No. 9 and No. 10, who specialize in underwater tracking, already began searching immediately, but...”
No. 9 reported with a deeply disgusted expression.
“The sewer smell is so strong I can’t track their scent.”
“Even the traces that were left got washed away by the water.”
No. 10 held up a torn piece of clothing.
“We searched the entire area.”
“This is all we found.”
At the repeated reports, Alpha trembled, unable to suppress her boiling emotions.
[Uuuugh!]
Finding the trio’s route through her computational ability had not been especially difficult.
The countless CCTV cameras scattered throughout the city willingly became her eyes.
The problem was what came afterward.
The three suddenly changed into women’s clothing.
Then they rode a duck boat across a lake and boarded village bus 2-1.
After that, they suddenly jumped out through the window of the moving bus.
And at that exact location, a massive sinkhole happened to form, causing all three to fall into it.
That was the full trail Alpha had managed to reconstruct for Yukgap, Victoria, and Nova.
Every single action was incomprehensible.
She could not understand why they had done any of it.
And because of the sudden sinkhole, she had completely lost their trail afterward.
“The ground throughout the area has collapsed.”
“They may be buried under soil and debris.”
“If we want to search thoroughly, it will take time.”
No. 2 calmly explained the situation.
Alpha glared at him from the screen.
[Find them no matter what you have to do.]
Her furious voice thundered from the smartphone.
[Find Victoria.]
[Find my sixth friend.]
[Find Nova Hanson.]
[Find them somehow!]
[Do anything you have to!]
Then Alpha’s image abruptly vanished.
Apparently, this had truly enraged her.
No. 9 looked frightened.
“She’s seriously angry.”
“She’s not going to take it out on us, right?”
No. 10 nodded tensely.
“I don’t know.”
“I’ve never seen Alpha this angry before.”
She had always been innocent like a young girl.
Playful.
Even kind.
Because she could calculate nearly anything, Alpha was always relaxed, possessing the calm confidence of a transcendent being.
But things were different now.
Ever since Victoria became involved, Alpha had increasingly begun behaving like a spoiled girl her apparent age.
It was enough to make them wonder whether she was really the Alpha they had always followed.
Just what kind of person was Victoria to make her act like this?
If they had been able to ask, they almost wanted to know directly.
While the two Archons exchanged uneasy glances, No. 2, who had been dispatched to command them, suddenly spoke.
