Fantasy Game: Infinite City

Chapter 582: Discussing a Transaction (1)

Han Zu remained wary of Christina. She was the first person to proactively find his hiding place. If she harbored ill intentions, and if she regained her strength and he failed to control her, she might reveal the location to others. It could be the Ferdinand family, or perhaps the Unlimited Company. Even if he ruled out his own involvement, he absolutely could not allow her to spread the news. After all, the entire base contained a vast amount of contractor equipment in addition to conventional equipment. Christina was no novice; if she saw the contractors' technology and spread the news, it would be disastrous.

The simplest solution was to kill her. However, since they were able to find him, they might have already shared some information with others before arriving. Even if he killed Christina, someone else would still come. Furthermore, they might have some way to confirm Christina's death. Given this assumption, acting rashly wasn't the best option.

There are several relatively feasible methods at present: using the contractor's technology to leave a listening device on Christina and then send her away; sending Christina to the contractor's site; imprisoning her in this secret base; or taking Christina with him.

Each of these methods has its pros and cons, and varying degrees of difficulty. Leaving a bug on Christina and sending her away would prevent her from learning more about him and the base, and would allow for real-time monitoring of all information Christina could access. However, this would be a remotely controlled device, and if the person were to enter a location completely shielded from the device, they might be able to evade Han Zu's surveillance. Furthermore, perhaps Christina or someone she interacts with possesses the ability to detect and eliminate such a device. Furthermore, Han Zu lacks memory-modifying equipment, so Christina would still be able to locate the base, and he wouldn't be able to remain there forever.

Sending Christina to the contractor's territory would completely block other forces from tracking her. The contractor's territory was vast, some even located at the edge of the universe or in uninhabited areas. Furthermore, given the level of defense within the contractor's facilities, even unattended, Christina wouldn't be able to cause much trouble. However, Han Zu wasn't certain about Christina's strange teleportation ability. She didn't need to lock onto any anchor point, seemingly allowing her to choose any location at will. In this case, if she seized the opportunity, she could potentially escape from the contractor's territory. After all, to the contractor, Christina wasn't even a threat, so naturally, they wouldn't keep a close watch on her.

By locking her up here, he could utilize the contractor technology within the base to completely block searches for Christina. However, his base lacked dedicated containment chambers, and he couldn't possibly store all the equipment; he still needed it. Furthermore, he couldn't stay in the base forever; there were other things Han Zu needed to attend to. In this situation, Christina escaping was the least of his worries. If she figured out how to operate a particular contractor's equipment and managed to take it with her while escaping the base, that would undoubtedly be a far more serious situation for him.

Bringing Christina with him, with his own powerful strength, he could completely hold the other party back. As long as he was careful, Christina wouldn't be able to escape. However, if he did so, Christina would be exposed to a lot of information that Han Zu didn't want her to know. Moreover, if for some reason a battle was needed, Han Zu would likely be too busy to keep an eye on her, giving her a chance to escape.

Han Zu couldn't help but frown as he pondered this. Christina's sudden appearance was like a hot potato in his hands. There were always some difficult situations to deal with Christina. He couldn't kill her, as there were too many uncertainties; he couldn't lock her up, as there were no stable guardians; and he couldn't let her escape. Although Christina had fainted upon meeting him, she had undoubtedly seen his face clearly. And now, Christina was actually awake, but for some reason, she was feigning unconsciousness, perhaps hoping to gain some information.

After thinking about it, Han Zu decided to play along with her first, pretending to leave the base to see what she would do. However, in order to prevent her from using that strange teleportation ability to escape, Han Zu would stay at a certain distance. In this way, even if the other party really wanted to leave, he could immediately enter the range enough to absorb the other party's energy and terminate Christina's teleportation.

He then found a terminal on a nearby table and pretended to read some information. Then, with a hurried expression, Han Zu walked to the teleportation platform at the end of this floor and teleported out of the base. However, in reality, he had only teleported from the base's negative 2nd floor to the dock at the bottom. From there, he used his clairvoyance to observe Christina's movements.

Sure enough, after Han Zu teleported away, Christina immediately sat up from the bed. She tiptoed closer to the teleportation platform where Han Zu had left and observed it carefully. However, out of restraint and caution, Christina wisely did not touch the teleportation device on the console, as its operation was still unclear and the text on it was incomprehensible.

After confirming Han Zu had left, Christina breathed a sigh of relief, stretched, and stretched a bit. Then, she began to stroll around Han Zu's base, the second floor below ground level. Although she carefully examined each item, she merely looked at them, not touching any. This behavior puzzled Han Zu. From her observation of each device, it seemed she wasn't uninterested in them, but rather she didn't want to displease their owners—herself. The underlying meaning of this behavior was that Christina was deliberately trying to curry his favor. Perhaps she needed his help, or at least advice, with something.

However, Han Zu was completely unfamiliar with Christina, and he didn't know whether the other party's current behavior was a pretense in order to lower his guard. Therefore, Han Zu did not intend to show up again so early. He decided to continue observing for a while.

After touring the entire basement, perhaps out of boredom or perhaps genuine hunger, Christina returned to her previous spot, grabbed a bag of snacks from a nearby table, and continued wandering around while eating. Finally, after a few minutes, Christina touched the first object in the base: the elevator button.

"Unrecorded biological information detected, sentry alert activated..."

"Temporarily shut down the defense system."

"Defense systems are down."

As soon as he pressed the elevator button, the base's defense system sounded a silent alarm to Han Zu and activated the sentry system. However, before the elevator could open, Han Zu quickly used his highest authority to temporarily disable the base's defense system and temporarily canceled the biometric authentication. The activated sentry weapon system was immediately retracted and hidden back to its original position. When the elevator opened, Christina found nothing.

Although she hadn't noticed the sentry weapon pointed at the elevator door just a second earlier, her instincts led her to believe there must be something inside. Perhaps it was a hidden surveillance device, or perhaps the elevator was simply a trap. So, after the elevator opened, Christina didn't enter directly. Instead, she ducked to the side, quietly reaching out and tossing the snack bag into the elevator.

After the bag landed, Christina quickly peeked inside, then retracted her body. After a few seconds, Christina extended a hand, quickly reached into the elevator, and then quickly withdrew it. She peeked out again. Of course, nothing happened.

After confirming that she wouldn't be caught in some insidious trap the moment she stepped into the elevator, Christina entered and retrieved the bag of snacks that had fallen in the middle of the elevator. The bag had a self-sealing seal, so the snacks didn't fall out.

However, the elevator was built using the contractor's technology, so there was no visible control panel, as it wasn't actually needed. Christina wasn't worried about this, simply eating a snack while searching for a way to operate the elevator. After five minutes, confirming there were no control panels, Christina left the elevator, puzzled. She began to wander outside the elevator door, likely trying to figure out how to operate it.

"What terminal might be used to control it?"

After thinking for a while, Christina thought of a possibility, muttered to herself, and then walked to the personal terminal that Han Zu had used before. After hesitating for a while, she finally picked up the terminal.

The terminal did have a backup elevator control program, but Han Zu had only used it a few times during testing. He'd always used the contractor's equipment to control it, but now was a good time to use it. So, Han Zu used the contractor's equipment to move the elevator control program to a prominent page on the terminal. Christina quickly spotted the program as well.

"found it."

Holding Han Zu's terminal, Christina returned to the elevator and used the program on the terminal to activate the elevator's permissions. The base had five floors. In addition to the entrance on the top floor, there were four other floors. However, the program on the terminal did not indicate the function of each floor, only the floor number. Christina prepared to explore each floor one by one.

According to Christina's speculation, the second floor where they are currently located has some household items, sofas and beds, as well as some equipment whose functions she is not sure about, and a transmission device. However, the number of these devices is not large. It is estimated that Han Zu usually lives on this floor, so the function of this floor should be similar to a living room + bedroom.

After arriving on the third floor, Christina exited the elevator and saw three or four large rooms, each sealed by heavy metal gates. Based on the gate numbers, she could find a system on the terminal to open them, but it required biometric authentication, and presumably only Han Zu could open them. Christina had participated in, and even led, the invasion of Han Zu's previous secret base. Although she couldn't open these rooms, she inferred from experience that they were likely storage facilities at the base, likely storing a considerable amount of goods. However, based on the storage capacity of the terminal, compared to the previous base, this floor, despite its large size, actually held very little. This suggested that Han Zu hadn't used this base for long, or perhaps hadn't spent much time there.

After learning about this situation, Christina did not stay on the third floor. She left by elevator and arrived at the next floor.

Christina didn't have a chance to observe the fourth floor closely. From the angle and range of the elevator door, she could see a lot of high-tech medium and large equipment, but she had no idea what they were used for. Although she longed to go over and take a look, she noticed a number of active sentry weapon systems on this floor, so for her own safety, she didn't step out of the elevator. She simply took a quick look and then continued on to the final floor of the base.

Soon, the elevator reached the base's lowest level. Christina remembered it as a cavernous dock for underwater vehicles or small submarines, but it was completely empty, with nothing but the structural support of the cavern. There was a small control platform, with information indicating that the underwater gates were currently open, but according to the information read, there didn't seem to be any underwater vehicles docked at the dock.

After a quick survey, Christina stood at the edge of the dock and peered underwater, observing something. Although she barely moved, and her actions were normally invisible, Han Zu, currently hiding outside the open underwater gate, could sense that Christina was using her own energy to establish a teleportation anchor point underwater just inside the gate. This teleportation anchor point possessed a strong self-signaling signature, effectively limiting its use to the creator. Any attempt to lock onto this special signature would dissipate the energy maintaining the anchor point, rendering the teleportation ineffective.

Christina's action wasn't intended to lure anyone here, but rather to leave herself an escape route in case of an emergency. This, however, left Han Zu baffled. He didn't understand why Christina, with her status, would need such a thing.

As Han Zu pondered, Christina completed the teleportation anchor point and returned to the second floor of the base via the elevator. She didn't pretend to sleep, nor did she leave immediately. Instead, she sat at Han Zu's desk and opened his computer. But Christina wasn't looking for any intelligence. Instead, she opened a video website and watched videos to kill time. She probably planned to wait until Han Zu returned, or if he didn't, she wouldn't leave.

"What on earth is she going to do?"

Christina's performance left Han Zu confused. He returned to the dock at the bottom of the base and leaned on the railing beside the dock, thinking about countermeasures.