Two hands expertly manipulating a holographic keyboard, two eyes making the holographic screens switch around to what needed to be answered, one mind working out questions that needed AI core to answer due to the amount of data required.

One screen kept providing data faster than Rune was able to process them, one screen was a live stream of short argumentations by lots of people in favor of something like “AU5-Stadium” or “854-Company-T”.

As for the final screen, it was just Mr. Finley typing things, lots of things, to argue for probably his own choice and opinion?

He was clearly finishing this precise document, or a part of it, as he soon made the central screen show a background of a beautiful landscape and looked at Rune with a polite smile that smelled of experience.

“So, can you tell me your thoughts about the test I made you go through?”

“Hu… The one sent was very charismatic, and talking with him was a pleasure, but apart from that? I didn’t really have to do anything as he just observed me refining my element with intent and said I passed. If I had to guess, I would guess it was a test to know my ability to hide things with my element? Can’t really think about anything else,” Rune honestly said what he thought about it.

“That’s a good starting point, but I don’t have that much time to make you guess things so I’ll have to cut short our interview. You probably already saw that we have been able to locate the IGS on a map, right?”

“Yes, a Maze very far north, a gigantic Arcadia south.”

“Exactly, the Maze is something very good to know, it means we’ll be connected to the greater world as soon as some tier 6 are born, but something happened, I can’t tell you what, it’ll be unveiled soon anyway, but it… Rushed the speed at which the government’s plan should have been applied.”

“Ok,” feeling obliged to reply and acknowledge what he said, Rune automatically replied like that, prompting a slight smile from Mr. Finley.

“And you, as well as your friends, should have been given invitations from the civil chaos cell to integrate the civil unrest unit, a part of what everyone is calling the secret organization, does it remind you of something?”

Blinking repeatedly, Rune hesitated but he had already made the connection, “Becoming trouble-makers at the prospects finding event? Utopia already received it?”

“Hehe, yes, and things should have progressed with all of you and your 2 soon-to-be-coming-back friends receiving an invitation too,” exposing lots of truths, Mr. Finley was closing in on why Rune was here.

“But for you, Mr. Tudor, your qualifications and your level of importance have changed the moment you created your cosmic mist composite element and showed your talent, so you’ll be integrating the terror unit, the right-hand of the terror cell, not the civil unrest unit.”

“Hosirha told me I had to say yes for it to happen? Not like I’m going to say no if all my friends will join their own cell, what’s the official name of the secret organization? Its logo is the humanoid seen from the back?”

“Official name is the Cell, it’ll be made public at the prospects finding event, the logo is the same one shown at the end of the trailer, yes. The benefits and your job will only be described once you say yes, do you accept to join the terror unit, Mr. Tudor?”

“Will it prevent me from continuing to be an adventurer and going on years-long expeditions?” Rune inquired about the 2 things he absolutely didn’t want to happen.

Even if they gave him 100 billion EP, he would still refuse if it touched on those 2 things that motivated him to wake up and train every day, never missing and always seeking to improve everything.

At this answer, Mr. Finley let a bit of satisfaction through.

“Be it for the terror unit or the civil unrest unit that your friends will join, there are no such restrictions, you have to take it as if you were a freelancer that got an access card to a new domain of activity,” he started and made a comparison a bit hard to follow.

“A special description fitting for you is that when you’ll be adventuring, you’ll need to practice adventuring skills, but while doing jobs for the terror unit, you’ll have to primarily use your cosmic mist element.”

“Ok, I accept then,” Rune finally decided and agreed to join the terror unit.

“Perfect, you’ll soon be contacted by some people explicitly telling you they’re also from the terror unit, just follow their instructions and…”

10 minutes of induction speech later, Rune exited Mr. Finley’s office and was escorted back by Orobas to the entrance.

From there, he passed by the apartment to wait the few hours needed before the Secluded Corner opened, and then went there to pass the entire night.

At the apartment, there was no one, it seemed it was either a major case of bad-timing on his part, or everyone had their own thing to do, similar answers but different processes involved.

Once the bar closed, he returned to the training park. Having an entire dome to observe his own element and try different things when he wanted was the place he needed to optimize his training.

The dome being completely isolated and in the middle of the wilderness had no impact on his choice to come back, it was only a slight plus added to the already massive… Ok, Rune really liked being isolated.

For the next 3 days, however, he started to see Utopia and Adreana bringing dozens of crates, with the Gar and Arik duo similarly coming, except for them it was to take pictures and make small vlogs with high-quality cameras they bought specially for this.

It was at that time that he was contacted by the terror unit. But the guy who contacted him turned out to be the same person who tested him, Hosirha Sirmons.

[Hosirha: Welcome to the terror unit Rune Tudor. As an officer of the Cell, I’m responsible to make your integration to the terror unit as efficient as possible. To explain your first available job, please come to the 5th block, east district, east capital sector, building 85]

With no time indication about when to come, Rune adopted the mindset he used in his life: if it can be done now, then do it now.

Leaving the lively training park behind, he went to the address and saw that it was a building with the 3 last floors capable of resisting his perception intrusion.

Entering the building, there were still a generous amount of people flowing in and out, the signs that could be seen everywhere indicated there were restaurants and small shops hosted here.

‘I haven’t finished exploring the south sector, and I planned to go to the north one next… But I can make an exception today.’

Taking the chance, he didn’t immediately get to the last 3 floors out of 8 and went to eat instead. With no indication which restaurants or shops were interesting, he just had to try them all.

‘Ok, let’s make a big exception. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time I’m surprised by random changes of a decision on my part.’

So Rune took the time he needed to visit everything, it was this carefulness that allowed him to discover very secluded but amazing establishments.

Every restaurant could have a life-changing energy taste, every shop was worth visiting to know how diverse the world was.

5 fully explored floors later, he finally stepped into the first of the isolated floor, and continued his tour of everything, because yes, this floor also contained dozens of places to visit.

‘Hello? Yes, we are a secret organization with 3 privatized floors. Hiding? What? Do you have to hide when you’re a secret organization? Oh dear, I didn’t know.’

His mental theatre played out like this.

It was only on the 8th floor where there was a large shop with a similar-sized isolated back shop, it completely blended into the floor disposition, and only when Rune’s perception couldn’t pass through it did he suspect it was where he needed to go.

‘I’ll finish with you then.’

Visiting the 3 restaurants on this floor, they were all completely average compared to the one he added to his list back on the 2nd floor, the ramen there was truly something he never tasted before.

The shops were all more average than the others, and when he entered the biggest shop, it was the same.

Deciding to stop his tour, he went to the receptionist and used the straightforward method.

“Hello, is there someone named Hosirha Sirmons around here?”

“Could you give me your name?” The human-looking receptionist answered without a single facial change.

“I’m Rune Tudor.”

‘And you forgot to say hello, didn’t your parents teach you to be polite with everyone? And you’re a receptionist too…’

“Oh,” the receptionist suddenly looked to have received or remembered who he was, “Please enter the back shop, he’s waiting for you there, welcome!”

While the welcome at the end could have a second meaning, the gesture pointing to the door just behind him was pretty straightforward.

After politely bidding goodbye, Rune entered the back shop area and his perception finally covered everything that was happening within.

Some big rooms, including meeting rooms and restrooms, as well as some small rooms, with one of them being used to stock what was needed to maintain the shop facade.

There were 4 people, including 3 in a meeting room and 1 coming towards him, it wasn’t Hosirha.

“You’re the guy with the anti-perception element, right? Hosirha talked about you,” the unknown short man asked. He really looked like a common kajo, with the same platinum blond hair and very white skin he saw in Astryde.

‘Why is no one saying hello! I’m not going to ignore that and submit like a sheep!’

“Hello, I’m the same guy, I’m Rune, and as it seems everyone is very laxist, I don’t think I need to tell my family name.”

“Yeah, you’ll get used to it, we’ll probably do the first operation together, so simply call me Arsen in the future, come with me I’ll bring you to him,” a short introduction followed by a simple smile sealed the job for him.

30 seconds later they arrived at the meeting room with 3 people already inside.

“Now that Rune is here, I’m letting you three introduce him to our unit’s goal and start to describe our first planned mission. I’ll be listening to the side,” the moment Rune entered, Hosirha said that and then turned on a holographic keyboard to start typing things.

Rune would never take the lead, it was something that was nearly carved into his DNA, so he put on his social smile, took a few steps to find a chair, sat on it, gave a thumbs up to Hosirha.

And waited.

‘Ah… That’s life, waiting for others to take the first step and just having to politely smile.’

The wait lasted 20 seconds before the one who accompanied him there, Arsen, started to talk.

“Let me first introduce those two to you, this,” he gestured to a humanoid man, he clearly wasn’t part of the 5 dominant species as he had a pair of eye-catching and extremely visible big ears covered in fur, “Is Miki, he’s a perception specialist and has chosen a sensor path.”

“The other is Rei,” he pointed towards the last guy in the room, he would be an average humanoid if it wasn’t for his burning red hair and eyes. And they seemed to be innate, not acquired like Rune could do with accessories.

“He’s our neutralizer,” he didn’t describe more than that, planning to explain it more later.

“The only person that isn’t here is Rhia, she’s our hacker, you’ll recognize her easily.”

“As for what the terror unit’s goal is, it is to simulate all sorts of infiltration missions, from very light to completely stupid, with more affinity towards very heavy hit, and to explain what very heavy means, I’ll let Rei explain our first operation to you,” with concise words, he finished the first part of the instruction and then shifted the responsibility around.

“You d*mbfu*ck! Why me!” With a temper seemingly as burning as his hair and eyes, he didn’t even try to discuss this and glared at the last person.

“Do it, Miki…”

“Ok, our first operation is to kidnap Aengus Finley, a director of the Cell, while he is still working, and bring him here, the additional requirements are that we need to go in and out of the adventurer HQ without being detected or leaving any trace behind,” the guy with furry ears simply told the shocking mission with a poker face.

Looking at the right-top corner, then the left-top one, Rune furrowed his brow, “That’s… A very special level of difficulty.”

Miki answered immediately, “We don’t have a deadline, and prior to you arriving, we were recruited only a few days after the trailer was aired, so we had some time to plan the operation.”

“I don’t think you arriving was planned, but you being here before the prospects finding event means that you’d have been recruited anyway, so enjoy the few months there are before the terror unit becomes full of new people,” Rei added from the side, he seemed a bit arrogant from what he just said.

‘But maybe he has a reason to be arrogant?’

“Now, I didn’t introduce myself completely before, I’m still named Arsen, but my job here is planning, all the jobs I mentioned are the first qualification of everyone, they don’t really describe exactly what they do, for example, in addition to planning, I’m also an infiltration backup and a diversion actor.”

“In addition to being a sensor, I’m also a diversion actor and I have the emergency planning right,” Miki said, before glaring at Rei, forcing him to describe himself.

“I’m the neutralizer, and before you arrived, I was the main infiltrator, but now I’m relegated to the main actor, and while I may not say it directly, your help will be greatly appreciated considering the difficulty we have to overcome.”

“Ok! That’s it!” Finishing typing something, Hosirha made his voice heard and stood up.

“Now that the introduction is done, I have the pleasure and regret to announce that your current 5 members composition will be the one you’ll keep until you complete your first mission,” without losing time, he followed with something more important.

“I also got the info that if we defeat the guard unit completely within 1 month, we’ll gain a bonus and maybe access to the reason why the Cell has been created so early, and believe me when I say it! I want to know!”

“Guard unit? the Cell seems very diverse, it also belongs to the Cell, right? Just with guarding duty instead of infiltration duty?” Rune intercepted crucial info there and his curiosity made him ask about it.

“Yes, but I didn’t say our goal was infiltration, I only described our job by saying it was simulating infiltration missions if you want the official goal description of the terror unit… It’s to, I quote it ‘Gravely hurt the IGS through any means available.”

“...” Rune remained speechless at this description.

The others who had already known it acted like this description was completely normal.

“Then why did you describe our goal as simulating all sorts of infiltration missions? Is it because… We can’t do much more than that? Or maybe we’re not allowed to? I don’t think demolishing buildings is something that would be allowed…” As soon as Rune started to talk, Hosirha remarked something from what he said.

“Our goal? I see that you already see this unit as something you’re part of, that’s a good start.”

“Yes, we can’t do much more than that, as you say. And if you want a realistic explanation, it’s because if we’re seen as bad people, then some prospects will visit us to teach us the meaning of life, that’s why we have to be unknown from start to finish,” Arsen manipulated the words a little, but his explanation completely made sense.

“Ok, so what now?” Rune accelerated the conversation.

“As I said,” Hosirha took the speaking right the moment it became available, “If we want to know some secret before the others, even if it’ll be made public someday, we, and by that I mean you all, the terror unit, need to succeed in our first mission in less than one month.”

“What was the advancement before I arrived? Does everyone know my anti-perception ability?”

“We were suddenly told someone would be added to our unit a few days ago, that he had a monolith anti-perception composite element, and that he would take on the role of the main infiltrator, that’s it, and now you’re here,” Rei was the one who said that while swinging his back in his chair.

“As for our plan, our options are really limited, and that’s because despite having answers to kidnap Mr. Finley, the answer is Rei, by the way, everything else remains very confusing,” Arsen weighed his words carefully.

“Well, if you want an idea of my ability,” Rune had a genius idea, “Then let me tell you that my group will soon open a training park, and in it is the latest, most powerful iteration of my element. and if everyone wants to gather with the missing member, Rhia, right? Then I wouldn’t be against it. At all. What do you say?”

As the three present looked at each other, Hosirha imperceptibly nodded to himself.

That was some quality marketing he just heard.

“When is the opening?” One of the three asked.

“Well, just search for ‘Undecided Training Park’ on the web, and all the information you want will be there, don’t hesitate to bring your friends and…”

‘My hidden advertising genius self is unrivaled!’