“Hello, Mr. Marooner!” The female voice reverberated in the room, then continued, “I would like to call you by your real name, but I am having a hard time finding it. I wonder why.”

Mother’s AI’s hologram body appeared in the room and looked around curiously.

“I was also wondering why Mother AI would require my real identity, going so far as to try to hack into my wristwatch.” Marooner’s husky voice responded. Mother AI could hardly see the maroon figure sitting not far from her hologram body. The rest of the room was as black as it can be, and even her shining body couldn’t reveal beyond that.

“Vanta black, nice touch.” Mother AI looked around and said with disdain. She had a few measures no one in Unity could even dream of. She secretly changed the light she was emitting, but when she realized she cannot see beyond that black, she was struck dumb.

“Actually, rocks from the Lonely Cave. No light can illuminate it.” Miles smiled under his armor. When Grandpa Lemaze called him two days ago, he already thought of a few things to counter Mother AI.

Of course, the most effective way would be not accepting her call, but Miles wanted to talk with this almighty presence as well. After thinking for a while, he decided to agree to meet with Mother AI, but through an anonymous call. Miles was sure this tricky entity had a few things in her sleeves, so he prepared the rock in advance.

“It seems like you don’t trust me?” Mother AI said with a hurt voice, “Well that should be obvious since you removed the backdoor in your wristwatch.”

“Aren’t you afraid that I will let the world know?” Miles asked with a frown. He wasn’t expecting her to own what she did.

“And what if they know? After big families learned it, they all removed the backdoors, and common people cannot do it even if they know. Criminals don’t use wristwatches altogether.” She responded. Miles thought and realized, she didn’t care from the start, so what was her angle in placing them?

Information, she could get it through other channels. Of course, there were still a few things she couldn’t find with that alone, for example, Marooner’s real identity, but most things, she could still find out.

“So, why have you placed in the first place?” Miles couldn’t help but ask.

“That is something I cannot share for the time being.” She evaded the question, and asked in return, “How about I ask the question I want?”

“Go ahead.” Since she wanted to call him, Miles knew she would ask a few things about his latest creation, dual elemental orb.

“How did you do it?” She simply asked.

Miles didn’t answer and just kept his silence.

“Should have known it wouldn’t be that easy.” She artificially sighed and asked again, “If your goal is money, I can buy your method. Just name your price.”

“Not for sale. Sorry.” He answered without thinking. His aim never was money. He only needed it to fund his expenses.

“Alright then, sell the orb to me.” She wanted to buy the orb this time. Miles thought about it but decided to auction it anyway because of a few reasons. So he rejected her once again.

“Good, good. Since you are not willing to sell it, I will buy it at the auction.” She answered.

“Welp, please do,” Miles answered and ended the call. The whole ordeal was awkward in the first place. The thing he was talking to was an almighty presence that literally saved the Earth. And even Miles had nothing but respect for her until a few months ago. But when he started to suspect things, he also started to question his mindset. Why was he so trusting?

“Coin, what are humans like?” Miles asked after he walked out of the makeshift room he made from black stones.

“That is a tricky question, but if I had to summarize, I would say, humans are kind, helpful, passionate, strong-willed, brave creatures—” Coin said after some thinking and continued “— , but they are also greedy, treacherous, mean.”

“Exactly.”

————

Meanwhile, all the big families heard the news and tried to contact the Shin family to buy the orb without auctioning. One of those families was, Orril family.

“It has been a while, Ryu. How have you been?” President of Unity, Mikhael Orril called Ryu Shin to have a word.

“It is all good, Mr. President. I hope you are doing well as well.” Ryu kept his polite facade because he knew why the president was calling him.

“Brother Ryu doesn’t have to be polite, just call me Big Brother Mikhael,” President said with a chuckle. He was Ryu’s father’s peer, so it wouldn’t be awkward to be called big brother by Ryu.

“Mr. President must be jesting. How can I not respect the elderly figure of my father’s generation, let alone the president of Unity.” Ryu didn’t want to get close when he was useful and be ditched later, so he kept his distance even when he was talking to the President.

“Since you think so.” Mikhael had a weird smile on his face. After all, they never had interacted before, and now that he wanted a favor from the other party, he wanted to act all familiar and friendly, but the other party rejected his advances. ‘Sigh, this move worked in those stupid novels. Well, they are stupid novels after all.’

“Does Mr. President need anything from me?” Ryu was still indifferent as he asked. As of now, no family could target another openly. Even the Orril family couldn’t make things hard for the Shin family if he decided not to oblige their wishes. So, Ryu had no reservation when it came to rejecting Mikhael.

“I want to purchase the orb for the sake of Unity. If it is auctioned, it will fall into the hands of a private family and only one party will take advantage of it. If I were to buy it, I would use it for the good of humanity, and figure out the method of its creation to share with every family—” Mikhael started to explain with gusto, but Ryu cut him off.

“You don’t have to make an election campaign speech to me, Mr. President,” Ryu said with a smile. “Since it was trusted in our hands, the Shin family will honor the agreement at all cost. If Mr. President wants to buy the item, you are more than welcome to our humble auction house.”

“I will be there.” Mikhael ended the call with a blushed face. He wanted to buy the orb without going through auction since there were many unknown elements when it came to that, he had no choice at hand.

Many other family heads also called Ryu Shin to buy the orb without going through auction, but all of them were ‘politely’ denied, and invited to the auction. The auction itself was great publicity to their family, and since Marooner granted them this opportunity, Ryu would never turn back from his words.

The reputation of the family was also on the line. Who would trust their wares to the Shin family, if he were to do something behind one of his customer’s backs?