Shadow Slave

Chapter 876: LO49

Sunny woke up with a start. The familiar sounds and vibrations of the Rhino told him that everything was okay, and that the vehicle was moving at high speed toward its destination. No one seemed to be attacking them...

And yet, for some reason, he felt a sense of deep unease. Sunny frowned and rose from his bed, then went over to the pilot's cabin. On his way, he passed Kim, who was running diagnostics on the secondary control panel, and Samara, who was tinkering with her rifle on the workstation in the cargo bay.

Reaching the front of the Rhino, Sunny silently looked through the armored windshield at the white wall of the blizzard that enveloped the world. Of course, he could have just accessed the feeds of external cameras from the command suite, but he trusted his own eyes much more.

...Nothing seemed out of place.

He hesitated for a few moments, then spoke to Luster:

"Did something happen just now?"

The young man glanced at him in confusion.

"Uh... no? Oh, there was a tiny spike of seismic activity a few minutes ago, but that's nothing unusual. Happens all the time. Don't worry, sir... we'll reach the installation in about half an hour."

Sunny scowled.

"...Good."

He returned to the lounge area, poured himself a cup of coffee, and then walked over to the command suite.

"Kimmy, contact the research facility. Tell them we'll be arriving soon."

software, activated the transmitter and sent a communication request to the installation they were approaching. For a few minutes, there was only static on the channel. Kim frowned, then repeated the call, this time extending the antennae

Still, nothing.

a

"What, no one's responding?"

studied the monitors, then said in a

uh, our signal doesn't seem

back

then, ask them for an update on the

there was

Command, either, sir. All communications seem to be

remained silent for a

completely cut off from everyone?

to experience a complete communication blackout. After all, Sunny had spent a ton of contribution points to upgrade

Kim hesitated.

blizzard is not supposed to

Sunny rubbed his face.

"That doesn't sound good...'

any sign of danger that could have been hiding in the white

throughout the remainder of their journey. Minutes passed by without anything happening. Soon, there was a soft sound and some movement in the lounge area - Belle, Quentin, and Dorn returned from the Dream Realm and climbed out of the sleeping

that, half an hour flew by. Sunny caught sight of the research installation long before the

like a small fortress settlement than a scientific base. It was perched dangerously close to the ocean shore, and had a thick wall surrounding it, with powerful turrets aiming at the dark waves. There was a large dome-like structure towering above the formidable fortress, painted white on

facility had no official name, and was known simply as LO49. Sunny had no idea what kind of research was being done on its premises, but considering that there was a sizable garrison of Awakened guarding the installation - complete with an Ascended commander - it had to be

valuable work, though, was the fact

slow down.