In the darkness, the poker card in Vance's hand made a sharp flick. The sound was jarring in the silence.
Old Ghost's breathing grew heavy, like broken bellows. He had lost. On his turf, in his element of darkness, he lost to a rookie. And he lost completely, played like a fiddle.
"Lights on," Vance said flatly. "The winner is decided. No need for more theatrics."
But the lights didn't turn on. Instead, a faint mechanical click echoed. Click-clack. The sound of a chamber loading. It was soft, but to Vance, it roared like thunder. The dry ink smell of Old Ghost vanished, replaced by a nauseating stench of Sulfur and Rust.
Pure killing intent.
"Since you like the dark so much, stay here forever." Old Ghost's voice turned hideous and crazy. "In the Ghost Market, dead men don't claim debts."
As he spoke, the thousands of clocks on the walls stopped ticking. The dials flipped, revealing dark muzzles behind them. Automated defense turrets. A dozen modified Gauss rifles locked onto every joint of Vance and Cerberus. One press of the remote in Old Ghost's hand, and they would be shredded in 0.1 seconds.
Cerberus's pupils constricted. His body tensed, a dangerous growl rising in his throat. He reversed his grip on the dagger, ready to block the bullets with his own body.
"Don't move."
Vance's voice remained calm, even lazy. He reached out and placed a hand on Cerberus's tense shoulder.
"Put the knife away, Cerberus. We don't need violence here."
"But..." The boy hesitated. His biological instincts screamed danger.
"No buts." Vance cut him off, then turned his head to address the invisible figure in the dark. "Old Ghost, your hand is shaking. Not from anger, but from fear."
"Shut up!" Old Ghost roared. "One button, and you're Swiss cheese!"
"Then why haven't you pressed it?"
Vance took a step forward. He couldn't see the guns, but he walked as casually as if strolling in a garden.
"Because you know, the moment you pull the trigger, the one who dies isn't just me. It's you."
Dead silence fell.
Vance continued, his voice echoing clearly. "District 9 Security Act, Article 1: Computing Power is Life. Any unnotarized lethal attack against a High-Value Computing Unit is treason against the Central System."
He pointed to the back of his own neck, where the neural port lay.
"You have that thing in your head too, right? The Violence Suppression Protocol. The collar the Elysians put on every dog. Once the system detects you committing an irreversible act of murder, it overloads your neural center in one millisecond. It fries your brain into porridge."
This was the underlying logic of the world.
In this wasteland ruled by the Elysians, humans were not individuals, but precious biological batteries. You could fight, you could maim, but you could never "scrap" a functioning machine without permission. Unless it was a gamble notarized by The Balance—only then was death considered "Legal Resource Recycling."
And right now, there was no Notary here.
"Your defense system might be fast, but it's not faster than the current in your brain." Vance smirked, his tone mocking. "Old Ghost, you're a businessman. Trading your life to kill two passersby... is that a profitable deal?"
Old Ghost didn't speak.
But in Vance's nose, the thick sulfur smell began to waver. It became intermittent, mixed with the sour scent of hesitation. Vance bet right. Old Ghost didn't want to die. The more power one had, the more they feared death.
"I'll tell you a secret." Vance took another step, less than two meters from Old Ghost. "Your suppression program has already activated. Does your head hurt? Like a needle in your temple? That's the system warning. If you don't take your finger off the trigger, the warning becomes an execution."
Clatter.
The sound of metal hitting the floor.
The remote dropped.
Heavy panting followed, like a drowning man surfacing. The crazy killing intent receded like a tide, leaving only exhaustion and defeat.
"You win..." Old Ghost's voice was hoarse, aging ten years in a second. "Lights on."
Buzz.
The electric hum returned. Yellow light flooded the room, making Vance squint. He saw Old Ghost slumped in the chair behind the workbench, pale and sweating, the hand that held the remote shaking violently.
The clocks on the wall flipped back, hiding the guns, as if nothing had happened.
Cerberus stared warily at Old Ghost, dagger still out.
Vance patted the boy's hand, signaling him to relax. Then, he walked to the workbench and gently placed the Joker card in front of Old Ghost.
"Good game."