The Black Dragon Society's fortress squatted in the Old District like a concrete tumor, its brutalist architecture a testament to paranoia and poor taste. Armored gun emplacements jutted from reinforced walls, while automated turrets tracked our approach with mechanical precision. Above it all, a shimmering barrier of runic light—the Xuanwu-III Defense Array—pulsed with enough energy to stop a tank battalion.
I stepped out of the truck, ignoring the rain that had turned the surrounding streets into rivers of urban decay. Marcus flanked my left, his newly enhanced frame radiating barely contained power. Lyra moved like a shadow on my right, her hand resting casually on her sword hilt.
*System Analysis: Target Property*
*Estimated Value: 350 million credits*
*Current Occupancy: Illegal*
*Zoning Violations: 47 documented infractions*
*Recommendation: Immediate foreclosure*
"Terrible feng shui," I muttered, studying the fortress through [Predatory Vision]. "And that color scheme? We'll need to gut the whole interior when we renovate."
"Boss," Marcus said, his voice uncertain, "that's a military-grade defense grid. The kind they use to protect government facilities."
"Was," I corrected, pulling out a leather-bound notebook. "Now it's just another tax write-off."
The fortress gates ground open with the screech of poorly maintained machinery. A dozen thugs emerged, led by a scarred man whose face looked like it had been used as a cutting board. His cybernetic eye whirred as it focused on us, and the plasma rifle in his hands hummed with lethal energy.
"Well, well," Scarface sneered, his augmented voice carrying across the courtyard. "Look what the storm washed up. You lost, pretty boy?"
His gaze lingered on Lyra with the kind of hunger that made my skin crawl. "Nice piece of ass you got there. Tell you what—pay the hundred-thousand-credit entry fee, and maybe we'll let you keep her in one piece."
I didn't even look up from my notebook. "According to the First Revenue Office Temporary Site Selection Ordinance," I said, my pen scratching across the page, "this property is hereby condemned for public use."
Scarface's laughter echoed off the concrete walls. "You hear that, boys? This moron thinks he can just walk in here and take our turf!" He gestured to his men, who raised their weapons with practiced ease. "Light pollution? In a place like this?"
The defense array's energy output tripled, bathing the courtyard in harsh blue light that made shadows dance like living things. The barrier hummed with enough power to vaporize anything that tried to pass through it.
"Thirty million credits worth of military hardware," Scarface boasted. "Courtesy of our friends in the government. You want to play tax collector? Come and collect this!"
I snapped my fingers.
*System Judgment: Light Pollution Violation*
*Ordinance: Municipal Code 847-L*
*Penalty: Immediate confiscation of energy sources*
*Processing Load: EXTREME*
*Warning: Audit Stress Level: 78%*
The effect was instantaneous and devastating. Every photon of energy powering the defense array simply... stopped existing. The brilliant barrier flickered once, then died completely, leaving only the dull glow of emergency lighting. A sharp spike of pain lanced through my skull as the system processed thirty million credits worth of raw energy in a single instant.
I tasted copper and realized my nose was bleeding.
"What..." Scarface's cybernetic eye sparked as it tried to process what it had just witnessed. "What did you do?"
"Collected unpaid light pollution taxes," I said, wiping the blood with the back of my hand while keeping my voice steady. "The city has very strict ordinances about excessive illumination in residential areas."
Scarface's face went through several interesting color changes before settling on a mottled purple. With a wordless roar of rage, he raised his six-barreled rotary cannon and opened fire.
The weapon was a monster—military-grade, designed to punch through tank armor. Muzzle flashes lit up the courtyard like a strobe light as hundreds of rounds per minute screamed toward my position.
I didn't move.
*System Judgment: Excessive Speed in Urban Zone*
*Violation: Municipal Traffic Code 23-A*
*Penalty: Kinetic energy confiscation*
*Processing Load: CRITICAL*
*Warning: Audit Stress Level: 95%*
The bullets stopped three feet from my face, hanging in the air like deadly hailstones. The pain behind my eyes intensified as the system worked to strip kinetic energy from hundreds of rounds simultaneously. Blood dripped steadily from my nose now, and I could feel my hands trembling from the neural strain.
*CAUTION: Energy Buffer Overload Imminent*
Armor-piercing rounds, explosive tips, tracer ammunition—all of it frozen in mid-flight as the system stripped away every joule of kinetic energy. One by one, they dropped to the ground with metallic plinks, forming a small mountain of spent ammunition at my feet.
"Speeding in a school zone," I explained, my voice slightly strained as I fought off a wave of dizziness. "Very dangerous. Someone could get hurt. Especially me, processing all this paperwork."
Scarface's weapon clicked empty. His eyes widened as he saw the blood streaming down my face. "You... you're bleeding. Is it hurting you?"
"Pain?" I laughed, though it came out as more of a cough. "That's just the cost of doing business."
The massive steel doors—three feet thick and designed to withstand siege weapons—stood between me and my new office space. I placed my hand on the reinforced surface and felt the system analyzing the structure beneath.
*Target Analysis: Fortress Foundation*
*Composition: 3,000 tons of reinforced concrete*
*Depth: 20 meters*
*Classification: Unauthorized construction*
*Violation: Building without permits*
"Since you've refused to vacate the premises," I announced, my voice carrying across the courtyard despite the throbbing in my skull, "and have actively resisted lawful taxation, I'm invoking the Illegal Construction Demolition Act."
I snapped my fingers one last time.
*System Judgment: Ultimate Foreclosure*
*Target: Foundation structure (20m³ cubic section)*
*Penalty: Complete asset seizure*
*WARNING: MAXIMUM PROCESSING LOAD EXCEEDED*
The ground beneath the fortress simply ceased to exist.
Twenty meters of solid rock and concrete vanished in an instant, leaving a perfectly square hole where the foundation used to be. The massive steel structure, suddenly unsupported, groaned once before collapsing into the void with a sound like the world ending.
I collapsed to one knee as the system overload hit me like a sledgehammer. Blood poured from my nose and ears, and for a moment, the world went white around the edges.
*Audit Stress Level: 100%*
*Mandatory Recovery Period: 6 hours*
*System Functions: LIMITED*
Scarface and his men plummeted into the pit along with several thousand tons of twisted metal and debris. Their screams were cut short by the crash of falling masonry.
"Lyra," I gasped, struggling to my feet while wiping blood from my face, "clean up the survivors. I want assets, not corpses. Dead men can't pay taxes."
She nodded and leaped into the pit with inhuman grace, her sword already singing through the air. I could hear her voice echoing from below as she worked: "Credit or debit? We also accept cryptocurrency!"
The corporate culture was spreading. Good.
I was about to follow when the god fragment in my pocket suddenly flared with heat. The crystal pulsed against my ribs like a second heartbeat, and my damaged system managed to squeeze out a few more warnings.
*ALERT: High-Energy Anomaly Detected*
*Distance: Zero meters*
*Classification: Void Bank / Ancient Debt Collector*
*Threat Level: ????????????*
*Containment Status: DETERIORATING*
I activated what remained of my [Predatory Vision] and peered into the crater. Through the layers of debris and twisted metal, I could see something that made my enhanced senses recoil in instinctive fear.
Purple-red light seeped through cracks in the pit's floor—not the clean glow of technology, but something older and infinitely more dangerous. The data streams my system tried to process dissolved into cascading question marks, as if reality itself was uncertain about what lay beneath.
*Target Analysis: FAILED*
*Entity Classification: ????????????*
*Estimated Debt: ∞ + Interest*
*WARNING: INSUFFICIENT CLEARANCE LEVEL*
A slow smile spread across my blood-stained face as understanding dawned. The Black Dragon Society hadn't just been squatting on valuable real estate—they'd been sitting on top of the universe's oldest tax evader. An ancient entity that had been dodging cosmic audits since before humans learned to count.
"Well, well," I murmured, watching the eldritch light pulse in rhythm with my heartbeat. "Looks like this property came with a tenant I didn't know about."
The god fragment in my pocket grew hotter, resonating with whatever lay trapped beneath the ruins. Through the system's fractured analysis, I caught glimpses of impossible geometries and mathematical concepts that hurt to contemplate—the kind of advanced accounting that could bankrupt entire dimensions.
*System Alert: Sealed Entity Detected*
*Classification: Primordial Debtor*
*Outstanding Balance: ERROR - NUMBER TOO LARGE*
*Estimated Time to Breach: 72 hours*
*Recommendation: COLLECT EVERYTHING*
I ignored the warning and stepped closer to the edge of the pit. The purple light seemed to pulse in greeting, and for just a moment, I could swear I heard something vast and ancient stirring in the depths below—along with the sound of cosmic calculators trying to process an impossible debt.
"Buy one fortress, get one universe-class tax evader free," I said, my grin widening despite the blood still dripping from my nose. "I do love a good bargain."