Exploring the Secret Vault

"Wait... can Devils fly?" Chen Xuan suddenly wondered. The only Devil he had ever dealt with was Gustav, and Gustav could at least turn into a swarm of flying insects.

"Most of them... can't," Elorie replied between gasps. "Devils have different abilities. The one thing they share is an appetite for... souls."

So Gustav was an exception?

"Let's get inside. She looks like she's about to give out," Lin Qing urged.

The three of them crept toward the ventilation opening. Wire mesh covered its outer edge, and rotating fans were visible inside. A set of cameras was half-buried in the wall above the duct, probably to check whether birds had nested there.

Lin Qing sliced through the mesh with Molecular Wire and entered first, smashing the camera overhead as she went.

By the time Chen Xuan and Elorie crawled in after her, she had already dismantled the fans.

To keep them from losing one another, Chen Xuan dropped his invisibility.

The duct was about a meter wide, large enough for an adult to crawl through. Lin Qing scouted ahead, Chen Xuan took the middle, and Elorie followed behind. He had to admit, the view made his mind wander. To avoid an awkward silence, he kept making idle conversation.

For instance, why make the ducts so large in a supposedly secret building? Why not make them just big enough for rats and install a dozen times as many?

Lin Qing laughed at him.

"Shrink the ducts that much and you couldn't even ventilate a house, much less a fully sealed building," she said. "The best defense is always an active one. Thinking you can design a building that shuts out every intruder is a fantasy."

"What's an active defense?" Elorie asked curiously.

"Guard dogs were the ancient version. As technology advances,