Vigle told Kuro everything that had transpired till now. Kuro just listened, saying nothing. After Vigle finished speaking, Kuro stood up with the lemonade in hand.

He looked through the window, observing the mining workers below. Anger was boiling within him to the point it was about to burst. The lemonade glass shattered to pieces by the force of his palm.

“Damn it! Damn it all! One shit hole after another! First was that weak chief who caused us trouble. Now there are stupid outlaws roaming on this planet?!”

Kuro’s fangs popped out of his fingers as if he was about to kill everyone in sight. Vigle and Gorger remained cautioned, not saying anything that would escalate the situation.

“You seem to have your hands quite full”

Suddenly, a voice echoed out from the background. All of their attention shifted towards the corner of the room on top of one of the many shelves. A being with purple swimsuit clothing stood atop, looking down at them. He had no eyes. A long mouth that seemed to stretch from the back of his head towards the front with 100s of sharp teeth and a long tongue. 3 black strips across the eye area and rabbit-like ears and a coating of white fur all around. His size was almost 4 feet 9 inches. A small body, but a menacing one at that.

“You?! How long have you been there, Ondhokar?”

The being’s name was Ondhokar. It seemed Kuro knew this being. The anger that had pent up in Kuro had just instantly disappeared. Only thing that was left inside was fear. Fear of destruction and death. In a single leap, Ondhokar elegantly jumped down from the place. His fall was calculated, no forced action. A person who seemed to have complete control of their action on ground and on air. Despite that, Kuro wasn’t someone to kneel before, just about anyone.

“Now, now, we don’t need to get hostile, do we? I am here for an errand, to be more precise.”

“Errand…”

“Whatever schemes you and your so called Lord are planning behind this stupid mining rig doesn’t concern the Doc. What he needs is his materials. A thousand units worth of hearthstones.”

“That's awfully a lot you know. You got money to pay for it?” Vigle said. Not seeing his boss kneel gave Vigle some confidence. But a stare from a monster like Ondhokar swept it all away. Regardless, Ondhokar wasn't there to fight. Like he said himself, it was an errand of utmost importance. From one of his pockets, he flung a card towards Kuro.

“That card has all the money you want and more.”

Kuro noticed it was an intergalactic transaction card. He flipped the card to find a small container containing a green fluid stuck to the back of the card with tape.

“What's this?” he asked.

“An energy drink. Drink it if you are losing in a fight. Courtesy of the Doc”

“Like I would ever pick a losing fight.”

“Whatever”

Saying that, he strolled towards the elevator. A wolf came rushing out of the elevator with some documents in hand which had a list of names and pictures in it.. Ondhokar was a very observant person. Among all the names on the list, one caught his attention the most.

“Miku…”

But he walked away, saying nothing. As Ondhokar walked away, Kuro and the rest let out a sigh of relief. The wolf kneeled before Kuro before giving him the list in hand.

“Sir, we have made a list of all the outsiders that have popped in the land”

“How did you make this?”

“Some of our boys worked in the intelligence facility of the underworld. They could dig up this list from the recent events that transpired across the galaxies.”

“This…. this is an O.D.Y.S.S.E. Y program list! You’re meaning to tell me that our work is being hampered by a bunch of fucking rookies?!”

He looked at Vigle with a pissed off glare. Vigle understood from Kuro’s body language that he was ordering Vigle to take care of this mess.

“I’m on it,” Vigle said, nodding his head.

Nozomi, Ethan, and Bull ambled in an aimless direction. Nozomi wasn’t familiar with this place, nor was Ethan. She didn't know what to do now.

“I think I should have arrested him at least, right?” she casually uttered,

“You thought of this now, you idiot?!” Ethan shouted, slapping her behind her back.

Ethan, though scared of others, was oddly relaxed in front of her. He sighed as he kept on typing on the laptop. Nozomi felt the gust of dust floating around her. The feeling of nothing was reaching her brain at an incredible speed. Though the fight was short, it was exhilarating for her. Ethan kept on researching as more and more info kept on popping out.

“Interesting,” he murmured to himself.

Meanwhile, Bull, being the playful dog he was, kept on trying to grab Nozomi’s attention. “Not now Bull.” She tried to shrug him off, but he was persistent. Bull kept on barking. Kneeling its head while simultaneously wiggling its tail. Those 10 eyes were staring at her with such a puppylike face that it was impossible to overlook this cuteness.

“Oh you little, come here you-”

She grabbed Bull, cuddling with him. Itching below his throat with her left hand while running her right hand across his fur.

“Found it!” Ethan shouted, which shook both Bull and Nozomi.

“Jeez, don’t shout suddenly like that.” she retorted

“Oh, my bad, but check this out.” he pulled the laptop close to Nozomi’s face. It showed a webpage with a company named on top.

“Nexus mining corp? It seems like a company that does mining work. What about it?”

“Well, that's the thing. There is nothing about it. Literally nothing. No documents, not a legitimate company page or even blog posts. But it seemed they have all the information of a normal company but with zero activity. A normal person would think it exists, but an expert at website design would know a company website isn’t usually like that”

“I’m not getting what you trying to say here, exactly.”

Ethan sighed and said further,

“Look at this list. This is the list of the mining corps currently working in the Velmor galaxy. No matter if it's an official corporation or an indie one, everyone needs to sign an agreement which would register them working on any of the planets. If not, that would mean-”

“Illegal access to territory.”

“Exactly. There is no data here that says they have access to this region at the moment. Rather, a company like this doesn't even exist in the archive database.”

“Then who the hell are they?”

“But get this, there is one company that had an association with this planet almost two years ago.”

”Two years?”

“Yea and that expired just after three months of work”

“What's the company’s name?”

“Falcon X”

Nozomi’s eyes widened at hearing such a familiar name…

“Isn't that…”

“The company run by the Ivan household. Also known as one of the most influential Royal families of the Velmor Galaxy.”

Nozomi was speechless hearing that. She realized this was no ordinary problem. Someone greater was being schemed behind all of this facade. But this was a problem which was not an easy one to deal with.

"What are we gonna do, Nozomi?" Ethan felt worried. He knew the history of royal families very well.

"We can't go against the royal families. They are the direct descendants of the current OverLord." he further added.

Nozomi gritted her teeth, feeling pissed at all of this. A feeling of helplessness was wavering in her mind.

"Is this what he felt?" an image of Ken popped into her head.

Back in the mountain steeps, Ken was slowly climbing the mountain with Liam and Lola sitting on his shoulders like two children on top of their parents. Ken, using his tentacle abilities, was zipping from one point to another as his arms could stretch up to 20 meters high.

“So uncle Halo is on your ship huh?” Liam asked.

“Yea, I found him and many of your villagers in those giant robots.”

Their attention diverted to the mining robots at the side. But Ken ignored them as those robots were not causing any problem to them.

“Once we get Uncle Halo back, I want him to read me that book.” Lola said with a jolly expression.

“Again?” Liam sighed. “I think you‘ve already memorized that book”

“I enjoy hearing that story,” Lola replied.

“What are you guys talking about?!”

“Oh, you don't know, big bro Ken. There is a really cool book. With magical warriors who fight against a great evil to protect the Universe. They are like the liberators of the world, you know. They protect the innocent but also follow their own way of life, doing what their heart calls for them.”

Lola was talking with enthusiasm. She was very into this story, no doubt.

“Really?”

“Hmm. They are so so so cool!”

“Ah, enough with those fairy tales, Lola. Those legends are never true,” Liam said.

“These fairy tales are close to my heart ok?! you’re no fun,big bro!” Lola pouted. A grin formed on Ken’s face as he heard their conversations.

“Those warriors… they are pretty cool, huh?” Ken said.

“Uh, huh? I really, really admire them! I wish they would also come here and help us in need too, you know”

Saying that made her realize her current situation, which made her lose her jolly expression.

“I wonder when we will be free…” she wondered. Liam also felt down, thinking about it. Ken realized the tense atmosphere and tried to think of a way to change it.

“So these warriors, what are they called exactly?”

Ken asked as his tentacle hand had reached the tip of the mountain. As they pulled upwards Lola said with joy again,

“The Phantom Reapers!”