Download App
77% Steel Waste / Chapter 546: Cutthroat...

Chapter 546: Cutthroat...

Elijah nods with a morose grin and begins leading the group through the VIP apartments. Dean makes a feeble attempt to resist his captor, but Elijah just shoots him in the foot... The hologram-like projectile almost blowing his foot completely apart.

Afton grimaces slightly at the bloody remains of Dean's foot, the bone and flesh of which had been decorated around the hallway. Of course, Dean screamed bloody murder, but Elijah kept firm control over the situation, pushing the weapon against the ghoul's temple when Afton starts to approach.

Thus, the group continues moving, Elijah leaving a long smeared trail of blood as he drags Deans shuddering body with him...

Eventually, they reach an elevator that was intelligently hidden nearby a storage cupboard and the stairs. It doesn't have any labels detailing where it led, nor did it have any buttons that would allow you to access it...

Elijah stops before it and points his gun at Christine, "Speak... Say 'Let go'... SAY IT." he commands as excitement shines in his eyes.

...

Afton's plant arm tightens its fist as tiny roots begin travelling up his sleeve, through his clothes and out the bottom of his trousers. Christine seems to be between psyching herself up to speak and glaring daggers at Elijah, which gives him plenty of time to put his plan in motion.

Now that they were 'close' enough, he could slowly approach with his roots, hopefully without the old man noticing.

"L-Let go." Christine says, but nothing seems to happen, causing Elijah to frown.

"Say it again... PROPERLY this time!"

"Let go!" Christine loudly repeats, and a light above the elevator door flickers to life.

Elijah follows everyone's line of sight and glances at the elevator, giddily grinning as he seemingly ignores the group. The elevator hadn't arrived yet, but he was acting as if the exit was already there for him... Fortunately, Afton had already begun his plan.

"W-what's thi-!?" Elijah mutters as he feels something slithering up his leg, before he's even able to get out a sentence he's pulled off of his feet, losing his weapon in the process. The root's girth swells as it strengthens and begins slamming Elijah into the hallway walls.

*Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!*

Afton grins viciously as he continues bouncing Elijah from one wall to the other, all the while multitasking and unclipping the old man's belt that held all his hidden devices. This continues for around a minute until he finally stops the beatdown, hoisting the elderly limp body up by its ankle.

Afton steps forwards and pokes Elijah in his chest, letting his body dangle painfully. "I told you didn't I? You're not leaving this place alive... Maybe I should take the opportunity and skin you, hang it up like a curtain to scare off anyone with similar ideas to you."

"Y-Y-You caan't! I'M ALMOST THERE! IT'S RIGHT THERE!" Elijah roars, reaching for his 'utility belt' but not finding it on his person. He growls and reach inside his elder robes instead, pulling out some sort of remote control?

He's about to press a button but Afton snatches it out of his hand, causing the elderly man to give an angry and distraught shout. "AAAAFFFTOOOOOON!!!!"

Afton ignores the man's screams and examines the control, quickly realising that it's linked to the Casino's central security. "Ah? A gift? How thoughtful." he says before turning and glancing behind him at Christine. "You had some business with him?"

Christine nods, "I do." she quietly replies, her new voice still difficult for Afton to get used to. She strolls up to Elijah with a hard look and draws a knife, with it, she presses the cold metal against Elijah's forehead before slowly beginning to cut the skin away from his face.

The group watches with morbid fascination as Christine carves the same scars she has onto Elijah, all the while the mad former-elder screams in agony, yet, still not begging for forgiveness, but promising retribution.

Afton wonders if the man was really so deluded to think that Christine would let him leave in one piece. She continues to carve long bloody lines into his skull, face, and lastly, neck. She makes sure not to deal a lethal blow, her cuts were efficient and measured... However, soon enough even Christine seems to have had enough, dealing the final blow to the elderly man by brutally cutting out his vocal cords.

She allows the corpse to slump to the floor as she tosses the organ away, taking a glance at Veronica who looks both horrified and relieved at the fate of her former mentor.

Honestly, it was hard to tell how Christine was actually feeling in this moment. She had a small satisfied smile plastered across her face, yet, both of her hands were trembling slightly...

[Elder Elijah killed : Quest complete]

[Reward for completion : Treasure.]

With Elijah dead, Afton turns his attention to Dean who was still slowly but surely bleeding out from his mangled foot. He quickly applies a liberal amount of Med X and Stimpacks while bandaging the wound tightly to prevent further blood loss.

*DING*

As if having waited for Elijah's end, the elevator doors finally slide open, revealing a cabin completely devoid of dust and looking spectacularly clean.

...

Afton glances at everyone, "Err, well... I should let you guys know that I had already found a way out of here, but if you wanna check out the treasure then I'm not gonna say no." he shrugs.

"We need to see if it's dangerous or not... Whether or not the treasure should be destroyed to prevent people like Elijah from getting their hands on it." Christine states after taking a moment to compose herself after her recent execution.

Afton shakes his head, "It depends on what it is... You should be aware that in all likelihood, I'll be taken it for Bulwark... Before anything though, me and Veronica should hop back in our armour... No point going in unprepared."

The group nod and not long after they're gathered back around the elevator entrance. They had collectively decided to leave Anja and Dean behind, both having been heavily injured and would be pretty useless in a confrontation.

Though, Dean seemed adamant on actually seeing what the treasure was... So, in the end, they decided that after it'd been scouted out and deemed safe, everyone else would follow.


CREATORS' THOUGHTS
Niggross Niggross

Hope you bois liked the chap, if I missed anything please let me know. Thanks!

If I you like my content or want to read ahead please go to https://www.p.atreon.com/Nagross, I'd appreciate it.

Also, thanks to my patrons for their support :

ShinAmazake

Chris Lindsey

Kingsprovince

Michael Jarrett

Nazlican Erdem

next chapter

Chapter 547: Vaulted Memories

Afton, Veronica, and Christine all enter the elevator, the latter of which seemed to tense due to how claustrophobic it was with everyone inside. The elevator travels downwards for a minute or so until it finally reaches the bottom... The doors slide open and the group are presented with the most heavily fortified area they'd seen in the Casino thus far...

Everything was plated in Saturnite alloy, Auto-Turrets were set up absolutely everywhere, from the floor, ceiling, and even the walls... The doors were covered in blue force fields that obviously originated from Big Mt... Last but not least, there were at least twenty Holograms slowly walking around the place, walking through the force fields while patrolling the area.

One immediately turns their head towards the group and starts turning red and beginning to charge up a laser. Afton immediately points Elijah's remote control towards it and presses a random button, causing all the Holograms in the room to freeze in place...

"Huh..." he mutters, feeling as if he got lucky, there were many other buttons and he just so happened to press the right one. Next, he needed to find the button for the turrets...

"Seems like Elijah already had everything planned out..." Veronica says from the side.

Afton nods, "If he wasn't a crazy bastard, I might have been impressed." he says while pressing another random button.

*Bzzzwwuuuu*

The forcefield all peter out as he presses the button, giving the turrets a clean line of fire at the group. The turrets quickly turn and start firing at them, Afton and Veronica having to step in the way to protect Christine with their armoured bodies.

*Click, Click, Click*

Afton presses a couple more buttons, accidentally causing music to start playing in the room as well as causing the frozen holograms to start dancing on the spot... The last button he presses activates the sprinklers with immediately start soaking the room. "God damn it!" he exclaims.

"Just let me do it!" Veronica states as she snatches the control out of his hand and confidently presses a button.

*Clack!*

*SHOOOO!*

Barrels of some sort of weapon pop out of the walls and immediately start firing streams of fire randomly into the room, water from the sprinklers sizzle and start steaming up the room, slowly but surely obscuring their sight.

"WHY IS THAT EVEN A FEATURE OF THE ROOM!?" Veronica shouts in shock as she presses a couple more buttons to fix it. The flame throwers turn off and the sprinklers shut off too. Another couple clicks and the Auto-Turrets stop firing, but still follow the group as if keeping an eye on them.

Afton takes the control back with a sigh, walking further into the room to check for any more traps... Fortunately, the current security seems to be everything. He looks to the side at some more heavy, saturnite plated doors, it was obviously the vault that contained the treasures that Sinclaire supposedly left here.

He walks over to it and examines it for a moment, allowing Nyx to try and gain access to it to check for any more traps... Strangely, Nyx is completely unable to even find the subsystems inside, let alone actually check them.

"You guys ready to find some treasure?" he asks over his shoulder, Veronica nods with a grin hidden under her helmet while Christine simply follows them with a neutral look.

Afton tries to push it open but finds that it's locked, similarly to the elevator, without any indication of how to actually open it... This isn't a problem though as Afton quickly recalls the scribbled messages that Vera wrote in her room... Let go, which was used earlier, and Begin again.

He relays this information to Christine who just says and speaks loudly towards the door, "Begin again."

*Click!*

*Griiiind*

Mechanisms inside the door begin quietly working, eventually allowing the heavy door to slowly swing open towards them, giving them access to the room. Afton is the first to step inside, and is intrigued to find a hatch leading deeper underground in the corner of the room, as well as a simple terminal waiting in the middle of the room.

Afton accesses it and is immediately greeted with a number of entries, Sinclaire's personal entries, messages to Vera Keyes, and other less interesting entries. Afton first decides to look at Sinclaires message to Vera Keyes, as he was curious to know what he thought about her betrayal.

The subsequent message was a long, heartfelt apology to Vera for the way Sinclaire had acted, as well as allowing his dark thoughts to turn what was once a safe haven against the apocalypse, into a trap for Dean...

Apparently, Sinclaire had rigged the terminal to shut the vault and disallow any attempts to escape if his personal accounts were accessed. The vault door with permanently close, and the elevator would go back to the upper floors before permanently restricting access to the vault.

Despite it all though, Afton was still curious over what Sinclaire had to say to Dean... "Nyx, can you isolate the terminal and prevent it from affecting anything outside?"

"I can certainly try, sir."

Afton nods, allowing her to do so. He wasn't afraid of being trapped, as he could simply cut his way out of the vault. The only real issue would be the elevator, but he could just climb his way out and lower a rope for Veronica and Christine to use to get out as well.

While Nyx was isolating the terminal, Afton walks over to the underground hatch that Veronica and Christine were struggling to open... It was apparently too heavy for them to lift, meaning there was a mechanism nearby for it... But, why would Afton refuse a time to show off?


CREATORS' THOUGHTS
Niggross Niggross

Hope you bois liked the chap, if I missed anything please let me know. Thanks!

Also, thanks to my patrons for their support :

ShinAmazake

Chris Lindsey

Kingsprovince

Michael Jarrett

Nazlican Erdem

Tarlock

Load failed, please RETRY

Weekly Power Status

Batch unlock chapters

Table of Contents

Display Options

Background

Font

Size

Chapter comments

Write a review Reading Status: C546
Fail to post. Please try again
  • Writing Quality
  • Stability of Updates
  • Story Development
  • Character Design
  • World Background

The total score 0.0

Review posted successfully! Read more reviews
Vote with Power Stone
Rank 200+ Power Ranking
Stone 3 Power Stone
Report inappropriate content
error Tip

Report abuse

Paragraph comments

Login

tip Paragraph comment

Paragraph comment feature is now on the Web! Move mouse over any paragraph and click the icon to add your comment.

Also, you can always turn it off/on in Settings.

GOT IT