Kill the Sun

After Vernon was done speaking, Aria stood up.

She talked a bit about the Extractors that every Manufacturer needed to dedicate to the city and tried to change a couple of allocations.

All these changes seemed to be unimportant and uninteresting to Nick. Especially since these changes were only relevant to people in the Inner City and bigger Manufacturers.

After a couple of minutes, it was time for Anatomy to say their piece.

Yet, surprisingly, they didn't have to say anything.

"They don't want to challenge their luck," Wyntor whispered to Nick.

Nick nodded in understanding.

The governor had made it clear that he was suspicious of Anatomy earlier when they had talked about the inspection.

Anatomy managed to buy a year of time, and they were not willing to risk that year just to ask the governor for some minor advantages.

After that, it was time for Ghosty's Lab.

Ghosty's Lab only talked a bit about their recent scientific research.

Ghosty himself talked about the research for almost 20 minutes.

Nick wasn't sure what the point of all of that was until Ghosty talked about a new product.

Ghosty's Lab was developing a method of converting a normal Containment Unit into one that could suppress Force Specters without the need to relocate the Specter inside it.

The product was still in its test phase, and Ghosty was asking for public funding for his research.

The governor declined.

However, Nick could tell that this had never been about the funding.

Ghosty had simply used this opportunity to present his new product in detail to the important people of every Manufacturer.

And sure enough, Nick saw a couple of people looking at Ghosty with interest.

"Some Physical Specters can turn into Force Specters after they advance a level," Wyntor whispered to Nick after seeing his confused expression. "If that happens, that Specter will almost certainly breach, and in the best-case scenario, the city will demand hefty fines that are well in excess of the value of the Specter."

Nick's eyes widened in surprise.

That was the first time he had heard about one kind of Specter changing into another kind.

"That can happen?" Nick asked.

"It is very rare, but there are precedence cases," Wyntor said. "If, by chance, something like this happens to one of the Manufacturers, the issue will not be the fine they will have to pay, but the loss of trust and confidence."

"The city will start demanding more Extractors in relation to Specters, which will essentially gut the profits of a Manufacturer for several years."

"For Manufacturers like Kugelblitz and Anatomy, converting almost all their Containment Units to avoid this risk is worth it, and it's also cheaper, based on what Ghosty said," Wyntor explained.

Nick could only nod in agreement.

After Ghosty's Lab was done, Gemini talked about their strongest Specter, the Distortion.

Surprisingly, they publicly said what kind of ability the Distortion granted people.

It gave people the ability to distort their surroundings, which could disorient others.

However, more importantly, that ability could be used in conjunction with others, which will result in much more power.

And with enough power, Prephyx could even be partially isolated from an area.

As soon as the other Manufacturers heard that, they focused on Gemini with interest.

Even Wyntor looked at the two from Gemini with interest.

Nick knew how Specters worked, and he knew exactly why everyone was interested.

Ghosty was the one that asked the question that was on Nick's mind.

"Does that help in suppressing Force Specters?"

Mindy Wunder, the CEO of Gemini, only smirked.

"Yes, it does."

Immediately, the Chief Zephyx Extractors started to talk to their CEOs and Directors.

The potential for this ability was immense!

They could save millions of credits!

On top of that, the base ability was also useful in many other fields and even had a great potential for future evolutions.

Naturally, Gemini was using this opportunity to announce their new initiative of creating Newbies.

Gemini had the second biggest number of Newbies, and now, they were going to get even more.

Of course, they were getting more so that other Manufacturers would purchase them.

The price?

A million credits.

Per Initial Newbie.

That was quite a bit more expensive than what Ghosty's Lab wanted for their Newbies, but the value of the Distortion spoke for itself.

In the end, she just asked for some idiotic funding that would never get granted to make it a relevant topic for the meeting and stopped talking about it.

But Gemini had achieved its goal.

After that, Solace talked a bit about the Extractors they had to dedicate to the city.

Apparently, they needed more Extractors for the next three months and asked for the city's help.

The governor said that they would only need to dedicate 10% of their Extractors to the city for the next six months, but he would expect 30% for the six months after that.

Solace just thanked him and accepted.

Then, it was the turn of the Spartans.

And they dropped a bomb.

"We found a level four Specter within ten kilometers of Crimson Fungus City, and we are asking for competitive protection due to our major investments in uncovering this Specter."

The other Manufacturers became interested.

"You don't have the manpower necessary to suppress a level four Specter," the governor said. "I can only give you one if you find a partner with enough power and show me proof of your significant investments."

"I can only give you a temporary one for one week. If I am not convinced by then, the information on your Specter will be publicized to the other Manufacturers," the governor said.

The Spartans just thanked the governor and nodded.

Naturally, this was also just an .

The top five Manufacturers were all interested in an Elder Specter, especially Solace. After all, Solace already had an Expert but no Elder to increase their power.

Meanwhile, Gemini wanted to keep Solace from joining the level of Manufacturers that owned an Elder.

Everyone knew that a brutal bidding war would take place between those two.

Both of them would want to become the Spartans' partner and claim the right to capture the Specter.

And finally, it was Dark Dream's turn.

"We have nothing," Wyntor said.

Nobody reacted to Wyntor's words.

Then, one of the representatives stood up.

"No issues here," he said.

Some seconds later, the governor stood up.

"Meeting adjourned."