"Two more etings closed," Kiri said.
Kenji looked up from the delivery sheet.
Unit 14 had not been quiet since morning. Papers moved from one table to another. Sera was checking nas against contract copies, Davin was marking sample lots, and Shinju had three files open at once. The office still looked small, but it no longer felt like a place waiting for sothing to happen.
Sothing was already happening.
Kiri placed two signed copies on the table. "Both are long-term supply windows. One is three years. The other is two. The volus are not huge in the first month, but they will grow after evaluation."
Kenji stared at the signatures for a second longer than he ant to.
"So we have to inform him," Kiri said.
Kenji understood that Kiri ant Wil, Rivan, or whoever from that side handled the manufacturing line.
Kenji took out his phone and called the number Rivan had used before. The call rang while the room grew quieter without anyone asking for silence.
Sowhere else, Adam was walking through a side street in another face.
This disguise was not Wil, not Rivan, and not the ssenger he had used with Bruno. He looked like a tired shop worker heading ho after an early shift, with a cloth cap and cheap glasses.
His original phone rang in his pocket.
Adam stopped near a closed stationery shop and answered.
"Sir," Kenji said, and even through the phone Adam could hear the excitent he was trying to hide. "We have more delivery commitnts. I will send the full details."
"How many companies?" Adam asked.
"At least seven now," Kenji said. "So are small first orders, but all of them need supply within the next few days. The first batches are staggered. I will ssage the dates, quantities, and chip types."
Adam’s face did not change, but his grip tightened around the phone.
Seven companies.
"Good," he said. "Send everything. I will handle it."
"Yes, sir."
Adam ended the call and kept walking.
At first, the news felt good. Seven companies ant Aster Core was no longer begging for one chance. Kiri had moved fast. Kenji had not collapsed under the pressure. The file had worked.
Then the other side of the result ca into his mind.
He had promised supply.
Until now, copying a few hundred chips had felt difficult but possible. A trial lot here, one ergency order there, a double batch for safety. But seven companies were not the end. If this kept working, then the number would not stay at seven. It would beco twenty, then fifty, then maybe a hundred.
At that point, Adam could not stand in a room with ORS water and keep pasting chips like a machine.
He turned into a narrower lane and slowed down.
’Can I copy the machine itself?’ he thought.
The idea had been sitting sowhere in his head for a while. If a machine could manufacture the chips, then copying the machine might solve the supply problem. But the mont he thought about it properly, the weakness appeared.
A chip was not made by one machine standing alone like a printer. There were clean rooms, wafers, chemicals, masks, testing tools, packaging steps, and people who understood the order. Copying one machine without the whole line might only give him a very expensive object he could not use.
Still, the idea was not useless.
If he ever reached a real production line, he could learn what part mattered most. Maybe he could copy finished wafers, a testing machine, or the right packaged chip in larger form.
But not today.
Today he needed delivery.
Adam changed his route.
The plan he had for the afternoon could wait. He would go to the second base first, the apartnt he used for supply work, and test how far he could push the output before his body refused.
He comforted himself with one fact. The seven companies did not need everything in one day. Kenji had said the batches were staggered. That ant Adam could make a few hundred units today, rest, make more tomorrow, and send them out through the sa delivery pattern. If he managed the schedule carefully, the lie could continue.
But that was only a short answer.
Long term, it was not enough.
Adam touched the small packet of ORS in his pocket. Water and electrolytes helped him keep going longer. They did not remove the cost, but they delayed the crash. He had produced about two hundred and fifty units before, and so were still left.
Back at Unit 14, the office slowly returned to movent.
Kiri was already preparing the next call. Davin was checking how many docunts had to be copied for delivery. Sera counted the signed papers twice because she did not trust the first number. Kenji looked younger for a mont, almost like he had forgotten the last few frightening weeks.
Only Shinju stayed quiet.
Kenji noticed after a while.
"What happened?" he asked. "You should be happy."
She looked at the papers, then at the door Rivan had used the last ti he ca.
"I am happy," she said.
"That did not sound like it."
Shinju closed the file in front of her.
"Nothing. I am just thinking."
Kenji did not push at once.
His silence made the thought harder to avoid.
Wil had appeared with money and chips. Then Rivan had appeared as his son. Bruno had co in with violence, then beco silent in front of Wil. He had apologized, lowered his head, and accepted punishnt as if the old man was soone he could not offend.
That was not normal.
Shinju had not forgotten the marks on Kenji’s face that day. She had not forgotten how Bruno had spoken before Wil arrived and how he changed after Wil entered. People did not change that fast because of respect alone.
Her legal mind kept returning to the sa point.
Who was Wil?
Where did his money co from?
What kind of man could bring a thug like Bruno to heel and then send business files full of private weaknesses as if they were market reports?
She wanted to ignore it because the company needed the help. Everyone needed the help.
But ignoring a suspicious pattern had never been her strength.
Shinju opened the file again, but she was no longer reading the contracts.
She was thinking about the man behind them.
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