Arknights: The Life Inside

Chapter 96

Chapter 96 - 96The Next Day

Yoren woke up early. Knowing that Brother ACE wasn't leaving lifted a weight off his chest. The relief made him feel lighter, brighter. He hummed a little tune as he jogged downstairs.

Hurd and his aunt, who were in the middle of making breakfast, turned to him in surprise.

"Yoren, why are you walking already?"

Yoren grinned and rolled up his pant leg.

"Second Uncle, my injury's healed! Look at my thigh, doesn't it look perfectly fine? White and shiny, right?"

Hurd frowned as he studied the fresh pink skin.

"Weird kid. Your body heals too fast."

After breakfast, Yoren called Snowsant and the others to his room for a meeting. He told them he wanted to start his own business.

Snowsant was the first to shoot her hand up.

"I agree! I mean, I love Aina too, but I want a place that's ours. A real home."

Ifrit jumped in, her eyes sparkling.

"Me too! If it's our own place, we can have BBQ parties whenever we want! Hehehe!"

Snowsant chimed again, beaming.

"And when we start making money, we can buy snacks!"

The two little girls spun wild dreams, voices overlapping.

"I wanna buy tons of candy!"

"I want Wangzai milk!"

"I want one of those huge princess beds like in storybooks!"

"I'm gonna plant a Christmas tree in the yard!"

Yoren quickly waved his hands to stop the flood.

"Okay, okay, timeout! You're treating this like it's make-believe. And sorry, you can't buy Wangzai milk—it's a specialty from my hometown."

Out of everyone, only Brother ACE remained calm and focused.

"What we buy comes later. Right now, what we really need is a headquarters."

Exactly. Yoren had thought the same. Though his second uncle was generous, this was just temporary. They couldn't build a future out of someone else's home.

The headquarters would be crucial. It would affect negotiations, supply storage, defense systems, even medical operations. Of course, they couldn't match a place like Black Steel International, not with their budget—but it had to feel like a real base. Not a backyard shack.

"Snowsant, tally up all our funds."

"Got it."

Because Terra's currency had a large denomination, the money looked less impressive when counted. They had 75,000 left from Hemer's envelope. After buying phones and other essentials, they still had 46,000 left from the Platt brothers' donation. Add the 7,000 ACE had, and that totaled 128,000 Terra coins. Plus, they still had two S-class origin stones.

Yoren broke it down and left 28,000 with his second uncle, just in case. Then, with 100,000 coins, he set off to find their new headquarters.

There were a lot of things to consider when picking a location: transport, strategic value, resources—but Yoren kept it simple. Headquarters could move in the future. What mattered now was getting started.

Hapi City was the obvious choice.

One, because light manganese ore was attractive.

Two, because of the privileges granted to the Infected.

Three... he was tired. He didn't feel like wandering into a new city.

In Hapi, the Kilt neighborhood made the most sense. Infected and ordinary citizens lived together there. It was the ideal place.

Yoren didn't want luxury, just space—room for logistics, a business front, housing, maybe even a small clinic. Something flexible. Something real. They wouldn't stay four forever.

He checked in with Hurd before leaving. Housing prices in Kilt weren't bad. District C was the cheapest. District A was mid-range. District B was pricier because it had commercial value—but they weren't planning to buy, just rent.

The

Yoren gave a thumbs-up. "Fitting name."

A few minutes of chatting revealed that their surname was Li. Ergou's father had died in an accident when he was young. He and his mother had lived here ever since.

His full name was Li Tianye. But everyone called him "Ergou." Some of the neighbors jokingly called him "Zhaotian." Why the nickname stuck—nobody knew. That's just how it was in neighborhoods like this.

Names, titles—they came and went. What mattered was how people treated each other.

But something else stood out to Yoren.

The surname "Li" didn't match the usual naming conventions in Victoria. People here didn't share surnames openly. Most went by given names or nicknames—like Cook, Hall, Wood, Brink. But Li? That was something different.

As they kept talking, Ergou shared one last thing.

He hadn't always lived with just his mother. He used to have an older sister.

But she'd run away from home a few years ago.

And no one had heard from her since.