?Nick just absentmindedly watched the guards leave.
Then, he looked back at the building, which was leaning against the megastructure.
It still was difficult for him to accept that all of this had happened.
"Boss?"
Nick looked back at his employees.
'Right, I should probably give some orders,' Nick thought.
"Take the next day off," Nick said. "You can come back the day after tomorrow during the morning. I will tell you what to do then."
Most of the people thanked Nick and quickly ran away.
Almost all of them had some loved ones, and they were quite worried about them.
The only reason why they had even showed up was to make sure that they still had a job and that the Specters didn't escape.
Jenny threw a neutral glance at Nick before she also left.
After some time, Nick was left alone.
For a couple of minutes, Nick just aimlessly stood in the middle of the street, looking around.
Eventually, he jumped to the entrance of Dark Dream's building again and sat down.
The building was tilted by about 20°, which made it a bit awkward sitting there, but Nick didn't care.
He just looked at the city from his elevated position.
The city's atmosphere had changed so much.
The feeling the old city gave people was one of hidden and distant danger.
Now, it gave a feeling of immediate threat and danger.
The main contributor was the red mist surrounding the city like a wall.
Over half an hour had passed since the incident, and the people were slowly coming to terms with their new situation.
Slowly, the shocked silence turned into heartbroken crying and aggressive shouting.
The refugees were crying in desperation, and the people who were living here were slowly starting to shout in anger.
They wouldn't share their houses with these dirty people!
Of course, there were also some people who wanted to help everyone, but those people were in the minority.
As more minutes passed, one scuffle after the other broke out.
People were blaming each other.
When humans felt like something unjust happened to them, they very quickly tried to find someone that they could blame for this injustice.
Sadly, nobody in the Outer City knew what had happened yet.
'I know whom they can blame,' Nick thought with self-ridicule.
For a while, Nick just sat there.
Over the next hours, a couple of missing employees showed up, but Nick just sent them away.
Eventually, Nick felt like he needed something to do and decided to clean the inside of the building a bit.
His first order of business was to feed the clerk's corpse to the Screaming Coffin.
After that, Nick grabbed the biggest pieces of rubble and moved them out of the building.
Of course, cleaning the entire building was way too big of a task, and he barely made any progress over several hours.
By now, a huge pile of debris had gathered below the building's entrance, but Nick just felt like the rubble inside the building was endless.
While Nick was cleaning the building, he constantly thought about the city, but it still didn't feel real.
At some point, Nick saw a couple of people waiting in front of the entrance.
They were the people sent to repair one of the Containment Units.
Nick brought them in and showed them the fourth floor.
After a while, the people decided to repair one of the unoccupied Containment Units.
Over the next hours, the people managed to repair it, and Nick transported the Blood Horse into the repaired Containment Unit.
With that, all the Specters were officially contained again.
The repair people left, and Nick was left alone again.
By now, it was already morning again.
Nick was still cleaning the building.
At 8 a.m., one of Wyntor's people showed up to tell Nick that Wyntor was still stuck in meetings.
Apparently, he was talking to a crazy number of people because of many different things.
Nick gave the man a rundown of what had happened in Dark Dream, and the guy left to tell Wyntor.
More hours passed, and Nick was still busy cleaning the building.
He didn't drink, eat, or sleep.
He was just cleaning the building absentmindedly.
At 12 p.m., one of Wyntor's people showed up again with a message.
"Sir says that he has done his best, but he couldn't get an exception for you," the man said.
"Exception for what?" Nick asked.
The man looked a bit surprised about that question.
"The undercity work," the man said. "Sir didn't get an exception for you, but you only have to do it once compared to all the other Zephyx Extractors."
"Sir has already dealt with the matter of security for the company. When the guards come to take you, just follow their orders. You don't have to worry about Dark Dream."
"Sir also said that he will contact you personally when he finds the time."
"He also told me to tell you that you shouldn't do anything drastic and that the only reason why he could talk with so many people in such a short time was that he trusts you with Dark Dream in his absence."
Nick's expression turned a bit uncomfortable.
"Thanks," Nick said.
The man nodded and left Nick again.
He still didn't know what undercity work was, but it didn't seem that important to Nick right now.
In fact, nothing seemed important.
What was the point of doing any of these things when he might as well be dead soon?
Whenever Nick thought about the fact that the state of the city was his fault, he felt a deep feeling of foreboding.
His heart was telling him that this was dangerous.
It was like Nick was hiding from an extremely powerful Specter.
Nick's heart was telling him that he would die if he confronted the Specter.
In the same way, Nick felt like he would die if he confronted the things that had happened yesterday.
Absentmindedly, his mind went out to the foreign ball of Zephyx in his neck.
The dangerous and explosive warmth of the foreign Zephyx calmed Nick down.
If he just touched it…
If he just moved it a bit…