Messing With Her? Are You Crazy! novel Chapter 1648

The air was thick with the sterile scent of disinfectants, cold metal, and strange chemical preservatives.

Staff members in protective suits bustled about.

Everyone wore security lanyards, their expressions tense. The chaos raging on the upper decks had clearly put them on high alert.

Julian Lancaster stood outside The Armory Inspection Suite.

Dressed in a pristine light-gray suit, a pair of thin gold-rimmed glasses rested on the bridge of his nose.

A polite, aristocratic smile lingered on his handsome face.

With his cuffs slightly rolled up, revealing pale, elegant wrists, he looked like a flawless, sheltered heir from a billionaire dynasty.

He looked far too gentle to be a man who dominated the international gray market, ruthlessly monopolizing the global underground arms trade.

Currently, a selection of high-tier weapon attachments—items not yet cleared for public bidding—lay on the table before him.

Officially, Julian was here under his Joker persona, demanding an early inspection of unlisted military hardware before the auction began.

Terrified of offending Joker, the crew eagerly complied.

After all, viewing attachments early was a minor concession.

In reality, however...

Since stepping backstage, his focus had never been on the weapons.

He boarded Project Zero-Transit solely to investigate the illicit ties between Black Sun and the ship's operators.

Over the past few days, scanning the backstage transit logs had revealed glaring anomalies.

Several shipments—lacking item descriptions, seller profiles, or even official serial numbers—had been quietly routed into the inner layers of The Sanctum Vault via The Logistics Spine.

Yet, the digital footprints for those transfers had been systematically wiped.

Anyone capable of erasing logs on Project Zero-Transit was far more than a standard buyer.

Julian lowered his gaze, his white-gloved finger idly trailing over a disassembled rifle barrel.

The unit was bristling with heavy life-support tubes.

The warning lights on its roof had been manually disabled.

At a passing glance, it looked like a high-maintenance pharmaceutical asset.

But Julian only needed one look to know something was catastrophically wrong.

When the ship's crew transported valuable cargo, their primary concern was repelling external ambushes.

Naturally, their defensive formations faced outward, guns trained on the corridors.

Their focus was entirely on neutralizing external threats the second they appeared, watching anyone who dared approach.

But this squad...

Although they were seemingly scattered around the pod, their true focus betrayed them.