"It's a laboratory." Hancock frowned as she looked around the giant hall, finding some computers, lots of screens, cabinets filled with books, and then glassed tubes and large cylinders filled with some strange liquid inside them. "Did you not say that this place was 800 years old?"
If anything, this place was even more futuristic than Vegapunk's laboratory on the Karakuri Island that they had visited.
"Yes." Sin nodded to her and then moved to the centre of the Hall, right in the middle of the Octagram, and out of curiosity, he placed his hand on the orb on the control panel, which was glowing in a greyish-blue light.
Suddenly, they heard a feeble beep, followed by more, and a few seconds later, they found themselves starting at a holographic screen.
"Access Denied! No matches for the fingerprints found." Robin read the alert on the holographic screen, which was written in an Ancient Language, one that she and Sin were very familiar with.
"This is the official language of the Ancient Kingdom." Sin frowned, and Hancock's eyes widened at his words.
"I am going to check the books to see if we can access the system in some other way." Robin immediately said, brimming with excitement, and then she quickly moved to the closest cabinet.
Sin and Hancock frowned when they saw her go through book after book and then just start dropping them on the floor in a slight show of frustration.
"They are blank?" He asked as he looked at the pages of the fallen books.
"Yes." His little sister nodded to him and sighed when even the last book turned out to be blank. "They are fakes."
"Sure?"
"Yes." Robin nodded and picked up a random book, bringing it over to them. "See the paper?"
"It's normal." Hancock nodded her head. And confirmed it by slightly tearing a page.
"The page layout is for diaries, and I suppose these are all the unused ones. When they evacuated this place or left, they must have taken the useful ones with them." The younger Black told them her guess and then sighed as she stared at the screen again.
"What do we do now?"
"Let's search for any hidden doors." Sin suggested, and both Hancock and Robin got to work.
An hour later, they returned in front of the screen and stared at it intently.
There were no hidden doors in this place, except for the Octagram they were standing on. And all three of them could tell that the only way to open it would be through accessing the system.
"Should I try and melt it?" Hancock asked, knowing well that if she did it, this system would be harmed as well. So, she was not surprised when both Sin and Robin shook their heads.
Robin just decided to step forward and place her hand on the orb too, and the same alert popped up on the screen again.
She kept repeating the process and frowned a little when she saw the system showing no warning about going into emergency mode or locking itself.
Sin then tried to press the buttons on the panel, and even tried to type on the holographic keyboard, but nothing happened.
"Should we press the red one?" Robin finally looked at him.
It was the only button that they had not pressed since it was coloured red, and they had assumed it to be an emergency switch.
Sin took a deep breath and then immediately pressed it, and quickly grabbed Hancock and Robin by their waists, ready to bolt out of there as soon as he sensed danger.
However, something unexpected happened when he pressed that button.
The glowing Orb suddenly split open, and then a needle rose out of it.
There was now a new message on the screen, asking them to verify their identity through a Blood Test. And both the girls instinctively looked at Sin.
Robin, of course, knew the truth about her Family, and Sin had informed Hancock about it as well.
Though the Black Family once used to the part of the Ancient Kingdom and was one of the Ruling Families, they were expelled for some unknown reason. It happened a couple of decades before the Ancient Kingdom fell, and at that time, the Royal House of Black had settled on a sky Island, having cut their ties with the other Families in the Kingdom.
Sin frowned, a little doubtful that his Blood would be recognised. But then, under the watchful eyes of the two girls, he decided to give it a try.
He carefully pressed his left index finger on the needle, allowing it to prick his skin and feed on his blood.
The system started verifying his DNA, and against their expectations, his Blood was recognised by it.
The Royal Black - Verified
"Kindly, fill in your personal information."
A few windows popped up, and Sin saw the names of his ancestors on it, and then he proceeded to fill in the rest of the names on the Black Family Tree, the ones had read about and remembered, before he submitted his and Robin's information.
Since she was present with him, he asked her to register herself on the system, and she did it by verifying her Blood as well.
The two of them now had access to the entire system, and Sin immediately got to work, searching all the files in it.
Robin was hoping to learn more about the Ancient Kingdom, and Sin shared her thoughts and more.
Even though he did not know much about it, he knew that the Ancient Kingdom's technology far surpassed that of their age.
However, everything they found on it was mainly related to a single project called Kraken. And when Sin and Robin went through its details and looked at the blueprint on the screen, they had very different reactions to it all.
Sin was madly grinning, but Robin was pensively looking at the Weapon that was created by the Ancient Kingdom.
"It's a Weapon, isn't it?" Hancock guessed from Sin's expression.
"Yes, and it is unregistered." He grinned, proceeding to press some keys on the panel.
The two girls narrowed their eyes when the floor under their feet started splitting and they were moved to the side together with the system.
A massive hole appeared, which was soon filled up as a platform rose from below, carrying a large metallic Egg which was easily sixteen meters tall, and just as wide in diameter.
It was a Weapon of Mass Destruction and a technology that probably no one else in the world had access to. And Sin had not looked at something of this scale and power before.
Following the instructions on the system, he immediately proceeded to register the Weapon under his command for the next 50 years, the Maximum time frame that was allowed before it would reset itself and he would have to register again. He also made sure to restrict the System Access to only the Black Family for the next 50 years.
Luckily, only the Royal Bloods from the Ancient Kingdom could register it under their command, and Sin doubted there was another Royal Family out there. Maybe some remnants. As unlikely as it was that those remnants would have any idea about their history and ancestry, he still did it out of precaution. Now, even if some royal blood decides to acess the system, they would be denied by it.
"Can you power it up?" Hancock impatiently asked as she watched Sin close the lid on the egg, having registered it under his command.
"It does not have enough power inside it right now." He shook his head before he walked back to the control panel and showed them its status.
"We need Dyna Stones." Robin said and inadvertently looked at the Cylinders which were filled with the liquid that was meant to store the Dyna Stones.
"Yes." Sin nodded to her and then opened a video where the different forms of the Kraken were displayed along with their information.
"It can turn into a Submarine?" Hancock was pleasantly surprised, and Sin nodded to her.
"It can also levitate, but it can not fly," He informed her.
"Was it also used to transfer the Na Island in the Sky?"
"No. That was somthing else, and there is no detail on it in the system. However, the Kraken was used to split the Island into Seven parts."
"How powerful is it? Island killer?"
"Yes." Robin pensively nodded her head, answering Hancock's question. "It even has self-repairing capabilities and an Aritificial Intelligence."
Hancock stared at the screen when she heard Robin's words and then took a deep breath, smiling at their luck.
"We have hit a jackpot."
Sin grinned at her words and nodded his head.
"Indeed. This will be our trump card when the need arises." He said and then glanced at the two of them. "For now, no one else needs to know about it." He seriously said, and both the girls understandably nodded their heads.
"Do you think there could be more such weapons out there?" Robin frowned, a little worried, and rightly so.
If this technology fell in the wrong hands, and even if they could not control it, they could have some mad scientist learn its secrets and create something deadly in its image.
And Robin was worried that something like that might have already been created or was under research.
"Maybe." Sin shrugged. "But we will not let anyone get their hands on this Weapon. It will stay here until we need it. Worst comes worst, I will give it the command to self-destruct."
Robin nodded her head to his words and then shut the system down, hiding the Kraken under the floor and returning the chamber to its earlier state.
"Let's go. Bonney must be anxious right now." She said to her friend and her brother, and the two nodded to her before walking out with her.
"No treasure?" The pink-head frowned when she saw them come out empty handed.
"Nope. No gold or jewels for Nami." Sin replied and then planted a kiss on her cheek.
"What was in there then?"
"Go, see for yourself." He said to her, and she frowned before she ran inside.
The three of them laughed when they saw her return, wearing a grumpy expression.
"A boring lab?" She asked, and they nodded their heads. "You wasted days for this!"
"Well, it was a fun Treasure Hunt." He shrugged.
"Yeah, right." She rolled her eyes. "Take me to the ship now. I want to eat." She demanded, and he obliged by taking them all back to the ship after retrieving the keys, which resulted in the door closing before them. "We can store our future treasure here. It will be safe." She thoughtfully said.
"Sure." And Sin smiled at her.