Persona 5 Royal AU

Chapter 47 - Slight Troubles

Sunday arrived, and we decided to head into the palace. There's only sixteen days left so we don't have time to waste now. Once inside, we teleported to the saferoom in the Export Line and started on our way. We found a will seed but it was guarded by security lasers, so we had to look for a way to shut them off. We looked out a viewing window and for sure, this is a factory.

"Do you think it's related to that "Escape to Utopia" thing?" Futaba asked.

"It's possible." I said.

"Hold on a sec. Ain't the guys in here movin' kinda weird...?" Ryuji asked.

We looked to see that many of the robots were so overworked, they were shutting down one by one.

"...Unfortunately, this is the exact opposite of how you would imagine a utopia to be." Makoto said.

"This is just horrible..." I said.

"These conveyor belts and the positioning of the workers... This is almost identical to the company's bun factory... I can't believe this..." Haru said looking hurt and stunned.

"At the very least, this is how Okumura views his workers." Yusuke said before looking disgusted. "My apologies for saying so, Noir, but this is truly atrocious."

"Well, it'll all be under control if we can trigger that change of heart in him, yeah? Let's go!" Ryuji said.

"We also still have to worry about my dream, we have no idea when this will occur." I said.

"Of course Joker." Morgana said.

We set out to get closer to the treasure. After fighting some enemies we saw the door that was leading to the path closer to the treasure. I saw something wrong, blocks that were hanging so dangerously that they could fall at any moment. We went forward a bit and a mechanical arm malfunctioned.

"Whoa! We almost got crushed!" Ann stated.

"That freakin' hunk of metal broke way too damn easy!" Ryuji exclaimed.

"There is no point in complaining at this point. We will be forced to search for another route." Yusuke said.

We had to make an alternate route, and looking at the mechanical arms, they were ready to give way at any moment. We found a machine connected to one of the one mechanical arm putting it on 10x speed, it broke down, we crossed the arm and fought the enemy after catching it off guard. We found a console and it turned out to be the controls for the security lasers guarding the will seed. With the second will seed in hand, we got going. Finally, we reached the door only to see that there was more to the factory.

Something felt off here, I reached into my pocket. The Desire's Gamble was at the ready if I needed it. We saw another door but to get to it, we have to go over a hydraulic press and past more lasers.

There was a control for the hydraulic presses. Break, lunch break, and unpaid overtime were the only options. I set it to break but it only lasted 5 seconds. That was awful and crossed off the list. Unpaid overtime is definitely out, so the only choice is lunch break. Lunch break was 30 seconds long but if we ran, we'd make it. How awful... The workers are already working overtime without being paid for it, and when we disabled the security, they called it a budget cut to security.

The next area was even bigger.

"Ren, I sense a large group of shadows here. Be ready, and be careful." Shadeon said.

We found a safe room and went a small ways away from it only to see the group Shadeon mentioned.

"How do we get past them?" Ryuji whispered.