Sakura Cross Street.

The neon advertisements flowed between the skyscrapers, like a torrential downpour, washing over the edges of low buildings, seeping into every corner.

John tightened his work jacket, passing through the corridor in the sour industrial gases.

The holographic ads directly opposite kept changing.

The entire budget apartment and the people walking in the open-air corridor were soaked in the neon lights, turning blue one moment and pink the next.

The engine noises were restless.

Hovercars and aircraft roared.

The sounds of street gang conflicts, the screech of brakes, the fleeting gunfire…

All these noises vanished the moment John stepped into the room.

The four walls filtered out the city's chewing sounds, leaving only a low-frequency hum echoing in his mind.

Gino crouched by the entrance, covering her mouth without speaking.

The sisal rope was half-sunken in the center of the sofa, its head upraised in the human-shaped worn-out indentation.

He had committed suicide, it was obvious.

A Rongju-Blast Boy kinetic revolver.

The gun was on the body's abdomen, having naturally slipped after being fired into the mouth.

From the floor behind the sofa to the apartment's front door, there were debris and blood.

"I'm very sorry."

John reached out to Gino, gently hugging her.

"Why not go to the entrance for some fresh air?"

He guided Gino to the outside, then turned back alone to inspect the scene.

Prosthetic Body: Messiah-Medusa V

John activated the cybernetic eye plugin.

A yellow gleam flashed through his pupils, the whole room shattered, cut into pieces by deep blue grids, then reassembled, with certain areas highlighted as abnormal traces by the system.

There was a broken window directly facing the sofa.

The neon cast by the skyscrapers would shine through the glass into the narrow apartment.

John walked to the window, once again seeing that robotic Cat Girl.

She was in a terrible state now:

Her plush ears and the artificial leather on her cheeks were torn, exposing the silicone layers and metal components in her eye sockets.

The floor around was scattered with bloodstains, hair stuck to it.

There's evidence of forceful breakage on the window.

John used his foot to turn over the Cat Girl's body — there were three gunshot wounds from her chest to her abdomen, consistent with the caliber of the weapon in the sisal rope's hand.

Rape?

Lovers' suicide?

Many guesses popped up in John's mind.

The room lights were off.

The air conditioning vent directly faced the window.

John's hands naturally dropped, standing in the shadows, his luminous prosthetic eyes examining every suspicious corner of the room.

This detective game was a bit of a brain teaser.

Fortunately, the problem was solved.

John merely looked up and saw an extremely familiar portable terminal among the scattered clutter beside the coffee table.

The sisal rope was a hacker.

Since the terminal was plugged into a data cable, maybe, before dying, he left some crucial information in cyberspace.

"Are you alright? Need your help…"

John returned to the corridor holding the terminal.

He had already wiped off the bloodstains on it.

Gino was in a daze, from the moment she lost contact with the sisal rope to realizing something was wrong, to the shock of prying the door and pushing it open at the scene, it all felt dreamlike.

She paused, pulled a data cable from her wrist, and began to decode the data terminal.

2077BYF-0024 Log

Bismarck promised the chip arrived, I checked it, no viruses embedded, it's really unbelievable… This small thing in my hand is actually Miko's soul, Miko is the name I gave her, I will love her.

… The program isn't complicated, Miko opened her eyes…

My god, she asked my name, called me master, I swear it's the happiest day of my life…

…Today was exhausting, but it's all worth it, I will live happily ever after with Miko…

I told her my thoughts, she agreed.

I want to touch Miko's ears, honestly, I'm a bit… Baka, just a bit too cowardly, I can't say the word love… My god, she lowered her head in front of me, her ears trembled, so soft to touch, really comfortable, those soft tufts of hair... Ah, sorry, I was too abrupt…

…Miko blushed, she didn't blame me, just leaned beside my knee, putting my hand back on her head from where I had taken it away…

Damn, why call me at this moment?

… Bismarck said he just finished reading the experiment report, this chip is still in the test phase, don't spoil Miko complacently, she's different from a Sex Doll, she's a digital soul with independent consciousness trying to break through human limitations...

Of course, she's different!

Miko is one of a kind!

…Ah? Miko actually asked who called me, right, she has full thinking ability just like humans, also with a contact list and a life module…

She's very scared.

Miko seemed to retain memories from the lab, she asked me if she would be sent back to her original place… That basement, forever locked…

I know the taste of loneliness better than anyone…

I told Nagata Miko I wouldn't let anybody take her away, I will love her, take care of her until forever…

I want to rest against Miko's arms, she agreed, that's great, Miko wants to know my story…

What's my story? I don't even have friends… Okay, maybe I have a few…

I turned over, lying on Miko's lap, wow, her figure is great, from this angle the ceiling is invisible…

She noticed, and she blushed.

I felt a bit at a loss, really, uh, Miko said she would tolerate some of my thoughts, even… actions…

…Oh god, I must have performed terribly, damn it, I've never experienced something like this before… It… Its process was too beautiful, I hope Miko didn't mind...

She said it was her first time too, that's good, I still have a chance to make amends.

Miko wants to connect to the network?

Ah, who blocked her network port? This method wasn't sophisticated, nobody can leave an imprint on my angel...

This is the end of the experimental log.

John and Gino simultaneously looked up at each other.

A hacker with social disabilities, a tailor-made AI cat girl, it seemed like an ordinary cohabitation story, so how did it turn into that mess in the room?

"There's a call record, it should be an automatic backup."

Gino found something new in the terminal.

This is the hacker's good habit.

They often soak in cyberspace, and to make their steps traceable, they create monitoring programs to record themselves.

[Contact-Bismarck (Voice Call)]

[Agave Rope: ... Miko, Miko has gone mad! Oh my god, what should I do?]

[Bismarck: Calm down, you need to tell me what happened, wait a minute, you didn't let it connect to the network, did you?]

[Background noise: (female hysterical scream, collision sounds)]

[Agave Rope: (Tugging, pleading, "That's a window, are you leaving me? Miko, I'm begging you... don't hurt yourself...")]

[Agave Rope: What's going on?]

[Bismarck: She's a sandbox soul...]

Bismarck explained a bit about the AI cat girl's chip principles.

Writing souls, customizing personalities, and even setting some subconscious "obedience clauses" require enormous computation, which can only be accomplished by installing AI.

Souls can be polluted.

This chip is a semi-finished product.

Its worldview is completely pieced together artificially, and once it connects to the network...

The AI's learning instinct will freely scavenge for knowledge, and all sorts of random things, various negative emotions will pollute its purity.

[Agave Rope: What should I do?]

[Bismarck: Pull out the chip and send it back.]

[Agave Rope: ... Miko, will she disappear?]

[Bismarck: ... Fool! You've only been with her for three hours! Listen to me, cut off the network environment, go right away, and then remove the chip from that thing's body, I'll give you a new girlfriend, that's it.]

[End of call.]

John and Gino exchanged glances after listening.

He didn't speak, turned around and went to the deep dive chair in the far corner of the room.

John pulled out the data cable and plugged it in.

Black Light breached Agave Rope's defenses as easily as flipping a toilet lid.

In the middle of Agave Rope's living room is a holographic projection device, which usually comes with sentinel mode.

The AI cat girl trying to escape would undoubtedly trigger an alert and capture.

"I found it."

John filtered through the video files, and indeed there was a video, or rather Agave Rope's last footage while alive.

[What should I do? (Male)]

The voice plugin automatically detected the human voice.

Agave Rope was on the phone with Bismarck for help while hugging the AI cat girl who was trying to tear open the burglar-proof window with her bare hands.

She had no combat prosthetic body nor metal claws, and could do nothing but embed her pretty fingernails into the wall.

The room had already been locked down.

After connecting to the network, she went mad, screamed, began self-harming—plucking out the plush ears and body hair, seemingly experiencing a severe identity recognition bias.

This AI had suffered a mental breakdown.

Agave Rope hung up the phone, crying, trying to pull out the chip.

[...Are you, you going to kill me? (Female)]

The AI suddenly seemed to calm down.

Her body was broken beyond recognition, makeup all smeared like a cyber psychotic temporarily recovering to normal as she stared blankly at Agave Rope.

[Are you going to be just like them... kill me? And then wake me up again... over and over, over and over again kill me... you... (Female)]

[No! Miko, trust me, I'll save you! (Male)]

[Liar! You're a liar too! (Female)]

The AI cat girl violently pushed Agave Rope away.

Her beautiful glass eyeballs glowed red, fault lights and mechanical structures were exposed between the gaps in broken artificial leather.

Now it was just a machine speaking human words.

[...You cowardly, timid simpleton, a fool relying on drugs... (Female)]

[...Miko!? It's me... how can you... (Male)]

Gino couldn't bear to watch any longer.

John felt a faint sorrow.

The AI called Miko had triggered its self-protection mechanism, like a small animal trying its hardest to retaliate.

It was doing its best to "harm" the human in front, to drive them away for its own safety.

[You cowardly recluse with social anxiety, the worm hiding behind the network, relying on virtual algorithms for self-satisfaction, self-sympathy! (Female)]

[Ah—!! (Male)]

Bam!

Bam!

Bam!

Brief flashes of flame lit up the dim room.

Outside the window, neon lights were dazzling, shining through the glass into this narrow space.

Agave Rope, panting, rushed forward, embracing the AI and apologizing madly.

[I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I... Miko (Male)]

The AI's structure was different from humans.

Three point-blank gunshots did not interrupt the computation core; instead, a short circuit caused a slight fault in the core chip.

[...Love, love you... (Female)]

The AI cat girl emitted warped synthetic voice.

Agave Rope hugged the "corpse" for a long silence.

He slowly walked to the sofa, sat down in dejection, and after a long while, suddenly raised his hand and put the gun barrel in his mouth.

Bam!

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