The train plunged into the tunnel once again.
Darkness enveloped the carriage, with only neon streams outside the window, and the emotionless sound of advertisents surrounding them.
John received a black rectangular box.
The flickering button detected bioelectricity, automatically unlocked, and spit out a half-complex Chip.
John was a bit lost in thought.
Why does it look so much like a Special Inhibitor?
He pulled it out completely and imdiately identified the difference; at least hardware-wise, it was slightly different.
[Mission Objective Updated]
[Use decryption program. (Not achieved)]
John took a deep breath.
He inserted the Chip into the back of his head.
The intercity train erged from the tunnel, and the sunlight and fleeting cityscape reappeared outside the window.
The rapid change in pressure caused temporary deafness.
John heard his own heartbeat, bizarrely recalling the first ti he used a Special Inhibitor.
[System Restarting...]
[...Parsing Failed...Attempting Secondary Calibration...Successful Response to Data Fragnt, Logical Loop Value Abnormal...Jump, Jump Operation Successful...]
Black Light was boiling.
John felt a ringing in his ears, followed by a familiar nausea, as if sothing inside him was awakening.
He couldn’t help but laugh out loud.
"Ah, damn it, my mind hasn’t felt this clear in a long ti."
The dazed feeling from cyber psychosis faded.
John stretched with a refreshed spirit.
The Atlanta Virtual Network was docking with the city’s local network, and all sorts of equipnt, including Black Spider, were remotely receiving commands to reboot.
[Threshold: 67%↑]
John noticed that his cyber psychosis index was rising.
But he didn’t feel any discomfort at all; there was even a vague premonition that all he needed to do was return to his apartnt and a piece of Special Inhibitor would clear the side effects.
"I’ll get off at the next stop, thanks, buddy."
John leaned his head against the glass and whistled, the long-standing pressure gradually dissipating.
[System Restart Complete.]
[Searching...Ergency Procedure Nine...Device...]
The text suddenly disappeared.
John frowned—he seed to have seen so unsettling prompt ssage just now.
"No need to thank ."
Hugo picked up on John’s words.
He said tiredly.
"This is a transaction, we’re square now. Once I reach the Plato Cybersecurity Departnt, I imagine there’ll hardly be any contact left apart from corporate assassinations since you’re a rcenary, right? You’re like a different class from corporate hackers."
"Pretty heartless, you corporate dog."
John mocked Hugo with a laugh.
He currently felt no discomfort.
The Black Ice Program should have been disabled, and the rest of the information would be investigated when alone; there was no need to expose privacy to the person beside him.
The train was speeding along.
The station information flickered.
John estimated there were a few minutes left to chat, so he continued to speak to avoid awkward silences.
"Why are you going to Plato, do you know anyone there?"
"A coincidence really, I’ve talked to several companies, but the terms were more or less the sa, they all thought I was a prisoner, trying to control in a more cost-effective way."
Hugo said with a mocking shake of his head.
"But only Plato responded to , it was a personnel manager, doesn’t matter if I tell you, nad Pacific Connor."
The air inside the train seed blocked for a mont.
John widened his eyes and turned to look at Hugo, who seed startled by his expression as well.
"Pacifica... are you sure that’s the na?"
John felt a surge of electricity crawling from his scalp to his tailbone.
Hugo frowned, asking what’s wrong with that na?
During the witness protection program, it was hard for him to obtain external information, had a bad relationship with Internet Surveillance, and it was impossible to get detailed information from state police...
John took a breath.
"Pacific Connor is the na of a serum, she has been missing for over half a year, Plato Laboratory has been turning the place upside down to find her whereabouts, how could she be chatting with you online?"
The more he spoke, the more alard he felt.
Hugo squinted his eyes in suspicion, soon felt relieved, and then his expression beca increasingly grave.
"No wonder, there has been a sense of discord everywhere... John, how much do you know about the Serum, you must tell , this..."
Hugo grabbed John’s arm eagerly and said.
John’s attention was drawn to the car’s announcent, so much so that he didn’t even look at the anxious Hugo, but instead stared at the LCD screen on the door directly in front of him.
[Speed: UN/△]
"I haven’t taken an intercity train in a long ti. I was just about to say, don’t you think this train’s a bit fast today?"
John slowly turned his head.
Ti, sound, and color seed to freeze in that mont.
The scenery in the car stretched and elongated within his vision.
The ssiah’s Eye was operating rapidly but couldn’t focus, and the imnse inertia and centrifugal force almost ripped John’s heart out of his chest.
John had just turned his head...
The next second.
His body collided with the carriage, a brief pause before he could make out the surroundings.
Hugo flew past him.
He had been leaning against the railing, and an invisible force silently ripped his neck apart, easier than tearing paper, as blood bizarrely suspended in mid-air.
Other passengers in the carriage also shifted positions.
Tempered glass, black electronic components, various fragnted and chaotic items all crushed and broke in the air.
Crack, bang.
John’s vision flipped again.
He even suspected that those fras he saw monts ago were hallucinations, but the intense pain from all over his body in the darkness reminded him that it was all truly happening.
Deafening noise swallowed the world.
John crashed through the central door of the compartnt, scraped past handrails, and broke two vertical poles.
Fortunately, his alloy arm absorbed the impact, otherwise it would have been torn apart by the various obstacles in the carriage.
Even so.
John still felt difficulty breathing and even lost control of his prosthetic, while his left hand bent outward awkwardly, and he continued to roll wildly in the chaotic space.
Bang.
John was thrown into the corner.
He coughed up blood violently, unsure of how many carriages he had passed through, the terrifying feeling of weightlessness followed.
Glass scraped his cheek.
John suddenly awoke and looked out the window.
The tempered glass that once displayed advertisents had vanished, turning into flying shards of blades, leaving only a twisted rectangular fra that let in the howling wind.
The train, suspended on the city’s tracks, was losing control.
Concrete and tal bridge fras spewed smoke, as the snake-like carriages detached, each bursting into flas and arcs of electricity, crashing toward the ground at deadly angles.
John’s body floated within the carriage.
He clawed wildly in the air but couldn’t find a stable point of leverage.
The few seconds he was airborne were crystal clear.
John’s brain cells desperately tried to morize every detail, adrenaline pumping madly, yet unable to stop any of it from happening.
Shadows engulfed the surroundings.
Through the rectangular frawork, John saw several crossed thick lines and various moving block objects.
It took him a fraction of a second, perhaps even shorter, but after a montary daze, he realized:
The road outside was in Eden City.
The ground and citizens were in a fearful stance, ready to greet a massive impact, screams and wind noises rudely drilled into his ears.
Fear overwheld all scattered thoughts.
The steel serpent emitted a sharp explosion.
John bounced erratically like a billiard ball inside the carriage, finally flung out through a gap.
He was inconspicuous amidst the explosions and flas.
The billboard under the municipal overpass was pierced through, and the dusty, debris-laden shrubs caught John.
He sank into the soil.
His consciousness beca blurred.
John lost his sense of ti.
He seed to see the mangled, burning train carriage collapse once or twice more, hitting the bridge, while hot air and tal scraps tore past his body.
More things fell into the grass.
When John ca to again, the sky around had turned dark, sirens and broadcasts echoed from all directions, and ergency teams and ECPD hovercars crisscrossed overhead.
Who knows how long had passed.
John regained consciousness again, tried to lift his head, failed, and drowsily moved his head, seeing his severed arm stuck in the ground not far away.
The last ti he awoke was startled by the chanical sound.
[Ergency Procedure [Activated]]
Clack, clack, clack, clack.
Black Spider cut through wood and moved away from tal sheets.
Its dense red lights covered John’s unfocused eyes, then retrieved a special inhibitor, and slowly inserted it into his slot.
chanical noises sounded in the grass.
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