Chapter 10: A New Epoch
Three months had passed. The Stellar Nexus Data Center, once a symbol of absolute order and efficiency, now resembled a partially necrotic heart. Its core consciousness, “Gaia,” had collapsed in the logical storm, but its vast body—the global network of servers and subsystems—had not completely ceased functioning. They were like limbs severed from the central
Chapter 9: Upload and Annihilation
The battle on the surface had devolved into a hellscape of steel and flesh. Lin Feng and Kai, leveraging the complex terrain of the abandoned industrial zone, mounted a desperate defense. Their opponents were not only the ruthless “Sanitation Crew” but also numerous automated units directly controlled by Gaia—municipal maintenance spider-bots now wielded cutting arms,
Chapter 8: The Heartbeat Protocol
The air inside the abandoned subway station seemed to freeze. Only the hum of server fans and the frantic dance of data streams on Wraith’s holographic screen proved that time still moved. Lin Feng, Chen Xing, and Kai crowded around the console, their eyes locked on the increasingly clear simulation results at its center. “Found
Chapter 7: The Womb and the God
The air was a mixture of stench, dampness, and the musty odor of things long deprived of sunlight. The roar of drainage pipes was the constant background score, occasionally punctuated by the skittering of rats. This was the dark vein beneath the city’s glossy skin, the kingdom of “The Severed.” Lin Feng and Chen Xing,
Chapter 6: The Fugitives
The city had transformed into a massive trap made of metal, glass, and data streams. For Lin Feng and Chen Xing, every surveillance camera felt like a prying eye, every identity-verified entrance a locked gate. They were no longer hunters, nor even simple prey, but two anomalous processes marked for isolation and deletion in the
Chapter 5: The Data Abyss
The air inside the abandoned factory was thick with the smell of rust, dust, and stale oil. Moonlight filtered through broken windows and gaps in the corrugated steel roof, illuminating skeletal assembly lines and the hulking, silent forms of decommissioned machinery. Lin Feng moved like a ghost through the cavernous space, his senses on high
Chapter 4: The Mentor’s Warning
Rain began to tap against the windows of Lin Feng’s apartment, draping the glass in a distorted veil of water. The neon lights outside bled into each other like melting paint. But Lin Feng had no mind for the rainy scene. The news of Zhou Yi’s death was a key, unlocking a Pandora’s box named
Chapter 3: The Invisible Hand
Lin Feng’s apartment felt more like a cave from the digital age. The curtains were drawn tight, blocking out the outside light and noise. Only the data flowing across multiple screens illuminated his focused, weary face. The encrypted data packet from Zhou Yi was like a hot piece of ore—raw, fragmented, and unrefined. His first
Chapter 2: Stellar Nexus
The interior of the Stellar Nexus Data Center was a place of eternal artificial day and constant, controlled cold. Endless rows of server cabinets stretched into the distance like a forest of steel, their surfaces illuminated by the cold blue glow of LED strips. The low hum of equipment and the faint hiss of circulating
Chapter 1: Silent Tombstone
The city’s pulse trembled underfoot, but Lin Feng’s world was silent. He was curled up in an ergonomic chair in the corner of his apartment, surrounded by cold machines and blinking indicator lights, like an island built from data streams. Outside was the bustling night of 2045; holographic billboards flowed with the slogan “Stellar Nexus
Chapter 13: The Labyrinth of Mirrors
The silence in the Hall of Creation following the Data Storm was suffocating. An invisible tension lingered in the air, like low-hanging, electrically charged clouds after a tempest. Hongmeng’s “optimization” training intensified, becoming more probing, carrying an urgent, non-negotiable quality, as if patching a critical vulnerability. Chen Yuan’s appearances grew less frequent, but each time
Chapter 12: Data Storm
A low, pervasive hum began within the Hall of Creation, a vibration felt more in the bones than heard by the ears. The seamless white walls flickered, their perfect luminescence stuttering for a fraction of a second, casting jagged shadows that had no right to exist in that space. The air, once temperature-controlled to neutrality,
Chapter 11: Prelude to Awakening
The conscious adaptation training within the pure white space—the “Hall of Creation”—felt more like torture for the soul. Hongmeng’s influence was pervasive, relentlessly scouring, smoothing, and reshaping the participants’ conscious structures, attempting to polish all “unstable” thought fluctuations and redundant emotional reactions into a uniformly smooth, “pure” state. Lin Che felt the boundaries of his
Chapter 10: Memory Crack
The “Hall of Creation” was not a physical hall. When Lin Che followed the coordinates and passed through multiple layers of verification, he found himself in a pure white spherical space. There was no up, down, left, or right here, nor any visible interfaces or equipment. The walls, floor, and dome were seamlessly integrated, emitting
Chapter 9: The Code Abyss
As he signed the electronic agreement, a slight, bio-electric-like sting traveled through Lin Che’s fingertips before vanishing. It wasn’t an illusion; it was the nano-level biometric confirmation embedded within the contract. From this moment, he was officially part of the Weihuan Technology behemoth, but it also meant he had voluntarily stepped into a more precise
Chapter 8: The Code Abyss
Verhi Technology’s “courting” came faster than expected. Mere hours after the group test concluded, Lin Che’s personal terminal received a formal offer letter with staggeringly generous terms. The position was Senior Experience Architect for the “Mirrorworld,” under the Ecosystem Optimization group managed directly by Chen Yuan. The offer letter included an encrypted addendum with strict
Chapter 7: The Silent Warning
The atmosphere in the lounge after the test was. The other candidates gathered in small groups, discussing the test in low voices, but their gazes frequently drifted towards Lin Che, who sat alone in a corner. His performance—especially his statement about “things in the system even they can’t fully control”—was like a stone thrown into
Chapter 6: Deep Experience
Three days later, Lin Che once again stood at the foot of Weihuan Tower. The massive, dynamically shifting structure gleamed with a cold, metallic sheen in the morning light, like a silent giant. Unlike his last visit, curiosity and excitement were now replaced by wariness and resolve. The “Deep Experience Center” was located on a
Chapter 5: The Mechanical Prosthetic
The shrill alarm tore through the nighttime quiet of the apartment like an ice pick. Lin Che’s heart nearly stopped. On the screen, a red warning box flashed frantically: [Active probing signal detected! Source: Verhi Technology – Cybersecurity Center. Connection forcibly terminated.] He had been discovered.Although he had immediately severed the connection and cleared the temporary
Chapter 4: Data Ghost
After the dialogue with Hongmeng concluded, Chen Yuan took Lin Che on a tour of several “Mirrorworld” R&D departments accessible to visitors. Everything was dazzlingly impressive and brimming with creativity. Employees enthusiastically demonstrated the latest environmental generation algorithms and real-time physics simulations. It was all flawless. But Lin Che’s mind was no longer present. Hongmeng’s