Chapter 8: The Price of Existence
1464 Words
I slumped in the filthy standing water, my heart like a runaway engine, pounding frantically against my ribs. Cold acid rain pelted my face, mixing with the warm liquid flowing from Brute's eye socket and trickling into my mouth—a sickly sweet tang of rust and blood.
I stared at the motionless steel corpse before me, my mind a complete blank.
I did it.
I killed him.
Just then, I saw something beside Brute's body. The metal briefcase he had protected with his life now lay on the ground, the emblem on its side glinting coldly under the neon lights.
An insignia composed of a compass and a scepter.
Olympus Group.
[Main Quest Completed.]
[Calculating rewards...]
[Protocol Deactivated: 'Existence Deletion' threat cleared.]
The cold system alert echoed in my mind like a death knell from a distant land. There was no joy of victory, no revelry of relief. The Sword of Damocles that had hung over my head for seventy-two hours was gone, but what it left behind wasn't freedom—it was a bottomless void.
I won. I survived. But why did I feel as if a part of me had died along with Brute in this filthy alleyway?
Rain washed over my face, over Brute's extinguished cybernetic eye, and over the bloody mire spreading slowly beneath him, diluted by the downpour. The neon glow was shattered by the curtain of rain, projected onto the alley walls like a series of distorted, mocking oil paintings. I smelled the air—a mix of rust, ozone, blood, and rotting trash. The scent was nauseatingly thick, yet undeniably real.
Real. The word was like a needle, piercing my numb nerves.
Propping myself against the slick wall, I stood up unsteadily. The aftereffects of my drained mental energy began to kick in; my legs felt as heavy as lead, and every heartbeat tugged at the throbbing pain in my temples. I walked over to Brute's corpse and looked down at the monster who, only minutes ago, had tried to tear me to pieces.
His one intact natural eye was wide open, holding a final trace of horror and bewilderment. It was as if, until the very moment death arrived, he couldn't understand why he was dying.
Neither could I.
I looked down at my hands; they were trembling slightly, not from fear, but from sheer exhaustion. These were the same hands that had just guided a bullet through the air, delivering his death sentence like a god. The waitress Nova at "The Lost," who had to tiptoe around even the drunks, versus this Nova standing by a corpse, terrifyingly calm—which one was the real me?
Or maybe, they’re both dead.
I forced myself to stop thinking about these meaningless questions. Survival was the only meaning that mattered. I crouched down and began to inspect my loot.
The Olympus Group briefcase was my primary target. It was made of some lightweight alloy. The surface was smooth, with no visible keyholes or seams—just a fingerprint scanner. I tried to unlock it using Brute's relatively intact hand, but the scanner didn't react. It seemed that once his vitals flatlined, his access was revoked.
I had no tools, and I lacked the strength to use "Physical Rewrite" to force it open. I had to give up for now and turned to search the rest of Brute's belongings. There were no pockets on his exoskeleton armor, but in a hidden compartment at his waist, I felt something hard.
It was a small metal lockbox, about the size of a palm, requiring both a fingerprint and a passcode. This time, I pressed his finger against it without hesitation. A green light flashed on. Next, I entered the private passcode I had decrypted from the intercepted intel—the birthday of his pet hellhound.
*Click.*
The lockbox popped open.
I had expected to find credit chips, weapon parts, or some other junk a gang leader might carry.
But there was no money, no gold, not even a spare bullet.
Lying in the soft, shock-absorbent foam inside the box was a single black, physically encrypted data chip, barely the size of a fingernail.
My heart constricted. This thing was probably worth more than a crate of gold. Brute keeping it in a personal lockbox instead of with the cargo proved how important it was.
I reached out with trembling fingers and carefully picked up the chip. It was cold to the touch, its surface smooth and unmarked.
The moment my fingertips brushed the chip, a violent wave of dizziness seized me!
【Data Corruption: 5.1%... Warning: High-density information contamination source detected...】
The world before me distorted once more. The alley, the rain, the corpse… everything began to fade and dissolve like paint dropped into water. A sharp burst of white noise rang in my ears, and my head throbbed with a splitting pain.
Fragments of memories that didn’t belong to me swept through my mind once again, like a violent storm.
This time, the images were terrifyingly vivid.
I wasn’t in the alley anymore. I was in a pure white, spotless room. The walls emitted a soft glow, and the air was thick with the distinct antiseptic smell of a sterile room. I was wearing an oversized white hospital gown, standing barefoot on the cold floor.
A man stood before me.
He wore a pristine white lab coat and gold-rimmed glasses, his hair meticulously groomed. He looked young, a gentle and charming smile on his face—a smile that held a hint of something I couldn’t quite grasp… Pity? Or was it relief?
“How are you feeling?” His voice was soft, like a spring breeze.
I opened my mouth, but no sound came out. It felt as if something was lodged in my throat.
He didn’t seem surprised. He simply smiled and slowly reached out to me. His hands were clean, his fingers long and slender.
“Don’t be afraid,” he said. “Everything is going to be alright.”
Then, he leaned down and whispered into my ear. In a tone that was almost like a dreamlike murmur, he spoke the words that froze my very soul.
His lips moved, and I could clearly read every word.
“Welcome home, Nova.”
“Aaaah!”
I screamed and fell backward, my back slamming into the cold wall. The jarring impact jolted me out of the horrific vision.
I was still in the alley. Brute’s corpse still lay at my feet, and the cold acid rain continued to fall. Nothing had changed.
But my world had utterly collapsed.
Who was that man? Where was that sterile white room? And how did he know my name?
“Welcome home”...
Those words were like a poisoned dagger driven deep into my memory, churning up a darkness I had never before touched. Wasn’t I just a randomly activated NPC? An “error code”? But that memory… that vision… it was so real it chilled me to the bone.I looked down at the chip in my hand. It lay quietly in my palm, as if everything that just happened was a hallucination. But I knew it wasn't. This chip was like a key—a key to unlock the long-sealed door to my past.
Choking back the nausea roiling in my gut, I gripped the chip and the briefcase tightly. These items, along with that man in the white coat, all pointed to a single source: the Olympus Group.
I took a deep breath. I inhaled the freezing rain, and it filled my lungs, sending me into a fit of violent coughing. But this time, there was no longer any confusion or fear in my eyes.
I looked at Brute's corpse, staring into his dead, unseeing eyes.
In that moment, I finally came to a clear, cruel realization.
In this world built on code and lies, there is no right or wrong, no judgment—only the most primitive law of the jungle.
Kill or be killed.
Innocence, confusion, fear... I buried all the emotions of the old "Nova" right then and there. They were luxuries, fatal weaknesses. I couldn't afford them.
I turned away, no longer looking at the body slowly growing cold. I pulled the hood of my "Ghost Coat" lower, concealing every expression on my face.
Step by step, I walked out of the filthy alley that had become the graveyard of my past, heading toward the deeper darkness woven from neon lights and sheets of rain.
The waitress from the bar was dead.
What survived was a ghost. An error code willing to become a devil just to stay alive.
And now, this devil was going to find her creator.
- Writer
