Chapter 128: The Adapter of PROJECT Oblivion
Not long after all the employees here were dismissed, Roland arrived at the workshop with Kelly in an AV. Numerous security robots were already deployed below, lined up in formation and fully prepared.
They had sealed off almost every angle from which the landing area could be attacked—professional to the extreme.
After arriving, Roland didn’t linger at all and headed straight for Micks’s office.
A faint metallic stench of blood still hung in the air. There were traces of dried blood on the floor, but Micks’s body was gone—most likely already dragged away.
As for why the place hadn’t been cleaned up properly… these were security robots, not domestic ones.
Getting security robots to do housekeeping was probably harder than getting them to kill someone.
Of course, if you’d modified them or bought upgrade modules from PROJECT Corporation, that would be a different story. The modules weren’t expensive either, as long as—
Ahem. Getting off track.
Roland walked straight to Micks’s desk, picked up Bartmoss’s netrunner access pod, glanced at it briefly, and then casually tossed it to Kelly.
Kelly’s expression changed instantly. She rushed forward to catch it, then carefully inspected it. Only after confirming there was no visible damage did she glare at Roland with a resentful look.
“Be careful, boss… this thing is extremely valuable…”
Roland rolled his eyes at her. Other people might think there was something priceless inside, but according to Roland’s memories, there really wasn’t anything good in there.
Unless V hadn’t checked thoroughly enough.
That was why Roland had never truly been after Bartmoss’s netrunner access pod—he’d been looking for Bartmoss himself.
Or more accurately…
Bartmoss’s corpse.
Roland tilted his head toward the freezer containing Bartmoss’s body, signaling the nearby security robot to open it and collect Bartmoss’s genetic data.
“System, check it. See if old Bartmoss is compatible with any templates.”
“Received, Host… Detection complete. Bartmoss is compatible with the Oblivion template.”
Roland blinked, then fell silent in thought. In the end, he reached a conclusion.
Yeah—this thing absolutely couldn’t be given to old Bartmoss. Even if it had to be handed over eventually, Bartmoss would need to be properly ‘trained’ first.
Otherwise, something would definitely go wrong.
Even if Roland could reclaim the template afterward, the destructive power of Oblivion meant that even the briefest loss of control would cause damage far beyond acceptable limits.
After all, Oblivion was something that could kill data.
Through some unknown black technology, simply wielding its weapon could erase data itself—true damage in the most literal sense.
“Kelly, how’s the netrunner access pod?”
After finishing his exchange with the system, Roland turned to Kelly.
At this point, Kelly had already formed a purple energy input line, connecting it to Bartmoss’s netrunner access pod.
“It’s a bit damp and encrypted, but overall it’s well preserved. Still usable.”
“You can crack it, right?”
“Small case. Encryption at this level? Even the old me could crack it with some effort. Let alone me now. Looks like Bartmoss wasn’t all that impressive after all.”
Kelly grinned, clearly excited.
Seeing her confident expression, Roland’s mouth twitched slightly. If he remembered correctly… back in 2077, someone had said almost the exact same thing.
If V hadn’t stepped in in time, that guy would’ve ended up with a fried brain.
Still, Kelly had the Charm Spirit template now, so it probably wouldn’t turn into a disaster.
“…Yeah, this one’s a bit tricky, but… alright, done. I cracked it! Huh? What the hell is this?!”
Just as Kelly finished breaking the encryption and smiled in satisfaction, a virus shaped like some kind of alien lifeform suddenly charged straight at her in cyberspace, startling her badly.
Then…
Then she casually used the Charm Spirit’s ability and charmed it, instantly converting it into a virus under her control.
“Tch… let me take a closer look. Huh, this is a very old data construction method… but I’ve never seen anything like this. It directly attacks the machine’s underlying logic, altering how it perceives humans… And after entering the first machine, it upgrades itself using internal data and databases?!”
“What the hell?! Th-this is basically a network virus with top-tier destructive power! …Though the data damage is pretty severe…”
Kelly rubbed her chin as she studied the virus’s faint, unstable form in cyberspace.
She guessed the damage was caused by the condition of Bartmoss’s netrunner access pod. After so many years of degradation, both the virus and its data had inevitably suffered.
Still, the important part was—
This thing was hers now.
Which meant this terrifying virus had become one of her weapons.
Just as Kelly was about to repair and refine the virus for her own use, a massive green figure suddenly appeared in her field of vision.
In the next instant, before her stunned eyes, the virus was transformed into something composed entirely of green data.
Kelly froze in place for a long moment.
Then an inexplicable thought surfaced in her mind.
I… I… I got greened?!
“The sir said this item is too dangerous. To prevent you from getting hurt, he ordered me to seal it away to avoid any unforeseen situations.”
Upon hearing this, Kelly instantly turned gray.
Roland ignored Kelly’s reaction and instead examined the newly obtained virus. Even he hadn’t expected there to actually be a payoff—and it even came with a chunk of orange essence.
“So… by the time V found this thing, it was already mostly destroyed.”
Roland rubbed his chin, then instructed Lissandra to recompile and optimize the virus.
“Send Bartmoss’s genetic data to Mudor. Tell him this belonged to the most advanced brain-development mind from several decades ago in this world. Have him start experiments.”
The security robot acknowledged the order, then carried the container holding Bartmoss’s genetic material outside. It boarded another AV that had arrived and departed the area.
According to the data panel, Bartmoss had an intelligence stat of 20 and was a specialist in netrunning. If nothing had gone wrong, he could have changed this world.
Of course, in a certain sense…
What he was doing now was changing it.
“By the way, System—since he can adapt to a template, that means… he’s not actually dead, right?”
Author's Note
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