-61- The Notorious

Before answering the apocalyptic prophecy, let me first ask you, my friend: have you ever doubted whether the emergence of the Eight Great Corporations is an inevitable course of human historical development, or merely a coincidence?

In our analysis and prediction, the Eight Great Corporations are not a normal phenomenon of civilizational development, but rather a distorted, deformed cancerous growth. Their existence is destined to lead to the decline of civilization, driving human civilization at a breakneck speed toward an inevitable apocalyptic milestone.

Without a doubt, we do not yet know the exact form the apocalypse will take. Perhaps it will be a global hot war dozens or hundreds of times larger in scale than the Silent War, or perhaps something entirely different.

At the very least, however, we can do something for the continuation of human civilization before all of this arrives.

It is our sincere hope that you, too, will become our comrade.

After finishing the message sent by the Firekeeper, Yvette hesitated for a moment.

As the sole survivor of the Origin Civilization, she naturally knew the exact form the apocalypse had taken: it was a viral leakage of a mutant factor contamination that first polluted the oceans before destroying terrestrial civilization.

The perspective of the Civilization Preservation Society, on the other hand, was rather simplistic, bordering on a conspiracy theory. They purely believed that the Eight Great Corporations were evil forces destined to destroy all of humanity, and therefore they sought to prepare for that destruction in advance.

From this, one might infer that the Civilization Preservation Society could not provide true clues regarding the origin of the apocalypse... though it was also possible that the Firekeeper simply wished to keep the secrets withheld for the time being, using this as an excuse.

"Wait... what does this have to do with me?" Yvette suddenly realized. Her reason for paying attention to the Civilization Preservation Society wasn't actually any of this.

She merely hoped that the society was genuinely stockpiling resources for the apocalypse, collecting all sorts of knowledge, so that when she left the dream, she could reap the benefits in reality.

As long as the Civilization Preservation Society was truly striving for its ideals, what did it matter if their motivation stemmed from a mundane conspiracy theory?

After a moment of thought, she sent a reply: "I am willing to contribute to the survival of civilization, but how do I know you aren't fraudsters? If you hold a vast amount of technical documentation, perhaps we could begin with a knowledge exchange and slowly build trust."

Her Element Decay Completion Technology could be copied and pasted at zero cost. Since the Civilization Preservation Society dared to collect various data under the guise of "infringing upon intellectual property rights," she didn't mind putting waste to good use by trading already-possessed literature for something else.

...

Akasha, the affluent district, along a certain bank of the Lorn River.

By the time Yvette took a taxi and arrived, her old schoolmates, Irene and Tennyson, were standing by the riverside admiring the night view. Under the lights of the night sky, a massive, ghostly blue holographic whale swam slowly, with busy shuttles darting around it. The neon signs on the street cast purplish-red ripples across the river surface.

Upon seeing her, Irene immediately walked over in excitement and asked, "Nameless, are you alright? The AJSP people told me there was nothing there and no surveillance nearby, and told me to wait for the investigation results. I seriously suspected they were colluding with Molt Biology and kidnapped you together!"

"If I wanted to leave, they couldn't stop me," Yvette said.

What she didn't mention was that she was the one who had cleaned up the scene. Although she hadn't devoured the flesh and blood of those beast warriors, she didn't want to leave even the slightest possible clue for Molt Biology, so she had burned them all to ashes.

Moreover, utilizing Hewlett's ID card and magitech terminal privileges, she had doctored the parts related to "Zero." Consequently, if Molt Biology investigated the matter, they would be far more likely to write it off as an accidental mishap during an experimental process—Hewlett acting on his own accord, conducting evil murder tests, coming into conflict with a mysterious expert, suffering retribution, and vanishing into thin air.

Although Molt Biology would still take notice of her eventually, by that time she would certainly have adopted a new identity to minimize risks, or perhaps even left the dream entirely.

"As expected of Nameless, you're actually this powerful..." Irene exclaimed in awe. She had always felt that Nameless was mysterious, harboring hidden depths, but she never imagined her depths ran this deep!

Judging by the abilities displayed in her battle against the werewolf assassin, and the ease with which she extricated herself from Molt Biology's tight encirclement... this was surely on par with the world's top 1,000 elite experts on the mercenary platforms, wasn't it?

Yvette turned her gaze toward Tennyson, observing his silent demeanor, and asked, "How is your condition?"

Tennyson nodded, and Irene chimed in from the side, "Nameless, he still can't speak normally; he can only communicate through circumlocution..."

"I'll lift his condition." With that, Yvette recited a series of instruction-like commands interspersed with obscure, meaningless pronunciations.

This was the incantation obtained from Hewlett that could restore freedom to beast warriors, complementing the safety phrase. By slightly modifying the content before and after the safety phrase, all shackles could be removed, restoring complete freedom.

Sure enough, upon hearing the incantation, a brilliant luster erupted in Tennyson's eyes. He reached out to massage his larynx, took a deep breath, and said with excitement, "I've recovered... Thank you, Nameless!"

"Just like that, he's recovered?" Irene asked in shock.

"You don't need to thank me. You just need to obediently follow me to the police station and help me claim the one million credit bounty, and I'll be quite satisfied," Yvette said.

"..."

Tennyson froze for a moment, immediately grasping the implications. The excitement that had just flared up turned bitter in an instant, and he lowered his head to say, "Don't worry... I certainly will."

...

Late at night, after leaving the police station and returning to her rented apartment in Bayad, Yvette knew the one million credits would soon be deposited. However, considering taxation, once the lengthy procedural red tape was finished, her actual take-home pay might only be around 700,000—not even enough to buy the newly salvaged magitech terminal she had acquired.

She then contacted the welder again, paying a small sum to have him forge a new ID card for her. This time, the name was changed to "Icy Rain Sion," preventing others from drawing a simple association between her and "Yvette Rochivia" through name-matching heuristics.

Of course, this was primarily to guard against Molt Biology. Black Tower Pharmaceuticals wouldn't mistake her identity; after all, four years ago when she was active in the Blackwater District of Ish City, the same-year "Zero" was still a four-year-old orphan in a welfare home suffering from a genetic disease—how could they possibly be the same person?

Thinking of this, Yvette suddenly recalled telling Hewlett earlier that she was sixteen years old, and couldn't help but chuckle softly.

When she registered her ID card four years ago, she had filled it out as sixteen. Was she still sixteen now?

Well, to be honest, she'd better call herself twenty from now on.

...

Over the next few days, relying on the impending bounty and her desire to sell the semi-liquid bio-armor, Yvette rarely went out. She spent her time scouring the dark web for buyers while selecting items she might need.

As for the magitech terminal, she planned to keep using her current one for now. Every time the rune-point cache increased by 10,000, the black-market price skyrocketed exponentially. She would rather seize one by force given the opportunity than pay such an exorbitant markup.

Bio-armor was a fine asset, but the bio-armor available on the black market—including the one she had seized—offered defense ratings no higher than her defensive spell "Crimson Armor," yet carried a steep markup. It felt unnecessary to waste her money on it.

Perhaps she could buy a batch of low-end elemental chips?

When scavenging in reality, the vast majority of items—such as magitech skateboards and magitech motorcycles—failed to start simply due to damaged chips, even after the energy storage panel issues were fixed. If she went to a manufacturer now to stock up on a batch of low-end elemental chips, wouldn't that solve the problem?

This included alloy blades; the precision of the elemental chips they utilized wasn't actually that high. After all, for military-grade weapons, the focus was never on cutting-edge refinement, but on rugged durability...

Thus, after spending a few days browsing the internet at home, filtering through items she might need to purchase, and drawing up a list, the quiet of the apartment was broken on the morning of the fifth day by an audio call from Castor, the middleman from Fading Light Bar.

"No way, Nameless, did you really capture the werewolf assassin?"

Listening to that incredulous tone, though she couldn't see him, Yvette could vividly imagine the look of shock and speechlessness on Castor's face.

"What is it?" she asked.

"You're in the news, Nameless! Big news! Front-page headline! On your very first gig, you captured the serial killer Werewolf Assassin, and along the way thwarted Molt Biology's dark conspiracy, forcing Chairman 'Old Caelus' to personally step out and apologize to the public!"

Perhaps because a certain middleman had also contributed to the transaction process, Castor's tone was exceptionally elated as he shared in her reflected glory, saying, "Forget Akasha right now—even across the entire New Eden mercenary world, you've made a huge name for yourself and become an overnight sensation!"