Chapter 320

"I've decided on this child."

I told the orphanage director that I would adopt Barbara.

"Heh, it looks like you had a good time."

The director gave a sly smile and swiftly prepared the paperwork. Without even bothering to ask for my personal information, he handed me falsified documents and urged me to sign them. It was, in essence, human trafficking.

Feeling disgusted at the thought of exchanging any more words with the director, I stepped into the room where Barbara was. It was a six-person dormitory, but she was the only one there.

Barbara opened the back of a tattered teddy bear lying on the bed and pulled out a terminal from inside.

"This orphanage is a great place to hide. The director is rotten to the core. He does human trafficking as a side business and has committed countless petty corruptions. Because of that, the paperwork for kids coming in and out is a mess."

That was why Barbara had chosen this place as her hideout.

"But that's not the only reason, is it? From here, it's easy to access Jafa Corporation's internal servers and convenient to keep an eye on me."

I twisted one corner of my lips as I spoke.

Barbara didn't deny it. She leisurely tapped away at the terminal.

"I just erased all traces of you and me. There won’t be any records left on the cameras either. We’ll vanish like ghosts. The director’s corruption will be anonymously reported to the upper management of the Jafa Scholarship Foundation in a couple of months."

"So you didn’t like the director either?"

Barbara shook her shoulders and chuckled.

"I have no personal grudge against him. But based on my experience, I figured you'd dislike him. Just trying to score some points with you."

After packing her belongings, Barbara took my hand and followed me.

As we walked, the other children in the orphanage looked at Barbara with envy in their eyes.

With the director seeing us off, we stepped outside.

Barbara led me straight to another one of her hideouts. She entered one of the many junkyards scattered across Border City.

A group of outdated androids, at least a few decades old, were sorting through piles of scrap.

Whirrr, click.

The androids reacted upon seeing Barbara. They shut the junkyard's doors and activated the security system. I noticed the surveillance devices installed in the fence coming to life.

"This place is officially under the orphanage director’s name. Not that the bastard even knows he owns a junkyard."

Barbara squeezed through a pile of scrap and pushed open a rusted door. Inside, the glow of electronic devices flickered.

Stepping into the hideout, I found advanced equipment and high-tech facilities that seemed entirely out of place. And in the deepest part of the room, Barbara’s full-body prosthetic was mounted—a replica of how she looked back in her academy days.

"Luka, when I saw you heading for Lazarus… I was sure you had found Giselle’s whereabouts. In this situation, suddenly stopping by Lazarus must mean something. It’s also the place where you woke up."

Barbara spoke while preparing for surgery. It seemed she intended to switch into her full-body prosthetic immediately.

"Hmm, I could’ve gone there because of aftereffects from the treatment at Lazarus."

"Don’t lie, Luka. We agreed to trust each other. You must know that Ilay is heading for the Empire. 'The Empire’s Blade' is also on the move. You’re not the kind of person who would stop by a hospital at a time like this."

I twitched my lips.

Whiiir—

Barbara lay naked on the operating table. Precision robotic arms extended from the sides and the ceiling, coming to life.

Click.

Her full-body prosthetic moved on its own and lay down on the adjacent surgical table.

‘Ilay Carthica.’

So Ilay really was heading for the Empire. He must have seen this as a golden opportunity. That was a concern for later. Right now, I had to find Giselle.

"Giselle left a clue about her whereabouts with Juppe."

Barbara flinched at the mention of Juppe’s name.

"That loose-mouthed idiot? You always complained about how frustrating he was…"

"Which is exactly why she entrusted it to him."

"Unbelievable. Juppe tried to hand you over to the Emperor under the guise of treatment. Giselle had to stop him time and time again."

I remained unfazed. I could see exactly how things had played out.

‘Juppe wanted to hand me over to the Emperor to secure the safety of our family. Back then, my chances of waking up were slim. Protecting someone who was as good as gone versus ensuring the survival of the family—his choice was obvious.’

It was an action taken purely for the sake of the family.

If Juppe truly hated or resented me… he would have handed over Giselle’s message to the Emperor long ago.

Whirrr—

I watched Barbara’s surgery unfold right before my eyes. A laser cutter sliced open the girl’s skull, from forehead to occipital bone.

Squelch.

With a sickening sound, her skull split open, revealing her brain.

Her brain had several electronic chips embedded in it. Directly implanting chips into the brain was an extremely dangerous procedure. It meant she had absolute confidence in both her skills and mental fortitude.

‘A brain transplant in a place like this…’

The robotic arms moved, carefully extracting Barbara’s brain and sealing it in a storage case designed for prosthetic bodies. Then, the occipital section of the full-body prosthetic opened, and the brain case slid inside, locking into place.

Shhhk.

The robotic arms opened the nape of her prosthetic neck and injected a series of drugs. Likely antibiotics and various inhibitors.

I saw the body of the girl, her skull wide open. The spot where Barbara’s brain had been was now a deep crimson. Blood trickled down, dripping onto the floor beneath the operating table.

‘…Is this really the body of a girl who died in an accident?’

I squinted at Barbara’s full-body prosthetic.

She twitched her fingers and toes first, then slowly sat up. Holding her forehead, she lightly shook her head from side to side.

"It feels like I just submerged my consciousness in a cheap network crawling with a million viruses and then yanked it back out."

Well, that certainly didn’t sound pleasant.

"Giselle was probably in cryosleep at Lazarus. When Lazarus shut down the hospital, they would’ve transferred the patients as well. Find out where she was taken."

I got straight to the point.

"Give me a second. Do you think Barbara is some kind of all-knowing search engine? You expect me to just pull up the answer like that?"

Barbara snapped irritably. It seemed the transplant had left her feeling off.

I waited for her to recover. In the meantime, countless thoughts surged in my mind. The state of the Empire, in particular, made my head itch with unease.

‘Ilay… are you really going to go through with it?’

I clasped my hands together and steadied my breathing. I felt like I was on the verge of panic.

"Are you even sure Giselle is at Lazarus? I’ve accessed Lazarus’s database before. There was no trace of her."

Barbara questioned me.

"You didn’t see it firsthand. She must have been registered under a different identity. Lazarus has some surprisingly loose ends. If someone bribed the staff, they could take out a patient in cryosleep and replace them with someone else."

Barbara gave a slight nod, seemingly acknowledging my point. But the hesitation in her movement suggested she still had lingering doubts.

"Lazarus is a NewGen subsidiary, so their server security is excellent—but not perfect. You waking up due to external interference proves that. But why would Giselle need to go into cryosleep in the first place? It only increases the risk. Why do something so dangerous?"

"…Because she had a reason to take that risk."

"What reason?"

I hesitated for a moment before answering.

"She wanted to escape time. Giselle couldn’t bear to watch her emotions change."

Barbara stared at me blankly. Twisting a lock of her falling bangs between her fingers, she finally spoke.

"Hmm, Barbara doesn’t get it. If emotions are so fragile that they change with time, wouldn’t it be better to just let them go? I have no doubt that I’ll never change."

"That’s because your emotions are driven by possessiveness and obsession. You won’t be satisfied until you have what you want."

Barbara stared at me with distant, hollow eyes. The strands of hair she had been twisting snapped one by one.

"Don’t dissect my emotions like that, Luka. Barbara likes Giselle."

"Mushir al-Kashura liked me too. That’s why he tried to extract my brain and link it to his own."

Barbara fell silent. Instead of responding, she connected to the network.

Her closed eyelids trembled slightly.

"…This is troublesome."

Even with her eyes shut, she furrowed her brows. A bad premonition settled over me as well.

"I can break through most security systems on my own."

"There are plenty of things in this world that can’t be solved with individual force, Luka. This is one of them."

Barbara slowly opened her eyes. Text floated across her cybernetic lenses.

Swish.

She raised her hand, extending her index finger upward.

"What does that mean?"

"The cryosleep patients from Lazarus were transferred to a NewGen orbital hospital. It’s safe enough, I suppose."

"An orbital hospital…"

Just hearing those words and seeing the direction of her gesture filled me with unease.

"So, if your guess is correct, Giselle is beyond the stratosphere."

A headache pulsed behind my temples. There were plenty of places in the world beyond my reach—but space, in particular, was the worst of them.

---

Ominous rumors were circulating through Border City’s networks.

‘A rebellion has erupted in the Empire.’

The details were unclear due to the Empire’s strict information control.

Even the Empire-born groups in Border City were acting unusually. Whatever was happening, some kind of upheaval was certain.

‘Ilay Carthica, what the hell are you doing?’

I was growing increasingly anxious. Things were already in motion.

"I handed over the list of Empire’s Blade executives to Ilay a long time ago. With our plans and timeline in shambles, there was no reason to take risks preparing anymore. Besides, the chaos that Giselle and I planned to stir up through Empire’s Blade—the Carthica Fox will handle that far better than us."

Barbara stepped out of a clothing store, now wearing a bright, flowery dress. She must have just checked the news about the Empire through the network.

"Damn it."

I sighed as I looked at her, all dressed up.

Barbara and I began planning our infiltration of the orbital hospital. There was no conventional way in, and even for Barbara, hacking into an orbital facility with no physical access was impossible.

"Honey, how do I look? Does it suit me?"

Barbara asked as she lifted the hem of her dress, flashing an artificial smile as if she had been programmed to do so.

‘This is insane.’

I recalled an old memory. I’d rather crossdress again than do this… This was unbearable.

‘Playing newlyweds.’

From this moment on, Barbara and I had to pretend to be a married couple.

"Barbara wants to make a face like she just swallowed shit too, but she’s holding back. Just think of it as a mission. You were a soldier, weren’t you?"

…This was going to drive me mad.

"I know, ho… ho…"

Barbara waited for me to finish my sentence. I dragged it out before finally spitting it out.

"…ney."

I could feel a cold sweat forming.

"Hehe, the first time is the hardest. It gets easier from the second time on. You’ve memorized the plan, right?"

I didn’t want to answer, so I just nodded.

We were planning to leave for space through Honey Space Travel, a travel agency in Border City. Honey Space specialized in orbital hotel honeymoons, a popular trend among the wealthy.

‘Which is why we’re pretending to be newlyweds.’

As expected of a top-tier hacker, Barbara had handled all the preparations flawlessly. She had fabricated fake identities and documents and even hacked into Honey Space's booking system, reducing what would have been a six-month reservation process to just two days.

"One more time—your name is Clyde now, and I’m Bonnie."

Our plan was to hijack Honey Space's space cruise and use it to infiltrate the orbital hospital. If an accident occurred aboard a luxury cruise and passengers were injured, NewGen’s orbital hospital would have no choice but to grant docking permission.