Cyberpunk

Just as the Great Scimitar was hovering on the sea, a group of "old hunters" were happily undergoing modifications.

In the outer space of the same planet, in the asteroid belt beyond two moons, a massive space fortress is moving rapidly.

Although this fortress did not move at the speed of light, it still activated subspace technology. Meteorites as large as mountains and as small as basketballs would mysteriously disappear wherever they passed.

Even more terrifying is that this mechanical fortress, comparable to a mechanical city, is not only enormous in size, but also equipped with various types of Tier 3 weapons—rail cannons, laser cannons, all kinds of turrets, as well as space torpedoes, celestial launch weapons, small combat ships, and so on. The sheer number of these weapons is in the tens of thousands. Even some Tier 3 civilizations' giant space stations cannot match its firepower. Compared to it, the weapons of space pirates are like sticks.

This "mechanical fortress" stormed into the defensive range of the Machine Rift Star with an unbridled and reckless attitude.

The next moment, not only did a large number of mechanical octopuses emerge from the radiation layer of the planet Machine Rift, but Cybertron also seemed to be deploying interstellar ships.

"Haha, hahaha, make way for me, I'm here to marry a wife!"

On the mechanical fortress, various mechanical parts split and reassembled to form the image of a mechanical giant thousands of meters tall. The giant grabbed with both hands, and in the next moment, a pulse with a range of hundreds of kilometers swept out, and mechanical octopuses fell like rain wherever it passed.

At the same time, on all the armed space stations surrounding the satellite planet, the turrets all turned around, and dense beams of energy beams shot towards the mechanical giant.

"A mere near-orbital weapon strike is no match for me!"

On the mechanical fortress, engines of various models began to run, and defensive platforms slowly rose up. Then, a terrifying energy tide engulfed everything.

"What kind of monster is this?!" a mid-level manager of a military contractor exclaimed in astonishment. In the holographic projection, his company's energy weapons had not caused any damage to the other party.

"On this joyous occasion of my old age, I will not hold a grudge against you. Otherwise, with my fiery temper, I would have torn these little things to pieces long ago."

The mechanical old man suddenly turned his head and looked at one of the "armed space stations." Under the terrifying aura, all the screens on the space station shattered.

The last energy monitoring screen that exploded showed an "energy level" of 300 million!

The mechanical energy of a third-order civilization building is barely over 100 million.

And the opponent's casual strike amounted to 300 million.

Ordinary space fortresses cannot do this.

This can only mean one thing: the opponent's "fortress" is equipped with higher-level weapons, such as fourth-tier civilization buildings.

"Why isn't the mother city responding?"

"The owner of an armed space station murmured."

"Reporting to Master, it's probably because of this scene."

Following the voice of artificial intelligence, a word "Thank you" that looked like ancient writing appeared in a blurry picture, which seemed to be the base of a space fortress.

"The Xie family, the high-orbit Xie family!?"

As the noblest of the cloud nobles, the Xie family are not the useless people of Cloud City, but true planetary nobles. It is rumored that they are the force responsible for the defense of the star sector for the mother city.

"This is a real space monster!"

"How did it get back to the planet?"

"What did it just say? It... it came to get married?"

Does it have a reproductive system?

The operators of the armed space station were frantically making satellite phone calls. Why did the other side appear at this time? What was their purpose? Would it disrupt the balance of power on the planet? All these questions were unknown.

However, they did not notice that ten mechanical giants, each a hundred meters tall, had also slipped into the planet through the same passage through which "Old Xie" had entered.

In space, distance becomes a terrifying number; without a monitoring system, it's no different from being blind.

These ten mechanical giants are Cybertronians, and they are professional law enforcement officers responsible for handling specific "planetary threats".

According to them, they catch insects.

Their levels have exceeded level 60, which is the upper limit of a level 2 civilization; levels 65, 63, and 67 are also present.

Second-order is the upper limit for species on this planet, but it is not their ultimate limit.

At this moment, the ten giants were actually discussing the same thing in their internal channels.

"Old Xie is acting crazy again."

"He's been acting crazy for a while now. It's said that mechanical life forms forcibly transformed by external forces all have this problem."

"By external force? What external force?"

"I don't know. It's said to be some civilizations outside this sector. You know, our Cyber Test Site is also known as a cesspool of civilizations. If we don't give them any benefits, what will we do if they sue us in the Civilization Council?"

"So, the Xie family are actually representatives of an extraterrestrial civilization?"

"The situation is more complicated. Social transformation is a very difficult task. Many times, people die while we are transforming. So we need to learn from civilizations that have already been successfully transformed, and get some data on civilization transformation. In the process, business dealings will follow."

"A diplomatic ambassador?"

"What's the big deal? I think the trade representative is more reliable."

"Is that so?"

"Alright, enough with the chit-chat. You haven't forgotten why we came here, have you?"

"Let's find that lost 'Great Scimitar' ship."

"This thing is easy to find. We have a locator, and a starship is so big, it can't be hidden anywhere."

"Instead of worrying about that, we should be more concerned about who Old Xie is planning to marry, since he's been clamoring to get married."

"It's a mechanical life form, how can it get married?"

"Why not? I've heard that some mechanical civilizations can not only marry and have children, but also evolve by marrying wives."

"That's awesome! What kind of civilization is that? Would we Cybertronians even consider marrying into one?"

A group of Cybertronians, seemingly on a mission but actually gossiping, leisurely entered the radiation layer.

But outside the real world.

Within a fragment of a virtual world.

The group found what they were looking for.

Place of Simulation

A world of image generation.

This is an encrypted data node known only to a select few top hackers. Here, all data, signals, sounds, and even smells are transformed into "images"—all sorts of images.

Some of the images are even viruses themselves, wandering around and trying to infect others.

The further you go in, the greater the probability of your own "visualization".

Once it's 'visualized,' there's no going back.

The "personality simulator" was born from here.

It couldn't remember exactly how it came to be, but it vaguely knew that a few hackers entered this place to do a task, and then were corrupted by the images. The remaining hacker code merged and gave birth to it.

It took a lot of effort for it to escape from here.

But this time, the hackers who got in weren't as unlucky as the previous ones.

In fact, even if a top 20 hacker is hunted down by a super corporation, it would be very difficult to kill them.

Their data clones, uploaded consciousness, hidden code, and taboo virtual modifications are more numerous than those of senior executives.

Moreover, this time, there is also an "Information Lifeform" that has been promoted for some time.

One great advantage of becoming an "information life form" is that you can see through "low-level information" changes at a glance, no matter how complex they become.

So, after dealing with the image monster, expelling several clones that might have been left behind by other hackers, and experiencing a large-scale image overlay, the Bird of Paradise team obtained what they wanted through their own strength.

"Is this it?"

Bird of Paradise looked at the object in its hand: an old-fashioned media player.

At this moment, the hackers' bodies were covered with colorful snowflakes.

Somewhat similar to 'Avalanche', but with richer colors, this is 'Code Simulacrum,' a possession software temporarily created by a few hackers to adapt to this place.

"There seems to be a line of text below," said the scorpion.

Bird of Paradise turned the player upside down, and sure enough, there was a line of text on the base—

House 320, Third Street, East London District, a gift from the Punk Family.

"Lent City seems to have been the financial center of the ancient Northern League, and East Lent District was one of its neighborhoods."

"And what is the Punk Family?"

"It is said to be an ancient killer virus."

"Interesting. Hackers these days are looking for ancient viruses. Are they going for a retro trend?" one hacker quipped.

Bird of Paradise turned on the player, put in the 'Avalanche' tape, and pressed play.

The dangerous avalanche and the unforgettable scenes did not appear. Instead, lines of ancient letters appeared, seemingly the operational guidelines of some underground organization.

We are committed to building anonymous systems. We defend our privacy through encryption, anonymous email forwarding systems, digital signatures, and electronic currency.

Encryption allows for the necessary loss of control that hive culture craves, enabling it to remain flexible and agile as it evolves into an ever-deepening entanglement.

In the age of civilization, we create these tiny worlds on a much larger bandwidth, making them more interactive and deeply immersive. We have evolved from static little images to dynamic 'virtual cities'.

To become a god, you must relinquish your absolute throne and yield it to the masses at the bottom.

"It looks somewhat familiar."

"Virtual cities, encrypted nodes, Cyber Hacker —doesn't that sound familiar? Did our industry start developing in the civilized era?"

Bird of Paradise took out the "negative" again, and this time, the surface of the "negative" was no longer garbled text, but a line of text—Crypunk4131 file.

"Anyway, we've found a lead for the second phase. Let's continue the investigation."

"House 320, Third Street, Donglun Special District. Check its current location."

Meanwhile, in the data processing center of a mega-corporation, a phantom figure slowly appeared.

Gao Yuanyuan glanced around and walked directly towards the wall. Just as she got close to the wall, a door opened.

Gao Yuanyuan pushed open the door and entered, but instead of a side path, she stepped into a human brain.