Bad News

This damn flashlight probably used up Li Fan's last bit of travel budget. Realizing he couldn't earn more from this poor bastard, he stopped paying attention to him. Li Fan called out to him for a long time, but the flashlight wouldn't even turn on its low beams.

As a result, probably because the space station disintegrated and all the hangar doors were sealed, Li Fan couldn't find a shuttle to rent and escape. He could only crawl out along the shuttle's catapult track.

The gravity system is now intermittent, sometimes hurling people away, sometimes crushing them, and occasionally launching large pieces of debris like cargo holds. He can only use his switchblade like an ice axe, trying to keep his body flat against the tracks to avoid being thrown into deep space.

Now that he's got the chip, he needs to find a way to deliver it to a logistics company before he can find a place to dispose of it. However, his body is about to give out. Although Li Fan can forcibly maintain his life using his Divine Sense and blood refining techniques, the spirits of people in this world are simply too fragile. Just a glance at an immortal was enough to cause the 'consciousness' and 'soul'—those metaphysical things—of this body to vanish completely, leaving it nothing more than a piece of flesh on the verge of death and decay, starting from the cellular level.

In addition, Li Fan and the security guards had just played around with spinning and jumping in a state of acceleration, which had exhausted him a bit. Now, as he climbed the orbit, he was bleeding all the way up. By the time he finally managed to climb out of the hatch and reach the outer shell of the space station, all that was left inside his rubber suit was a pile of rotting internal organs and pus-filled limbs, and bones stuck together with bloody skin.

Sigh, there's really not much he can do now. If the system doesn't step up its game soon, things are going to go wrong.

Li Fan ejected a safety rope from his elbow and secured it to the safety lock on the outer shell of the space station, thus securing himself to the hull. As the space station components disintegrated and rotated in the vacuum, he looked up into deep space and, under the sunlight, saw a yellowish-white planet in the distance.

That's Jupiter's moon, Jupiter's Jupiter's moon. Its surface is covered with a thick layer of ice, beneath which lies liquid water. It's the only place in the Solar System besides Earth where large amounts of liquid water exist. Moreover, the planet has a metallic iron core. According to the system, it was a resource point that ancient humans fought over for a long time during the interstellar development era. Numerous orbital factories and research stations belonging to various companies exist nearby. Li Fan estimated that the emergency rescue fleet should be arriving by now.

The company will likely still come to shelter refugees and survival pods from the space station; it's definitely a paid service. Even if you go bankrupt, it's not a big deal; the expenses for space rescue are covered by the Public Security System, and you can pay off your debts slowly afterwards. Of course, many people do go bankrupt this way...

Moreover, before the disintegrated OP173 wreckage is bound by Jupiter's moon's gravity and falls onto the ice sheet, eventually sinking into the deep sea, a large number of interstellar junk collectors will surely flock to it, vying for the company's legacy.

It was like a whale fall attracting a frenzied shark feast.

So Li Fan wasn't worried about turning into dust in space, and quietly lay there to conserve the power of his protective suit.

Then he heard a clicking, clicking vibration coming from the alloy casing. Li Fan turned his head and saw a spider-like, multi-legged drone, about the size of an adult's palm, crawling towards him.

"Drip drip drip drip?"

But the drone didn't interact with him; instead, it flashed its "eyes" and spat out a round lens the size of a fingernail.

Li Fan suddenly looked up and dodged.

In the same instant, the lens flashed, shooting out a high-energy beam of light that sliced through the alloy plate. At the same time, a cockroach pounced, leaping onto Li Fan's face in a flash! It spat out a drill, whooshing and piercing into Li Fan's skull!

Damn! Military supplies, huh!

Li Fan grabbed the drone and tried to pull it away, even tearing off half his face, but he couldn't shake it off. The drill steadily pierced his skull, creating a bloody hole, and then directly inserted a needle-like transistor containing circuitry into his brain! It was clearly aware that he was playing a single-player game and wanted to force him to connect and interact online!

Holy crap! They should drill a hole in your skull! Is this how hackers physically connect to the internet these days?! Damn it!

Enraged, Li Fan swung his knife backhand, plunging the switchblade into his chin, severing the transistor in the crown of his head. Simultaneously, with a flick of his wrist, he sliced off half his head, tossing it, along with the drone attached to his face, into the vacuum of space!

But then the spider shot out another steel cable, which again caught on the safety lock on the space station's outer shell! It pulled it back in the opposite direction!

Damn it! You're relentless! Fine, I'm leaving!

Without hesitation, Li Fan slashed the safety rope with his knife before the spider could pounce on him, leaping into the air and launching himself into the vacuum!

With a leap of all its might, the space station quickly moved away, and the spider-like thing indeed dared not give chase. Such a sophisticated contraption must be expensive; if it crashed into Jupiter's moon and got lost, even the hacker would probably be reluctant to part with it.

Damn it... But seriously, if these two damn systems don't come to my rescue soon, I'm really going to die...

In deep space

'Unidentified communication signal requests connection.'

Where did the signal come from? The system? The company?

That's it, my life essence is exhausted, and my spacesuit is about to run out of power. I really can't hold on any longer.

Accept.

Then the light screen flashed.

Li Fan opened his eyes and found himself sitting in a luxurious shuttle.

How luxurious is it? The cabin Inner Landscape features blue skies and white clouds, a proper garden and lawn, and a sauna and swimming pool with a group of stunningly beautiful real people—not robots, but real companions. Stepping onto the terrace and looking up, you can see the starry sky and the vast ocean outside the observation deck—a kind of understated luxury.

Li Fan was stunned for a moment, then looked at the reflection in the wine glass in his hand and found himself possessing the cybernetic body of a handsome, strong young man with an almost perfect physique and appearance. Then the reflection in the wine glass raised its glass and smiled at him.

"Li Yi, your sacrifice satisfies me."

Oh, it's you. Whatever.

Li Fan was completely numb.

The reflection in the glass, having finished its red wine, walked to the enormous floor-to-ceiling window with a panoramic view. The reflection, standing amidst a sea of glittering stars, spoke to him...

"I like people who can get things done. Would you like to come over here and help me?"

Looking out the window, Li Fan knew his location almost instantly, without needing much astronomical knowledge. The destination of the straight flight path of the rose gold shuttle was that clear, azure star, like a gem in a starry sea—the planet of life.

Ah, Earth, everything about it is so nostalgic... and not a single thing has changed...

Thank you for your praise, Immortal. However, he is not yet capable of joining this game. He should start by saving his own world first.

"Is that so? Heh, whatever. If you change your mind, then chant my name. I've been waiting for your summons for a long time."

The shadow smiled, stretched, walked into the pool, and embraced the couples.

Li Fan was looking forward to what would happen next, but unfortunately, the dream vanished in the blink of an eye. His warm and soft partner in his arms disappeared without a trace, and he woke up to find himself in front of an unfamiliar metal sunroof.

This is an unfamiliar spaceship. It has virtually no interior, with exposed metal pipes everywhere, clearly an industrial vessel.

A cyborg wearing compound eyepieces—no, a person whose entire face has been modified and who has mechanical compound eyes—suddenly leans forward, and in every shot, the blood-soaked human figure on the operating table is reflected.

"Holy crap! This thing's actually alive! You scared the hell out of me! Hey! Want me to put a head on your head? I have a spare prosthetic body, I'll sell it to you cheaply. Damn it! You paid extra to come all the way here, and you just picked up a dead body?"

Li Fan hissed as he realized he had been pulled out of the water by someone.

"Tick-tock tick-tock..."

"What's that 'didi da da' sound? Oh, the verification code? Hey, I'm asking for your verification code. 'Didi da da da,' it's four 'da' sounds, right? Bro, I'm not a pirate, I'm here to pick up a package. Please confirm the order number and sign."

Li Fan looked at the LCD panel the other party had taken out, then reached out and pried out the chip hidden between his ribs.

"Package received confirmed. Welcome to Xinghai Express. Xinghai Express is now offering a Galaxy VIP monthly card, saving you 40 coins per shipment! Break even on just one order! Ship more, earn more! Big discounts on large items! Receiving your package is like making a profit! Please contact customer service for details!"

Hey bro! Your boss is so stingy! He won't even cover the surgery fee. I see you've lost half your head. Luckily, I have a spare prosthetic head, a knock-off of the Xingtian version! Interested? I'll sell it to you for 500 coins! Seeing how miserable you are, I'll give you an extra 50% off!"

"... I have no money."

"Damn! Not even 250! You poor bastard!"

The cyborg grumbled and cursed, but still quickly inserted tubes all over Li Fan's body, put him in a plastic bag, and chained him up.

In the blink of an eye, Li Fan found himself on another ship.

This time it was the system's ship, with a humanoid figure that looked like carbon dust gathered on its silver, bullet-like, fluid metal hull.

"Wait a minute, the goods are just passing through the door. We'll go back once we're sure no one is tracking us."

Li Fan checked himself and confirmed that there was nothing wrong with his primordial spirit.

"What's going on this time? The company's hackers are so skilled! You cruisers can handle them, but the security guards can't? I'm begging you guys to be more reliable! Stop messing things up like this!"

"Sigh... It's really not that we're trying to trick you. If it were just a few information security technicians on the other end, it would be fine, but just now people from the Seven Departments and Nine Departments came in through the back door, so I had no choice but to stay silent!"

I knew it was so easy to find a system chip of that caliber! That company bastard has gotten himself into a real mess. Not only is he being investigated by his own security department, but he's also being watched by the police. He's definitely involved in other major cases, murders, and he's probably planning to raise money and run away!

"Sigh... This is really bad luck. Under normal circumstances, the Security Bureau wouldn't need to get involved... We probably messed with the Earthlings. Luckily, we used Plan B, otherwise we really wouldn't be able to get out of this."

"What's going on? Seven Departments? Nine Departments? Earthlings?"

"The agents under the Public Security System are divided into Seven Departments) and the Cybercrime Investigation Department (Nine Departments). Of course, they only deal with crimes committed between citizens of Earth."

In fact, these days, eight or nine out of ten crimes are both economic crimes and cybercrimes. So generally, cases involving company disputes are handled by Seven Departments, cases involving professional hackers are handled by Nine Departments, and cases involving both are handled jointly.

"I just don't know if they're from this plane's branch office or from headquarters; the skill levels are worlds apart. Look, they've even brought out the mobile force."

Then the holographic image appeared, and in the repeatedly switching visual scenes, it was seen that at the moment the space station automatically disintegrated, squads of mobile troops wearing SBS mobile suits and fully armed to the teeth emerged from the stealth assault pods and suddenly descended into the OP173 space station from all directions.

These mobile soldiers operate with radar stealth and optical shadows throughout. Each team of four is equipped with more than twenty equally stealthy drones of various models, ranging from wolfhounds to brown bear-sized fire support drones. These killing machines are armed with projectile weapons to electromagnetic weapons, silenced pistols to gravity hammers, monomolecular knives to plasma lightsabers, swarm missiles to railguns—they are armed to the teeth.

This terrifying force is merely a security guarantee.

Because wherever they went, the company's self-defense systems and security gates were silently hacked and unlocked, and the local security personnel were almost completely powerless to resist as they were stripped of their authority, rendered in a state of shutdown and shock, and the entire space station and the company's key departments were silently taken over.

Oh my god... but how come there were none just now...?

"It's a pity that guy killed too quickly, leaving no one alive, even those on the other side of the door were all dead, there wasn't even a chance to trace their source code or insert a magic puppet or something."

Before he could finish speaking, Li Fan saw the live feed from the perspective of these mobile suits flicker, and a black shadow seemed to appear on his retina. Then the entire screen went black.

Wow... that was a bit too sharp, wasn't it...?

"Let's play it safe. We don't have the strength to provoke the Public Security System right now. You keep an eye on things; if things get out of hand, clean up the mess. Did you steal the script that took apart the space station?"

"Don't worry, it seems safe for now. That guy cleaned up the entire star system database, and the firewall is spotless. It's a pity we don't know which nook or cranny it's hiding in now. Let's not come to this rural area again, it's too dirty."

Damn, big cities sound so dangerous... I think I'll go back to the mountains... Oh right.

"A small, spider-like drone was chasing me just now. Which side was it from? Seven Departments? Nine Departments?"

"A small drone? Just now?"

"... When that guy made his move, the local Quantum Network was delayed. Who could have used a drone?"

The system retrieved the visual recordings of Li Fan's prosthetic body and saw that the drone image that had drilled into Li Fan's head had been erased. It looked as if he had suddenly gone mad, drawn his sword to slash his face, and jumped into the void to commit suicide.

The system remained silent for a moment.

Although nothing can be seen, the fact that it is 'invisible' can reveal a lot.

"Unable to scan... erased the record..."

"A drone the size of a spider? The size of a fingernail but capable of cutting through alloy layers? So fast you couldn't dodge it and it still tried to force its way in? And it managed to control it, even locating you, despite the interference from that thing the whole time? This MEMS is amazing..."

"Damn, this level of equipment is at least military grade! Where in the Seven Departments or Nine Departments would you find something like this! This is practically illegal! Isn't the committee going to do anything about it?"

Illegal? Nanobots have tiny spiders; what law are they breaking?

"The higher the level of electronic integration, the weaker the anti-interference capability, especially since there was no one around at the time, right? This means that the drone fired without citizen authorization. Was it directly remotely controlled via a quantum network, or was it already using autonomous intelligence...?"

Regardless, this level of ECCM surpasses military-grade standards and is close to the robotic technology of the Omnic Rebellion era. The Combine lost six billion people fighting the robots back then, and their headquarters were destroyed; otherwise, the company wouldn't have existed..."

"No need to guess, it must be a toy custom-made for a VIP client by some company. This kind of technology can't be produced by some private workshop; it must be a top-tier giant corporation... I need to check that company's books and see who that bastard has offended."

"Well... so the bad news is that your old system has likely been compromised by frontline corporate hackers who have modified the logs, and we can't even detect it."

"Right now you have no identity and no internet connection, so that guy can't find you for the time being. But once you officially sign a contract with us and are connected to the quantum network, he'll eventually be able to track down the puppet. At that point, information leaks will be the least of his worries; people could even die."

"Another piece of worse news is that although the chip has been successfully transferred and we can upgrade it for you, considering that this thing has attracted so many deadly forces to fight over it, and even dismantled two space stations, we are not sure what kind of trouble it will cause after we install it on you."

So, Li Fan, what do you think? Should we continue?

What's there to consider? Do you expect to spend your whole life dreaming in a body bag?

Damn it! Come on! Upgrade me!

'Confirmed, system upgrade in progress'