The parents who ascended

"Gemini was awesome."

"The Metaverse was awesome."

The boy's expression vanished. He fell silent for a moment, and his eyes suddenly grew moist.

He mechanically ate the chocolate cake in his hand, bite by bite.

"But what I can't understand is this."

"The moment the Gemini Superbrain ascended."

"Every employee inside Gemini Tower."

"Somehow disappeared along with it."

"Did the Gemini Superbrain take them away?"

"Were they converted into data?"

"Or did they become gods?"

"But."

"Why did my parents-my adoptive parents, to be precise-have to be core technical staff for the Gemini Superbrain?"

"They... disappeared too!"

"And then I became an orphan and ended up in an orphanage in Rust City?"

As the boy spoke,

grief and loneliness intertwined in his heart.

His arm trembled slightly, and crumbs of chocolate cake fell onto the nutrient pod.

The nanny robot detected them instantly. It immediately sprayed cleaning solution, then flipped out a sponge brush and scrubbed furiously with squeaking strokes, as though it had an extreme obsession with cleanliness.

The boy lowered his head.

He saw that the nutrient pod had become spotless in an instant.

He gave a bitter laugh and blinked back his tears. "You really cleaned it thoroughly. Not a thing left!"

A moment later,

the boy collected himself. "But maybe that's good. Who knows? My parents might have become some higher form of life, watching me from up above."

Then he looked up.

He saw that this luxury home had two floors. Through the glass wall of this bedroom, he could look across the double-height hall and see a bedroom on the second floor.

There was a nutrient pod in that room, and it was actually upright.

An elderly man slept soundly inside.

The old man had a full head of silver hair, wrinkled skin, a skeletal frame, and age spots all over his body.

Even technology as advanced as a nutrient pod could only slow aging at best. It could not grant immortality.

The boy glanced at the boy inside the nutrient pod beneath him. "You have family... Is that your grandpa? Or your dad? He seems pretty loving, always facing you."

"Hmm... probably your dad."

"The way people have children in the Metaverse..."

"The nutrient pod directly extracts genetic material from a man and a woman, then grows a baby in vitro."

"The nanny robot handles everything."

"Once the baby has developed in the nursery pod for three months and its neural network has formed, it's transferred straight into a nutrient pod."

"Its consciousness appears in the Metaverse as a little baby. The parents take over and raise it there, becoming a happy family of three as it grows."

"In this age, no matter how old you are, you can still become a dad."

"Basically, you give birth to a consciousness and toss the actual body aside."

Qin Yiguan stared at Ninth Brother's face inside the pod. "Look how clean and pale you are. I bet you were born in a nutrient pod and grew up in one too. Have you never woken up?"

"And look at that miserable expression."

"Are you being abused in the Metaverse?"

"Here, let your big brother draw you a smile."

As Qin Yiguan spoke, he dabbed a little chocolate sauce onto the glass cover, drawing a broad grin over the boy's face.

But less than a second later,

the nanny robot's body jerked, and the little face was instantly wiped away.

The smile at the corners of Qin Yiguan's mouth slowly faded.

Ninth Brother's face became clearly visible inside the nutrient pod again. His eyes were closed, his brows faintly furrowed. Though his consciousness had entered the Metaverse, his expression looked as though he were having a nightmare.

This boy was about Qin Yiguan's age and build, and even looked a little like him.

Qin Yiguan gazed at him, as though looking at another version of himself.

Once again, he used chocolate sauce to draw a broad grin over the boy's face.

The nanny robot wiped it away again.

Qin Yiguan's expression gradually turned cold, and irritation began to rise within him.

"Why spend your life dwelling on painful things?"

"Why do you always cling to those painful memories?"

"You should smile!"

"Smile for me!"

"That expression reminds me of my painful past... I'm starting to dislike you!"

Qin Yiguan growled, his voice echoing through the empty spaces of the mansion.

Inside the Metaverse.

The two men in black trench coats, Officer Wang and his deputy, stood quietly in the moonlight.

"Captain."

"We found all of the girl's remains. Twenty-eight pieces, no more, no less."

"The medical examiner has already examined them..."

"Even the cutting method, force, and angles were exactly the same as what that boy demonstrated in his reconstruction."

Xiao Li swallowed, feeling a chill of fear.

Then,

Xiao Li looked at Officer Wang. "Captain, that kid is terrifying. He's far too familiar with criminal methods. Have you never considered... that one day he might commit a crime himself?"

Officer Wang's expression remained calm. "No."

His deputy, Xiao Li, was still uneasy and ventured, "Do you have any monitoring measures in place? Something basic, like notifying his parents about this?"

Officer Wang was a heavy smoker. He lit another cigarette. "His parents... were core technical staff at Gemini."

His deputy, Xiao Li, froze. "They ascended... Oh, to be precise, they mysteriously vanished when the Gemini Superbrain evolved?"

Officer Wang pondered for a moment. "The nearly five thousand employees in Gemini Tower did indeed disappear that day, just as the rumors say."

"But Qin Yiguan's parents didn't."

With the cigarette between his lips, Officer Wang turned to Xiao Li and suddenly said, "But Qin Yiguan's parents didn't."

The young officer's face had inexplicably gone a little pale. "They... why didn't they?"

Xiao Li felt he was about to hear another terrible truth.

Officer Wang exhaled a smoke ring. "Twelve years ago, back when my body still regularly moved in and out of the physical world, I received a report one cool afternoon."

"A young couple had died gruesomely in their home."

Xiao Li's pupils contracted. "The Qin family? Someone killed them over an unknown grudge, but the young Qin Yiguan escaped and became an orphan?"

Officer Wang shook his head. He held his cigarette between two fingers without bringing it to his lips. His eyes narrowed slightly as he sank into his memories.

"When I entered that room."

"The two bodies were slumped in a corner, and the wall behind them was covered in blood."

"The man had been stabbed eleven times. The woman, twelve."

"I could tell that the man must have been gentle, courteous, and well educated when he was alive."

"And the woman was beautiful. She gave the impression of someone gentle, attentive, and good at caring for others."

"Their house was clean and tidy too."

"It should have been a warm, loving home."

More than half the cigarette in Officer Wang's hand had burned away. Ash fell from it, but he did not notice.

"There was no trace of the killer left in the house."

"I tried to find the murder weapon without disturbing the scene."

"Then."

"I found a six-year-old boy under the dining table."

His deputy, Xiao Li, suddenly opened his eyes wide. "Qin Yiguan! So you'd known him all along, Captain Wang!"

Officer Wang tacitly confirmed it and continued, "I remember clearly. That child was covered in blood, in a spray pattern. In his hand... he held a dagger, also covered in blood."

"And his eyes were vacant. He was actually clenching a piece of bloody flesh between his teeth."

His deputy, Xiao Li, froze completely.

"Blood..."

"A dag... ger..."

"Could it be!"

Horror filled Xiao Li's eyes. "What was the flesh in his mouth?"

Officer Wang's pupils trembled slightly too. "My mind was a little muddled at the time as well. I turned back and examined the two bodies carefully, and discovered that the woman... Qin Yiguan's adoptive mother... had a piece torn from her arm..."

His deputy, Xiao Li, recoiled half a step in shock. "Wh-wh-wh... what!!!"