The Heart-Pounding Prison Life of the Atrocious and Cruel Great Sinner Benya Tomiri (1)
Plenty of things had happened, one way or another, but after boarding the fleet dispatched by the planetary government—no less than its flagship, the battleship Lombardia—I was transferred directly into a space prison orbiting Lombardia, the heart of Milano-III, capital planet of the Milano System. And that was how my first overseas trip wrapped up.
Ah, no, that's not right. Strictly speaking, the trip hadn't ended so much as I had just checked into my 'lodgings'······.
"Absolutely not! Stripping a scientist of her lab coat is an outrage against language itself!!!"
"Where does a criminal being hauled off to prison get that kind of confidence?"
"Hold on, wait—weapons are prohibited inside the prison!"
"This is my body? Look at it. It's flesh."
"······???"
"For your reference, these parts that look mechanical are actually wired into my living tissue, so they can't be removed either. Please be understanding~"
"Uh. Hm."
In the end, everything I carried was confiscated—my clothes, of course, along with the communication terminal Ilena had prepared for me (basically a smartphone from my old world), the various portable lab equipment that had been clipped to my original outfit as a matter of course, the vials of special reagents, all of it.
The only thing I barely managed to hold onto was the white lab coat, that must-have fashion item of every mad scientist. That, at least, I defended to the bitter end.
"Get in. This is your room."
"Oooh."
"Your raw physical abilities are far too low for us to risk letting you mingle with the other criminals, so we've arranged a solitary cell for you."
Prison being prison, the room was a beggar's hovel compared to my quarters back at the branch building on Milano-V. But measured against the standards of my old world, well—how should I put it.
To put it as simply as possible: it was about on par with one of those fifty-buck-a-month studio rooms from the 2026 I'd transmigrated out of. There was a reasonably tidy bed with freshly laundered blankets and a pillow folded neatly on top, a table and a small chair built flush into the wall sitting lonely beside it, and behind the bed, beyond a proper partition wall, a combined toilet and shower. It was, all things considered, livable.
I set the orange prison uniform they'd shoved at me to replace my confiscated clothes down on the table—still folded neatly, because the fabric was simply too wretched to wear—and, keeping only my hard-won white lab coat while the rest of me remained in a state of flawless nudity, I flung myself onto the bed. Time to enjoy a happy dopamine detox, doubling as a vacation.
Of course, "dopamine detox" was a bit of a stretch. Strictly speaking, it meant escaping a reality where an obscene mountain of work and incidents had pushed my brain to the verge of overheating, and spending my days recuperating dopamine through nothing but shameless forum-posting.
"Ah. My bad."
Just as I'd replied to that anonymous user, compared to the outside world where incidents and catastrophes erupted at the drop of a hat, this place really was peaceful and cozy. So regardless of whatever flabbergasted emotes the gallery users slapped on my post, I doubled down—"it counts as a dopamine detox, period"—and settled back into bed to keep shitposting at my leisure.
Besides, resting up like this, filling my belly with two meals a day (I wasn't moving my body anyway, so there was no need to bother with three), sleeping when I should and lounging when I could, with food, clothing, and shelter all solved for me—living off the hard-earned taxes of the poor citizens of Milano-III like a professional freeloader…
Perhaps thanks to the dopamine detox, the brain that had been grinding itself rigid under the crushing weight of everyday life turned as soft and squishy as Ilena's lunchbox in a mere three days.
"Hmm······ come to think of it, I've barely ever actually looked at my own branch's status window!"
Posts from other users that I'd normally skim past were suddenly registering in my head, one after another, and thanks to that I was even picking up on the chatter of this world's players—stories I'd completely forgotten about.
So, since I happened to have time on my hands, I decided to seize the moment and go rummaging through my own status window, checking off whatever needed checking. And so, still nude with nothing but my white lab coat draped over me—because the orange prison uniform's fabric was too wretched to wear, and it remained folded neatly on the table—I sprawled across the bed, plopped today's lunch (a bowl of white oatmeal, Sweetness Edition) between my legs, and started poking at the status window to size up my situation.
But was it just because it had been so long? I'd been too busy to spare it a thought, so this was effectively the first proper look since right after my transmigration—over two whole months since I'd last opened it.
Head of the Milano Branch of the Demonia Empire—and, among the countless consuls the Empire has seeded across the galaxy, a standout posting remarkable results.
Currently devouring an entire star system at a very brisk pace, and is thus rated as a top-10 active consul.
"Ooooh······ hmm, very interesting."
Reading it all felt like someone diligently painting gold trim over my entire face, frame by frame, and I found it thoroughly delightful.
And with that, I could feel it, vividly and viscerally: whatever else this world might be, there were unmistakable undercurrents running through it that called to mind a territory-management sim.