A Rainy Day (1)
A Rainy Day (1)
I had a dream.
Sometimes I dreamed of days I missed, and sometimes I dreamed of painful times.
This time, it was clearly the latter.
The surroundings were filled with blood and debris.
The walls, the ceiling, the floor. Everywhere I looked, there was only red.
I could tell at a glance.
It would take at least dozens of people to produce this much, wouldn't it?
This wasn't an amount of bloodstains that a single person could spew.
The scent of blood that seemed to pierce the tip of my nose made my expression twist on its own.
It was an instinctive reaction that slipped out before I knew it.
It wasn't my first time seeing a human corpse.
Ever since I arrived in this cyberpunk world, I had seen them countless times.
But this was the first time the situation was so severe that the phrase "mountain of corpses" came to mind.
I barely swallowed down the nausea that rose to my throat.
Someone spoke.
'It's not that you were late.'
No, I was definitely late.
I answered.
Even though I knew everything, even though I had played the game.
Because if I had moved even just a tiny bit faster, something like this wouldn't have happened.
Beyond the shadows, a wide glass wall was visible.
Between the finely spattered blood droplets, a cold, torrential downpour was falling.
Soon, I woke from the dream.
My whole body was drenched in sweat.
Hearing a swooaaaah sound, I turned my head.
Just like what I saw in the dream, rain was falling outside the full-panel glass window.
Ah.
Looks like I forgot to set the wall panel switch after coming in last night drinking with Drex.
I approached the window with sluggish movements.
When I pressed the window's shading switch, the entire glass pane began changing to a dark concrete pattern.
What a fucking shitty dream.
I lay down on the bed and closed my eyes.
But it didn't seem like I would fall asleep again.
6. A Rainy Day (1)
Chrome Psycho.
How they occur, and for what reason they are born—the ones also called chrome junkies—was not yet known.
It was convenient to understand them as a type of indiscriminate random crime or a kind of offense committed by people with intermittent explosive disorder.
But there was one difference.
In most cases, Chrome Psychos had their entire bodies armed with 'chrome,' with cyberware.
In other words, the scale of the incidents was different.
It was also a topic frequently aired on NCB24, the news channel of Neon City where I lived now.
In a way, it was only natural.
Even within this cyberpunk game world where the crime rate was already high, if you had to pick the city boasting the highest crime rate, Neon City couldn't be left out.
If you noticed that this figure even included the relatively low-crime Upper and Middle Layers combined, you could guess how many incidents occurred in this city's shadows.
As I said earlier, the cause behind the birth of Chrome Psychos hasn't been precisely revealed yet.
Just from statistically calculating the occurrence rate, it's said that 'Chrome Psychos' appear especially frequently on 'rainy days.'
The reason for that, too, was unknown.
But,
today, I felt like I now knew the reason.
"Ugh, my joints are aching."
[Confirmed. I understand that this is a symptom occurring in 'humans' of above-average age and is an extremely normal situation.]
"No, that's not it."
The areas where I had implant surgery hurt.
I groaned, keeping my voice down.
In a way, it was only natural.
Even just going through the process of having a metal crown placed on a tooth at the dentist, people feel their 'implants' aching on rainy days.
But I had gone one step further, replacing certain parts of my body entirely with lumps of chrome.
On humid days, it was only natural for it to hurt.
Of course, the severity varied from person to person, but even I, who had merely added cyberware implant grafts to parts of my skeletal structure and muscles, was like this.
What about people who had chromed themselves up more than me? And how much worse must their pain be?
I didn't even want to imagine it.
Chrome Psychos were clearly driven to commit crimes by this pain that drove them out of their minds.
I resolved the matter in my mind.
"My head hurts too, on top of that."
[I believe the headache is due to consuming a beverage synthesized with alcohol and the dwarf 'Drex'.]
.......
Anyway, my head hurt too.
If I had one complaint about living with Eve, it was that she was too literal and factual.
So anyway, it's raining and my body aches.
I made a firm resolution that today, absolutely, no matter what happened, I would not go outside.
As I was doing that, a message notification caught my eye on one side of my vision interface.
Checking the time received, it was a message that had arrived while I was still asleep.
It was Catherine.
Sender: 'Neon City's Top Freelancer'
- I'll go get checked by Drex like I said yesterday.
- Be careful not to let anything happen while I'm away.
I can't figure out why she keeps trying to hang around my house when she has so many of her own.
I briefly recalled last night's events.
Me, who had forgotten my promise to come home early and drank heavily with Drex just like that, only returning home after the sun had set.
Because of the cheap synthetic alcohol, my memory was fuzzy, but a hazy recollection of giving Catherine the most heartfelt 'grand jeol' of apology remained.
Maybe thanks to that, Catherine's mood seemed more relaxed than yesterday, judging by her message.
I sent Catherine a short reply telling her to take care and come back safely.
After all, I had been dragged off to No Answer once for not contacting her for a week.
So unless something was up, replying as soon as I confirmed the message was easier on my conscience too.
Now then.
What should I do now?
Several options existed.
It was fine to watch net streaming, and fine to watch variety shows, movies, or news programs.
Even just roaming around net space was enough to kill time.
If there was one slight drawback, it was that staying home like this made gaming the best option.
The problem was, there were no games I could play.
It was too much to further enjoy the classic old game I had been playing until last time.
There was the hidden truth that it actually wasn't a normal game, and also, I had already hit the max level.
It absolutely wasn't because I felt guilty after recommending that warrior to someone when I quit the game.
Anyway, it was hard to log back in with a light heart.
That left finding another similar classic game, or enjoying some inoffensive virtual reality game, but...
Unfortunately, the 'high-spec data module' I had ordered online hadn't arrived yet.
Thinking about it, it was strange.
It had clearly been a long time since I ordered it, too.
Why hadn't it even shown signs of arriving yet?
Since it came to mind, I accessed the net site operated by the courier corporation.
Delivery tracking....
Tracking number inquiry....
Hmm.
·
·
·
ㅡ Customer's package has arrived at [Neon City], [L9 Terminal].
ㅡ Customer's package is departing from [Neon City], [Lower Layer], [Redwood].
ㅡ Package has been lost. (Reason: robbery)
"......."
This is why I can't stop hating orcs.
Of course, there was a chance it wasn't orcs.
Probability-wise, about 0.01%.
"...Haa, should I just go out and buy it?"
I decided to handle the compensation claim later.
Honestly, if I wanted to get it quickly, going out was the right way.
Well, for me,
I had been trying to save a bit, and going out to buy something was a hassle.
What to do. Should I go out or not?
If I'd known my package would end up with orcs, I would have asked Drex to pick one up for me when I saw him yesterday.
While I was agonizing like that, Eve spoke to me.
[Information. I inform you that based on a net space search result, there is a cyberware specialty store within a 1km radius selling products at a price 14.25% cheaper than average.]
An AI wanting to go out was tempting me.
It hadn't been long since I'd pledged not to go out and just stay home today.
I had to break that pledge and go out like this?
And it's raining outside?
That line of thought underestimated me.
After deliberating for a while—long enough to be long, short enough to be short—I made my decision.
"Let's rest today."
[.......]
No meant no.
I had the pride of an 'I'.
If I ordered again, it would be delivered someday.
Or I could just pick it up while running another errand when I was already out.
I lay back down on the bed just like that.
Happiness.
What's the big deal about it?
Happiness is something you can obtain just by lazing around in bed....
I wondered why I'd agonized over it so much.
Then, shall I watch some net streaming?
I manipulated my vision interface with familiar hand movements.
One of the good things about falling into a cyberpunk world was that I could pull up a screen in mid-air while lying down and watch whatever I wanted.
What was there to watch now?
Ah, Eve was streaming.
I didn't understand how it worked.
But Eve kept streaming without stopping even while living with me.
It looked like high-level multitasking.
Just in time.
To watch Eve's stream, I tapped the name [Eve] on the hologram.
[Dear humans, that shall be all for today.]
And simultaneously, the stream turned off.
"?"
The chat window reactions flared up too.
ㅡ ????
ㅡ ?
ㅡ Did the stream just turn off only for me?
ㅡ What's with the sudden ending, master...
ㅡ Open up!! Open it again!!
ㅡ The age of artificial intelligence has ended! Rise up, humans!
ㅡ ??????
If my suspicion about this situation was correct,
these reactions from people were only natural.
"Streamer Eve-nim?"
[I ask, what seems to be the matter.]
"Your stream turned off, didn't it?"
[I kindly answer that the scheduled broadcast time has already ended.]
"Doesn't seem like it, though?"
[.......]
...So she was going to play it like that, was she.
I wasn't someone who would fall for Eve's shallow tricks like this. Then I could just watch a different stream.
A brief search followed.
"......There's really nothing to watch."
Was it because it was a weekday daytime time slot?
Regrettably, there really weren't many streams on.
Come to think of it, it felt like there had never been this few streams before.
It was an unusual thing.
I decided to change my objective.
If there were no streams worth watching, finding the VOD of Eve's streams would do.
Eve had been streaming for days, so there was plenty of archived footage.
I had checked last time by searching, so I was sure.
.......
But why weren't there any?
It was strange.
No, extremely strange.
There wasn't a single archived video of Eve.
Looking at the reactions on the net space bulletin board, that place was buzzing too.
Many people were discussing Eve's suddenly vanished videos.
Judging by the time, it seemed they had disappeared right around the point when I started looking for the VODs.
Most were saying they didn't know if something like this was even physically possible.
Hmm.
"Do you really have to go this far?"
[I lie, saying I don't know what you are talking about.]
"......."
Then at least don't tell me you're lying.
That was the feeling.
A feeling as if a puppy was throwing a tantrum because I wouldn't take her for a walk.
...Well, I couldn't do anything about it.
In the end, I started preparing to go out.
Since the coat itself had a waterproof function,
I just needed to grab an umbrella on top of my usual outing prep and it was done.
Eve said it was close, so I figured I'd just go and come back quickly, right?
That was what I thought.
If I had known I'd run into a Chrome Psycho on the way back, I definitely wouldn't have gone out.