What spread out before me was the interior of an ordinary apartment.
A reasonably spacious living room, one bathroom, three bedrooms.
It felt familiar. Of course it did — it was identical to the home I'd lived in during my past life.
There was no particular reason I'd recreated my past life's home exactly.
It was simply easier to build something familiar than something strange. That was all.
Though perhaps it felt slightly larger than I remembered, owing to the fact that it was completely empty — not a single piece of furniture anywhere.
"It's pitch black outside."
I drifted closer to the large window.
Beyond the glass was absolute darkness.
It reminded me of outer space.
That was probably the unrendered region out there.
If someone fell in, they'd never find their way back.
That chilling thought crossed my mind, and I took a step back.
"My body rendered properly, too…."
Standing in the middle of the living room, I looked down at my hands.
The floor was faintly visible through my glowing palms.
Apparently my body was shining with a semi-transparent light.
When I moved my hands away and checked myself over, I could see my familiar uniform.
I hadn't consciously chosen to wear it.
Had some part of me decided, without thinking, that this was the most comfortable thing to be in?
I tested it by spinning in place.
If this were my real body, my thighs would be screaming right now.
Maybe it was because this wasn't actual movement — more like operating a puppet from the inside.
No matter how much I moved, there wasn't even a ghost of pain.
Oh, for reference — my real body was back in the Commander's office, sitting with its eyes closed.
Anyone passing by might think I'd fallen asleep.
But I'd locked the door securely. No one would find me.
*Still, better to be careful. Just in case.*
What if someone decided to do something to my body while I was in here?
I wouldn't be able to notice from this side.
It seemed wise to always keep safety in mind.
For now, though… I had a free window of time, so it was fine.
After moving around a few more times to run my tests and confirm the fidelity of the rendered world, I flopped down in the middle of the living room.
Then I buried my face in both hands and cried out in theatrical astonishment.
"Could it be… that I'm a genius?!"
Leila's power was supposed to be nothing more than shooting lightning bolts.
And yet here I was, having built an entire virtual world out of it.
At this point, I was starting to feel a little frightened by my own brilliance.
Was I about to change the course of history?
I let out a low, delighted cackle and stared up at the ceiling.
I'd already decided on a name for this technique.
A world built from electricity — the Cyberbrain World.
If it performed the way I intended, it would be an enormous asset going forward.
"Since I've gone to the trouble of entering the Cyberbrain World… I might as well test that first."
I bounced to my feet.
Then, with a light step, I headed toward the entryway.
Of the three rooms, the one closest to the front door.
I stood before it and, without a moment's hesitation, turned the handle and threw it open.
If the apartment matched my past life's home, this should have been a small bedroom.
But beyond the door, a space far larger than the living room opened up to greet me.
"Oh…!"
If I had to give this sight a name, it was unmistakably a library.
Bookshelves taller than I was stood lined up in a row.
It almost looked like a corridor made entirely of shelves.
*This is… the Memory Corridor!*
This was the Memory Corridor, rendered inside the Cyberbrain World.
Seeing it like this, it really did look like a flashback room from a game.
As I stepped inside, the door slid shut behind me on its own.
The Memory Corridor had a heaviness to its very air.
I glanced around, then approached the nearest bookshelf.
Books were scattered across it at irregular intervals.
I pulled out one that looked particularly thick.
On its spine were the words: *The End of the 3rd Loop.*
"Open."
I murmured the words with the book in hand.
The pages began to flutter on their own, turning one after another.
As though infinite pages existed within, they kept turning and turning.
Something seeped out from the paper and soaked into my body.
A sense of reality washed over me — as though I were truly there, in that place.
Then, in vivid high definition, a scene unfolded before my eyes, accompanied by crystal-clear sound.
It was the final moment of the 3rd loop — the one I treasured most.
"Pfft, who came up with this idea? Oh, right. Me."
This was an immersive visual playback through Sentiment.
The only disappointment was that it was camera footage, so the angles were a bit awkward.
Still, it worked well enough.
Thoroughly satisfied, I closed the book.
Then I slid it back into its original place on the shelf.
The other books were much the same.
The Commander's sad face when I'd turned down his dinner invitation.
The Commander's anguished expression when he'd been disappointed after I was attacked.
The Commander's look of horror when Midir drove a blade through my thigh.
Arishia and Yubina's faces when I'd woken up after collapsing.
These were my treasures, collected one by one since I'd built the Memory Corridor.
Of course, the quality wasn't quite at the level of emotion I was truly after.
But someday, I wanted to fill every shelf in this library to bursting. That ambition stirred warmly inside me.
*Well then… time to stop sightseeing.*
Maintaining the Cyberbrain World consumed a fair amount of energy.
I was already running a little hot, my body temperature creeping up.
I forced myself to endure it and stepped back out of the Memory Corridor.
My next destination was the second room, connected to the living room.
I opened the door and walked in to find a space that looked like a command center.
This was exactly where I'd come to the Cyberbrain World for today.
I moved deeper inside and stopped in front of one of the monitors.
A moment later, I was watching the footage playing on screen and snickering.
"Pfhehe, Commander…. Studying in your bedroom?"
If that library was the physical manifestation of the Memory Corridor —
Then this command center was the physical manifestation of the Leila Network.
The feed from the hidden camera in his bedroom was playing here.
But the fun of peeping only lasted so long.
He wasn't suffering. He was just absorbed in his studies.
My interest evaporated quickly, and I moved to an empty spot beside the monitors.
Somewhere around here should work.
Once I'd found a suitable position, I extended my palm.
"Import."
*Crackle!*
With a sharp, crackling burst of electricity —
The computer I'd seized earlier materialized in this space.
About five hours and thirty minutes remaining.
That should be more than enough to accomplish what I'd come here for.
I settled naturally into the chair in front of the computer.
"Now then… let's see if it runs properly."
I pressed the power button, and the monitor lit up immediately.
Thump, thump. Was the flutter in my chest anticipation, or anxiety?
The moment the screen fully loaded, I pumped my fist in silent triumph.
The Valkyrie surveillance program that had been shackling me all this time —
The blocking software — none of it had launched.
Because I was using the Leila Network as a kind of VPN.
The system wouldn't even register that a computer had been turned on.
From this point forward, I could use the internet without anyone knowing.
"I have internet freedom…!"
Honestly, it was moving.
In my past life, I'd been practically addicted to the internet.
It felt like finally returning home.
I was so overcome I could almost cry.
Right. Later, when I had a little breathing room, I'd play to my heart's content.
I launched the most commonly used search engine, then placed my hands on the keyboard with a serious expression.
[ Search > where to find dirty vid ]
"No — that was involuntary."
That's not why I brought the computer here.
I'd nearly hit Enter without thinking. I deleted everything I'd typed.
I hadn't had a chance to freely browse the internet in so long.
The desire had just… overflowed before I could stop it.
Not that indulging in a little pleasure would be the worst thing in the world —
But now was not the time to go off track. This was important. Focus.
I settled myself down and typed something new into the search bar.
[ Search > biggest hacker community ]
Right. Let me think this through.
Why had I brought the computer into the Leila Network in the first place?
To gather information ahead of my future scheming.
To predict what was coming based on the information I collected —
And use that to craft the perfect death plan.
So what was the most effective method for that?
Raking in every scrap of information floating around on the internet.
The more protected the information — locked away like jewels in a vault — the better.
But here was the problem.
I didn't know how the internet in this world was structured.
I didn't have any detailed or sophisticated knowledge of hacking.
And I certainly didn't have some magic hacking tool that cracked things with a single click.
My ambitions were sky-high, and my reality was a ditch.
The road to becoming a proper schemer was this difficult.
So I decided to change my approach.
*If I can't do it myself, I just need to find someone who can do it for me.*
I was going to hire a hacker.
A professional who would diligently gather information on my behalf.
Which meant the question shifted.
How on earth would I find someone like that?
"I make the talent come to me."
I navigated to a hacker community notorious for being absolutely vile.
Apparently they were famous for trolling every site imaginable.
They'd even reportedly attacked Valhalla's official website at some point.
And the ringleader still hadn't been caught.
A trash heap where people who found meaning in life through mischief gathered together.
Which made it exactly the right place.
I posted the following in the forum where pointless chatter accumulated:
[ Title: You guys are supposed to be amazing hackers, right? ]
[ Security's tight ]
[ Body: I'll post a photo of where I am. If you can figure out who I am, I'll give you my entire fortune. For real. But if you can't find me, it just means you're all garbage hackers lol ]
It was a blatant provocation.
In any normal community, this kind of bait would be ignored and buried without a single response.
If the roles were reversed, I wouldn't even click the title.
But perhaps because these were people who found purpose in tormenting others —
Comments began flooding in under my post almost instantly.
*Oh yeah? Keep your fortune. Just let me have a look.*
That was the energy — hunters throwing themselves at the bait.
And not even anonymous accounts. Logged-in accounts.
Not just text, either — the post had a photo attached.
The hackers who haunted this community came charging in one after another, declaring their intent.
Yet remarkably, one hour passed, then two, with nothing to show for it.
The comments had devolved into nothing but laments about what kind of freak I was.
"Holding up nicely."
The secret was the Leila Network.
It had been built from the ground up with the purpose of preventing tracking.
A completely separate system, mimicking radio communications through my unique ability.
Whatever they tried, they simply couldn't parse the bizarre data it produced.
I kept pouring fuel on the fire, taunting them without pause.
*Thought you guys were good at this. Guess not.*
*Ugh, the hacking is so boring I can't feel anything…!*
*You really can't figure out where this is? It's right here!*
Even when I got banned, I kept coming back under new accounts to keep provoking them.
Eventually, the community's administrator sent me a private message.
[ Shark: Please stop…. We give up…. How do you keep getting around the bans…. ]
Good. I'd hooked one. Now, how to cook this one up.
I smiled at the fish that had swallowed my line whole.