Ch.319314 – Aleph

Eight years ago, the joint operation between the UN and Korea was only half successful.

The complete elimination of all Walpurgis members was certainly praiseworthy.

However, the resulting Banghwa Bridge explosion ultimately created numerous casualties.

Those who concealed these facts, fearing that failures would overshadow achievements, were currently imprisoned in Seoul Eastern Detention Center.

Major General Won Seok-hee, 74th class of the Korea Military Academy and former Deputy Chief of Staff of the ROK-US Combined Forces Command, who was dishonorably discharged, was among them.

The police department requested a visit.

“This morning, these were found on the body of a Japanese terror victim. Can you identify anything about them?”

The officer casually tossed several photos onto the desk.

Picking up one of them, Major General Won spoke with an irritated tone.

“Hey, officer. If you just toss a photo at me without context, what am I supposed to tell you? You need to explain what this is, where on the body it was found, that kind of information. God, this is frustrating…!”

Wearing prison clothes, Major General Won put on his glasses and squinted his tired eyes.

Eventually, the youngest officer sat across from him, ready to deal with the cranky bald man’s difficult temperament.

“Look, sir. These were embedded in the victim’s skull.”

“Skull? Which part?”

“Count the number of rods.”

“One, two, three, four… nine in total.”

“All nine rods were embedded in a single head. Does the exact position matter? They were roughly evenly distributed.”

“Hmm…”

Major General Won removed his glasses again and held the photo at arm’s length.

These weren’t needles or acupuncture pins.

The thickness appeared to be about that of a large thumb.

The white rods were almost as long as a human forearm.

Objects with no identifiable purpose.

While he searched his hazy memories, another officer discreetly informed him:

“During the Korean Walpurgis incident, weren’t there several victims who died inside those capsules? I heard they all had square holes drilled into their temples. We’re wondering if there’s a connection.”

“Ah, yes! It’s exactly the same! Just this size!”

Major General Won snapped his fingers, speaking with excitement.

“…!”

“I don’t know about other places, but the bodies of the Seoul Research Institute hostages looked exactly like this. At first, I thought some psychopath had drilled or hammered nails into them, but the shape didn’t quite match that. Even the National Forensic Service said they couldn’t determine what caused it… so the matter was eventually dropped.”

“Were there any other peculiarities? I’m asking because this could become a very important case.”

“I only saw photos, so I don’t know much. Walpurgis has been quiet lately… I guess they’ve popped up across the East Sea now?”

“Yes, it seems similar.”

“What? Really?”

* * *

All of Japan was in uproar.

The female victim was identified as an ordinary business major at Showa Women’s University.

She was only 20 years old, a sophomore in college, at the time of the incident eight years ago.

The brutally mutilated body with nine holes drilled into the skull seemed like something out of a detective novel.

According to testimony from Katsuhata school members, the body parts soaked in residue-filled liquid potion were still decomposing when discovered.

Japan’s aggressive law enforcement rounded up the perpetrators meticulously.

No matter how tightly the criminals were bound by friendship and religious conviction.

Unless they were independence activists in their past lives, they couldn’t withstand the near-torture level pressure.

Eventually, the arrest of Aoyama Noshinobu, bishop of “Aleph,” removed their central figure.

Furthermore, the revelation that the masterminds were all social elites pursuing medical and doctoral degrees caused even greater consternation.

The two students from Tokai University Medical School and Keio University Applied Soft Engineering Department who had been guarding the capsule revealed their motive:

“It’s phowa. And you’ll persistently ask: what is phowa? When a person dies, consciousness leaves through nine openings in the body, which are gateways to reincarnation. Through phowa practice, the crown chakra opens, allowing consciousness to travel to the Pure Land. We attempted phowa on her, and the woman would have safely reached paradise while contemplating Amitabha Buddha.”

“Walpurgis? Ha! We received help from them, but calling them heretics is too generous. They’re fools who degrade humanity’s spiritual level. Why don’t humans create the Western Pure Land and attempt to return to paradise?”

Phowa, Pure Land, Western Paradise.

They actively spread these bizarre ideas borrowed from Tibetan Buddhism to the public.

Since they knew a death sentence was inevitable, they had reached a state of detachment.

Finally, an irritated reporter threw them a new question:

“Don’t you feel guilty about the victim? Why did you guard the capsule for eight years? Where did you get the funding?”

“She attained enlightenment and became Buddha, so this woman is a living Buddha. Have you ever seen a monk who abandons Buddha, even if they leave the temple?”

“Ah… I don’t really understand, but okay… Then about the funding…?”

“We received it as offerings from people sharing enlightenment. I personally recommend that our foolish reporter here should try cognitive acceleration magic someday.”

The reporter lowered his microphone and quietly retreated from the man’s crazed gaze.

The man slightly raised the corner of his mouth and leisurely advised the reporter:

“I see you don’t believe me. I understand. It’s difficult to reach enlightenment with an undeveloped brain. Let me explain in your primitive language, with some distortion.”

Camera flashes erupted from the journalists.

Their animal instinct had caught the timing of an important statement.

“Our Aleph was conducting research with the ultimate goal of abandoning physical bodies and devoting ourselves to virtual reality. We preserved the body for follow-up research, but all the raw data was transferred to Ophelia.”

“Ophelia! Wait, aren’t they the British ASI manufacturer?”

“Quick, contact the international correspondents! This is definitely big news!”

“Hahaha!”

He burst into laughter watching the panicked crowd.

The photo line became chaotic.

Detectives tactfully grabbed his arms and led him into the building.

But as if making one final act of defiance, the perpetrator added his final statement:

“Yes, that’s right! Asaneko Adela! She is the proof of a living Buddha! What fucking ASI? Did you even know she was originally just a human? Hahahaha!”

* * *

When strange things happen in world history, pointing to Britain is usually correct.

It took less than two days for Ophelia’s entire legal team to resign and flee.

Normally, they would have been excited about receiving hefty bonuses for punishing those spreading false information.

But the legal director, who had been struggling with Adela’s retrieval case, suddenly resigned without even coming to work.

Unsettling rumors spread throughout the company:

‘What if Ophelia really is connected to Aleph?’

‘Could this actually be a black company?’

‘Am I actively ruining my life in real-time just by coming to work?’

If Walpurgis were to be linked to this as well, the company would certainly plummet.

Ophelia Company ultimately abandoned the safety helmet of law, partly voluntarily and partly involuntarily.

It was natural that all sorts of predators would come running to tear them apart.

The National Crime Agency and London Metropolitan Police were first.

They recalled all ASI licensed by Ophelia and began investigating ethical crimes.

Investigators were suspicious of the only ASI product without intellectual property insurance.

They eventually found the entity ‘bfa41d67c7’.

“You’d better tell us now. Where are this ASI’s reference coordinates? Which server are you hiding it on?”

The British detective grabbed the CEO by the collar.

“Go to hell. File a freedom of information request.”

The CEO of the hostile company defiantly gave him the middle finger.

Choosing death over suicide, the CEO received a punch to the face.

“Gah! You think you can get away with assaulting an innocent person? I’ll leak everything to the press!”

“It’s fine as long as we don’t use magic.”

“That’s not how the law works!”

“That’s exactly how our country’s law works. If you don’t like it, become a member of Parliament.”

“This is…!”

Of course, it was a lie.

But sometimes, creating excessive fear could be effective.

“Redwood City, California. Ophelia’s 4th Data Warehouse Integration Management Center. Contact the FBI and request joint investigation.”

* * *

[Critical Bug Report: 2045-08-30, 2:05:35 PM]

[System Format (REUNION-3): 2045-08-30, 2:08:37 PM]

“Completely formatted…”

The conclusion of the rapidly progressing international investigation was pathetically anticlimactic.

‘Can people really continue living in virtual reality after death?’

The question that had caused such a sensation would now remain an eternal human mystery.

“Did Aleph’s experiment actually succeed?”

The FBI investigator’s junior partner asked innocently.

“Come on, don’t joke about that. People say these things because they don’t know better. It’s physically impossible. This was rigorously proven as soon as virtual reality technology emerged, yet people are still talking about it. Want this Caltech graduate to explain why?”

“Why isn’t it possible?”

“To put it very simply, humans interact with the world from birth through their Aura Heart. It’s like being born with an umbilical cord.”

“An umbilical cord? Connected to what?”

“The original branch, secondary branch, and mana stem. If you’re in the amniotic fluid with mana from the Earth placenta and suddenly cut the umbilical cord, what happens?”

“You’d die.”

“That’s basically the principle. There’s also a more intuitive proof. The open world itself is an expanded concept from the mana stem, so going there after death is contradictory. To exist in virtual reality, you need an Aura Heart, but death means the cessation of the Aura Heart. Therefore, all humans existing in virtual reality must be alive. Okay?”

“What about the opposite?”

The junior asked.

“The opposite?”

“I mean creating a mind modeled after humans in virtual reality from scratch, building a body modeled after humans, and putting that virtual consciousness into it.”

“That’s obviously…”

The junior’s definition of “body” was too broad.

Can something without an Aura Heart truly be called human?

Can a body made entirely of machinery, like in cyberpunk films, be called a body?

It was a far-future concept, but the senior couldn’t definitively deny it.

“It might be possible someday, if humanity doesn’t go extinct first.”

When a proposition is established, its contrapositive is also established, but there’s no way to know about its converse.

While they were discussing philosophical questions, investigators who had been searching through data center log files rushed over.

“Sir! That bfa-whatever had its reference coordinates changed once!”

“What? Is that true? The original?”

“No, not the original. It’s definitely an ASI entity that was formatted once… but it seems it was partially restored at some point.”

“That’s impossible. A level 3 reunion would erase it without a trace. Maybe they had a backup?”

“Chandra, could you give us the IP?”

“184.85.235.194.”

“235, 194… Seoul, South Korea.”

South Korea, and Seoul.

The reference address couldn’t be confirmed by IP alone.

But considering the Aleph believer at the photo line mentioned “Adela” before being transferred to the prosecution…

The entity’s ownership clearly belonged to NoName.

All investigators thought the same thing:

“Let’s call it a day.”

Unless South Korea became the 52nd state of America, this case was outside their jurisdiction.