Dressed in elegant, formal evening wear, Rose and Eve arrived at their destination in a sleek, private vehicle. As they stepped out, the crisp, rapid snapping of camera shutters and a barrage of flashing lights engulfed them. They stood before a colossal, towering megastructure. Behind the security barricades, a crowd of hundreds watched with bated breath, their eyes glued to the luxury black vehicles gliding toward the entrance. A plush red carpet rolled out before them, charting a path toward a sprawling, grand fountain plaza.
"This city seems quite habitable, from what I can observe," Rose noted.
"Of course it is. That's why they call this place the White City of Entertainment," Eve replied with a knowing smile. "And right ahead of us is the South Korea Megah Entertainment headquarters. Hundreds of A-list celebrities will be gathering here shortly, Rose. Our target is Mr. Jack Jin-Lee. I'm trusting you to deliver the package directly into his hands. This should be an easy walk in the park for you. Like I said, no bloodshed required for this one. I'll keep an eye on Mr. Xu myself."
Eve offered a confident smirk. As the two parted ways, a pristine white limousine pulled up to the curb, triggering a deafening wave of ecstatic fan shrieks that filled the air.
Rose moved swiftly toward the grand fountain plaza. Utilizing the advanced social-computation skills he had acquired, he seamlessly mined data from the surrounding crowd, pinpointing his target's exact coordinates without raising a single hair of suspicion. He then tilted his head upward, scanning the architecture of the megastructure. Within a single minute, a comprehensive 3D structural blueprint of the building was rendered inside his mind. Without a moment's hesitation, he calculated his infiltration vector.
"There must be an accessible entry point," his optic sensors locked onto a ventilation duct. "And that shaft appears to be my optimal choice."
Slipping into the shadows, Rose shed his formal dress, revealing a sleek, pitch-black tactical bodysuit designed specifically for high-mobility operations. With a simple, calculated flick of his reinforced fingertips, the vent cover was effortlessly pried loose. Rose's slender, synthetic frame slid fluidly into the cramped shaft, fitting perfectly. The long, metallic labyrinth eventually led the machine down into a maintenance janitorial closet deep inside the facility. As he cracked the door open, he observed two security guards engaged in casual conversation before splitting up to patrol their respective sectors. Sensing an opening, Rose deliberately swept his toe against a nearby flowerpot, tipping it over and leaving the door slightly ajar.
Clang!
"Gae-shibal?! A rat or something?"
The noise piqued the guard's curiosity, drawing him toward the dark closet to investigate. Exploiting the pitch-black environment, Rose burst through the door in a seamless blur, slipping past the officer before the man could even register a shadow. Emerging into the main corridor, Rose located the elevator bank and overrode the controls, surging up toward the 30th floor. The glass elevator ascended rapidly, passing a massive, multi-tiered auditorium packed with nearly a thousand spectators. Brilliant spotlights converged onto the main stage below.
"And now, the moment you've all been waiting for~~~~ Prepare yourselves for our stunning, electrifying ladies~" the announcer's voice boomed over the speakers. "ACT ZERO LINK!"
Concurrently, Rose's elevator chimed, docking at the executive offices of the 30th floor.
Rose stepped out onto the long, desolate corridor entirely alone. Pressing his back flush against the wall, he glided forward silently until he reached the entrance of an office styled in stark white and crimson. Rose's thermal vision picked up a heat signature behind the partition. Inside the office, a man in a sharp corporate suit was pacing, holding a phone to his ear, conversing with an unknown contact.
"I'm afraid that's impossible, boss. I have to get this music track finalized by Friday."
"I am well aware, Mr. Lee. But I expect you to attend the gala downstairs tonight regardless."
"I'd love to, boss, really. But even if I leave right now, I'm afraid I'll be cutting it incredibly close."
"Just make sure you----@#@$#%----"
A sudden blast of harsh, screeching static tore through the line, sending a piercing ring through the man's ears.
"Ouch! Hello? Hello?!" Jack Lee winced, shouting into the receiver. When the signal finally stabilized, a voice drifted back—but it wasn't his boss.
"Mr. Lee, I am profoundly disappointed in you. We expected your cooperation for this grand undertaking. It is a pity that you forsake our collective enterprise in pursuit of personal endeavors."
"Boss? What's going on?" Jack Lee stammered, utterly bewildered by the cold, mechanical cadence bleeding through the phone.
Then, without warning, that exact same emotionless voice whispered directly into his ear.
"Are your personal endeavors truly that paramount?"
The words hit like ice, forcing Jack Lee to spin around in sheer terror.
Standing right behind him was a young woman with neon-green hair and smooth, plastic-laminate skin. Her pitch-black eye sockets held no human gaze—only a pair of piercing, glowing green optic sensors.
"W-Who the hell are y--"
Before the sentence could form, the machine exerted a fraction of its kinetic force, shoving the executive down hard into his chair.
"Who I am is irrelevant. But what you have done is a matter we must discuss."
"I-I don't know anything! Get out before I call security!" the man stammered, desperately trying to deny his involvement.
"Your index finger. Allow me to examine it." Rose slid his cybernetic digits into the gap of Jack Lee's index finger. Snap! With a cold, calculated twist, Rose snapped the man's finger like a dry twig.
"AAAGHH~! Gasp! What the hell do you want from me?!"
"You operate as the right hand of the Yueguang Eastern Syndicate. And your true employer is attempting to operate behind our backs. I am here to ensure a message reaches your master's ears. Listen very carefully." Rose leaned in, positioning his face inches from Lee's ear.
He whispered, "Please, do not attempt this again. I am certain you do not wish to see my hands turn from pristine white to crimson. A thief belongs in the shadows of his own domain. But if you mistakenly breach the wrong territory, one day, a domain will inevitably detonate. Thank you for your audience, Mr. Lee. A cooperative listener always yields an elegant outcome. Maintain this decorum, and we shall have no further complications."
Finishing his statement, Rose reached down, gently grasping the man's necktie and straightening it back into a immaculate, orderly knot.
"As for your finger... I calculate that a swift twist, repeated three times, should snap the bone back into its proper alignment."
Rose's pitch-black humor left Jack Lee's face completely bloodless, pale as a corpse. The office lights suddenly killed, plunging the room into absolute darkness. When the backup power flickered back online a second later, Rose was gone—leaving only a stark, blood-red crest stamped onto the palm of the executive's hand.
Jack's breath hitched. "Y-You... The Blood Dragon..."
Rose vaulted through the window pane, dropping from the 30th floor. His boots met the concrete roof of a lower adjacent building with a soft thud.
"Target has received the package," the machine reported.
"Excellent work, darling. Come rejoin the party," Eve's voice chimed smoothly inside his comm-link.
"I request to remain outside for a duration."
The machine looked down at the bustling streets below. A sea of various vehicles flowed back and forth like neon currents. Rose's optics reflected the vibrant, blinding beauty of the cityscape. The mainframe in his head processed an anomaly—a strange, foreign sensation cascading through his digital consciousness. It was a feeling he had never experienced within the bleak confines of Yueguang.
The machine sank to his knees, his gaze entirely locked onto the shimmering, sparkling lights of the traffic below. Across the way stood a massive, sleek skyscraper topped with a colossal glass biosphere. Inside, a lush, natural forest flourished, looking like a preserved sanctuary trapped within a glass jar.
"Eve... I have a question," Rose spoke aloud to the empty night.
"Go ahead, shoot," Eve replied instantly.
"What does beauty look like to you?"
"For me, Rose? Human beings will always look at things through different lenses. My definition of beauty doesn't really align with the status quo. It sounds like you've processed a new variable. Tell me, what looks beautiful to you?"
"A city bathed in unyielding light. Faces filled with smiles. A place entirely devoid of cruelty."
Hearing Rose's assessment, Eve let out a sharp, quiet sigh through the comms.
"You've grasped a fraction of what it means to be human now, Rose. But the things we yearn for... they rarely manifest in reality. The world we were dropped into was never a bed of roses. And roses come in many shades: white, purple, pink... and blood red. A rose possesses thorns designed to lacerate anyone who dares to possess it. A white flower can turn crimson in a heartbeat, painted by the blood of those with malice in their hearts. To the rest of the world, your name might signify love. But to me, it embodies death. Because the more we love, the more loyal we become to someone, the wider we open the door to a pitch-black abyss—one we can never crawl back out of. It's an inescapable lesson. Just look at Feng and me... we share a similar origin, yet our philosophies exist on entirely opposite poles."
"How was your life before, Eve?"
"It doesn't matter anymore. It all happened lifetimes ago. I just remember a time when I was a caretaker at an orphanage in Poland. It was a dismal, suffocating existence; those children had absolutely no one in the world but me. Until a dark, choking smog rolled in and tore them away—they were my family, Rose. The world operates on cold arithmetic. For power, for the survival of a species... they'll tell you that sacrificing a million lives to save ten million is a necessary evil. And you know what, Rose...?" Eve let out a bitter, cynical chuckle.
"....It's all a grand facade. A lie to mask the true, primal nature of the organism that calls itself 'human.' They slaughter one another every single day. Do you truly desire a flesh-and-blood vessel... a soul like theirs? What chance does a machine like you have when you throw yourself into a pack of wolves? My directive is to protect you, no matter what. And I will protect you using my own methods, Rose."
"I see. And if I were to be born human... who would I be to you?"
"Well... you'd probably be my child," Eve replied, a soft, rare warmth bleeding into her chuckle. "You still don't know how to wield that blade properly, do you? Don't worry, I'll teach you myself. Let's call it a night, Rose. Mission accomplished."
"It is a pity I must depart from this city," Rose uttered his final thought, concluding an effortlessly flawless assignment. "I wish i could come back."