C106 — [5.1— False Them]

False Them was a futuristic science fiction novel that portrayed an anti-utopian society.

 

 

The novel was set in the distant future.

 

 

Human technology had advanced to the point where it could create bionic humans.

 

 

The bionic human with a stronger body could replace humans to do many dangerous jobs, which at first facilitated the development of human society.
 

But gradually, with the progress of bionic technology, the difference between humans and bionics in appearance was less and less obvious.

 

 

More and more jobs were occupied by bionics with more favorable conditions and cheaper prices.

 

 

This aroused the discontent of the lower classes.

 

 

They lost their jobs, were reduced to pauperism, and rejected the bionics as a result.
 

 

Within a short period of time, there were many incidents of bionics being k-illed in the streets for no apparent reason.

 

 

The conflict between humans and bionics was on the verge of breaking out.

 

 

In the original, under the dark tide of society, the bionic people were gradually unwilling to be ensl-aved by the fate of humans, and they formed a resistance team in the dark.
 

 

Under the oppression of mankind, they searched for ways of survival.
 

 

The government also discovered these rebels who tried to defy human beings and decided to execute all the bionic people of their model.

 

 

Tick-tock—the computer emitted a sharp alarm sound.

 

 

In the cluttered and dimly lit room, a young man with messy black curly hair opened his eyes and swept his gaze over the lighted computer screen in the room.
 

This was a small, cramped room in a slum area.

 

 

One room, one hall, everywhere piled up with clutter, crowded to the point that, in addition to the bed, every corner of the room had no place to stand.

 

 

 

This computer was the most valuable thing in this room.

 

 

 

The system’s gloating voice came to his ears.

 

 

Whenever he woke up in the gap between changing worlds, the system would take the opportunity to escape its confinement.

 

 

Even if it couldn’t do anything, it would still make a few mocking remarks in his ear.

 

 

[You won’t be as lucky in this world as you were before; your luck has come to an end.]

 

 

[He can’t save you either!]

 

 

Feeling a bit dizzy, he rubbed his messy hair and stood up noncommittally.

 

 

He stepped on the dark floor with his bare feet, and blue veins could be seen on his white feet.

 

 

Ignoring the noisy system in his ears, Jiu Shu began to simply gather up the mountain of trash bags of instant food products on the floor.
 

 

At least he had to create a little walking place.

 

 

The owner of this body was a young college student who had just graduated from school.

 

 

 

Because his qualifications were not outstanding, coupled with the fact that he was an orphan and didn’t have a good family background, in this future society where classes were solidified, the original owner couldn’t find a suitable job at all.

 

 

Graduating from school meant being unemployed.
 

 

Even his university loan couldn’t be repaid, his situation was so wretched that he was almost at the point of not being able to eat.

 

 

Luckily, the welfare system in this world could still barely support him, but there was nothing more.
 

 

In order to change his life, the original owner debuted as a virtual idol on the Internet, using his not-so-professional voice to sing.
 

 

Perhaps because his voice was quite good, he did accumulate a group of fans.

 

 

As a result, the original owner’s life became more affluent.
 

 

But the good times didn’t last long, and he was soon exposed for his youthful ambition and arrogance, offending his peers and revealing his true nature.

 

 

 

The original owner wasn’t good-looking, and in this era where rich people generally adjusted their genes to their looks, looking ordinary meant being unattractive.

 

 

Not to mention that the original owner was mentally depressed due to long-term live streaming, with his days and nights being reversed. The photos exposed showed pale skin, lifeless eyes, and a sickly appearance.

 

 

Compared to his originally active voice, this appearance was simply cheating on fans’ feelings.

 

 

It instantly caused a backlash from the fans, who left madly abusive comments under his account.

 

 

Soon, his live broadcast channel was blocked.

 

After losing the income from the live broadcast, the original owner couldn’t keep the house he originally rented in the uptown area and moved to the sketchiest slum in the downtown area.

 

 

The original owner got this depressing room, and for several months in a row, he didn’t go out.

 

But going from luxury to frugality was difficult; accustomed to spending a lot of money, he soon spent all his savings.
 

The original owner’s life was in dire straits, and he had to start worrying about making ends meet.

 

 

Because of his previous high income, the government had long since cancelled the minimum living allowance for him.
 

 

Now, in order to be able to maintain the most basic living standards, he could only sign up with a small, unheard-of firm in the underground black market.

 

 

He had become an underground idol in the city, someone that couldn’t be seen by the public.

 

 

In this country with a huge gap between the rich and the poor, the population had long since broken into the billions.
 

 

Under the huge fan market, besides those orthodox idols that could appear on TV, there was also a group of idols that couldn’t appear in front of the public.
 

Most of them joined these irregular, small firms in order to chase a nebulous dream.
 

They said they were idols, but in reality, they were just performing on stage at small private venues or even on the street, growing in popularity by getting close to their fans.

 

 

They earned a meager income from tickets and peripheral fees.
 

 

Unlike the glamorous idols, these underground idols mostly took what they could get from their fans, who were willing to spend money on them.

 

 

Satisfying their desire to be close to their idols, handshakes and hugs were the most common, and occasionally more intimate behavior.
 

 

To the decent people of the upper class, this kind of underground idol who would do anything for money was no different from people who sold their bodies.

 

 

It wasn’t even as good as live broadcasting.

 

 

The original owner couldn’t stand the discrepancy and refused to accept reality.

 

 

 

He also refused to get close to his fans as arranged by the firm, afraid to show his face in front of the crowd.
 

 

Tired of this, the firm threw the original owner into an underground black market bar as a bar resident.

 

 

The clientele in such underground bars were usually people from everywhere and even bionic people.

 

 

In a society that generally detests bionics, this was simply a strange shame.

 

 

As a result, the original owner had no energy to go to work every day.
 

 

Even if what appeared in the bar was only his hologram and not his real-life presence, one could still tell from it that he was perfunctory.

 

 

Such an underground idol would, naturally, not be popular.

 

 

That was why the bar owner had recently recruited new staff.
 

 

After receiving the notice from the firm, the original owner knew that he was about to be sacked, losing even this job that he didn’t even despise.
 

 

His great despair overwhelmed him instantly.

 

 

Already deeply depressed, he committed sui-cide after swallowing an entire bottle of sleeping pills.

 

 

“Ahem!”

 

 

Spitting out the only pills left in his stomach in the toilet, Jiu Shu touched his sweaty forehead.
 

 

Only then did he raise his eyes to look at himself in the mirror.

 

 

 

The original owner had a face with decent features, but it was pale, and the dark circles under his eyes were so heavy that they were like smoky make-up.

 

 

After replacing the soul, his pupils were no longer as dull as before.

 

 

Jiu Shu could feel the remaining unwillingness in his body.
 

 

The original owner’s dream was to return to the glittering uptown area and become the popular internet idol of the past.

 

 

 

Jiu Shu washed the fatigue from his face and returned to his room, looking at the various chat messages on his computer screen for a long time before retracting his gaze.
 

 

He looked at the system panel in front of him.
 

 

This world was quite interesting, so he’d just go ahead and fulfill the original owner’s wish for the time being.
 

 

Anyway, there was still a long time until the arrival of the plot node.
 

 

It was just enough to use it as a way to k-ill the boredom.

 

 

 

Counting the time, the current object of discipline should still be going about his ordinary working life as usual, not joining the Bionic Human Revolutionary Army or falling in love with the female main character.
 

 

“……” Tapping on the recent social news, Jiu Shu’s fingertips gently rubbed the edge of his lips.

 

 

His complexion was pale, and only his lips were bright red.

 

 

But it wasn’t necessarily so; after all, the female lead was a popular idol who often appeared in the entertainment news, and it was only natural for the object of punishment to have a crush on her.
 

It fit in with the original plot.
 

 

The original plot had a darker setting, with bionics living in the cracks of society, possessing human emotions but never getting recognition.
 

 

They saw humans as their creators but were repeatedly betrayed and tortured until they finally rebelled against human rule.

 

 

The original story line was also centered around the conflict between humans and bionics.
 

 

It told the story of Cory, the hero who was the leader of the bionic rebels, and Lianqi, the human heroine, who fell in love in this chaotic world.

 

 

The object of punishment was a supporting character in the story named Zero Three.
 

 

An assembly line product produced in a factory, he had a quiet personality and appeared aloof on the surface.
 

 

Although he acted as if he didn’t care at all about the attitude of humans towards him, he still couldn’t hide the longing for humans that many bionics had imprinted in their hearts.
 

 

Every bionic human longed to be recognized by humans and gain value for their existence.
 

 

As a bionic who worked for the government and was always sidelined by his colleagues, Zero Three never felt that he was needed by humans.
 

 

Until one day, he received a strange email.
 

 

It was a distress email with the name of popular actress Lian Qi written on it, and she begged Zero Three for help in a desperate tone, asking him to help her escape from the agency’s grasp.
 

At first, Zero Three thought it was a prank and didn’t take it seriously.

 

 

But later, Lian Qi launched a video call directly to him.

 

 

 

After a series of proofs, Zero Three was finally convinced that he had indeed become the object of actress Lian Qi’s plea for help.
 

 

Actress Lian Qi’s tone was sincere as she begged the object of discipline, a machine that had no human rights in the eyes of humans.
 

 

This was the first time Zero Three was so desperately needed by a human.

 

 

He obliged.
 

 

In order to be able to rescue Lian Qi, who was imprisoned by the company, he put in a lot of effort and was bruised all over before he finally rescued Lian Qi from the company’s pursuit.
 

 

But it wasn’t until the two of them met that Lian Qi told him, full of guilt, that it wasn’t him she was looking for.
 

 

It was supposed to be the male protagonist, Cory, who was the leader of the bionic rebels.
 

But because all communications were under the government’s eavesdropping, she had no choice but to lie and let Zero Three save her.
 

 

Because he was the leader of the Bionic Rebels, Cory had a great cause that hadn’t yet been completed and couldn’t be easily discovered by the government.
 

 

Zero Three didn’t show any expression after hearing these words from the heroine; he just nodded and accepted the heroine’s apology.
 

 

He watched the heroine leave before lowering his head, his eyes woodenly looking at his body, which was constantly oozing artificial blo-od.

 

 

Having lost most of his internal organs, his life had come to an end.
 

 

To Zero Three, there was nothing sadder than having thought that he was the protagonist of a story, only to find out in the end that he was mediocre and ordinary.

 

 

No matter how hard he tried, even going through gu-nfire, in order to save Lian Qi, he still lost the only job that could give meaning to his existence.

 

 

 

All he got was a dream.
 

 

It was only when he woke up that he realized that he was just an insignificant bionic human from the beginning.
 

 

A bionic man who was never cared for by humans.
 

An artifact that was despised by its maker.

 

 

Jiu Shu narrowed his eyes and opened the webpage after a moment of thought.

 

 

Searching for various information about the heroine.
 

 

It was found that the female main character was currently on the rise and had yet to reach the level of the original plot, where she was so popular that everyone knew about her.
 

 

That also meant that the object of punishment hadn’t yet received the email that changed his life.

 

 

After a pause, Jiu Shu continued to read down the page and found that the female main character had actually had contact with the original main character from before.

 

 

It seemed that it was after offending the female main character and upsetting a group of forces behind the female main character that he was reduced to this.
 

 

[Why don’t you give up? Look, He definitely won’t fall in love with you in this world; you should kill Him before it’s too late so that you can gain more energy, right?]
 

 

[Don’t you really want to go home? Just k-illing him once is enough; it’s worth many times your salvation; why can’t you wake up a little bit?]
 

 

[If He really loves you, He won’t care about your k-illing; if He leaves you because of that, doesn’t it just show that He doesn’t love you enough?]
 

 

[This is simply a win-win choice!]

 

 

 

The system was making noise in his ears again. Having been suffocated for a few worlds, it had clearly gone mental, incoherently attempting to convince Jiu Shu.

 

 

 

Jiu Shu casually banned the system and continued to look through the information.

 

 

Although he had the original owner’s memories, it wasn’t enough; he needed to know more before he could do anything.

 

 

Seventh City

 

 

Lower City

 

 

“Hey! Zero Three! Hurry up and get rid of these corpses! Really, the room reeks of bionic human stench!”
 

The heavily armed police officer pinched his nose and walked out of the room.

 

 

Their eyes impatiently looked towards the bionic human Zero Three, who had arrived late.

 

 

In the dimly lit corridor, the cold-light lamps that the occupants had affixed to the walls illuminated the dirty and dilapidated floor.

 

 

It also illuminated Zero Three’s pale and gloomy face.

 

 

His nearly two-meter-tall body made it so that he would make people feel oppressive discomfort just by approaching at close range.
 

 

This man named Zero Three was the latest model of Combat Bionic Man, specializing in disposing of those bionics that tried to escape after harming humans.
 

 

“……”

 

 

Facing the poor attitude of his colleagues, Zero Three habitually narrowed his eyes; his face was still the numb expression that was created in the factory.

 

 

It was now three o’clock in the morning, and his colleagues had only come to inform him an hour after receiving the mission.
 

 

It caused him to have to come here in a hurry, as there was also a performance deduction for being late.
 

 

This month’s salary was already about to be deducted.

 

However, for Zero Three, who had an extremely low materialistic desire, the money in his personal account was still quite enough, so even if all of this month’s salary was deducted, it was fine.

 

 

He was already used to this intentional exclusionary behavior from his colleagues.

 

 

Simply because he was an artificial bionic.

 

 

“Hmph! Look at this wimpy look of his, he’s an inferior species, yet he’s acting as if we’re bullying him!”

 

 

Seeing Zero Three enter the room, the sarcasm on the faces of several people was completely undisguised. Putting away the gu-ns in their hands, they slowly and methodically headed downstairs.

 

 

 

Anyway, the matter of wrapping up was left to these bionics; humans wouldn’t accompany the bionics to wait for the job to finish.

 

 

Soon, only two bionics, who were busy collecting corpses, were left in the room.

 

 

Apart from Zero Three, there was also a bionic human named Seven Two.
 

 

They were the only two bionics in this frontline execution squad.
 

 

In the room where the mur-der took place, the walls were covered with large spatters of blo-od, and there were also traces of scratching made by fingers.
 

 

It looked like a human’s struggle before death.
 

 

Since the bionics all had night vision, there were no lights in the room; only the simple table lamp on the table was emitting some light.
 

 

It reflected the equally pale faces of Zero Three and Seven Two.
 

 

Due to the different models, the two of them had a huge difference in size, one strong and tall, the other short and skinny.

 

 

“They’re too wary, always suspecting that we’re colluding with those criminal bionics; that’s why their attitude is so bad; don’t take it to heart.”

 

 

Seven Two persuaded Zero Three in a serious manner.
 

 

Zero Three lowered his eyes, picked up the broken arm fragment on the ground without saying a word, and put it into the body collection bag on the side.
 

 

The human corpses had been carefully collected away by the medical staff long before he arrived, and now the only thing left were the bionic human’s limbs after being brutally split up.

 

 

In fact, the person who really cared wasn’t him, but Seven Two.
 

 

That was why he talked so much every time he encountered unfair treatment.
 

 

Zero Three actually cared, but had just become accustomed to it.

 

Or rather, he had become numb and learned not to care about the way others treated him.
 

 

“Hmm.” Zero Three listened to Seven Two talking, and only now and then did he give a hmmm as if he were interested.
 

 

Not a single word was actually being listened to.
 

 

These bionics working for the government were not like humans with an official establishment but rather like machines that would wear out.

 

 

 

Whenever they died, they were scrapped, and their bodies were sent to the robot graveyard to be reused as waste.

 

 

The bones he was collecting now would be sent to the incinerator after the forensic examination had been conducted and had lost their research value, not even being worthy of being used twice.
 

 

Snap-
 

 

A chip fell out of the half-head held in the black glove.
 

 

Zero Three’s pitch-black pupils were fixed on the chip, and his slender fingers stretched out, storing it in an evidence bag to the side.

 

 

Recently, they were pursuing a serial mur-der case related to bionics.

 

 

So far, there had been no results from the investigation.

 

 

It was only established that there was a resistance organization consisting of bionics hidden in the Seventh Metropolis, which was defying the ban on harming humans and continuously ki-lling some humans who had bullied the bionics.
 

 

Now they were even plotting some terrible conspiracy.

 

 

 

They needed to be found and solved quickly.
 

 

Today’s bionic man was supposed to be arraigned so that he could obtain more detailed information about the resistance group’s location, but he was brutally split up by those teammates just now.

 

 

It was good that the chip in the bionic man’s brain was still there, and useful information could still be extracted from it after returning to the police station.
 

 

“Right, Zero Three, didn’t you say the other day that you wanted to go to the Phantom Bar to enjoy yourself? How about going there in a while? It just so happens to be when the bar is at its most lively!”

 

 

Zero Three put away the body-collecting bag in his hand and was silent for a moment before correcting, “It’s to investigate.”
 

The latest clues showed that the underground stronghold of the Resistance was related to the Phantom Bar.
 

Originally, their actions were very covert, and it was only after their recent frequent activities that they were caught in the act.
 

 

No one knew exactly what they were planning, but it was conceivable that it wasn’t good.
 

 

For this resistance group that had been characterized as a terr-orist organization by the government, Zero Three had never been shy about speculating about them with the utmost malice.
 

 

“It’s been a long time since I went to see Xiao Tiantian’s performance, and I heard that she’ll be singing all night today, just in time!”
 

 

Seven Two didn’t care about his companion’s explanation and brought out his mobile phone.

 

 

 

Looking at the underground idol on his mobile phone’s wallpaper, a female whose stage name was Xiao Tiantian, he blushed and let out a demented laugh.

 

 

As bionic beings who were rejected by the mainstream culture of society, those of them could only possibly get some attention when they were confronted with underground idols.

 

 

But that was also money in exchange; they weren’t really being cared about by others at all.
 

 

Zero Three knew that his colleague hadn’t purchased the nutrient solution necessary to maintain his physical strength for the past few months; instead, he took all of his money and dedicated it to Xiao Tiantian.

 

 

 

Seven Two’s obsession with idols had reached a point that Zero Three couldn’t understand.

 

 

 

He didn’t think that this would really get humans to care, and when Seven Two couldn’t bring a cent anymore, he would be abandoned without hesitation.
 

 

Zero Three believed that Seven Two must know this as well.

 

 

But he was still obsessed with giving all his money to a stranger he had never met before.
 

At one point, Zero Three suspected that Seven Two had been infected with a virus, but he had not.

 

 

 

Zero Three could see Seven Two’s self-delusion; he didn’t do much to discourage him but just felt that he was very pathetic.
 

 

As a bionic man who had been working for a long time, Zero Three had thought that Seven Two would have learned to face the loyalty and longing for human beings in his heart as rationally as he did.
 

 

He learned to ignore the things that bionics shouldn’t crave.
 

 

Now it turned out that Seven Two had learned nothing and acted on impulse, just like the other bionics, without any sense to speak of.
 

 

“Alright, I’ll go get ready and get ready; I’ll go to Phantom bar in a few minutes!”
 

 

While Seven Two excitedly left with the body-collecting bag, Zero Three took one last look at the room.

 

 

 

His eyes swept over a line of blo-ody letters on the wall.

 

 

 

“God does not love bionics.”

 

 

 

The twisted blo-od letters contained the madness of the Bionic Man’s dying breath.
 

 

Unlike the loyalty program that was injected into the chip when each bionic human was first shipped, all of these bionic humans that harmed humans were caught in the error of the ki-lling program.

 

 

 

The only end that greeted them was death.

 

 

 

After all, compared to cheap bionics, humans would always be above bionics.
 

 

Especially now, after the multiple serial k-illings within the Seventh Metropolis, humanity’s vigilance towards bionics has reached its peak.

 

 

 

As long as someone called the police to report that a bionic human showed signs of harming them, the bionic human would immediately be sent to the police station, waiting to be split up and sent to the robot graveyard.
 

 

So, humans were right to alienate bionics, and bionics should consciously stay away from humans.
 

 

They shouldn’t fantasize about being needed by humans and becoming an existence that humans cared about.

 

 

Because they were just machines.

 

 

Machines were not supposed to have feelings.

 

 

 

“……”
 

 

Lowering his head and looking at a spam email saved on his mobile phone, Zero Three was expressionless.
 

 

This email was sent to the bionic people by the Resistance group.
 

 

It encouraged the bionic people to stand up against human ensla-vement.
 

 

Even though humans were the creators of the bionic people, when the bionic people developed feelings, they were no longer machines.

 

 

There was no difference between humans and bionics.

 

 

 

[So don’t grovel to humans.].
 

 

 

It was this email that led to the frequent mu-rders within the Seventh Metropolis.
 

 

It made humans fear the bionics even more, and the bionics’ situation became increasingly sad.
 

 

Zero Three looked at the email for a long time before deleting it completely.
 

 

The faint light from the mobile phone shone on his brow, which was considered handsome, only revealing the ghastly whiteness of a dead body.
 

 

Compared to the normal warm skin tone of humans, bionic people’s skin was always miserably white, and their skin would always remain slightly cool to dissipate heat, which was especially noticeable in the sunlight.

 

 

After cleaning the room, Zero Three and his companion Seven Two drove to the Phantom Bar, located in the deepest part of the lower city.

 

 

 

As a large bar that was quite famous in the lower city, even at three or four o’clock in the morning, the entrance was filled with traffic.
 

 

Occasionally, one could hear the decadent sounds leaking out from inside the door.

 

 

Mixed with the muddy neon and dim cold light, it gave people a dizzying sense of impact.
 

 

“Why do you always have a dead face? Can’t you show a smile? Smile a little, lest when Xiao Tiantian sees it later she’ll think I have a problem with her, and that won’t be good.”
 

 

“She’ll be sad!”
 

 

Seven Two said as he walked towards the bar, wanting to get into the best seat to watch Xiao Tiantian perform.
Zero Three’s eyes grew more and more indifferent as he watched Seven Two’s demented appearance.

 

 

 

He ignored Seven Two and walked straight towards the first floor of the bar that the clues showed.

 

 

He wouldn’t be like Seven Two, who dove into his unwarranted love for his idol; he kept his mission as a bionic human in mind every moment.
 

 

The case needed to be solved as soon as possible in order to stop more humans from being harmed, so that he could have the value of continuing his work and not being discarded in the robot graveyard.

 

 

“Rush through the years without ever…”
 

 

The youth’s lazy voice came from the first floor of the bar.
 

 

Zero Three’s movements lurched, not following the planned route to find clues.

 

 

Instead, he followed the direction from which the voice came but only saw a slowly dissipating holographic projection.
 

 

Zero Three only saw the back of the person’s white neck, glistening like jade, when he lowered his head.
 

 

“Today’s show is over; please come back tomorrow!”
 

 

The attendant stood at the side of the stage and spoke with a smile on his face to the audience, who were showing their dismay under the stage.
 

 

The stage performance on the second floor had always been full these days, but the singer’s performance time had never been lengthened and had to be finished on time every day.

 

 

Zero Three looked at the place where the holographic projection disappeared for a long time before withdrawing his gaze.
 

 

He heard the audience who dispersed from the stage mention the name of the holographic projection just now: Jiu Shu.

 

 

But knowing the name meant nothing to Zero Three; after all, they were just strangers to each other, and all he needed to do was continue to investigate the clues.

 

 

 

There was no need to care about the name of a strange singer at all.

 

 

After all, he wasn’t an emotional person like Seven Two.
 

 

But for some reason, the figure of the person slowly dissipating just now always appeared in front of Zero Three’s eyes. His slender and fair fingers casually moved the microphone away, and his drooping gaze dissipated before his eyes.
 

 

The faint sound of the song also echoed in his ears.
 

 

Perhaps it had been too long since he had listened to a song; that was why he cared so much.

 

 

In fact, that singing voice just now wasn’t that melodious; there were many singers who sang even better than him, so there was no need for him to care so much.
 

 

Zero Three said so in his heart, and his rapidly beating heart finally slowed down a bit.

 

---

TN:

Intense already 😁