NOVEL WEB Book 7: Chapter 6
Part 1
Finally.
At long last, the extreme tension of imminent death had relaxed.
“Ayumi…”
“Don’t worry. I just barely missed his heart and silver works as a disinfectant. The wound’s tissue has returned to normal, but the muscle around it is many times stronger than a human’s. Tense up and you could tear yourself open. And don’t forget that transforming now could take your life. We’ll have a black market doctor or someone remove the affected tissue later.”
Partway through, Ayumi started speaking to Meslayate who was curled up and grimacing.
“No, not that. Although I am grateful you could avoid killing him. But you promised in the beginning you would punch out everyone here, including me and Erika. That way you wouldn’t have to worry about his transformation tricking you.”
“Hmph.”
My little sister gave a snort and tapped her small fist against the top of my head with the same force as a gentle pat.
“…Wait, Ayumi…”
“What, you want to keep going?”
Dammit. I wanted to lecture her, but my body refused to move properly.
I still hadn’t gotten over what that Werewolf had done to me. In fact, it might take more than a few days to do that. It felt a lot like being hit by a small car. So while leaning against the wall, I pointed my trembling finger toward blindfolded and bound Erika.
“Okay, then. Ayumi, take care of Erika. Just save her already.”
“To be clear, you’ve taken more damage than anyone else here, Onii-chan! Fuguu. Even more than the Werewolf!!”
The way my Zombie little sister would complain but still obey my instructions was one of her best points if you ask me. She had mastered taking action before even thinking.
And once she was saved, my older sister immediately stopped acting the damsel in distress.
In fact, she was angry.
What was that Fly had said about a balance between power and beauty? All I could see was fear!
“Satori-kun. I am partially to blame since I was captured, but I get the feeling you will permanently lose your way if I hold back here, so I am prepared to throw out my shame. I am going to tell you something very important, so listen carefully.”
She bent over to move her face in close and looked me in the eye from extreme close range.
“Eri-…”
“Listen.”
I didn’t dare look away.
I had to wonder if Meslayate had blindfolded her to block the overwhelming pressure of her ruler’s eyes.
And Amatsu Erika said the following:
“If you ever do anything that causes you to lose your life for no good reason, I – and probably Ayumi-chan as well – will not hesitate to bite you.”
“…”
Even if that was a hypothetical scenario, her statement held great meaning.
“Also, we will fight every last person who attempts to judge that twisted form of peace and we will grasp victory even if it means covering the planet with the undead. That is how important the Amatsu family is to us as a place we can finally relax in. There are ways to wipe out the human race aside from the Calamity. Never forget that.”
“Fuguu.”
Ayumi cut in from the side.
I hoped she would take my side here, but she was just as exasperated.
“To be blunt, Onii-chan, if we lost you, we’d probably be so overcome by rage that we couldn’t stop ourselves. We were working against each other in that simulation, but what do you think would happen if we work together to spread our infections in a calculated fashion? The Bright Cross’s methods were despicable, but there was a reason they felt the need to go that far.”
She didn’t seem to be joking.
When they saw I couldn’t nod or shake my head, they seemed oddly accepting of it. In fact, I had a feeling they would have hit me if I had readily agreed or disagreed.
“Anyway, Onee-chan.”
“What is it, Ayumi-chan?”
“So which side was that Meslayate on? The Traditionalist side or the Hidden Cloud side?”
When Ayumi changed the subject, Erika brushed back the hair falling over her cheek.
“Is there any doubt? Given how much he built his identity on being a ‘real’ member, do you really think he would work to undermine our group?”
…She had a point.
I had initially suspected him since he was the only Werewolf, but Meslayate’s pride in the 13 Eastern European Families was real. And not just any 13 Eastern European Families would do. He loved the one he shared with Erika and the others. There would have been no room for the Hidden Cloud’s temptation to reach him. If their scout or agent had approached him with a grin, he would have hit them right in the vitals.
“Fuguu. Then this was all a waste. Although it’s good you’re safe, Onee-chan.”
“Don’t be silly,” I said. “This was 4-to-8 Russian roulette and even that Fly was an enemy, but we finally found an ally we can open up to and rely on. We couldn’t hope for anything better than that.”
Meslayate seemed the most surprised by what I said, but that was none of my concern.
A crime was a crime and it might require a punishment, but Meslayate’s crime had only happened because we had carelessly cornered him along with everyone else in that multi-purpose building. Plus, he had so much pride in and love for the 13 Eastern European Families that he was willing to go this far over it.
When all the Vampires had collapsed in that multi-purpose building, Meslayate could have delivered a finishing blow while they were defenseless. There had been at least 4 in that conference room. But he hadn’t done that. If he held a grudge or had betrayed them, it would not have turned out this way.
…I felt I could smile and forgive his crime.
In fact, now that everything had settled down, I felt like we were the ones that should bow down in apology.
Of course, this was all predicated on the fact that Erika was unharmed. There was no reason to push away happiness here.
Part 2
We had settled things with Meslayate, but that wasn’t everything. We still needed to deal with the Hidden Cloud group inside the 13 Eastern European Families.
“I guess it makes sense to leave that to Karen back in the multi-purpose building. Maxwell, call all of the building’s internal numbers. Karen’s bound to answer one of them.”
“Sure.”
It took 5 rings before she picked up. It seemed that god was confident in her position there.
“Hello, hello. This is Karen-chan. You’re disguising where this call is from, aren’t you?”
“We’ve dealt with things here. Meslayate is clean. What about you? Found anything on that Hidden Cloud that wants to kill the gods?”
“Let’s just say I have my suspicions. Like I said, I want the help of someone good with data and computers so I can attack the Hidden Cloud. I more or less know what needs to be done, so come on back to the…what was this building called? The Starlight Kukyou?”
…To be honest, I only cared about removing this corruption from the 13 Eastern European Families, so I didn’t need to get involved beyond that. Unfortunately, Karen refused to tell me who was on the Hidden Cloud side. She was probably doing it on purpose to negotiate with me.
It was a pain, but I had no choice.
“Understood.”
“Yes, yes. Please get back ASAP.”
She hung up.
Ayumi and Erika exchanged a glance too.
“What will you do, Onee-chan? Fuguu, it’s already 3 AM, so if this drags on, the sun could come out and you wouldn’t be able to return home.”
“The same is true for all of the 13 Eastern European Families, so it’s no excuse for me alone to sit this one out. Don’t worry. I can use the network of tunnels below the city to get home if I have to.”
…She said that, but Erika was so bad with machines that she would come crying to me in nothing but a negligee because she was having trouble hooking a normal DVR up to her TV, so I doubted she could open the electronic locks on those thick doors. I had to add that as a priority line on my to-do list.
“Meslayate, you’re a different matter. I don’t know if you’re staying at a hotel, an inn, or renting out someone’s room, but you need to get back there for today.”
He gave me a look of surprise and even more displeasure, but I was not going to budge on this one.
“We can’t take you into a fight when you have that silver wound. You can take a logistical support role until we can deal with that injury, okay?”
He gave a deep growl that was clearly not human language. He was not happy, but he seemed to give in for the time being. Based on the movements of his ears and tail, I doubted he was going to argue the point right now.
…The truth was I did not fully trust Karen. I had finally found a trump card I could rely on, so I wanted to preserve Meslayate for now.
In her long skirt with the wide open front, skintight black leather pants, and crimson corset that accentuated her large breasts, Erika covered her mouth with a black-gloved hand and giggled.
“My, my. Meslayate, you certainly have taken a liking to Satori-kun.”
“Eh? What do you mean, Erika?”
“That proud ‘Vampire’ never obeys someone else’s oral commands. Not even I could get him to back off with a verbal promise without a test of courage to prove I was worthy of trust.”
“???”
It didn’t feel real even after she explained it, but was she saying he would listen to me?
Still, I wanted a source of information on the 13 Eastern European Families. It felt weird, but I exchanged email addresses with that long-lived nobleman of the night.
My beautiful sisters and I parted ways with injured Meslayate and left the building.
Like Ayumi had said, we did not have much time with dawn approaching. After looking around the abandoned factory’s grounds, we found an old bicycle that had been sitting there for who knows how long.
That introduced a slight problem.
“Fuguu. Onii-chan only found one bike.”
“So it seems.”
“But there’s three of us and only two people can ride it at once.”
“That is about the size of it.”
I could have sworn some invisible sparks were flying.
“Fuguu! Onee-chan, you just have to transform into a bat or wolf and elegantly follow us!”
“My, my. Shouldn’t you give that spot to me since I was just being held hostage?”
“Vampires have 20 times human strength and Zombies only have 10 times, so I’m weaker!”
“Show off your skills as a runner girl. And if someone is going to sit behind him, I’m sure Satori-kun would prefer someone with big boobs.”
“Fuguu, fuguu! I’m lighter and more compact. Pedaling uphill with heavy old Onee-chan weighing you down would be hell, Onii-chan!!”
“…Ayumi-chan, how about we take this out back?”
“Oh, c’mon, Onee-chan! Your boobs aren’t the only thing that’s big! Like your butt!”
“Wait, you…!! I-I-I warned you, little sister!!”
I didn’t know what they were fighting about, but when an argument showed no sign of ending, settling it with rock-paper-scissors was the Japanese way.
“Rock paper scissors!!”
“Rock paper scissors!!”
“Rock paper scissors!!”
And so the squeaking of the bicycle pedals echoed through the late-night residential district.
“Pant, pant. Why do I have to run a marathon when I was the one that found the bike?” I asked. “I’m the intelligent and clever type, so I’m not cut out for this kind of physical exertion.”
“…”
“…”
“And you two! Don’t look so glum after stealing the bike I found and taking the easy way out! Why do you look like this wasn’t what you wanted!?”
The scenery changed as we left the residential district and approached the subway station area. At this time of night, there were not many people for how many lights there were. Old guys who had missed the train were passed out drunk here and there.
…Only now did I recall the possibility of being questioned by the police. Although Erika could get out of it by showing her Archenemy ID since Vampires could only be out at night.
We returned to the Starlight Kukyou multi-purpose building via the underground parking garage.
I didn’t know what floor Karen was on, but I started by taking the elevator to the top floor where the large conference room was.
She must have had a hard time waiting because she was standing restlessly in the hallway.
“Hiya, Satori-san.”
“…You sure seem calm. Did you finish sorting them into the Traditionalist side and Hidden Cloud side?”
“Easily. I just had to close them each in different rooms and say the first one to tell me what they know would be the winner here.”
“You monster.”
“Oh, but none of them went full-on backstabber right away! Just like with shoplifting and train molestation, it’s the wrongfully accused people who freak out the most. It’s the ones who saw the accusation coming who can keep their cool, so they’re the suspicious ones. Once you’re used to it, it’s really easy to tell them apart.”
I guess someone who has observed humans for centuries would have far more data to work from. If a normal person tried that, their prejudices and suspicions would turn it into a witch hunt.
I thought she was going to guide me to where the Hidden Cloud side was gathered, but that was not the case.
Karen opened the completely deserted large conference room.
The tables were covered with smartphones, cellphones, and tablets like the evidence gathered after a fraud group was arrested.
“Did you confiscate all this from the 13 Eastern European Families? But isn’t this way too much?”
“Of course it is.” The miniskirt armor widow (!?) sounded nonchalant. “The Hidden Cloud uses a trial period just like any group. To recruit people, they want to lure them in with favorable conditions, but they can’t have the recruits betraying them at the last second and spilling the beans to professional hunters like the Bright Cross. So the 13 Eastern European Families is still not part of the cloud. At this stage, the Hidden Cloud wouldn’t want to leave any evidence that would lead back to their core.”
Of course, there was no way to completely erase digital data. I’ve heard there are some who prefer to write encrypted text on paper for that reason.
“So the devices the Hidden Cloud contacted are physically destroyed after a certain period of time?”
“It’s kind of like an even more brutal version of ransomware. The 13 Eastern European Families must have known about it because it looks like they prepared a ton of cheap mobile devices in advance.”
While telling me that, Karen casually grabbed a tablet from the table and tossed it to me. It may have been nothing to her, but the notebook-sized device was kind of scary.
The screen was completely frozen.
It could not contact anywhere but the Hidden Cloud and it displayed a countdown to the physical destruction of the hardware.
It was one-time-use and waiting for the connection to be made from this end.
“The limit is about an hour… Maxwell.”
“No. I doubt simply tracing the signal will lead us back to the core of the Hidden Cloud. For one thing, I cannot even predict what kind of defenses and avoidance measures they will use.”
“Don’t worry. I don’t expect you to do everything right away.”
“…”
“Hey, aren’t you getting a little too advanced when you can get upset that I agreed with what you’re saying?”
“The device is currently offline and I can detect no EM or IR signals. At the very least, it is not playing dead while gathering data with a camera or microphone.”
“Contact our white hacker friend Anastasia. Send her a frozen version of the virus and have her analyze it. If I’m remembering right, her university lab has a modified blog analysis program that uses a database of viruses and similar programs to detect the coding habits and idiosyncrasies in a new virus and narrow down the possible creators.”
“And then we wait for the answer?”
“No, I’ll let you be the star. Prepare a flowchart of conversation patterns. We’ll do a CC attack.”
Digital crimes and hacking might sound like nothing but a bunch of incomprehensible programming language, but that wasn’t the only method.
For example, you could call up a software development company’s support desk and pretend to be a customer in trouble in order to access their internal tech, like unlocking passwords or activating shared settings. That was known as a customer center attack or CC attack for short.
I was going to base this on that.
“There is a customer here: the person the Hidden Cloud recruiter wants to get on their side. But I’ve never spoken with them before, so I can’t do this.”
“Shall I drag out one of the corrupted 13 Eastern European Families members?” asked Karen.
“We only get one shot at this, so we can’t have them betray us and shout that it’s a trap. I would prefer someone we can trust.”
It had to be someone that the Hidden Cloud, who were willing to cause the Calamity to get back at the gods, would want on their side very badly, but it also had to be someone we had absolute trust in.
…Everyone naturally turned in the same direction.
“Eh? Me…?”
Erika was confused by everyone’s attention.
But no one was a better fit for our needs. She was an Eastern European Queen and the most important member of the 13 Families, but she was also family for Ayumi and me. She would never betray us.
“This might be a poor example, but it’s like a sting operation to catch scammers. Erika pretends to be interested on the phone to keep the recruiter there. When she doesn’t know what to say, she finds a way to avoid giving a straight answer. Maxwell and I will come up with the necessary questions and responses, so we’ll give her cue cards to read. Maxwell.”
“Sure. I will do my best to inconspicuously slip in questions related to their identity and what methods they have to prevent someone from tracing the signal. Even if tracing them would normally be impossible, that can change if one of them tells us too much. Let us use this conversation to find a foothold for tracing them.”
“O-okay. I’ll do my best…”
Erika only had to follow our instructions, but she seemed weirdly nervous and almost shy. She was normally a perfect big sister who could do anything, but maybe she was always like this on the phone.
The method of accessing the Hidden Cloud was simple. There was only one button to tap on the single-use mobile device.
“O-okay, I’ll make the call.”
“Right.”
I had Maxwell create a new file so we could construct the flowchart in real time.
Erika bit the tip of her black glove’s middle finger and pulled it off before touching the tablet’s screen with her slender, white pointer finger. Then she gently set the device down on the table. Just to be safe, she placed the removed glove over the camera lens.
Perhaps because it was not a phone, it was only capable of speaker phone. Hearing the person on the other end was easy enough, but there was also a risk of them hearing us moving. We couldn’t be optimistic.
The “processing” icon flashed for a while, but then it suddenly cut out completely.
It was finally beginning.
We had a connection to the Hidden Cloud’s recruiter.
Part 3
A high-pitched artificial-sounding voice came from the tablet.
“Have you figured out which side it is in your best interests to join?”
Erika glanced over at me. I operated my smartphone real quick and held the small screen toward her.
…There’s no point in lying here. Tell them it’s you using someone else’s device.
“Are you asking that of Elisabeth as an individual, or were you under the impression she had taken control of this entire 13 Eastern European Families?”
“…”
“If you hang up without saying a word, I will interpret that as the entire Hidden Cloud insulting the 13 Eastern European Families. Were you hoping for a war?”
The silence continued for a while, but according to Maxwell’s analysis, it was fairly meaningless. We could not hear any rapid breathing or flipping through notes, so they were not actually unsure how to respond. They simply hoped to retake control of the conversation by making us impatient enough to lose our cool.
Haunted houses were scary, but the atmosphere was ruined once you spotted a staff member sneaking around in the background. This wouldn’t be enough to rattle us.
Finally.
The artificial voice slowly resumed speaking.
“Who are you?”
“Someone other than Elizabeth. That is all I will say.”
“Amatsu Erika, the Eastern European Queen. Now that is a big name.”
Ayumi’s eyes widened in shock and she glanced over at the dark window.
But that wasn’t it.
If they were observing the building and knew Karen and I had taken out the 13 Eastern European Families, they would not have responded to the call.
So I knew exactly what to display on my screen for Erika.
…They simply researched all the members of the 13 Eastern European Families in advance. They’re just making an educated guess based on how you speak and how you referred to Elizabeth as a subordinate.
Erika gave me a displeased wink and wagged her bare white index finger. She apparently did not like me saying she Elizabeth was a subordinate.
“However, I doubt Amatsu Erika would want to push a fellow member out of the way to contact us.”
“How much do you really know about me?”
“What is your point?”
“What I want first and foremost is the survival and prosperity of the 13 Eastern European Families. I have no way of knowing if I can reach a nice clean end to this if I continue a witch hunt against an unknown number of corrupted members. If the alternative is destroying ourselves in a fruitless internal struggle, wouldn’t it be better to simply change the entire organization’s affiliation?”
My older sister with the crimson corset accentuating her large breasts kept glancing over at me. She was following my instructions, but she was clearly not happy about what I was having her say. The way she silently bared her fangs was really scary!
“That does not sound like your style.”
“What I want is irrelevant.”
Their conversation was like two locked blades.
Meanwhile, Maxwell was listing up every pattern for the possible developments and responses. I chose one from the list and held my smartphone out toward Erika.
…Let’s get down to business.
“Our 13 Eastern European Families has just one demand. Bring an end to the conflict you have created amongst us and we will move the entire group to the Hidden Cloud. That is the only way to prevent my precious companions from destroying each other.”
“What are you asking us to do?”
I let Erika see my smartphone’s screen.
“I can stay in the Amatsu household, but we cannot have the entire 13 Families live with us as a homestay. Thus, providing them a new home is the bare minimum. I would also like you to provide them with a travel route. When Vampires cross the ocean, we remain in our coffins which are shipped as cargo. Of course, that is all for nothing if hunters sniff us out.”
“None of that sounds like a direct means of stopping your internal conflict.”
“It is the same as the rules for a refugee camp. People will obey someone who supplies them with basic necessities. Of course, that is only for a stable source of supplies.”
“I see. But the specifications are going to be rather lengthy.”
“Use a Net Box.”
“No. We can’t use a civilian uploader.”
“What about Sky Mail or a Data Bottle?”
“Disposable addresses are nice, but you cannot avoid the risk of data remaining on the third party’s server.”
“Then what? Should we directly exchange the data with P2P file sharing software?”
“Is anyone in your 13 Eastern European Families using a Cranberry Phone not infected with this malware? That can use an old satellite phone service that exists outside any national authorities’ watchful eyes. The satellite manages the data instead of a server on the surface. Once we send the data and you receive it, we can hack the satellite and have it burn up in the atmosphere to ensure no data remains in a third party’s hands. We will monitor things and send instructions when necessary.”
The call ended and the tablet went entirely silent. They may have increased the CPU’s clock frequency an excessive amount. Whatever it was, I doubted it would ever run again.
Erika gave me an anxious look to ask if she had done a good job, so I gave her a thumbs up.
“Maxwell, analyze the voice! Even if the pitch was altered, they can’t hide their breathing and the pauses before answering. Figure out when they were nervous or worried!”
“Sure. There were oddities at the mention of a Net Box and P2P. On the other hand, I can detect no change at the mention of Sky Mail.”
“What about the final Cranberry Phone suggestion?”
“Nothing. Less than the Sky Mail.”
“…Hm.”
While I pondered this, Ayumi gave me a puzzled look.
“Fuguu. So what did you figure out from that?”
“I haven’t completely figured anything out yet.”
There was no point in lying, so I honestly reported on the situation.
“But they were clearly avoiding something. And there was a predictable reaction in how they avoided it.”
“Fugu.”
“Ayumi. To keep it simple, let’s stick to the 5 main school subjects. If you had to choose just three of those to determine whether or not you passed an important entrance exam, which would you choose?”
“Japanese, social studies, and science. If I could be more specific, I would go with modern literature, geography, and biology. Oh, but if I could choose just the fill-in-the-blank section, I’d go with English.”
…It was impressive how she went for the ones that were almost entirely memorization.
But…
“I bet our blonde big sister would choose English, math, and science. She would avoid this country’s history and classical literature. I would choose math, science, and Japanese. Chemistry and short essays if I could be more specific. …My point is you can tell something about someone from what they’re good at and what they avoid.”
To be blunt, both Sky Mail and P2P had some risk. The fact that they had been more nervous about one than the other pointed to the Hidden Cloud technician’s area of expertise.
These days, schools taught simple app development just like they taught dance in gym, but none of the world’s textbooks would teach you how to hack or commit digital crimes. Everyone was self-taught and shared techniques within their team, so incomplete knowledge and unnecessary detours were unavoidable.
And these crimes could seem widespread since they occurred on the global internet, but it was actually a surprisingly narrow field. It was the same as a band of thieves or marriage scammers. Not everyone you met on the internet was a monster.
With computers and mobile devices spreading around the world, it was said there were more than 4 billion users, but I wanted to believe obsessives like Anastasia, who pored over every line of source code whenever the monthly OS update file came along, were rarer than hobbyists who used bazooka-like single-lens reflex cameras or amateur radios. Even I generally left everything to Maxwell.
In other words…
“If they’ve created a place for themselves with their skill in this one field, this won’t be their first crime. If we check through past cyber-attacks, we have a good chance of discovering a ‘similar anonymous individual’.”
Thinking back, their excessive fear of leaving any data on a third party server may have been the same sensitivity as someone with a criminal history trying not to leave any fingerprints at the crime scene.
“Miss Anastasia has sent a reply. After checking the virus code against the 17,600 entries of the university’s digital crime archive, it matches the Bad Caste hacker group which has caused trouble in India.”
“A country of mathematicians with a population of more than a billion? That’s quite the melting pot.”
“Bad Caste is a team which claims to work toward the end of unjust discrimination and the elimination of wealth gathering in the privileged classes, but the estimated suspects vary from street children to industrial billionaires. They are estimated to have between 500 and 1000 members. That is the same as a small village or town, so it is not enough to identify an individual.”
“They wouldn’t all be skilled hackers. A lot of them would be DDoS zombies simply used for their machine power. The attacks would be led by a handful of elites – of heroes. Refine the search with Net Box, Sky Mail, Data Bottle, P2P, and Cranberry Phone. We can filter through these heroes using their strengths and weaknesses. That should give us the answer.”
“And there it is. Their real name is unknown, but they go by Avatar Null. That may mean an incarnation of zero or a god with no set value or contents.”
“It just means they’re intangible like a ghost so no one can catch them. Don’t read too much into a simple joke.”
For Avatar Null, was the Hidden Cloud like a second job, or had Bad Caste been nothing more than camouflage and a means of keeping busy during their downtime?
“More importantly, check through their history. We need to use the Cranberry Phone satellite service as suggested while also setting up a trap that will distract them.”
“Three years ago, Avatar Null was caught by an exchange’s software switch lock, so their hacking server system, which was hidden on a cruiser, was located and seized. You could call it a ‘you thought you had ended the call, but it didn’t end’ trap. It seems they just barely managed to avoid being identified and arrested themselves.”
“That’s not even a mental blind spot. It’s one of the most basic things. That’s the problem with being self-taught.”
“As they say, it is darkest below the lighthouse. They also made similar silly mistakes when destroying a bank’s deposit data and attacking an attorney’s office. They seem to have escaped trouble by using a zombie PC in another country as a proxy.”
So after a painful experience, they were trying to be careful but couldn’t quite shake their bad habit.
We could use this.
“Maxwell, set up the trap with a software switch as planned.”
“This is not a guaranteed method. This was a source of trauma for Avatar Null, so they will be most wary of just such a mistake. If they notice, we will lose any chance of tracking them down.”
“I want to know for sure whether or not they’ll step on this landmine. And there’s one way of ensuring I know that.” I paused for a beat. “We don’t bury the landmine. If it’s just sitting there on the side of the road, we know for a fact they won’t step on it.”
That might sound pointless, but it wasn’t. If we set up a blatant trap that anyone would notice, Avatar Null would definitely avoid it. And that would make what they did next easier to predict. Simply put, it was like placing two grenade tripwires, one high and one low. When they tried to avoid the lower wire, they would run right into the higher one.
So…
“Wait, Queen. What is this…? I’m pausing the data transfer. There’s something I want to check!”
We were now using a Cranberry Phone and we were very much in control of the conversation.
“Hoping to negotiate a better deal at the last second?” asked Erika on my instructions. “You were the one who suggested this safe satellite route.”
“It isn’t that! Just wait! It’s to protect both of us!!”
Good, they had noticed the software switch trap.
The question was where they would step after avoiding the obvious tripwire.
…Erika did not know much about computers, so I needed to control the flow of conversation.
“Like I said before, my colleagues are in a hurry to escape. This is a small island nation with advanced communication infrastructure, so the number of cameras per square kilometer is greater than even London or New York. If we stay here too long, we cannot avoid those old-fashioned hunters.”
“…What are you asking of us?”
“How do you do, everyone? I am saying we will negotiate at a later date. For now, I am focused on getting the 13 Eastern European Families to safety. And by the way…” Erika glanced over at my smartphone. “This should go without saying, but this incident occurred while your Hidden Cloud was recruiting us. If we are sniffed out by a hunter and there are any victims, I will determine the cause and provide the appropriate punishment, so keep that in mind. I am not talking about just any 13 Eastern European Families; I mean this 13 Eastern European Families. In other words, if anything were to happen, responsibility would lie with you.”
I gave a thumbs up and Erika ended the call.
She elegantly placed her soft-looking bare hand on her soft-looking cheek and tilted her head.
“Are you sure that was good enough? I didn’t guide them anywhere and that sounded like a simple goodbye.”
“Don’t worry. That was perfect.”
The Hidden Cloud’s Avatar Null clearly wanted Erika’s 13 Eastern European Families quite badly. Otherwise, they would not have stayed in contact when someone could intercept the signal.
However.
We were causing trouble at the last second to force a change of venues, but if we too obviously lured them onto a field full of traps, they would never agree to it.
Which meant…
“There won’t be another negotiation,” I said while sticking out my tongue. “Once they know their negotiation partner is just standing around after declaring them the responsible party, Avatar Null will panic. They’ll have no choice but to contact us, so they’re sure to hack into the Cranberry Phone you were using. Without any other data, they’ll have to do it no matter how afraid they are.”
“I see. In other words, being aggressive isn’t the only way to negotiate.”
“Avatar Null is an expert hacker. They wouldn’t fall for any crappy performance we put on to lure them onto a minefield. But if we dive right into that danger zone like complete amateurs, Avatar Null will have no choice but to follow us. We just have to capture them there. Maxwell.”
“Sure.”
If we knew what route the enemy would use to hack in, infecting them with a virus was easy. We just had to put a ton of viruses on the Cranberry Phone Erika was holding and wait.
“I have detected suspicious packets disguised as an app update notification. It is almost certainly Avatar Null hacking in. The 39 viruses installed on the mobile device – including Sweet Lady, Blue Blood, and Tao Long D – have activated. The counter-hacking has begun.”
“Watch out for a zombie PC proxy or an IP randomizer server.”
“How low spec do you think I am? I have located Avatar Null’s hacking machine. I am listing up the cloud space he or she is in charge of protecting. …I have determined the full scope of the Hidden Cloud.”
“Then we don’t need them anymore. Keep the Cranberry Phone connected while contacting their local police. Don’t expect them to actually get arrested, though.”
“Sure.”
It didn’t matter to me whether they were simply arrested or focused on physically fleeing. As long as they couldn’t settle down and remain active online, we were free to do as we pleased.
Now, then.
“Let’s find out what Avatar Null was most focused on protecting. That will be the Hidden Cloud’s central management. What we do with that info will be your decision, Karen.”
“Aye, sir.”
“But don’t you forget that you needed my help for this. If you sully my work here by doing anything as uninspired as slaughtering them all, I will find a way to punish you for it.”
After driving my point home, I prepared to hand Maxwell’s list to Karen.
But.
“Wait a second, Maxwell. Is this the correct result? You didn’t fall for a proxy or something?”
“I simply provided the answer you requested.”
“Fugu? Did you find some kind of problem? Like did you lose all the data?”
“The opposite.” I gulped. “There’s too much. This has 1,010,368,098 results for the ‘central management’.”
Part 4
A billion results.
The entire population of the earth was around 7 billion. There was no accurate data on the number of Archenemies, but they were an overall minority. Even if you combine humans and immortals, I doubted the total would even reach 8 billion.
In other words.
“This says more than 1 in 10 people on the planet are part of the Hidden Cloud…”
When I said it aloud, the scale felt utterly absurd.
“There are 40 people in my class, so this would mean 3 or 4 of my classmates are members! Can that really be possible!?”
“Is it really that surprising?”
That unbelievable question came from Karen.
“I mean, we’re talking about the Hidden Cloud that truly wants to drive the world crazy and destroy it to strike back against the gods. If it didn’t cross national, religious, financial, and academic boundaries, it wouldn’t be a very realistic goal. They wouldn’t seem like much of an enemy.”
“But that makes them bigger than my stepmom’s Absolute Noah. How am I supposed to believe that there’s more than one organization like that out there?”
“You may be looking at this wrong.”
I wanted believe this had come as a shock.
But Erika spoke up as if trying to face the cruel reality.
“Take us Archenemies for example. We compromise our lifestyles to not interfere with your human lives. We officially register ourselves with the government, but there’s actually a lot that remains unclear. Archenemies like us are everywhere, from the schools and supermarkets to the Bright Cross and Absolute Noah. …What if the Hidden Cloud is more like that?”
They could be human or Archenemy. They made no distinction between governments and criminal organizations.
They hated the gods.
They wanted to drag those gods down from heaven and give them the bitter taste of defeat.
…A third power had split off from the world based on nothing more than that.
So were there that many people who had been denied the normal blessings and had given up on waiting for hope? And had they actually begun taking action?
“Let’s assume they can be found anywhere. Just like they were found in Absolute Noah’s Echidna and our 13 Eastern European Families.”
…If they had worked their way into the center of those secret organizations, it would be strange if they had not gotten into our schools and shopping centers.
Just like every country had both men and women.
Just like every religion had both adults and children.
The Hidden Cloud had already crossed all boundaries to that extent.
Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism all said the spread of evil was a sign of the end times.
The end times.
The Calamity.
The end result of an extreme moral hazard.
“But at the same time, that does not mean all of them are taking special action like the Echidna and Fly.”
“What do you mean, Erika?”
“If they really do have a billion people hidden across the seven seas and the six continents including Antarctica and if all of them viewed us hostilely enough to risk their lives, everything we did would have been reported back to the Hidden Cloud. At the very least, we couldn’t have defeated the 13 Eastern European Families here in this building, right?”
“…Now that you mention it.”
“How seriously they take it differs from person to person. Not all of the registered members will be participating in real time. A lot of them may have registered and never thought about it again.”
…So that’s it.
I had been overwhelmed by the number at first, but not all of them would be on the level of a final boss. Also, even I was an atheist. But if some accidents, illnesses, and other unfortunate coincidences coincided, I might still curse the general idea of ‘god’. The Hidden Cloud was an outlet for that. A billion might sound like an incredible number, but the number of people registered with social media sites or for free email services could easily reach a billion. Even the ones that had begun as a tiny startup or a university club. And if people could be with the Hidden Cloud as well as some other group, Karen was right that it was entirely possible. Members of the police and military could create accounts with the Hidden Cloud and people could try out registering and never touch it again, so it may have been a realistic number after all.
Especially if a single person could create multiple accounts.
“But this does nothing to narrow down a target, does it?” Ayumi sounded worried. “So we have a billion suspects? This doesn’t tell us which ones are a threat. Or if there even is a core. Who are we supposed to attack to end this? It’s not like we can go around the entire world slaughtering the billion people who made those accounts.”
Blue-armored Valkyrie Karen only giggled at that. …Knowing her, causing a planetary disaster could actually be an option. Like a deluge sans ark.
…But wait.
“You might be able to gather a billion people from social media or a search engine, but who created this outlet? No, this would require more than just creating it. Just like OSs have monthly updates, systems require maintenance. It wasn’t that Avatar Null hacker. This would require corporate manpower on the level of a powerhouse in the IT business.”
“Sure,” said Maxwell. “Shall we think of that as the core of the Hidden Cloud?”
“But that’s easier said than done. We’re talking about a server system that can support access from a billion accounts while keeping its existence entirely secret. The larger something is, the harder it is to hide. Just like the CIA has the contradictory title of the world’s most famous spy organization. Something dazzling but impossible to identify no matter how hard you search sounds a lot like Cinderella’s dress to me. Assuming they don’t have a convenient fairy godmother, could you really find a way to do that?”
“Fuguu.”
An odd sound escaped Ayumi’s mouth.
No…
“…Is it really that complicated? They just need that fairy godmother, right?”
“Ayumi?”
“No, maybe getting involved with them at all was a big mistake and there was a much shorter route to the answer.”
She winked.
She raised her index finger.
And my cute little sister, a Zombie with Voodoo origins, said the following.
“Everyone might have forgotten by now…but this all started with that Evil Spirit black market. If you sacrifice the person you care for most, they can give you whatever and whoever it is you want, right? Yes, no matter how ridiculous it might seem.”
[crucial notice] Payment Confirmation [on the pinup board]
Payment (First Half): Complete.
Security deposit confirmed.
Your payment is in order. To live up to the trust you have placed in us, we will immediately begin shipping out the requested product.
As per the contract, we will procure the equipment and deliver it to the appropriate destination. We will provide a manual, so you will need to prepare your own operation staff. The personnel for the test run will only ensure the delivered equipment is in working order. If you wish us to assemble it and provide continuing support, you will need a separate contract.
Also, you will only be delivered the bare equipment. This should go without saying, but do not forget to disguise it.
We look forward to the second half of the payment as well.
All of Evil Spirit is hoping you will find the product to be worth even more than you paid for it.
- How you dispose of this message is up to you. But if this goes public, we have measures in place to ensure it will not lead back to us.
Back to Chapter 5