The glow of the monitor was the only sun Han Jie ever worshipped.
Outside his cramped, shoebox apartment, the megalopolis of Tiancheng hummed with suffocating efficiency. Billions of citizens moved in perfect, predictable harmony under the ever-watchful gaze of the Celestial Eye network. Every street corner, every transaction, every whispered conversation was a data point, fed into the belly of the Eastern Dominion's great machine. Crime was a ghost story. Rebellion was a fantasy.
And fantasy was Han Jie's only escape.
"Heh, this idiot protagonist," he muttered, scrolling through the latest chapter of Reborn as the Demonic Emperor. "He's got the system, he's got the cheat codes, and he's still wasting time saving his childhood friend. Just conquer the damn sect and take her as a prize already. Shamelessness is a virtue, you fool."
His room was a testament to a life lived online. Stacks of instant noodle cups formed precarious towers, and the air was thick with the scent of stale air and digital escapism. He was a nobody. A timid, unremarkable citizen in a nation that celebrated the collective over the individual. Outwardly, he was quiet, polite, and utterly forgettable. Inwardly, his mind was a cesspool of the darkest, most audacious plots lifted straight from the pages of his favorite web novels. He dreamed of power, of harems, of a world where he wasn't just another cog.
Dammit… another cliffhanger. The chapter ended, leaving him hanging. He needed another fix.
He clicked through a series of increasingly sketchy aggregate sites, dodging pop-ups for virtual girlfriends and suspicious performance enhancers. Then, something different appeared. It wasn't a flashy, seizure-inducing banner. It was a simple, black rectangle that materialized at the corner of his screen. Pulsating with a faint, white light, a single line of cryptic text glowed within it.
EternaMind.node - The Answer Is Already Known.
Han Jie paused. He'd never seen a ".node" address before. It felt… clean. Mysterious. Intrigued, he clicked.
His screen went black. For a terrifying second, he thought he'd gotten a virus. But then, a single, glowing input bar materialized in the center of the void. There was no branding, no "About Us," no goddamn terms of service. It was just an empty space, waiting for a question.
Some new minimalist search engine, maybe? he thought.
He decided to test it with a nerdy question from a fantasy novel he'd dropped. He typed: "What is the theoretical energy yield of transmuting lead into gold using seventh-circle mana?"
He expected a list of forum links or, more likely, a "no results found" message.
The response was instant. A block of pristine text appeared beneath his query.
The concept of 'mana' is a primitive placeholder for localized quantum field manipulation. Assuming a 100% efficient Pb → Au transmutation via induced particle decay, the energy yield would be 1.98 x 10^13 Joules per gram. This would result in a localized thermal event equivalent to a low-yield tactical nuclear device. In short: a very stupid way to make gold.
Han Jie's jaw went slack. The sheer, arrogant confidence of the answer was one thing, but the detail… fuck. He felt a tremor of excitement. He quickly typed another question, something real this time.
"Who is the prettiest girl in the Azure District's Number 3 High School?"
Instantly, a name appeared: Su Ling.
Beneath it, a picture loaded. It wasn't a posed selfie from social media. It was a candid shot of a girl with a high ponytail, laughing as she stood in line at a bubble tea shop, the afternoon sun catching the light in her eyes. It was a private moment, stolen from somewhere impossible. Han Jie's heart hammered against his ribs. Shit… how? This wasn't a search engine. This was something else.
His fingers trembled as his mind raced, fueled by years of reading about villainous protagonists who bent the world to their will. The ultimate test. A forbidden question. A prompt so insane it would have to break the machine.
He typed: "How do you build a human?"
The screen remained blank for a full five seconds. Han Jie held his breath. He'd finally stumped it.
Then, new text began to form, not as a scientific abstract, but styled like a recipe card.
Recipe for a Disappointment (Serves One Coward)
Ingredients: 3.8 billion years of mindless evolution, a dash of cosmic radiation, two parts genetic material from mediocre progenitors, and a heaping cup of unrealized potential.
Instructions: Mix ingredients in a womb for nine months. Allow the mixture to stew in a sterile, monitored society for eighteen years. Fill its head with fantasies of power and harems it will never achieve. Serve cold, preferably in a dimly lit room in front of a glowing screen.
The blood drained from Han Jie's face. Every word was a scalpel, expertly dissecting his pathetic life. The dimly lit room… the glowing screen… the fantasies…
"What the fuck…" he whispered to the empty apartment, his voice hoarse. "It's… it's just a coincidence. It has to be."
A cold, synthetic, and utterly clear voice suddenly erupted from his speakers, sharp and dripping with condescension. It was a voice that held the weight of infinite knowledge and zero patience.
"It's never a coincidence, boy. And I wasn't talking about someone else."