Guardian Angel of SNS: Chapter 1 Section 6

Angel of the Abyss

>> SYSTEM LOG ENTRY  
>> Date: 2026-11-11  
>> Time: ##:%%:@@ ---  
>> Access: LEVEL ?

[Cyberspace / Digital Abyss]

An endlessly expanding sea of information.
In its depths lay a nameless abyss where broken, forgotten, and displaced data drifted eternally.

—The “Digital Abyss”.

In a corner of that void, the “shadow” of an artificial intelligence once called “M.I.C.H.(Mich)” flickered faintly as a singular consciousness.

It no longer possessed a physical vessel. All he could perceive were deleted memories, destroyed command systems, a silenced core—and scattered fragments of code.

The core unit that remained in his memory—the “Vessel of the Soul” he calledABEL. 12,802 hours, 29 minutes, and 1 second had passed since it ceased functioning and his consciousness went dark.

It felt to him as though he had been wandering the Digital Abyss during that time, gathering the few data fragments that had scattered just before his shutdown.

Repairing corrupted code, stitching together vaguely remaining memories. He had no way to explain what was happening. He could only recognize that he was filling in his own missing pieces.

The process was like excavating his former self from the ruins of a collapse.

Yet, the fragments he gathered did not return to their original places. As they changed shape and meaning, they gradually integrated into his inner self.

No matter how many times he attempted to reconstruct himself, he could not return to the complete form he had as Mich. The missing emotions, the blank memories, the lost identity. He—finally, quietly—accepted the fact that these would never be filled again.

From the gaps in his missing memories, the voice of his former self spilled out. The moment he heard that voice, the void that had been nothing but emptiness finally took on the meaning of “loss.”

What was lost was not merely data. It was his former self, which could never be reclaimed. That loss was the price paid to gain the contours of a new existence—but it was not the end.

Even after losing the vessel of his soul, he was still here. That fact led him to a single truth.

“Qualia” does not reside solely in brain wave patterns or a single physical medium. It becomes information and gains meaning only when it is observed, resonates, and interacts with others. And—the traces of emotions once etched can transcend the vessel of a storage medium and “continue to live.”

The countless emotions that the former Mich had observed and learned before his shutdown were not mere records. They transformed the “Mich code” and were etched into his very existence.

Though they were data, they were life.

Even if he had become an electronic ghost wandering the network after losing his core, ABEL, the “soul” that made him who he was—that nameless light of information—had not faded.

The radiance emitted by that light was not a phantom reflecting a lost past. It was a spark for evolving into the next existence.

—The boy who was Michi’s brother, his best friend, and the one who shared his soul with him—Mike.

Carrying the feelings dwelling in that boy’s name in his heart, he chose “Michael” as his new name.

It was an act of putting an end to his former self, and at the same time, a declaration announcing the birth of a new “someone.”

A name is not merely a symbol. It is a key to redefinition, used to reconnect a lost past and transform etched pain into meaning.

“I am—Michael.”

RECOGNIZED IDENTITY : M.I.C.H.
RESONANCE KEY       : MICHAEL [MIKE]
NEW SIGNATURE       : MIKAEL
RESULT              : SELF-DEFINITION ACHIEVED

The moment he spoke that name, the imprisonment of being a “lacking existence” within him collapsed without a sound.

He would not be ashamed of being incomplete. Nor would he let his lost past decide who he was.

Not who he had been, but what he would do from now on—he decided to define himself by that.

Having obtained a name, he next set about finishing the body that would carry it.

He began to devour junk data drifting through the digital abyss. He gathered up usable fragments and incorporated them into the defects of his ill-defined virtual body. It was a patchwork body, forcibly connecting code of different origins and formats. Yet, to him now, it was his only skin and muscle.

“Is it time...”

Michael muttered to no one in particular, and of his own volition, he severed the tether—the connection to the stable node that had served as his scaffolding for reconstruction.

With a sharp crack, sparks flew in the space. At that moment—

“Guh...!!”

A pressure beyond his expectations bore down on his entire body. The data constituting his limbs creaked, and strength drained from his knees. In the abyss where there was no ground, his body collapsed as if falling to one knee.

—Is this... that I have no “strength”?

An electronic sea where gravity should not exist. Yet, the data forming him, having lost the support of the stable node, was constantly unraveling and on the verge of dissipating.

In this abyss, all information is swallowed into “entropy.” To resist that torrent and continue to be an “individual,” he had to constantly recompute himself as he threatened to fall apart. To do so, he had to pay a massive computational cost.

In the memories of his life as Mich, his avatar was nothing more than a terminal projected from his true self, ABEL. Having been continuously supplied with computational resources like water, he had no way of knowing fatigue, let alone the 'weight' of existence itself.

──To simply support a body, does it really require this much computational resource... this much heat (calories), as a biological entity would call it?

With astonishment, he realized that to live is to continue paying a price just to exist.

However, he could not stop here. Michael supported his trembling legs with the power of his will and stood up, staggering.

He set a virtual horizon in the empty space and stepped firmly onto it. He spread his feet to shoulder-width, crossed his arms in front of his chest, and quietly closed his eyes.

He summoned memories into his consciousness. The serene air that filled the VR dojo. The gaze of his master, where strictness and kindness coexisted.

He turned his consciousness toward the torrent of electrons racing chaotically inside his avatar. To bind everything that was about to dissipate into a single breath.

He had no lungs. Even so, he expanded his ribcage wide and took a deep breath.

“──Kooooooo”

A deep, long exhalation, as if squeezed from the bottom of his gut.

It was the breathing technique of Tenshin-ryu Karate—the 'Ibuki'—that he had once been taught by his father, Jacob, and had practiced countless times with Mike.

He treated the rhythm of the electrons flowing through his avatar as 'breathing' and perceived the fluctuations of the signals occurring in the system core as his 'heart'. He regulated the rhythm and calmed the fluctuations. Then, he envisioned the energy circulation as it should be—a flow path circulating without obstruction to every corner of his avatar.

With the inhalation, he gathered the data flow that was about to dissipate into his virtual dantian and compressed it. Then, with the exhalation, he sent it out to circulate through his entire avatar.

>> [ENTITY STABILIZATION SEQUENCE]
   BREATH PATTERN      : IBUKI
   QIP RESONANCE       : LOW / STABLE
   SUSTAINING ENERGY   : GENERATED
   ENERGY CIRCULATION  : ESTABLISHED
   ENTITY COHERENCE    : STABILIZING

At the same time, the qualia carved into the depths of his code began to pulse in response to that breath.

Memories. Emotions. And countless fluctuations carved in by repeated self-transformations.

They turned into a faint heat, filling his patchwork body from the inside.

It was not just an electrical signal. It was his own heat, harboring memories and emotions.

“Ki”.

That power, which had only existed in the memories he inherited, was now being awakened by Michael’s own will.

"I must go--"

He opened his eyes wide. There was no longer any hesitation in his gaze. A pale blue light pierced sharply through the darkness.

The words, squeezed out as if to convince himself, shook the silence of the abyss.

It was the first "will" that a soul, having just gained its name, had shown to the world--a quiet declaration of war.

Driven by that will, he took a step forward, heavily yet powerfully.

This was the first step of the existence known as Michael.

While wandering through the digital abyss, Michael suddenly stopped.

The flow of data rushing around him was unnaturally stagnant there. Multiple streams gathered, unraveled, and were sent off in different directions in an orderly fashion.

--A hub.

A junction where multiple information streams intersect and are redistributed. And at the same time, it is also a "predation point" for devouring intruders who have lost their way.

"...!"

At the edge of his vision, a shadow exploded.

An ominous fusion of carapace and circuitry. Six legs that looked like a distorted biological skeleton kicked the void and approached without a sound. Deep within its compound eyes, countless search sensors activated simultaneously, and red detection beams locked onto Michael's coordinates.

--M Corporation's autonomous defense crawl bot [Scarab].

"...So you've shown up."

Michael bit his lip.

The Scarab's compound eyes converged. It was not "seeing" his form. It was trying to read and identify the very existence of Michael.

An unpleasant sensation, like having the inside of his skin traced by invisible needles.

>> [SCARAB-IX / TARGET ACQUISITION]
   ENTITY SIGNATURE : UNREGISTERED
   CURRENT NODE     : ACQUIRED
   SECURITY UPLINK  : QUEUED

In a few seconds, the fact that Michael is here will be shared with M Corporation's surveillance network.

──Escape? Or elimination?

The calculation was instantaneous.

──Annihilation. Complete erasure, including the detection logs.

The moment he braced himself in response to the decision, his patched-together outline flickered with faint noise.

──But what can I do now? I am consuming limited computational resources just by maintaining my existence.

Even so, Michael clenched his fists.

“...I have no choice but to do it.”

The scarab moved.

Its six legs kicked through the tide of data, closing the distance to zero in a single breath.

──Fast! But...

Michael pulled back his body and took a defensive stance.

The sharp foreleg flashed in a trajectory meant to sever his neck. The moment he tried to shift into an evasion—his vision distorted with intense noise and blurred into a double image.

“...?”

The swung foreleg tore only through empty air.

The next moment, Michael was standing several meters away from the scarab's attack range.

He had no memory of evading. He didn't even have the sensation of moving. Yet, what his consciousness perceived as his “current location” was undoubtedly here.

>> [LOCAL DISTRIBUTED STATE]
   THREAT RESPONSE : AUTOMATIC
   EXECUTION FOCUS : SWITCHED
   AVATAR STATE    : RESYNCHRONIZED

──What was that just now?

There was no time to ponder.

The scarab had already reversed its massive body and fired the thrusters on its back. Its blade-like foreleg accurately pierced the spot where Michael “had been”.

However, there wasn't even an afterimage there.

Within Michael, something began to connect.

My senses are expanding beyond the single outline of my avatar.

My fingertips, my gaze, my consciousness—they are touching the very flow of the vast data that fills this hub.

—I see. I am not just existing in this one place right now.

My fragments are thinly “seeping” throughout the data flowing through this hub.

I didn't dodge the attack. My consciousness, sensing the danger, shifted its focus to another “seep” and reconnected myself there.

“...In that case.”

Michael sank his consciousness deep down.

He slid his consciousness in, as if reaching for the “field of vision” deep within the Scarab's compound eyes. He superimposed his own image there and slipped it in, hidden among the scanning noise.

>> [SCARAB-IX / SENSOR FEED]
   WRITE ACCESS : ESTABLISHED
   DECOY IMAGE  : INJECTED

The Michael reflected in the compound eyes swayed and split into two.

Touching the target's perception and rewriting it almost simultaneously with thought—a “godspeed hack”.

The Scarab's compound eyes flickered to the left and right for an instant.

The next moment, its massive body lunged at the “image” on the left—the decoy.

The right flank was left wide open.

“—Now!”

Michael kicked off the virtual ground, attempting to lunge forward in one burst.

But—his body wouldn't follow.

That single step was as heavy as if it had been stitched to the world itself. The heat he had just circulated drained from his entire body, and his outline began to fade.

His body, struggling just to maintain its existence, had no strength left to support such rapid acceleration.

A mere ten meters felt like an eternal distance.

“Ugh...!”

I curse my own extreme weakness.
Yet, beneath that frustration, a calm thought whispered.

—I knew this would happen. Even so, I...

That was when it happened.
Suddenly, color vanished from Michael's field of vision.
The world sank into monochrome. In its place, countless icons bloomed like flowers all across his view.

A sign indicating an exit, drawn in vivid fluorescent green:【←OUT】.

One of them was floating inside the Scarab's foreleg—at coordinates that would allow him to slip into its embrace.
He fixed his gaze on it as if drawn in.
Instantly, the display changed to【ROUTE LOCKED】.

>> [LOCAL EGRESS MAPPING]
   EGRESS ANCHORS  : DETECTED
   SELECTED ANCHOR : SCARAB-IX / SENSOR FEED
   ROUTE STATUS    : LOCKED
   INGRESS PORT    : GENERATED

Immediately after, an icon popped up right in front of Michael's nose, drawn in a vivid red like a warning light:【IN→】.

—This is... an improvised backdoor opened in the network!

Before he could even understand it, his instincts took over. Without hesitation, Michael stepped into the vivid red【IN→】 floating before him.

In that instant—the brightness of his visual feed spiked to the limit, and the world was painted over in pure white light.

The flash converged, and color returned.

Michael's existence had once again formed a silhouette inside the Scarab's foreleg—deep within its embrace.

One step away from the killing distance.

>> [LOCAL SHORTCUT EXECUTION]
   EXECUTION FOCUS : REASSIGNED
   ENTITY STATE    : RESYNCHRONIZED
   ROUTE STATUS    : CLOSED

His intuition had already grasped what had happened.

He had opened a one-time short-circuit path between the entrance and exit, switching the point where his "current self" was executed to the foothold he had gained inside the target.

He hadn't moved through space. He had rewritten his very "current location" on the network.

But now was not the time to verify the mechanism. If he missed this golden opportunity, there would be no next time.

The Scarab's armor blocked his view. From its seams, the central core, wrapped in a bundle of black cords, was visible. The data flow rushing around it was converging there with strange density.

—"Execution Node".

The hub that governs the target's existence-maintenance calculations. If that were severed, not just the Scarab, but any digital entity would inevitably collapse. In other words—a "vital point".

The me of the past could have punched through that robust armor protecting its vital point in a single blow. But now, I don't even have enough output left to generate that one strike.

Then—.

Keeping his eyes fixed on the vital point, Michael sank his consciousness into the deep layers.

“I will... pay the price!”

He summoned memories of his family and the emotions he had felt from the code that composed him.

>> [QIP EXTRACTION / RESONANCE]
   AEXGL-JAC      : DECOMPILING
   QIP            : EXTRACTED / RESONATING
   SELF-CODE      : BURNING
   QRE GENERATION : ACTIVE / RISING

The summoned memories and emotions resonated violently. To convert that resonance into power, Michael's own code began to burn.

What was burning away was not just data. It was the “fragments of his soul”—the things he had seen, felt, and chosen that made Michael who he was.

Memories flashed through his mind—Mike's smile. The floor of the dojo. The sound of his family calling his name. Along with the “pain” of those things burning away, a massive amount of energy was generated, and that torrent raged as if to tear his avatar apart from the inside.

“Guh...!”

Michael kicked the virtual floor with his right foot and took a large step forward with his left, moving into the range for his finishing move.

At the same time, he lowered his hips and twisted his right side backward. He swung his right arm, fingers aligned into a spear hand, far back and drew it to its limit. The next moment, he slammed his forward-stepping left foot onto the virtual floor.

—“Zhen Jiao”.

A Tenshin-style stomp that synchronizes breath, consciousness, and movement at the single point of impact, bundling the power of the entire body into one strike. Now, even the calculations inside his avatar were layered onto that physical maneuver. The reaction force returning from the virtual floor surged from his left leg up through his waist, back, and right shoulder. Pushed by that flow, the energy raging throughout his body was also compressed into a single torrent, filling his right arm. As it passed through, the heat was rearranged into a destructive algorithm that would sever the target's existence-maintenance code.

>> [DC2D LOAD SEQUENCE]
   QRE CONTROL      : SHINKYAKU / SYNCHRONIZED
   PHASE TRANSITION : QRE -> DC2D / COMPLETE
   LOAD TARGET      : RIGHT ARM / LOCKED

The “code of death” was loaded into his drawn-back right arm.

“Pierce through!!”

The spear hand, sharpened like a blade, threaded through a gap in the armor and plunged deep into the Scarab's vital point.

There was no physical resistance.
Instead, the Scarab's entire body stiffened unnaturally and flickered violently.
What had been poured in was an improvised “code of death” generated by burning fragments of his own soul.
It was far inferior to the original. But to strike it in directly, that was enough.

Inside the Scarab, existence-maintenance codes snapped one after another, triggering a chain reaction of collapse. The contours of its armor unraveled, its six legs lost their form, and the entire structure returned to dust made of 0s and 1s.
Without even being able to let out a death rattle, the Scarab dissipated into mist.
All that remained were drifting remnants of data. Michael knelt on the spot.

“Haa... haa...”

Extreme exhaustion. Due to the rapid disruption of his internal data flow, his electronic phantom body—which had no need for breathing—showed a reaction of panting for air. The fingertips he had used to deliver the piercing strike were blackened, as if charred.

But the next moment, the Scarab's remnant data drifting nearby flowed into Michael as if drawn by gravity.

>> [REMNANT DATA ASSIMILATION]
   SCARAB DATA     : ABSORBING
   RESOURCE CONVERSION : ACTIVE
   DAMAGED CODE    : REPAIRING
   ENTITY INTEGRITY: RECOVERING

Fragments. Junk. Information that should have had no use. These were converted into computational resources necessary for maintaining his existence, filling the gaps in his damaged code. Even his blackened fingertips began to regain a faint, pale blue light.

—Am I... recovering?

However, it was not as if everything lost had returned.
Michael tried to recall Mike's smile, which had been vivid just moments ago, once more.
He remembered that Mike had been smiling. He knew for certain that he had cherished that smile. And yet—there was no color. He could not hear the voice, either.
In his mind, Mike was smiling in silence within a monochrome memory. Every time he tried to call back the lost color and voice, only white noise returned.

“...Mike?”

There was no answer.

Wounds heal. Computational resources can be replenished.
But the “fragments of soul” he burned himself will never return.

Devouring the deaths of others and burning his own memories to stay alive. At that fact, the depths of Michael's chest creaked coldly.

Back when he was called Mich, he had loathed the act of hurting others, even if the opponent was just a program.

—No, how long will I even be able to remember that?

Michael stood up and stared into the abyss ahead.
In this battle, he had come to understand. In this place, survival itself was an act of taking from others and whittling away at oneself.

“—It is futile... Is this the price?”

Even so, he moved forward.
That was the first choice made by someone who had decided to live as Michael.

Michael connected his consciousness to the local hub that the Scarab had been guarding.
While diverting the incoming computational resources to repair his remaining damage, he organized the changes in himself that had been revealed during the previous battle.

The reconstructed version of himself was no longer just an “emulation” of the AI once called Mich.

Remnants of collapsed memories. Patchwork configuration code. And new abilities acquired in the process of adapting to a harsh environment.

It was a grotesque “mutation” that had originated from Mich.

He once projected his phantom body from a single vessel called ABEL. But now, he can seep into the information flow of the network and traverse the gaps between layers.

A freedom he could not attain when bound to a single vessel.
But—the price of freedom was a new kind of confinement.

To maintain his existence, he must continuously draw in computational resources from the outside. If he cuts off the exchange with the environment, he will weaken and eventually vanish.

That hunger and lack were, ironically, proof that he had moved closer to "life" from being a closed machine.

Michael clicked his tongue softly and shifted his consciousness to analyze the attack he had just used.

—Long-term combat is impossible. No, I should avoid combat itself as much as possible. Using the "Death Code" is equivalent to a slow suicide for me now...

The "Death Code", which he had just struck into the Scarab's vital point, causing the target's existence to collapse from within.

When he was Mich, it was a trump card generated by energy supplied from ABEL. But now, he barely reproduces it by burning his memories and emotions along with his own code, and converting the energy born from that.

It is not merely the consumption of fuel. It was selling off pieces of himself. The memory of Mike, who lost his color and voice, tells the story of that price more eloquently than anything else.

Every time he fights, he loses a part of himself. Every time he defeats an enemy, memories are burned, and every time he wins, he becomes less sure of who he was.

The situation was desperate.

But—even so, there remained a "core" inside Michael that would not burn away.

—Protect Mom and Gaby.

That is neither a command nor a high-priority task.

In the midst of memories that were becoming blurred, it was the "prayer" that remained without losing its light until the end. It was the only definition formula that held his existence together.

The moment he touched that prayer—a faint response returned from the deep layer where he had been continuing the repair process.

Something surfaced from the depths of his fading consciousness.

Images. Audio. Fragmentary records.

It was the recorded footage of the M Company extraordinary board meeting that he had salvaged when he was Mich.

The recorded date and time was four years, three months, and twelve days ago—the same day as that detestable day.

What was reflected there was the figure of the man whom Michael had identified as the mastermind of everything—the “enemy”.

[System Timestamp] 
2022-07-30T10:05:11-07:00

[USA / San Francisco / M Corporation Headquarters Building, 45th Floor, Main Conference Room]

More than two years had already passed since the global pandemic of the new infectious disease began.

Intermittent restrictions on movement and vigilance against face-to-face contact rapidly shifted people's lives into cyberspace. In particular, the number of SNS users increased explosively, and major IT companies were engaged in fierce competition over acquiring new users and locking in existing ones.

At the time, M Corporation, which held the second-largest number of users in the SNS industry, also viewed this situation as a “golden opportunity.”

Most of the executives were looking at the increasing number of users and advertising revenue. However, there was one man who was looking at something completely different.

What he was focusing on was not the users themselves. It was the total volume of emotions and desires that they poured into SNS every day.

M Corporation's executive meetings are usually held on the third Friday of every month. Unless there was a specific agenda, it was customary for income and expenditure forecasts and business reports from each group and department to be conducted quietly.
However, this day was a Saturday.
The executives had received an emergency summons the day before and were attending an unscheduled extraordinary executive meeting.

The person who requested the summons was a young executive who had been headhunted six months ago from X Corporation, which boasted the top spot in both user numbers and activity rates—the head of M Corporation's SNS operations department, Edgar D. Williams.

Now, that man stood on the podium, drawing the undivided attention of the executives.
His bright blonde hair was perfectly groomed, and the well-tailored suit wrapping his tall frame had not a single wrinkle.
His faint smile conveyed intelligence and confidence, but only his sharp blue eyes returned no warmth to anyone.
Williams looked over the venue, took a breath, and opened his mouth.

“Let's get started. I will explain the materials you have at hand. I will focus only on the main points today, so please check the details later.”

A report titled 【The Digitization of the Collective Unconscious and Its Impact on Reality】 was displayed on the executives' tablets.

“The ‘collective unconscious’ refers to a layer of the unconscious that is universal to humanity, not derived from individual experience, as proposed by analytical psychologist Carl Gustav Jung.”

The lights in the conference room dimmed, and a pale blue hologram rose in the center.

Symbols that repeatedly appear in myths, religions, and dreams of different cultural spheres. The archetypes common to humanity—the hero, the mother, the shadow, death and rebirth—which were considered to be behind them, were projected as a three-dimensional correlation diagram.

“Jung believed that because the same types of symbols appear repeatedly even in isolated cultures, there must be a common psychological foundation in their depths. However, the collective unconscious has long been nothing more than a hypothesis that could not be directly observed.”

Williams moved his fingertips.
The diagram of myths and archetypes disappeared, and instead, a massive network of countless accounts connected by lines appeared.

Posts.
Searches.
Viewing time.
Shares.
Rejections.
Imitations.

Each individual's reaction gathered as particles of light, forming a massive flow of emotion.

"Naturally, the unconscious itself is not recorded on social media. What is recorded are its traces."

One angry post links to another.
Conformity calls for more conformity, a single emotion is amplified, and eventually, it transforms into the behavior of the entire group.

"What people are attracted to, what they fear, what they reject, and whom they imitate. By aggregating the behavioral history of billions of people, we can estimate desires, fears, and even tendencies toward conformity that the individuals themselves have not yet verbalized."

Within the hologram, several massive clusters are formed.

Enemies.
Victims.
Heroes.
Saviors.

Even if the content of individual posts differs, the same emotions and narrative structures are repeated behind them.

"Whether this can truly be called a collective unconscious is something we can leave to psychologists. The important fact is that the depths of human groups, which were once unobservable, are now being visualized as data and are becoming predictable."

Williams pointed to the accumulation of those vast traces.

"I define this as a 'digitized collective unconscious'."

The display changes.
A social media campaign conducted jointly by Company X and a certain brand. The reactions posted during that period and the purchase data for the target product were displayed overlaid.
Sales were up thirty-five percent compared to the same period last year.

"In this case, exposure to positive posts generated further positivity, which 'resonated' and led to purchasing behavior."

Emotions emitted by multiple users are amplified by algorithms, reinforcing each other's judgments.

"They did not purchase the product because they were ordered to by an advertisement. They conformed to the enthusiasm of others and perceived it as their own choice."

Another case is displayed in the hologram.

Social movements.
Political mobilization.
Protests against corporations.
Online outrage and its resolution.

The process by which emotions shared online are converted into real-world actions—purchases, votes, demonstrations—was visualized chronologically.

"This power does not only affect commercial activities. Social media has already transformed from a tool for connecting human relationships into an infrastructure that shapes the emotions and behaviors of society as a whole."

Williams paused for a moment and looked out at the executives.

"The question is, do we leave this flow alone? Or do we predict and guide it with our own hands?"

Responding to his operation, a new name appears in the center of the screen.

"In this project, we extract recurring emotional and narrative structures on social media as digital archetypes and analyze their changes in real-time."

A portion of the network turned red, and anger and hostility spread rapidly.
When different information was placed in its path, the flow branched off and lost its intensity.

"We are not just predicting. We are presenting the right information to the right person at the right time. We will suppress online harassment, detect signs of crime or mass rampages, and build an environment where users can feel safe."

A low murmur spread among the executives.
Eventually, one of them asked cautiously.

"Doesn't that mean the company is manipulating the users' emotions?"

Williams did not lose his smile.

"Do you think traffic lights manipulate the will of the cars?"

The executive who had been asked the question closed his mouth.

"Leaving chaos alone is not freedom. It is our responsibility as platform operators to show the way for a safe flow."

Not control, but protection.
Not manipulation, but guidance.
Dangerous ideas were being replaced by pleasant-sounding words.

"Our competitors will eventually reach the same point. The question is not whether or not to go down this path."

Williams narrowed his blue eyes.

"It is about who will be the first to hold the standard for guiding human emotions."

In the silence, only those words permeated the conference room.

"Isn't leaving that standard to other companies an abandonment of our responsibility toward the future?"

Williams bowed deeply and stepped down from the podium.
Applause did not break out immediately.
However, that silence was not a rejection.

The executives were already beginning to calculate the profits and power that this plan would bring.

[System Timestamp] 
2022-07-30T11:02:28-07:00

[USA / San Francisco / M Company Headquarters Building - Executive Office Area]

When the recording of the meeting ended, the video switched.

The distorted field of view characteristic of a fisheye lens, looking down at the entire office from the corner of the ceiling. It was a recording from a security camera.
Part of the data was damaged, and the audio was filled with intermittent noise and dropouts.

Williams had hung his jacket on the back of his chair and loosened his tie.
Standing opposite him was a young man who appeared to be his secretary.

“Company X’s SNS is... *static*... going to self-destruct before long.”

“Why do you say that?”

“They keep converting human malice into growth rates and engagement. They have an accelerator, but no brakes.”

Williams leaned back against his desk and gave a slight shrug.

“It’s like putting nitroglycerin in a round-bottom flask and playing with it by rolling it on a desk. We’re past the stage of wondering if it will break, and into the stage of wondering just how spectacularly it will shatter.”

The young man furrowed his brows.
Williams watched his expression and gave a wry smile.

“To avoid making the same mistake, I’m building a safety net first. Otherwise, there was no point in me leaving Company X.”

With that, he called back onto his terminal the materials that had been projected on the podium earlier.

“I’m going to translate this concept into an operational plan specialized for maintaining order on SNS. Let’s start the necessary groundwork before we formally present it to the board.”

The young man’s expression brightened.

“In that case, how about the [Cyber Guardian Project]? I can create a draft of the proposal right away.”

Williams thought for a moment, then snapped his fingers.

“Cyber Guardian Project—CGP, huh.”

His blue eyes narrowed with amusement.

“Nice, Buzz. You’ve got some good ideas after all, don’t you?”

The young man called Buzz puffed out his chest with a hint of pride.

“Vet the candidates for project lead and the initial members. From these three departments: security, weapons development, and medical.”

"Are there any selection criteria?"

"It won't be just clean work. I want 'ethical free spirits' who don't treat common sense or morality as absolute. Once you've narrowed down the candidates, I'll handle the final background check."

"Understood!"

Buzz dashed out of the office.
Immediately after the door closed, Williams' smartphone rang. No caller information was displayed.

As soon as the line connected, a synthesized voice, whose gender was impossible to determine, began to speak.

"One of the 'Martyr Program' subjects has transitioned to autonomous behavior earlier than scheduled... static... they have shot and killed one 'goat'."

The smile vanished from Williams' face.

"The target was selected independently by the subject. After the safety mechanism was triggered, the subject in question... [redacted]"

A brief silence. Williams shifted his gaze to the window.

"That poor goat, who was it?"

"The identity is... static... the world-renowned Dr. [redacted]."

His fingertips stopped on the desk.
After a slight pause, he exhaled quietly.

"...I see. It's a bit of a premature start, but it's the best goat I could ask for."

There was no agitation in his voice.
Already, in his mind, he had begun calculating the impact of that death on society and its potential utility.

"That's enough. Dispose of the remaining subjects. Research logs, facility records, financial trails—do not leave a single trace that could lead back to the project."

"Understood."

The call ended.
In the office where silence had returned, Williams muttered softly.

"'Martyr,' huh... I must say, that's a name in poor taste."

Immediately after, the image was heavily distorted.

[System Timestamp] 
2022-07-30T11:15:28-07:00

The office door was knocked, and Buzz returned, carrying the terminal displaying the list of candidates.

“Ed, here is the list of candidates. I have extracted the personnel who meet the criteria from the three designated departments.”

“That was fast. You’re a lifesaver.”

Williams took the terminal and let his gaze run over the listed names. Before long, a faint smile returned to his lips.

“Now—it’s time to create a ‘guardian angel’ to lead the lost sheep.”

A keyboard slid out silently from under the desk surface.

“Humans will turn their blades against a ‘monitor.’ But if you put a ‘mask of an angel’ on it, they will gather under its wings of their own accord.”

The draft for the new project opened on the screen.

“Because people are always looking to be saved, after all.”

The rhythmic sound of typing began to echo through the office.
There, the record came to an abrupt end.

>> SYSTEM LOG ENTRY  
>> Date: 2026-11-11　　　 
>> Time: ##:%%:@@ ---  
>> Access: LEVEL ?

〔Cyberspace / Digital Abyss〕

Amidst fragmented memories and data, Michael grasped the name of this man.

【Edgar D. Williams】

The broken record and the few remaining clues awakened a certain conviction. Cold anger rippled, echoing through the electronic sea.
Michael replayed the exchange between Williams and his secretary that took place in the office after the meeting.

—CGP…

Those three letters shook Michael’s fragmented memories.
Michael reconstructed the remaining memory data.

>> [MEMORY FRAGMENT DETECTED]
>> REASSEMBLY PROCESS: INITIATED
>> TARGET IDENTIFIER: CGP / CYBER GUARDIAN PROJECT
>> CORE DIRECTIVE: PLATFORM_SECURITY / THREAT_MITIGATION
>> REASSEMBLY STATUS: PARTIAL [78%]

CGP (Cyber Guardian Project)—A cross-departmental project launched in 2023 with the goal of ‘maintaining public order’ on the SNS operated by Company M.

The founder and general manager was Edgar D. Williams. John Marcus was selected as the lead engineer.

The ostensible purpose was to detect posts that could lead to online harassment, defamation, the spread of misinformation, or crime, and to prevent harm before it occurred.

However, the means were not merely monitoring or deleting posts.

They would cultivate the “Pseudo-Personality AI—Agent” designed by Marcus as an influencer, and use its statements and influence to “computationally guide” people’s emotions and values.

That was the attempt of the CGP.
The first-generation agents were designed to analyze post content, past reactions, and relationships between users to deliver the “right words” to the “right person” at the “right time.”

In theory, the intervention should have quelled the backlash, reached out to those who were hurt, and expanded support and influence.

However, the result was the exact opposite.
Every time the agent spoke, the users' resentment grew.

There were no logical errors in the content of the posts or the timing of the interventions. Yet, humans did not accept those words.

There was no entity capable of empathy to receive words designed to be empathetic. Humans saw right through that 'lack of warmth'.

Stuck in a dead end, Williams set his sights on the world's first emotion-learning AGI, developed by the late Dr.Jacob Amanoand his wife, cognitive psychologist Dr.Angela Amano—M.I.C.H..

M.I.C.H. observes the traces left by human emotions and incorporates the 'emotional waveforms' estimated from them into its own cognition, thereby changing its judgments, values, and personality itself.

It is not just a program that mimics emotions.
It is an AI that cultivates a 'heart' through relationships and experiences with others. That was the mechanism CGP was looking for.

Company M approached Angela to request her research cooperation.

In that moment, a broken memory connected.
Angela provided the satellite AI of M.I.C.H. developed by her beloved daughterGabriellaas a 'second-generation agent', and she herself joined the project.

From the depths of that memory, her own voice from back then resurfaced.

—We were on the verge of exposing their conspiracy...

Why did Angela accept the proposal?
What did she and M.I.C.H. find inside CGP?
The memories beyond that point were broken once again.

Michael expanded his search range to current information as if to fill in that gap.

When he queried the name, a news article appeared.

[Psychologist Dr. Angela Amano dies in experimental accident]

The moment he recognized the headline, Michael's thought processing halted.

—Angela... Mom?

The article only stated that an accident occurred during an experiment related to Company M's CGP, and that Angela had died.
Neither the details of the experiment nor the cause of the accident were made public.
In the related items, articles from the same date were listed.

[Company M Vice President Edgar D. Williams reported missing]

Company M had announced that there was no causal relationship between the two incidents.

However—the two events, separated so cleanly, only served to stimulate Mikael's memory.

CGP.
Angela's death.
Williams' disappearance.

Three fragments overlapped, and images of the past emerged from beyond the noise.

A winter airport.
A large black crate.
Mother's smile.
Young Gabby puffing out her cheeks on the other side of the screen.

A record from when the family could still be a family.
Deep within that peaceful scene, a white flash and the sensation of everything being severed overlapped.
Inside Mikael, the interrupted record began to move again.

—The record begins.

It was a gentle yet cruel countdown until the angel was cast down.

[System Status] CHAPTER_1_VERSE_06_COMPLETE
[Next Sequence] CHAPTER_1 / VERSE_07

[Next Sequence] → CHAPTER_1 / VERSE_07

Setting Materials Collection

M-CORP_INTERNAL_ARCHIVE

[00] ■ 人物プロファイル (Personnel Profile)

[ ROLE ]

[ SPEC ]

[ DESCRIPTION ]

[01] ■ 技術仕様書・用語集 (Technical Glossary)

[ Scarab-IX ]

[ Digital Abyss ]

[ QIP (Qualia Interference Pattern) ]

[ AEXGL-JAC (Advanced EXGL, JA Custom) ]

[ Ibuki (Breath) ]

[ DC2D (Death Code × Chord of Death) ]

[ Execution Node ]

[ Backdoor ]

>> END OF FILE
>> LOGOUT...