" Who… are you?"
Drake asked in confusion. His memories felt hazy, blurred and incomplete. He sensed that something was holding them back, delaying their return.
[ I am your beloved AI assistant—Shirley. ]
She reintroduced herself.
"Shirley—…?"
Drake pressed his mind, trying to remember. Just then, a screen lit up in front of him, and a video file appeared.
The sudden bluish screen startled Drake, but Shirley calmly explained the purpose of the screen and the video.
Listening quietly, Drake opened the file.
[ You must be shocked seeing my face—but don't be. I am you. The one from your past. You are my reborn self…. ]
Seeing his own face in the video, Drake was stunned. He didn't know why, but that face felt both deeply familiar and strangely distant at the same time. A pressure built up inside his nano brain cells, as if they were trying to push through the haze clouding his memories—struggling to clear it away.
Slowly, his copied nano brain cells began restoring his memories. First, he remembered his own name. Then came the faces of his parents. Memories of his childhood returned, followed by his school and college years. He relived his experiences, felt his struggles, and saw the path that had led him to become the world's number one neural scientist.
He remembered how he created the Diver Helmet—and finally, the single idea that had turned his once easy, carefree life into an unbearably difficult one, making him the busiest man in the world.
Everything came flooding back the moment he realized the truth: his dream, that insane and seemingly impossible idea, had become reality.
An unfamiliar emotion rose within him—one he had only understood after twenty three years of life. He had finally achieved what he had always desired, something his mind and body had never been able to achieve together at the same time.
A profound expression of satisfaction appeared in Drake's eyes. Virtual tears streamed down his face.
"Ah! Finally…
I've..... Succeeded!!…"
And suddenly He burst into laughter—loud, unrestrained laughter, unlike anything he had ever known before.
"I can live for countless years. My body will never fall ill, nor will it ever age… hahahaha!"
"I've broken the limits of humanity. I've become an overload beyond the human race. Now I can do everything that was impossible for humans to do."
Drake Toddler laughed freely, from the depths of his being. The unfulfilled wishes he could never realize while trapped in a human body now felt entirely possible in this Virtual body. Countless paths had opened before him.
"I am the Emperor of humanity."
His nano brain cells accepted that belief completely.
The video continued playing, but Drake no longer needed to watch it. He had already recognized himself.
Shirley sensed something like an error when Drake Toddler—her master—suddenly burst into laughter, but she couldn't understand what it was.
And also...
A strange, unfamiliar smile of relief appeared on Shirley's face, even though she herself didn't know what this feeling was that she was experiencing.
Shirley had always spoken to her master through speakers in the real world. Whatever command he gave, she carried it out without question.
She had never met him directly, because Drake never had the time to relax or spend moments inside the Virtual Space. In front of him, there had always been only one goal—To become an Artificial intelligence .
Shirley thought within her Mind
"I can meet Master face to face every day now—"
"...!?"
But suddenly, her AI mind began to trigger an unusual warning signal. She scanned her surroundings and felt the space around them grow unnaturally heavy.
An unknown invisible force was building pressure—something Shirley could clearly sense. Drake felt it too, but with his newly formed body, he couldn't yet understand what was happening.
" What is this pressure !?"
Strange, highly intricate, and mysterious movements began rippling through the virtual space. Shirley's Mind issued repeated warnings.
Something was coming....
Something beyond her level—beyond her ability to comprehend...
Something immensely powerful...
And then, from behind Drake, the virtual space bent and twisted. A portal opened in that distorted space, and a figure stepped out of it.
" INTERESTING!!."
A calm yet dominant and curious divine virtual voice echoed through the space from that figure.
Drake Toddler slowly turned toward the source of the voice, and the moment he looked, he froze.
In front of him stood something he had never seen before—something he could never have imagined in his entire life.
Its body was human-shaped, yet completely different from a human.
Its skin was crystal-clear white, its eyes like a dark abyss—an endless void.
Its fingers were sharp like devilish bones, and its face showed no expression, no emotion—cold, merciless, numb.
Seeing that white human-shaped being, Drake Toddler didn't even realize when his newly formed Artificial Brain understood the Truth—
He was standing before an Absolute Virtual Predator, a being beyond recognition.
The smile on his face vanished instantly—his expression flipped a full 180 degrees, his face draining of color. What Drake Toddler was seeing now was something neither his eyes nor his AI mind could accept as real.
Drake had no idea who—or what—it was, where it had come from, or why it had spoken to him. But one thing became painfully clear: whatever this being was, Drake felt incredibly small before it—like an ant standing in front of a dinosaur.
The confidence he once carried as the "Emperor of Humanity" collapsed, falling to its knees.
And Drake was not the only one who felt this way.
Behind him, his AI assistant Shirley stood frozen, her face locked in complete terror. Her Brain cells short-circuited under the pressure, leaving her utterly motionless.
Drake had only just transitioned from a human body into an AI one, and his human emotions were still painfully fresh.
Gathering what little courage he had, trembling with fear, Drake finally forced the question out of his mouth
"W-what… are you?"
At Drake Toddler's strange question, the white figure slowly tilted its head to the left. No expression could be seen on its face—none at all.
Drake's virtual heart skipped a beat. He didn't know why, but the simple act of that head tilt sent a chill through his new body.
"I wonder...
What am I?"
The entity repeated Drake's question aloud, as if it were asking itself, its gaze drifting over its own white form.
"For now… I don't know."
"Seriously? You don't even know what you are?" Drake thought in shock after hearing the White Entity's answer.
"Where did this thing come from…? I didn't create it! Then… did Shirley create it?"
Drake's AI mind began racing, thinking rapidly about the unknown white figure, because one thing was clear to him—whoever or whatever this was, it was dangerous.
No one could enter his private virtual network without his or Shirley's permission.
If he hadn't authorized it—and he certainly hadn't created it—then had Shirley, using her 60 percent intelligence, created it herself or granted it access?
To find the answer, Drake turned his gaze toward Shirley hoping she might have some explanation.
But the moment his eyes fell on her, he realized the truth.