Chapter 127: Today (3)

The twenty-second cycle.

Orff approached Everly and Misha once again.

This time, he was just a little bit smarter than before. Before setting out, he carefully recalled his impressions of Everly:

She seemed to come from a well-off family, didn’t lack money, and probably didn’t care much about his hacking skills. Her personality matched what the other boys had said—somewhat cold and hard to approach—but she wasn’t a bad person. She was very serious in everything she did and studied diligently…

Beyond that, he noticed something else: Everly and her friend Misha both seemed a little superstitious.

…Well, maybe “superstitious” wasn’t quite right—after all, they’d already encountered a time loop, so it did feel like some supernatural forces really existed in this world.

In any case, in the previous cycle, he had noticed that Everly wore a crystal necklace around her neck, an exotic-looking animal tooth bracelet on her left wrist, and a cross bracelet on her right. Misha was similar, wearing accessories that looked old-fashioned, out of place for her age, but full of religious symbolism.

Were they believers? Not exactly—it seemed more likely that they had a special interest in the mystical.

If that was the case… maybe…

Remembering the words his grandmother had left before her death, along with the family poem passed down for generations, Orff decided to give it a try.

The result was beyond his expectations: facing a girl who disdained both money and technology, the moment he mentioned the Fountain of Youth, her attitude changed dramatically.

“If you really can give me clues about the Fountain of Youth, then of course I will help you,” she said, patting him meaningfully on the shoulder. “You’re not lying to me, are you?”

Even though the girl in front of him was smiling, Orff felt a chill run down his spine for some reason.

“Y-yes! I’m telling the truth—I’m not lying to you.”

He immediately raised his hand and swore an oath. Excited and terrified, his thin body trembled uncontrollably.

After accepting Orff’s request, Everly asked him whether his goal was to uncover all the people trying to kill him or simply to break free from the loop and reach the next day.

“If you just want to survive until 24:00, that’s easy. Stick with me, and I can guarantee nothing will happen to you before then.”

Orff didn’t hesitate to choose the former.

“Even if they don’t succeed in killing me today, whoever wants to will keep trying tomorrow. I only have one life—if I’m unlucky even one day, I die. So please, help me find the real culprit and put an end to this once and for all.”

Everly nodded, thinking that the boy wasn’t completely foolish after all.

Considering the potential danger, taking on this task was primarily to satisfy her own curiosity and sense of justice. Before starting the investigation, Everly checked with Misha to see what she wanted.

If Misha didn’t want to face danger, she could leave early. If she chose to join, Everly would offer a generous reward for her assistance.

“Oh, Everly, you don’t need to pay me. You’ve helped me so much already—I just want to help you in return as best I can,” Misha said, hugging her friend closely, firmly deciding to stay.

So the three of them temporarily set aside all other matters, climbed into Everly’s Grand Cherokee, and began sorting through all the clues they had so far.

“First, let’s confirm—are there any listening or surveillance devices on your body?” Everly asked.

Orff shook his head quickly. “I’ve died so many times, I’ve checked already. Nothing like that. I only have my phone—no other electronics. And my phone’s fine—I’m a hacker, so I can tell these things.”

Everly nodded, thinking that this guy really wasn’t completely dumb.

“Do you know why you keep trapped in this loop, repeating over and over? Like, is it because of some special bloodline, or did you get hold of an object with strange powers or something?”

Orff shook his head again. “I don’t know… Until today, I was just an ordinary person. I haven’t gotten anything strange. I haven’t even left campus in the past month.”

“…” Alright, that question isn’t urgent. They can set it aside for now and focus on breaking the loop first.

Everly went straight to the point: “Let’s start with a conclusion—your dorm neighbor, Ronald, is very suspicious.”

“What? Ronald? No way! He has an alibi for several of my deaths. Like the time I was killed by a flowerpot.” Orff blinked, his face displaying that uniquely naïve, sheltered look typical of an American college student.

Everly sighed. Orff could be sharp in some areas, yet so slow in others!

“Then why do you think you just happened to be in exactly that spot under the classroom building when the flowerpot hit you? Isn’t it possible he lured you there after he had already left?”

“Maybe… it was an accident?”

Everly didn’t buy it. In a tightly-paced movie, no shot is wasted. Someone like Ronald, who had spoken to the protagonist more than once, could hardly be just a passerby.

She was ninety percent sure that guy was one of the killers. Considering that the dorm’s communal bathroom was generally only used by male students, she suspected Ronald was also the one who pushed Orff during the first and second cycles.

“Have you realized yet that the people trying to kill you aren’t just one person—they’re a group?” she asked.

“A-a… a group?!”

Alright, it seemed Orff really hadn’t realized… Everly began to wonder how the movie’s happy ending was actually achieved, because Orff didn’t look smart enough to find all the killers within a limited number of loops.

“You call yourself a top-notch hacker, right? Instead of arguing with me here, why not hack into your friend’s phone or computer and see if he’s been in contact with anyone suspicious lately?”

“You must be mistaken. Ronald is my good buddy—he wouldn’t do something like that to me…” Orff protested verbally, but his body was honest enough to take the laptop Everly handed him.

Although he usually seemed slow and dim-witted, sitting in front of a computer transformed Orff entirely.

In the world of zeros and ones, he was no longer timid and clumsy; he became a ruler over everything at will, radiating confidence like an emperor presiding over his empire.

Ronald’s laptop wasn’t powered on and wasn’t connected to the internet, so Orff couldn’t hack it—for now. He decided to use the campus Wi-Fi as a gateway to access Ronald’s phone.

As Ronald’s friend, Orff knew the account credentials he used for Wi-Fi. In this case, stealing information from Ronald’s phone was as easy as tearing open a bag of chips.

Unexpectedly, though Ronald seemed careless and rough around the edges, he had a habit of regularly clearing his browsing history. From browser history to background cache, everything was wiped clean. Orff searched for a long time, but found nothing.

But by coincidence, just as Orff was hacking, the completely unaware Ronald suddenly opened Zhuite (a social app) and logged into a small alternate account even Orff didn’t know about.

He privately messaged an account named A.

[The target has gotten into a car with the two girls and has not exited yet. Possibility of leaving campus cannot be ruled out.]

[A: If they leave, I will notify the ‘Butcher’ and the ‘Nest Guardian’ to coordinate and take over the subsequent work. Continue monitoring. Today’s execution must succeed.]

[Understood.]

Everly and Misha finished reading the chat log and simultaneously looked at Orff.

Orff buried his face in his hands, blushing red.

“Damn it! How could Ronald do this to me? I always considered him a good buddy. Every time I made money, I’d buy him pizza! He likes Yuni from the cheerleading squad, and I even helped him find out her interests… Ugh, this is infuriating!”

Misha stifled a laugh and patted his shoulder, enjoying the spectacle. “Stop mumbling and find out who this A is.”

Orff sniffled and nodded pitifully.

Compared to Ronald, A was far more cunning. It was also a small alternate account, registered with entirely false information, logged in through a virtual IP, and immediately erased all network traces and logged out once the chat ended. The gateway computer was also shut down, leaving Orff temporarily powerless.

“Unless A logs in again, I won’t be able to get any more information,” he said, clearly frustrated.

“Then let’s think about it another way. Have you done anything recently that could make people hate you or earn enemies?”

If someone was being targeted, there had to be a reason. A group going to such lengths to eliminate Orff today suggested that indiscriminate killing was unlikely. Everly suspected that Orff must have done something to provoke them.

Orff paused, then shook his head honestly. “No, usually I just attend classes or play on the computer. Occasionally I eat with Ronald and the others, but I rarely get into conflicts with anyone.”

“Online?”

“Uh…” At the mention of the internet, Orff first looked puzzled, then surprised, and then gradually realized something. “Could it… could it be…”

“You figured it out, didn’t you? Tell us—what did you do?”

“…”

Orff hesitated for a long time, but under the pressure of his survival instinct, he finally admitted the truth.

As mentioned before, Orff was a hacker.

He was self-taught and unconventional, having been fascinated by computers since childhood. Gifted and determined, he learned on his own while reading books. Naturally, he became a hacker.

As a tech-savvy person, he, like other hackers, had a certain overconfidence in his skills. He also enjoyed proving himself by breaking into difficult systems, seeking the thrill of technical challenges.

Not long ago, while exploring the internet, Orff stumbled upon a dark web URL. Curious, he clicked on it—and discovered it led to a snuff livestream site.

“When I entered, the bloody livestream had only just started.”

Even now, just recalling what he had seen made Orff shudder.

The background of the livestream appeared to be a small wooden cabin. At the center of the screen stood a muscular man wearing a black hood. In front of him was a young girl tied up, and he was using a fruit-peeling knife to slice at her thigh.

He had immense strength; each strike removed a large piece of flesh. The girl’s once-plump thigh soon caved in, blood gushing relentlessly, her screams of pain so piercing and horrific that it was almost unbearable to listen.

Yet the hundreds of anonymous viewers watching the livestream did not react with horror, nor did a single person intervene.

In this hidden corner of the internet—outside the reach of normal society, law, and morality—people shed their polished façades and revealed their cruel, brutal, savage, and twisted sides.

If the snuff livestream site was a cesspit, then the viewers watching the entire broadcast were the flies drawn to its stench—parasites of society, lice crawling atop civilization, morally corrupt and vile. Any derogatory term could hardly exaggerate their depravity.

Stirred by the girl’s suffering, the comment section on the left of the livestream scrolled rapidly: some cheered, some urged the man on, and one even offered a bounty of 5 Bitcoins (about 1,600 USD at the time), giving the muscular man a gruesome order:

[This little piglet is squealing too loudly—it’s hurting my ears. I want you, the Butcher, to cut out its tongue.]

As soon as the comment appeared, the message feed exploded again. Many jumped to curse the commenter, claiming the request was ruining the fun: “If the sweetie stops screaming, what am I supposed to listen to?” “The wails of prey in its final moments are the most beautiful symphony—such a waste to ignore it!” Similar messages scrolled endlessly.

But to the muscular man, everything else was irrelevant; all he cared about was the money.

“Thank you for your order. As you wish,” he muttered in a hoarse voice. He turned and grabbed a blood-stained pair of scissors from a wooden wall covered in various t*rture implements.

Just as the livestream audience held their breath, anticipating a shower of blood, “pop”—the screen went black.

The website had crashed.

——————————————————————————

Author’s Note:

At that time, Bitcoin had dropped significantly; at the end of the year, 1 bitcoin ≈ $320.

Regarding the hacker details, I’ve tried to stay accurate—hopefully no glaring mistakes.