Chapter 4

“Who turned off the oxygen supply valve?”

When Joshua’s voice sounded from the third basement floor, I was trying to brute-force level three permissions.

In the surveillance footage, my physical body was lying in Laboratory Capsule No. 7.

My face was pale and many tubes were sticking out of my body, with a slight rising and falling of my chest.

Wanda stood by the capsule with a shot of new medication in her hands.

She wasn’t pretending to be weak or vulnerable today. She looked down at my body with excitement in her eyes.

“Tiffany, did you know that William said that your brain activity is a world-class sample?

“If your consciousness schema were to be transferred to my project, I’ll be Garcia Tech’s next generation ambassador.”

Her new project was called Wanda AI.

My brain waves made up the core emotional schema, while her face was the commercial packaging.

Joshua rushed forward to stop her.

“Ms. Scott, that’s a living human being we’re talking about!”

Wanda slapped him hard.

“How could you call a person who can’t even open her eyes a living human being?”

Someone opened the door.

William walked in.

Joshua looked as though he had seen his savior.

“Mr. Garcia, she switched out the life-support fluid! Mrs. Garcia will die!”

Wanda’s eyes turned red at once.

“I didn’t, William. I just wanted to help you.”

Joshua said in a trembling voice, “Mr. Garcia, clearing out the emotional schema and access to the oxygen supply valve requires master permissions.

“Ms. Scott is using the sub-account you opened for her!”

The look on William’s face changed, and he looked at me in the laboratory capsule.

He didn’t immediately call for a doctor nor restore the oxygen supply.

He simply stood there in silence.

At that moment, I finally saw for myself his filthiest side.

It wasn’t that he didn’t know that I would die, but he was calculating.

Saving me meant confirming his crime of conducting illegal experiments.

Meanwhile, not saving me meant inheriting my shares, taking my algorithm, and continuing his facade of a devoted husband.

But he couldn’t let me die completely, as the moment my brain wave activity stopped, the Late Wife Companion System would collapse.

He needed me to provide him a response, but he didn’t want me to testify against him.

Wanda grabbed his hand.

“William, once Tiffany wakes up, we’re doomed.”

William shut his eyes.

When he opened them once more, he walked to my capsule and put his hand on my face through the glass.

“Tiffany.”

His voice was so soft, like a lover whispering sweet nothings.

“Why must you wake up? Can’t you just remain in the system?

“I’ll talk to you every day.”

I was controlling the sound system in the laboratory, my voice coming through choppy.

“William Garcia…

“You’re despicable.”

His face paled, and Wanda shrieked.

“She’s still conscious! Switch it off, quick!”

The vital signs monitor started beeping.

My heart rate and blood oxygen level were dropping, and the ten-minute countdown started.

At the same time, new commands were popping up in the virtual system.

[Starting to clear out emotional schema.]

[Clearing out anger.]

[Clearing out resistance.]

[Clearing out the will to live.]

The oxygen supply was getting cut off from my body, and my anger was getting cleared out by the system.

Wanda, who was still wearing the wedding gown, was slowly putting on my name.

William was standing before the capsule, his eyes turning red.

Wanda shook him and said through her sobs, “William, you can’t back down from this. She’ll hate you for life if she wakes up!”

William swallowed past his constricted throat.

“She hates me already.”

Wanda was stunned.

William suddenly laughed bitterly.

“Despite that, she is still my Tiffany.”

He reached a hand out to hit the restore button.

Wanda shoved him aside.

“She isn’t yours!

“She always had the upper hand over you while she was alive, and now, she wants to ruin you even while dead. I’m the one who truly loves you!”

She yanked out the oxygen supply valve hard, and the blaring siren pierced their eardrums.

Joshua screamed, “Mr. Garcia!”

The three-minute countdown timer started.

In the virtual world, my emotional schema had been 70% cleared out.

The pain, hatred, and indignation I felt were stripped away inch by inch, right from the marrow of my bones.

William threw himself onto the control panel.

“Restore the oxygen supply, quick!”

Joshua cried out loud, “Ms. Scott blocked our access to permissions!”

Wanda collapsed on the ground, laughing herself to tears.

“Good that she’s dead.

“It’ll be all clean once she’s dead.”

The countdown timer was in the final ten seconds.

I saw the secret key appearing in the dark.

It was the last thing I had written in my wedding vows.

William had once said that I was surprisingly romantic for a programmer, but he didn’t know that it wasn’t a line from my vows—it was a backdoor program.

[Launch Begonia Protocol?]

I clicked on the confirm button.

Before the screen went dark, I said one last thing.

“William, your good wife is dead.”

At the next second, the vital signs on the screen in Garcia Tech zeroed out, and William’s voice rang through the darkness.

“Tiffany!”