Chapter 3

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In a dilapidated society, the only crime is getting caught

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In a dilapidated society, the only crime is getting caught.

This pod right here, in my hands, is a personal property of the Bureau. If they catch me, I'm gonna be so fucked up. I don't really cuss that much but terrible times call for it, and getting captured is one of the most terrible thing that can happen to anyone. I can't bear to imagine how atrocious the punishment would be. Death might pay me an early visit once the Bureau discovers about this. Though, I'm certain that it won't happen if death visits them first.

Stealing the pod is a piece of cake, I tell you. Replacing it with a decoy is much more difficult. Success rate is uncertain, but I guess months of brainstorming and planning have been paid off.

Glass and some scraps of alloys and screws are the basic starter pack to replicate a pod. Lucky for me, searching for these things are barely a burden. If I am in need of mechanical parts, only one place in this city is my go-to spot. At the edge of Scarville, there's this sector called Scrapyard where mountains of trash and junks reside. In that area, the abundance of useful rubbishes are overwhelming. No one believes that there can be some good supplies buried in there. Well, I've got what I need from there so it's definitely proven to be beneficial.

And oh man, it actually did work!

The pod doesn't have any security lock system to secure it from unwanted users so I got in without breaking a sweat. It might have been left unlocked but most of the files are not. It requires time for me to breach its system, a lot of time. Unfortunately, I don't have the luxury of it so all I can do is fiddle around. In order to make this work, I'll be needing more bottles of patience. I can only hope that I'm not looking for something that doesn't exist anymore.

"Come on, man. Where could it be?" I mutter to myself. I've been swiping through the stuff in this pod for an hour or so but still haven't seen it. I know it's here, it must be hidden somewhere.

"You gotta be here somewhere..." my fingers have been moving restlessly in an attempt to consume lesser time. Swipe here, swipe there, swipe, swipe twice. Thrice. Again and again until...

"Gotcha!"

I finally found it. The detailed map of the entire Paragon.

With a single tap on the pod, a light has been projected in the air, displaying a 3D holographic model of the map. My eyes are dumbfounded with what I’m seeing right now. Technologies inside the Paragon are always superb.

"Now, where shall we start?" I mumble as I bring my hands together and eventually moving it away to zoom in on a better view of Scarville. I wince at how awful it is to look at. Perhaps 'pitiful' is just the appropriate word to describe it.

Paragon is built to ameliorate perfection in humanity, that's what the Bureau tells their people. Every city corresponds to a different stage in the process of reaching the 'perfection' they desire, and at the edge of it dwells the city of Scarville. Smallest circle and definitely the poorest one.

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