Neurolink System in the Modern World

"But sister Alice will be more in danger if we wait." She protested.

"Like I said, we lack information. Moving blindly would just attract unwanted attention. They got Alice, right? So for all you know, you\'re their next target because you\'re not being careful," I reprimanded her. I feel like this girl would cause trouble if I don\'t remind her to stay low-key all the time.

"But..."

I cut off her words. "You said you will follow my orders, right? Besides, I could feel that Alice is safe," I reassured her.

"You have a way to tell?" She exclaimed after misunderstanding my words.

"Of course," I nodded and acted confident. I\'m pretty sure that the system would give me a failed mission notification if something bad happened to her already. So, seeing that a mission was still available, there was a high chance that she was still alive.

The issue here was how I should proceed. If I\'m going to save Alice, it would be much better to rescue my mother along the way if they were being held in the same place. But right now, I don\'t think my power was enough to take on this mission.

I might be able to cause some serious damage, but what would happen when I exhausted my Mind Power? So, the first thing I needed to do was to farm some skill points again and power up. I also needed someone who could cover me while I\'m regenerating my Mind Power.

"Hey, you said that there were six of you, right?" I asked her.

"Yep."

"Then could you contact the other 4?"

She mused for a moment, thinking about my question.

"I could contact the other 2. But I don\'t know if they will be willing to help," she sighed.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I tried asking them already, but they told me to forget about Sister Alice and just live my life."

"Ohhh" I touched my chin in contemplation after hearing her words.

"They\'re heartless, right?" she started venting.

"Nope, they\'re actually pretty smart," I chuckled, thinking that those two were not idiots like her.

"OPPA, you always bully me!"

I shifted the conversation right away, seeing that she would again start acting like a spoiled brat. "What about the other two?"

"I can\'t contact them," she replied with a sad look after seeing that I\'m not willing to engage on a banter with her.

"Alright, forget about the missing ones. Get the other two and tell them that I needed their help. Here is my dummy number, contact me after you convinced them."

"Okay, OPPA," she nodded.

"By the way, how did you figure out that I was controlling the crow before?" I asked her. This was one of my weaknesses that I needed to figure out. I wanted to know why and how, so I could think of a way to at least hide this glaring weakness.

"Oh, intent. I could tell that the crow has intent," she answered while putting her finger to her lips.

"Intent?" I asked.

"Aunty taught us how to detect it. So how it works is like intuition. We can tell if someone is watching us. In your case, OPPA, you don\'t even try to hide it," she giggled.

"Do you know how to hide this Intent thing ?" I pressed her further .

"I remember Aunty telling us that to hide intent, a person needs to remove any malice from his thoughts first. To be honest, your intent was too strong that I felt like you were planning to kill me back then," she explained.

"I was planning to kill you," I admitted.

"OPPA? You were really trying to kill me?" She exclaimed after hearing my words.

"Don\'t mind the past, and just focus on the future," I immediately shifted the conversation.

She pouted her cheeks, but I refused to deal with her tantrums and gave her a cold look to put her in her place.

Finally, she gave up and started conversing with me normally. She would add some little childish remarks from time to time, but it wasn\'t too overbearing, so I just gave her a pass.

I got the general idea after hearing her explanation about "Intent".

As for the key, she couldn\'t tell me much due to the oath, but from some of her words, it seemed the door was like a seal. Once opened, it would lead to a big power-up beyond my current abilities. I recalled the system reward "Neurolink Overload," so it must be related to that skill.

After talking extensively with Rei Mei about things I should know, I inquired about her driver, whom she considered trustworthy.

To add an extra layer of security, I spoke to him directly. Using my Suggestion ability, I subtly influenced his mind without alerting her.

It seemed she could only detect my suggestion when it was explicitly aimed at her, as she showed no reaction when I controlled her driver. I put her words into consideration regarding Intent and programmed her driver in a way that would make him clueless about being controlled.

This tactical move allowed me to place an undercover informant, someone who could discreetly keep an eye on Rei Mei without her knowledge.

With all my questions somewhat answered, I ended the meeting. It would be safer for me not to interact with her too much while I finished my preparations.

***

On the backseat of the car, I saw the city of Seoul on the horizon, closing in.

The lights were amazing to look at, unlike the darkness of the outskirts. It was beautiful and peaceful, and I yearned for a life of peace in this city.

However, not all dreams could come true, and no matter how much I tried to hide, it seemed that chaos and problems would come to me regardless.

Realizing that my original plan needed some adjustment, I picked up my phone to contact someone. I needed more power fast, so I had to be bolder with my actions.

"Hello, this is Zyden. I want you to look up something for me."