Personalized dicine, brain-machine interfaces, advanced biotechnology, quantum computing...
"...blah, blah," Blake muttered under his breath, scrolling past yet another article filled with difficult words.
None of it stuck.
Or rather, none of it felt like sothing he could actually use.
It wasn’t that the topics weren’t impressive, they were. If anything, that was the problem. Every single one of them required a level of understanding he simply didn’t have. Years of study, experience and context.
Things he couldn’t just fake overnight.
"...What am I even supposed to do with this? Creativity my ass," he mumbled, rubbing his eyes as the screen’s brightness decreased.
He clicked on another link anyway.
And then another.
And another.
Hours passed like that.
Each ti, it was the sa cycle: read a bit, understand half of it at best, then realize there was no way he could turn it into sothing original or understandable.
At so point, he even tried taking notes, but that lasted all of ten minutes.
The notebook in front of him remained mostly empty, save for a few scattered words that didn’t connect into anything coherent.
Blake leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling again.
"...This is pointless."
But he didn’t stop or, at least, not imdiately, because he kept going, scrolling, seading.
He was trying his hardest.
Even as his thoughts grew slower and his focus started slipping, he forced himself to keep looking. There had to be sothing. So angle he could take. So topic that didn’t require him to lose too much ti.
But every path led back to the sa wall.
By the ti the clock ticked past midnight, frustration had long since turned into sothing duller.
’Ah, what the hell man, what I said earlier was bullshit, I can’t find an appealing topic that I can turn around...’
Tiredly, he still pushed forward.
At so point, he didn’t even realize he had stopped properly reading the articles. His eyes moved across the screen, but nothing registered.
"...Right," he said quietly, finally setting the phone down.
Silence filled the room.
For a mont, he just sat there, unmoving, letting everything settle.
And then, slowly, he exhaled.
"...I’m not doing this."
The decision ca out simple.
Why was he even trying to force himself into sothing that clearly wasn’t his?
That wasn’t just risky, it was downright stupid.
If anything, it would make him stand out in the worst way possible.
Blake ran a hand through his hair, leaning forward slightly.
"...Think."
His gaze drifted back to the screen, unfocused at first.
And then, he sat composed again.
"...AL-TECH."
He blinked.
The na sat there in his mind for a mont before sothing clicked.
The motto.
It had been ntioned multiple tis in the things he read earlier.
Always improve it, no matter what.
Blake frowned slightly, repeating it in his head.
"...Always improve it."
It wasn’t just about invention, it wasn’t just about creating sothing new.
Improvent.
Iteration.
Refinent.
"...So it doesn’t have to be completely new," he murmured.
That changed things a lot.
His thoughts began to shift, moving away from abstract, complicated fields and toward sothing... more grounded.
Sothing real.
Sothing he could actually work with.
"...Asher."
The na ca out quietly.
Trail-X.
Alfred’s student.
If AL-TECH valued improvent, then analyzing sothing existing, sothing relevant should still fit within that idea.
And Trail-X was more than relevant.
He was practically the center of attention.
"...And no one’s really digging into it yet," Blake added, sitting up a little straighter.
Sure, people admired him, talked about him, speculated here and there.
But nothing detailed, nothing structured yet, nothing that actually tried to break things down.
Especially not in a way that connected him to anything deeper.
Blake’s eyes narrowed slightly.
"...So why not?"
It didn’t have to be purely scientific, he knew that wasn’t the point.
And Trail-X was, without a doubt, part of that.
It sounded a little ridiculous, conducting and handing in a research about a super hero. But he was a living, breathing phenonon that people still didn’t fully understand.
The more he thought about it, the more it made sense.
"...Yeah."
A small spark of focus returned.
He didn’t need to invent anything, he just needed to analyze.
"...I already know everything about his identity, anyway."
That part almost made him laugh.
Out of everyone who could possibly attempt sothing like this, he was probably the only one with access to the full picture.
Well.
Almost full! If it weren’t for the fact he was lazy in his past life.
Blake reached for his phone again.
"If I make it too accurate, it’ll look suspicious," he muttered. "So... just enough."
Enough truth to make it convincing, to build a steady balance. That was all he needed.
He started searching.
Videos, clips, interviews.
Anything that showed Trail-X in action.
Hours passed again, but this ti it felt different, since he wasn’t aimlessly scrolling anymore.
He was looking, pausing, rewatching and, most importantly, carefully mixing informations.
"...That jump again," he murmured, replaying a clip for the third ti.
There were details people overlooked.
Small things.
The way he landed.
The angle of his movents.
The consistency.
Blake leaned closer to the screen.
"...Yeah, my action mangas did turn out to be at least useful."
He jotted sothing down.
Then another.
Occasionally, fragnts of mory surfaced, brief clips of things he had seen before, that he had glanced at without much thought.
The genre was sci-fi, anyway, so he also had a limited set of choices.
Ti seed to have stopped again.
At so point, the sky outside began to lighten, but Blake didn’t notice, he was too focused, too absorbed in piecing everything together.
By the ti he finally leaned back, exhaustion hit him all at once.
"...Done," he muttered.
The result wasn’t perfect.
Far from it.
The structure was... questionable.
So parts felt more like observations than actual research.
Others leaned into speculation more than he would’ve liked.
But overall...
"...It’s not bad."
For sothing thrown together overnight, it was more than he expected.
And more importantly, it definitely stood out.
Blake stared at the docunt for a mont longer before finally sending it.
"...Guess that’s it."
There was nothing else he could do now.
So he let himself rest.
***
Three days passed.
Blake tried not to think about it.
Tried being the key word.
Every now and then, the thought would creep back in.
Was it too obvious?
Too strange?
Not good enough?
He checked his email more tis than he wanted to admit.
And then, there it was.
Blake stared at the notification for a second before opening it.
"...No way."
His eyes scanned the ssage quickly. His expression shifting to one full of anxiety.
"...It worked!"
For a brief mont, he just sat there, letting it sink in.
Then he exhaled, a faint sense of relief settling in.
"Alright..."
There was no backing out now.
Blake got up, already thinking ahead.
If he was going to walk into that place, he needed to look like he belonged there, at least just a little.
Besides, this was his debut as a thief, so at least if he fails, he’ll still look pretty while arrested.
He took his ti getting ready, making sure everything looked right.
Even if he tried to keep it light, there was truly no room for mistakes or unnecessary attention.
Myles didn’t know about any of this.
Blake had considered telling him but, in the end, he decided against it.
"...Too risky," he muttered.
Even if Myles found out later, it didn’t matter.
Right now, involving him would only complicate things.
Especially considering he’s the villain.
And if sothing went wrong...
"If that missing piece beca an issue..."
Blake’s expression hardened slightly.
"...No."
AL-TECH announcing sothing like that publicly would only cause chaos.
They wouldn’t do that.
Which ant the situation would stay contained.
Taking one last look at himself, Blake grabbed his things and headed out.
***
The SSRT tower stood tall in front of him, just as imposing as he saw on his phone.
Maybe even more so.
Blake paused for a brief mont, looking up at it.
"...Here we go."
Then he stepped forward.
The entrance was exactly what you’d expect: clean, modern, guarded without being overly obvious.
As he walked in, he could already feel it.
That subtle shift in atmosphere.
Like stepping into a place where everything was being observed, even if you couldn’t see it.
"Welco."
The voice pulled him out of his thoughts.
Blake turned slightly, offering a polite nod as one of the staff approached.
He returned the greeting, keeping his expression calm.
’Um. Let’s hope the staff won’t be around.’
He was just another visitor, nothing more, after all. "...Yeah," he thought quietly.
This wasn’t just a visit.
Not for him.
As the staff began guiding him further inside, Blake followed without hesitation.
The doors closed behind them with a soft sound.
And just like that, he was in.
’...This is going to be a labyrinth ga.’
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