Chapter 4: Mutation

This world has only just reached the year 2007, and the progress of the internet is undoubtedly far behind the world Sun Cheng lived in before he transmigrated.

To say nothing of anything else, although the United States telecommunications providers here have launched 100Mbps internet packages, there are very few users, and most are research institutions and corporate entities like the 【Advanced Computer Technology Research Center】.

In this year of 2007, the average internet speed for ordinary internet users in the United States has not even broken 2M; the "Information Superhighway" strategy proposed by former President Clinton over a decade ago is clearly no longer valued by his successors.

If it were a high-level Decepticon, such as the leader of the 【Cassette Corps】 to which 'Frenzy' belongs—Soundwave—he would have no need to care about these things.

As far as 'Frenzy' knows, as the intelligence master of the Decepticons, Soundwave can even transform into a spy satellite in outer space, instantly invading, monitoring, and even destroying the Earth's internet by capturing electromagnetic waves and various communication signals.

But Sun Cheng cannot do that; he is, after all, only a lowest-level Decepticon spy, still unable to break through the constraints of basic physics, which is why he needs a relatively high-quality port like the 【Advanced Computer Technology Research Center】.

"Information channel link successful... activating temporary port Enhancement... authorized to use secondary storage area... security protection function activated... filtering function activated... adding key search terms 'alien, robot, mysterious characters, unknown patterns, extraterrestrial civilization'... invasion function fully activated... target: World Wide Web..."

Sets of commands were rapidly issued from the 【Spy Template】, and because of this, Sun Cheng once again discovered the terror of the Decepticon mechanical lifeform.

With the 【Core】 at full power, he did not even need to perform any further interference; the work of invading the internet was already proceeding in an orderly manner, to the point that Sun Cheng was, for a moment, at a loss as to what he should do.

"The truth hidden by the White House, revealing the unknown Area 51!"

"NASA discovers Earth-like planet 174 light-years away, could intelligent life exist?"

"UFO appears over Houston, who is peeking at our aerospace Base?"

"The unknown ghost of Tucson, multiple people saw a suspected F22 fighter circling over the 'Graveyard' late at night!"

Following the two arms connected to the computer's fiber optic interface, countless filtered pieces of information searched from the internet were being downloaded at a terrifying speed into the storage area located in Sun Cheng's Brain.

1M, 10M, 1G, 10G...

Even though he had set keywords for search filtering, in just over ten minutes, Sun Cheng's Brain storage area had accumulated nearly 10G of various complex content, having clearly pushed the Laboratory's download speed to the limit.

At this moment, Sun Cheng finally realized the limitations of the 【Core】; the 【Spy Template】 he was equipped with was strong, but when it came to detailed intelligence analysis, he mainly had to rely on himself.

Now that he finally understood what he should do, he cast aside distracting thoughts, sank his consciousness into his Brain storage area, and began to browse through the numerous internet news articles and data that had been downloaded all at once by the 【Spy Template】 in a dragnet fashion.

"Mysterious Area 51? Another cliché alien story..."

"Apollo Moon Landing Program inexplicably terminated... conspiracy theories... wait, it seems the Decepticon Legion's forward Base is now on the Dark Side of the Moon... could there really be a connection between the two?"

"... Huh, although the characters on these Mayan Pyramids are a bit blurry, they are undoubtedly the script of the planet Cybertron..."

"What the hell? Why would the first car invented by Karl Benz have the Decepticon emblem printed on it?"

Although the vast majority of things searched from the internet were messy and useless, relying on an analytical ability comparable to a super Computer Science, Sun Cheng still managed to sort out some clues from the numerous complex pieces of information.

Although very surprised, he was absolutely certain that he had actually seen the Decepticon emblem printed in an inconspicuous corner of the car body in a black-and-white photo from the internet regarding the 'Father of the World's Automobiles' Karl Benz and the first car he manufactured.

What surprised him even more was that Sun Cheng had actually found one, several, a set, or even several sets of Cybertron planet script on the promotional pictures of many historical sites.

Among these characters, there were only a very few he could decipher, while more were encrypted and could only be deciphered by the writer and higher-level Decepticons who understood encrypted script.

"There's something strange... definitely something strange..."

While pleasantly surprised, thinking a little deeper, Sun Cheng could not help but break out in a cold sweat.

What on earth is wrong with this world?

Mechanical lifeforms from the planet Cybertron might have come to Earth a long time ago.

Some Decepticons might even have hidden their forms and mingled in the human world.

Based on his limited understanding of the Decepticon Legion, this mechanical race could simply be described as 'filled with conspiracy, arrogance, and war to the bone'.

What he found most incomprehensible was that those Decepticons who might have come to Earth a long time ago did not destroy this world, or control the Earth and enslave humans—these low-level lifeforms that they viewed as no different from crawling insects!

Thinking about it is terrifying!

One has to admit that even a country as strong as the United States, which claims to be free, has much stricter internet controls than outsiders know.

Because he had captured some clues, Sun Cheng quickly adjusted the invasion and began to conduct further targeted searches.

However, to his distress, he soon discovered that the internet seemed to have been cleaned up by a pair of invisible hands; except for a very small amount of information that had too much exposure or was saved in some remote corners of the internet, more information about the Decepticons and the Cybertron planet script had all been artificially erased.

This kind of efficiency is far beyond what one or even several internet companies could achieve; there is no doubt that only one force can do this, and that is the government!

"Could it be that the United States government is cleaning up the traces of the Decepticons' existence behind the scenes? Or is it that the humans on this Earth are not what I thought? Do they actually know about the existence of mechanical lifeforms like the Decepticons from a long time ago, and have even had contact with them?"

Doubts accumulated more and more in Sun Cheng's mind, and after discovering that he could no longer search for more clues from the Normal Mode network, the idea of withdrawing could not help but emerge in his heart.

He immediately shut down the invasion function and pulled out the two arms inserted into the computer mainframe case.

However, at this very moment, Sun Cheng suddenly felt a violent tremor in the 【Core】 within his body; before he could react, he felt a wave of dizziness strike him, and when he came to his senses, he found that he was no longer in the office from just a moment ago, and the surrounding environment had suddenly transformed into a small, spherical space emitting a soft, watery blue light.

"What's going on?"

Being completely unable to feel his arms and body already made fear bubble up in his heart uncontrollably.

Upon realizing that he was actually floating in mid-air, although Sun Cheng could not see his own expression at this time, he was very certain that it must have looked terrible.

"Where is this?"

He looked around vigilantly and soon relaxed slightly.

In this spherical space of only a few square meters, there was no one else present except for two dim screens floating not far ahead.

However, after cautiously staying in place for a while, Sun Cheng could not hold back and drifted forward, stopping vigilantly only when he reached one of the screens.

Unexpectedly, as if sensing Sun Cheng, the screen in front of him suddenly lit up, and soon the figure of a small mechanical person, only three heads tall, sitting quietly on a chair, appeared on it.

"Robot? Wait, why does this office look so familiar... isn't this my current body?"

The robot figure that suddenly appeared on the screen made him freeze, and after taking a few more careful looks, he was completely certain that what was displayed on it was indeed himself.

"What's going on?"

Still unable to figure out the current situation, he hesitated for a moment before drifting toward the other screen on the side!

Just like before, when Sun Cheng arrived in front of this screen again, it immediately lit up, projecting the figure of a young man with a decadent expression lying face up on a bed.

"It's me, that's me!"

As soon as he saw the young man on the screen, even though he could not feel his body at all at this moment, Sun Cheng still felt blood rushing to his head; he drifted back and forth in front of the screen in excitement, and even let out a silent roar in his heart.

"What's going on? Where is this place? Why do I see my body from before I transmigrated? Is anyone there? Get out here..."

While drifting back and forth in excitement, he accidentally touched the light screen.

The next moment, a tremendous suction force suddenly erupted from the light screen.

Sun Cheng felt his vision go black and immediately fainted!