Lynn and Officer Ch’en’s acquaintance actually dated back four months.
Back then, after his spectacular failure to get adopted by Texas, Lynn had been reduced to a stray wandering the neon-lit streets and damp alleyways of Lungmen.
He relied entirely on his terrifyingly accurate intuition to scrape together a living, sniffing out opportunities wherever they hid.
He would mooch free Wi-Fi outside cafes, scavenge discarded food, and shamelessly monopolize the free sample trays at local supermarkets.
But as the old saying goes: walk in the dark long enough, and you are bound to bump into ghosts.
Even when things seemed perfectly fine, subtle disasters were always waiting to strike.
The main reason Lynn still harbored a deep distrust of his own intuition was because of one specific incident.
After a successful afternoon of leeching internet access, he had followed a ‘good feeling’ back toward his makeshift shelter in the maintenance sewers.
Instead of a safe haven, his intuition led him straight into a dead end, boxed in by a group of thugs reeking of cheap alcohol and bad decisions.
Seeing that Lynn’s clothes looked out of place and oddly valuable, the drunks drew their blades and demanded he strip down to his underwear.
Then, Officer Ch’en arrived.
Fresh off her shift and on her way home, she took one look at the pathetic mugging in progress and decided she had zero tolerance for it.
It was a blur of motion.
A devastating sweep of a leg, a few sharp impacts, and the thugs were groaning on the concrete.
But before Lynn could even dust himself off to thank his savior, Ch’en’s professional instincts kicked in.
She demanded his identification.
That was where the real trouble began.
Lynn was a complete anomaly—a ghost in the system.
He possessed no ID, no background records, no memories of his past, and an absolute lack of basic common sense regarding how this world functioned.
Naturally, Ch’en hauled him straight to the Lungmen Guard Department for a thorough interrogation.
But what could the L.G.D.
possibly dig up on someone who had literally transmigrated?
The databases turned up entirely blank.
Coupled with the fact that Lynn had been subconsciously relying on his intuition to evade security cameras and crowded checkpoints to hide his transient lifestyle, the multi-department investigation reached a grim conclusion: Lynn was highly suspicious, potentially a dangerous infiltrator.
After two days of detention in a sterile holding cell, the official verdict came down.
He was to be exiled to the barren wastelands outside Lungmen to fend for himself.
Surprisingly, Lynn never complained.
He did not curse the system or blame Ch’en.
In fact, during his two days in lockup, he and the strict officer ended up chatting quite amicably through the bars.
Ch’en was merely executing Lungmen’s legal protocol, but she actually felt a lingering sense of guilt over the whole affair.
Lynn had not committed any actual crimes.
He was just a lost soul actively looking for honest work, and during his brief detention, he had even casually helped her untangle the logic behind a few pending L.G.D.
cases.
Tossing someone like that into the unforgiving wilderness felt like a waste of a life.
Lynn simply waved off her apologies.
Everyone had a job to do.
The greatest parting gift Ch’en could legally secure for him was a standard-issue military shovel.
After a quiet farewell at the city limits, Lynn spent an entire month surviving hand-to-mouth in the desolate periphery of Lungmen.
That was where he eventually crossed paths with Exusiai, who was returning from a courier run.
The rest of the story was practically legend within the walls of Penguin Logistics.
Exusiai had found the dirt-smudged vagrant wandering the wilderness and immediately tried to drag him into the company.
When that was met with firm opposition from the others, the Sankta simply rented a cheap apartment on the outskirts and took care of him herself.
After a chaotic series of adjustments, near-misses, and small domestic adventures, Lynn finally managed to scrape his way into the Penguin Logistics roster.
If it had not been for his terrifyingly effective performance during that one specific night, he would have been stuck doing manual labor in the outer slums for months before earning his place.
Looking back, it was a bizarre chain of cause and effect.
If Ch’en had been given even a fraction of leeway by her superiors, or if Lungmen’s laws possessed a shred of mercy, Lynn would have likely ended up clinging to the L.G.D.
officer for free meals instead of ever meeting Exusiai.
It was a perfect storm of unfortunate coincidences.
“I really didn’t expect the infamous Officer Ch’en to have a soft spot.” Croissant leaned against the lounge table, a wide grin on her face.
“I’ve slightly changed my opinion of her.
But tossing a guy she just saved straight into the wasteland…
yeah, that definitely sounds like her style.” “Oh my…” Franka, the Blacksteel International operator who had somehow made herself entirely at home on their couch, rested her chin in her hands.
“Miss Croissant, I didn’t expect our new friend to have such a scandalous past with the L.G.D.’s finest.
How regrettable.” “Can you two please not make it sound like Officer Ch’en and I had some sort of illicit affair?” Lynn sighed, rubbing his temples.
‘Although that kick of hers was indeed incredibly powerful, I am completely innocent.’ Surrounded by the teasing gazes of the Penguin Logistics crew and their Blacksteel guest, Lynn vehemently defended his honor.
Truthfully, if he did not possess such a mild temper, he might have harbored a deep grudge against the L.G.D.
He had been surviving just fine as an undocumented ghost until that alleyway brawl ruined everything.
The thugs who actually started the fight merely got locked up in a warm cell, while he was thrown out into the lethal wilderness.
Yet, Lynn held no resentment.
Growing up in a peaceful world had ingrained a certain respect for diligent law enforcement in him.
Ch’en was just doing her job, and doing it well.
Even now, after returning to Lungmen only to end up under L.G.D.
scrutiny all over again, he just chalked it up to his own abysmal luck.
“…I have a question.” Texas, who had been sitting quietly in the corner chair, finally spoke.
She looked at Lynn’s perfectly innocent expression, her eyes narrowing slightly.
“How exactly did you manage to get online during your time wandering Lungmen?” “Huh?
The internet?” Lynn blinked, leaning back against the counter.
“You know how people’s computers just inexplicably stop working sometimes?
Most of them don’t want to pay exorbitant repair fees, so they just sit there getting angry at the screen.
I would walk into cafes or shops and offer to fix their machines in exchange for an hour of internet access.
I didn’t have an ID or money, so I bartered with manual labor.
You’d be surprised how many people took that deal.” “And then?” Texas asked, her voice flat.
“How did you fix them?
What were you doing online?” “Most technical problems can be solved by just restarting the machine,” Lynn explained, his tone entirely serious.
“If one restart doesn’t work, you try a second time.
If the screen is still frozen, you just give the computer chassis a few solid smacks.
If absolutely none of that works, then moving to a different computer entirely will definitely solve the problem.
As for what I did online…
I browsed forums, researched the city, argued with netizens about novel settings and data structures, and looked for under-the-table jobs.
That’s pretty much it.” “That’s it?” “That’s it.” Lynn spread his hands, the picture of harmless honesty.
“Actually, I got pretty famous in a few blocks because I didn’t charge money and my success rate was high.
People were lining up to find me.
If Officer Ch’en hadn’t thrown me in jail, I probably would have opened my own electronics repair shop.
Honestly, most tech support here just involves turning things off and hitting them.” A heavy silence descended upon the lounge.
‘No one has ever fixed an Originium-powered terminal just by smacking it!’ Several people in the room who actually understood basic electronics stared at Lynn’s matter-of-fact expression, screaming internally.
Texas simply stopped talking.
She stared at Lynn for a long, complicated moment.
Reaching into her jacket pocket, she pulled out a cigarette, paused, and then silently swapped it for a chocolate Pocky stick instead.
She placed it between her lips, watching Lynn get mercilessly teased by Croissant and Franka, her quiet gaze betraying absolutely nothing of the thoughts racing through her mind.
[Rhodes’s Note: Enjoying the operation so far, Doctor?
(This daily grind literally pays the landship’s rent!
to use the links!)