Villain’s Programming - Chapter 255



Only Noblemtl

Episode 255 Ashley

My eyes started to darken and then started to brighten. It was a phenomenon that I now took for granted.

‘What kind of memory will it be this time?’

Dojun originally wanted to watch ‘Lost Memories’ to see a useful ‘AI developer’.

The Shangri-La Project was a project that implemented a huge virtual world, so AI developers were essential.

‘But we don’t need AI developers anymore. We have Marshall, right?’

Even though AI developers were no longer needed, Dojun’s heart was pounding.

‘I hope this time it’s a good memory.’

The ‘Lost Memories’ I’ve seen so far haven’t had any particularly good memories, except for meeting ‘Sally’.

‘It was bad or very shocking. Please, please. Just this once… … .’

Dojun looked ahead, praying earnestly.

‘uh!’

At that moment, Dojun’s head became dizzy without him realizing it.

‘Sally?’

I saw Sally in front of me, wearing a white dress. Although she looked a little older, she was pretty.

‘Surely this is a wedding?’

In the memory, Dojun put a ring on Sally’s hand and kissed her on the lips.

‘Ah! You postponed your wedding because of work in Korea, but you ended up getting married.’

Dojun felt good because he had married Sally in his past life as well as in his present life.

‘Fortunately, I think this memory is a good one!’

After the wedding, a reception was held. Sally greeted many guests and looked in one direction.

“Dojun, there’s someone I want to introduce you to.”

“Who are you?”

“My colleague.”

Sally took Do-jun from her memories and brought him to an Asian woman.

Dojun looked at the oriental woman and frowned.

‘I feel like I’ve seen you somewhere before.’

The woman appeared to be in her early fifties, thin and with heavy eye makeup that gave her scary-looking eyes.

However, she seemed to be no ordinary person as she was wearing luxury goods all over her body.

‘Who is it? I’m sure I’ve seen you somewhere.’

When Dojun was wondering who the woman in front of him was, Sally grabbed the woman’s hand and said.

“Ashley, thank you so much for coming! I know you’re busy.”

“Thank you. It’s your wedding, so of course you should come.”

Dojun was surprised by Sally’s words.

‘What? This girl is Ashley?’

At first, I thought it was someone with the same name, but I was wrong. The person in front of me was definitely Ashley.

‘Oh my gosh, that’s why I feel like I’ve seen this before. But… is this really what Ashley’s future will look like?’

The Ashley I saw a while ago wasn’t like this. She was a little chubby, if not fat, and had a gentle face.

‘I can’t believe Ashley has changed so much. Of course, it was a previous life and a lot of time has passed. If I didn’t know it was Ashley, I wouldn’t have recognized it at all. But where is Marshall?’

Dojun looked around. Since Ashley was here, he thought Marshall would be there too. But Marshall wasn’t there.

“Ashley, this is my husband. Dojun, say hello. This is my friend Ashley. We used to work together at MS. Sadly, she left, but we met often after that.”

At Sally’s words, Dojun greeted her in her memories.

“Hello. I’ve heard a lot about you. This is Dojun Hwang.”

“It’s Ashley. Dojun… Hwang. Are you Chinese?”

“No. I’m Korean.”

Ashley’s expression hardened at Dojun’s words. The corners of her eyes trembled and her lips tightened. But she quickly returned to normal.

Do-jun and Sally in their memories didn’t see that figure, but Do-jun, who had been keeping an eye on Ashley, saw it.

Sally spoke to Ashley for a while and then said in a regretful voice.

“Ashley, call me from behind. I’ll contact you separately later.”

“…huh.”

In his memory, Do-jun followed Sally with a happy look on his face. But strangely, Do-jun kept thinking of Ashley.

* * *

My vision darkened again and then brightened. I saw countless computers, desks, and people in front of me.

‘Here is… … .’

I didn’t see it much, but it was a place I saw in my lost memories.

‘It’s an office. They’re working on the Shangri-La project… ‘

Dojun looked around. He saw Sally and William typing on the keyboard with a donut in his mouth.

‘Why did you come to the office?’

Dojun now knew that ‘lost memories’ did not mean useless memories.

‘I’m going to show you the memories from my past life that have great meaning to me. The last memory is definitely Ashley. Ashley’s appearance that has definitely changed was shocking. So, does this have some meaning too? … . . ‘

Dojun wanted to look around the office a little more, but in his memory, Dojun was sitting at his desk and starting to work on something.

‘What are you doing?’

Dojun looked at the monitor. He naturally thought it was something related to ‘security’, but it wasn’t.

‘Huh? News? What kind of news is it that makes you look like a crazy person during work hours?’

Dojun looked at the monitor out of curiosity. For a moment, Dojun’s head went blank.

‘North Korea and South Korea fought a local war? And on Ganghwa Island? Not Yeonpyeong Island, but Ganghwa Island! How many people live there? Then isn’t this a full-scale war, not a local war?’

As Dojun had thought, there were quite a few casualties.

[In effect, an invasion by China, not North Korea.]

[What are the UN and US decisions?]

[South Korean leadership leaves Korea.]

[US concludes that it was a deviation by some military forces dissatisfied with the North Korean regime.]

Dojun clicked his tongue after reading the article.

‘This is crazy. And when I watch the news, it looks like North Korea has been completely eaten up by China.’

Dojun felt unknowingly angry. No matter how far the South and the North are apart, North Korea is clearly the land of the Korean people.

‘Fucking Chinese bastards!’

Although the urge to curse rose to the tip of his chin, Dojun held it back and checked the date.

‘April 21, 2030. It was three days ago that we had a local war with North Korea. In reality, it was almost 20 years later.’

Dojun was worried.

‘Can’t this be stopped in this lifetime?’

Dojun was wondering how he could prevent something like his past life from happening in reality. But then,

“Dojun, are you okay?”

Sally approached and asked. Dojun in the memory hesitated and answered.

“Yeah. It’s okay.”

“Have you contacted your younger sibling?”

Dojun shook his head in memory.

“…no.”

“Don’t worry. Nothing will happen. Korea and the US are allies, right? Dad said that the US will step up and Korea will be safe.”

Sally comforted him. In her memory, Do-jun had a satisfied and relaxed expression, but Do-jun wasn’t like that. It was because of the article she had seen earlier.

[US concludes that it was a deviation by some military forces dissatisfied with the North Korean regime.]

‘This is a deviation? That can’t be! How can a deviant force fight a local war?’

Unlike his previous life, Dojun in his current life has learned quite a bit about international relations.

‘I am peace-oriented, but only when there is no harm to my own country.’

The United States claims to be the world’s policeman, but on the other hand, it is a country that hacks the world for its own benefit.

‘If that kind of news had come out, we might have already had some negotiations with China.’

“Dojun, and don’t worry about what Ashley said. I talked to Ashley, and she said she’s sorry and that she was just too excited.”

“…okay?”

Do-jun in the memory answered with his eyes wide open in relief, but it wasn’t Do-jun.

‘What is this?’

Luckily, Sally told me what happened.

“Ha. To be honest, I was going to fight with Ashley that day. In front of Do-jun, he said things like Korea would be better off being absorbed by China, and that it would be good if there was a war. I thought I was going crazy.”

Dojun was also speechless.

‘Ashley, you’re getting old, aren’t you crazy? Why are you saying such things?’

“But when I talked to Ashley, she had her own circumstances. Do-jun, I didn’t say anything, but… Ashley was actually married.”

Sally told me about Ashley and Marshall, who worked together at MS, and how they got married and went on a honeymoon to Japan.

“But, my husband died. Do-jun, don’t you remember? The Great East Japan Earthquake.”

“How could you forget that? That’s when the Fukushima nuclear power plant exploded. Really? At that time?”

“That’s right. He died in the tsunami. I went to Marshall’s funeral too.”

“oh my god.”

Sally shook her head.

“After that, Ashley’s personality changed. Ashley, who was kind to everyone, became sharp. Until recently, I thought it was because Marshall died. But after talking to Ashley this time, I realized that wasn’t the case.”

“… Was there something else going on?”

“Yeah. Ashley and Marshall were at the Fukushima Ramen restaurant at the time. They were there with a Korean couple.”

“Huh… a Korean couple?”

Dojun immediately realized who they were. He had heard it directly from Ashley.

‘No way, Jooyeon Kim? Ashley changed like this because of Jooyeon Kim?’

The rest of the story was something Dojun also knew. The only difference was that Dojun wasn’t there in his previous life, and in this life, Dojun came and saved Marshall.

“Ashley tried to save Marshall somehow, but it seems she failed. Ashley tried to die with Marshall, but… Marshall begged her to run away, to somehow survive. It was his wish.”

Dojun in the memory bowed his head deeply.

“So… Ashley survived?”

“Yeah. Ashley went up to the roof of another building and saw the ramen shop collapse in the tsunami. She passed out after that. When she opened her eyes, she was in a hospital. After that, Ashley couldn’t trust anyone. And… she said she got angry without realizing it whenever she saw a Korean.”

“…I didn’t know there was such a pain.”

“I just found out about this. But that doesn’t mean Ashley’s actions toward Dojun are forgiven.

“Sally, I’m okay.”

Sally sat down with Do-jun in her memory at Do-jun’s words in her memory. Do-jun in her memory made a pleasant expression.

After that, Sally went back to her seat, and Dojun sat down in front of the computer again.

“I need to show Ashley that Koreans aren’t all bad people.”

* * *

My eyes darkened and then brightened again.

Time passed quickly. Dojun no longer looked at the article and focused on his work.

“Let’s make sure that the AI ​​Ashley’s team creates never lets data leak out.”

After Marshall died, Ashley changed. Originally an accounting expert, Ashley also excelled at finance and investments.

Five years after Marshall’s death, Ashley had amassed a fortune through corporate M&A. With that money, Ashley contacted Marshall’s former colleagues and created an AI company.

– Marshall AI Company.

As the company’s representative, Ashley was one of the key members involved in the ‘Shangri-La’ project.

‘The AI ​​developed by the team from Marshall learns from external data. However, this creates a security vulnerability. The data is randomly obtained, and there may be hacking data.’

In his memory, Do-jun upgraded his security system to block this hacking data. After a few months, the security system Do-jun wanted was completed.

Of course, it wasn’t made by Dojun alone, the entire security team rushed to make it.

Do-jun was surprised when he saw the security system.

‘Isn’t this similar to GUARD CAT’s security system program?’

After making it, it seemed like it was almost identical rather than similar.

‘Surely there’s Annie in the security team?’

Dojun thought about the people in the office, but there was no one similar to Annie.

Dojun wanted to see the logs of the people who uploaded the source code, but in his memory, Dojun wasn’t interested in such things.

In his memory, Do-jun turned on the new security system. He started to perform security checks, focusing especially on the AI ​​team.

And after a few days, Do-jun in his memories discovered something strange.

“What? Why is AI not just collecting data, but also distributing it?”

Although AI has been collecting data by surfing the Internet, it has never transmitted the data to the outside world.

“That’s weird. Why is the data only being transmitted to China when it’s fine everywhere else? Eight. It’s probably just a bug. I’ll have to tell Ashley.”

Dojun felt frustrated.

‘No, the data is only leaked in China, how can that be a bug? I need to find out more right away!’

Dojun shouted, but it didn’t reach the Dojun in his memories.

In his memory, Do-jun sent Ashley what he had found out via email.

‘No! Ashley is the most suspicious!’

While Do-jun was shocked, Ashley received an answer.

That was when.

Dojun, who saw the message, was about to press the YES button right away. He was so curious about what kind of email he had received that he was going crazy.

But Dojun did not press the YES button on the next message.

Dojun lowered his raised hand.

‘This is a different story.’

I needed to organize the memories I had seen so far.

Dojun pressed the ‘NO’ button.

* * *

“Phew.”

Dojun opened his eyes. He saw the ceiling of a familiar small room.

Dojun opened the window. A cool river breeze blew in.

“Ha. Now I feel like I can live.”

As the stuffiness disappeared, Dojun sat down at his desk again.

‘So, you’re saying that a local war will break out between China and North Korea in 2030? Because China is manipulating North Korea from behind the scenes.’

That wasn’t all.

‘For some reason, they are stealing the Shangri-La Project’s AI data from China.’

Dojun tilted his head.

‘But is that possible?’

The security of the ‘Shangri-La Project’ seen in Do-jun’s lost memories was at an incredible level.

Even Dojun couldn’t see a way to break through it. That’s how great the security team’s capabilities were.

‘How did you get through it? It’s impossible. Someone inside must be helping… ‘

At that moment, two people came to mind for Dojun.

‘Ashley and Baeksent’s Ma Huateng! It can’t be a coincidence that AI data is going to China.’

Dojun was worried.

‘Baeksent is participating in the Shangri-La project. Why is Ma Huateng stealing AI data?’

I couldn’t understand it at all. But then it happened.

Dojun’s cell phone rang. When he checked it, he saw that an email had arrived.

‘Who sent this at this hour of the morning?’

Dojun went to the PC in the living room and opened his mailbox.

‘This is!’

The email wasn’t sent by anyone. It was sent by a ‘worm virus’, not a person.

‘We’ve arrived at our final destination!’

Do-jun had planted a ‘virus’ in the documents and AI script data that Kim Joo-yeon had taken out.

‘Okay. Let’s see who it is.’

Dojun opened the email. There was an IP address written there. Dojun immediately traced the location using the IP address.

‘Shenzhen, China? Isn’t this 100 cents?’

Dojun was surprised.

‘Baeksent was after AI data?’

At that moment, Dojun’s lost memories came back to him.

‘Wait a minute, maybe AI data flowed to Baekcent in my past life too?’

I had my doubts, but I’m almost sure.

Dojun knocked on the desk. He was wondering what to do with this.

The worries were long. Before I knew it, it was 4 AM.

“It won’t work. You’d be an idiot to stay still when you know the future.”

Dojun immediately gave a special execution command to the ‘worm virus’.