"Angelui i demonui kruzhili na duh minoi Angels and demons were circling over me, rassekali terni-i mlechuie puti Breaking apart shadows and milky ways." "me znayet shastya ottovo Not knowing happiness is the only one." "shto evo zova ponyat ne s-mog The one who could not understand its call." "mana du vortes, mana du vortes The flow may swallow you." "The flow may swallow you aeria gloris, aeria gloris Flying in glory, Flying in glory mana du vortes, mana du vortes The flow may swallow you." "The flow may swallow you aeria gloris, aeria gloris Flying in glory, Flying in glory" "I am calling, calling now." "Spirits rise and falling." "s-toboi ostatsya dalshe To be with you longer..." "Calling, calling..." "In the depth of longing s-toboi ostatsya dalshe To be with you longer... mana du vortes, aeria gloris The flow may swallow you, flying in glory" "Hello everyone!" "Welcome to the Laughing Man Room!" "Well well, it's been six years since we last had this chat.." "It's pretty surprising, eh?" "I cenrtainly was surprised." "Though it might be inappropriate, considering the circumstances, as the net master, Onba, I felt my blood stir." "Those here right now are diehard Laughing Man "freaks"." "But they also have no intention of entering the debate." "Stop talking like that." "You'll get... attacked... in the commentary..." "I heard that there'll be people here in this chatroom who'll be discussing interesting things about the Laughing Man." "Who among you would that be?" "I think all of us here would fit the description." "Although there are those who don't quite meet the criteria." "What is that supposed to mean?" "Just what I said." "File 09 The Man Who Lives in the Net's Dark Depths" "In any case, what's this about the Laughing Man dying right after he reappeared?" "I was just starting to hope that I could become one of the real-time freaks, too." "What are you getting worked up about?" "No one's complaining about things like that anymore." "How idiotic." "Speaking of "idiotic", I think that your appearance qualifies in that category." "Well, hurry up and give us a topic worth discussing." "All right then, why don't we discuss why the Laughing Man suddenly reappeared and made an assassination threat?" "Allow me, teacher." "I think it's because the world continues to be boring and full of crap." "We know that already." "Whats I'm trying to get at is, could it be that this incident and the incident six years ago were perpetrated by different men?" ""Men"?" "You don't even know if the Laughing Man is actually male." "The Laughing Man is a he." "According to information from a particular source, he has to be a man." "Besides, if the person was female, would she call herself the "Laughing MAN"?" "Wait, please." "I think you'd realize this if you'd look closely at the available data." "The person has not referred to himself as the Laughing Man even once." "Even so, he's a man!" "Remember that broadcast when he kidnapped that company's president?" "He definitely looked like a guy." "That's easy to explain." "He could have been wearing a male cyborg body." "Wait a second, you're going off topic here." "Don't any of you have opinions regarding the fact that this incident is too different from this past "style",which was limited to corporate terrorism?" "Although this incident also started from suspicions over a micromachine company, don't you think that it was too crude of him to plunge headlong into an assassination attempt on the Commissioner?" "Well, as the story goes, it's true that he started off six years ago by hacking into cyberbrains of the president's secretary and family members and sending emails.­" "Then, are you saying that this recent incident was perpetrated by a fake?" "Isn't that a strong possibility?" "It's been a full six years since he last disappeared." "Isn't this incident just a farce that rode on the waves generated by the Laughing Man's surging popularity on the net?" "But what is the basis behind the belief that corporate terrorism IS the Laughing Man's style?" "Wasn't his first kidnapping also "crude"?" "Well, I don't think he did anything on impulse after kidnapping the president." "That's right..." "After all, it wasn't cool at all to manipulate someone else to assassinate others." "Well, the Laughing Man is thought to be a Grade A+ hacker, but he's never killed anyone." "Heh, it was fun to see, but I guess it was all a fake." "I guess it's better that way..." "So much for being a real-time Laughing Man freak..." "Poor you." "Then... what are your reasons for thinking that the Laughing Man is "cool"?" "Well, of course he's cool!" "How can you say that he isn't after all the things he's done?" "I'm not saying that he's NOT cool." "If someone is "cool" for being a good hacker, then it's true that the time-delayed virus used in this incident was certainly a marvel." "After all, it was made so well that not even the police could create a vaccine until after it became active in the Security Police's cyberbrains." "That's true enough." "After all, it's even rumored that the police couldn't even find a trace of the virus itself after the incident." "I see." "Still, the perpertrator ended up dead." "Yeah!" "Since the guy that made the virus was killed by someone else, it has to be that the guy was fake and he ended up being killed." "By whom, and for what reasons?" "Allow me, teacher." "It was because of some conspiracy by a secret society!" "Come to think of it, according to information I got from this particular source, the victimized corporations had hired assassins even before this incident." "Note: he's making a pun out of "source" and "sauce", which have identical pronunciation in Japanese." "Which "sauce" did you get it from?" "Pork cutlet?" "Oyster?" "Why would the corporations get rid of him?" "Well, they've been waiting for a chance all this time!" "They had cause to go after him after all the threats and ransom demands." "They finally tracked him down when he made that assassination threat, that's all." "Even so, what's the point in getting rid of an imposter?" "That's right." "Even if he was the real thing, there's no way that they could've first found someone that not even the police could identify." "Well, so that's the thing..." "It's not very "cool" to be tracked down so easily like that." "Then, how about this: he was killed by the real Laughing Man." "Of course that can't be." "Just as the police say, the reasonable conclusion is that the Lauging Man was a complex entity that had some internal squabbling." "If so, then can it be said that we're back to our first conclusion?" "That is, that the recent incident was instigated by a different "person"." "I'll ask this again, what is the basis behind the belief that corporate terrorism is the Laughing Man's "style"?" "You're too obsessed with this!" "It's because he wouldn't be "cool" otherwise, okay?" "!" "But... please try to remember." "Was that first incident all that "cool"?" "I see." "We have to go back to the beginning if we are to properly discuss this!" "All right then, let's look back on the Laughing Man Case as a little break from the current debate." "It is now 7:20 AM on February 3rd," "Travler's Weather Forecast time for the traveler's weather forecast!" "To all of you who're commuting to work this morning, my best wishes." "Today's Weather" "Today, February 3rd, is just 100 days from the opening of the International Exposition." "So, for todays poll, we've thought of this question:" "2024 International Exposition in Japan 100 days until opening of the Awaji Expo" " Expo..." " That's unfair!" "If so, then please tell the truth in front of the camera!" "Stop this." "You can't shoot." "Do you really think so?" "Watching this is probably a bit boring now, but we can't really help that, since this was the only time someone who might have been the man himself was seen." "If that promise you made a while ago is true, then right here and now..." "Have you noticed?" "I can't do that right now." "The program's logo got written over - pretty detailed stuff, don't you think?" "Why don't you tell them?" "That won't have any meaning!" "Serano-san, unless you speak the truth yourself..." "Yeah, not to mention the regional weather forecast symbols." "Although, there are rumors that that stuff changed only after they started broadcasting replays." "That, I cannot do." "Whatever the details were," "Why?" "!" "this is the origin of the Laughing Man Case, that shook the nation six years ago." "But he's not cool at all in that footage." "His hands were trembling when he was holding the gun, too." "You simpleton!" "That's what's cool about him!" "Still, if you compare this with the subsequent corporate terrorism incidents, his actions were really rash." "That's not it." "It's because he put himself in danger in the beginning, even though he was a Grade A+ hacker," "We felt that he was trying to lay bare the falsity of scheming corporations..." "I don't get it." "Nah, that's what it is." "While seemingly instigating an overly-simple crime." "the cunning indicated by hacking all the media sources..." "That's where his charisma lies." "You guys are so passionate." "It's like, "I love the Laughingh Man" you know?" "It's not like he actually sent out that message himself,even once." "In addition to Serano Corporation, it now seems that Japan Micromachine Corporation has been threatend." "This is most alarming news!" "Special Emergency Report The Laughing Man Strikes Again!" "Could those be an unknown number of office desks?" "This time, it is a threat made against Sagawa Cybernetics Corporation's main division!" "How in the world did he manage to move all those desks in a single night?" "!" "It can surely be said that this is an unprecedented case of corporate terrorism!" "Is he real?" "!" "He has to be real, right?" "The Cybernetic Man:" "Part Two" "Please call the Nanoplant Corporation." "I mean, Satsuma Meditech is the largest corporation of its kind in Kyuushuu, right?" "!" "Why would you send a killer virus into a place like that?" "!" "I have no idea!" "He probably hacked into the gardener bot last night and did it." "Take the helicopter out!" "Hey, look!" "Oh, I have a t-shirt with Mytel Corporation's mystery circle printed on it." "After this, when it was decided to invest public funds in order to offset public fear over the devaluation of the victimized corporations' stocks, tha Laughing Man annouced that he would cease his attacks and disappeared into the dark depths of the net." "I remember that Kadoya once temporarily raised its stocks price by saying that there was a Laughing Man symbol in its snack products." "What do you think about the rumors that individuals in every industry made huge profits in the stock market as a result of these actions?" "If we were to base our judgement solely on that, then it's quite possible that the Satsuma Meditech case was a fake." "Is that a cute girl's intuition?" "Well, why don't you try comparing the shift in stock values for other victimized companies with that of Satsuma's?" "Well, come to think of it, Satsuma was the only one that didn't receive government assistance." "I see." "No one noticed, because all six corporations profited by about the same amount, after the ceasefire was announced." "Well, it's true that it seemed pretty lame after all the speculation in the talk shows." "Well then, it's decided." "It was all staged by the media." "Now that we're reflecting on this anew, the incident of six years ago seems to have a lot of inconsistencies as well." "I guess it would be a little too forced to think that these attacks were all by a single person." "So, in the end, it means that it was carried out by a group, right?" "There are quite a few critics out there who think that the mindset behind the first and second bout of incidents differs." "I want to push for a "single perpetrator" theory." "That's a bit difficult to stomach, don't you think?" "There's no point in trying to figure out whether the two incidents were perpetrated by the same person." "I feel that the key to unlocking this case actually lies in the factors that lead to a chain of events after both the kidnapping six years ago, and the recent assassination threat." "Oh, that's pretty sharp, lady!" "I think so, too." "All right then!" "Let's think it over, while looking over the visual files we have in stock here." "However, before we proceed, we'll delete the backup files cached on the server, so let's take a short break." "Hey, do you remember how the alleged designer of this mark, Paul, got taken in for questioning by the task force at the time of the attacks?" "The one who kept saying that his design database got hacked, and that the particular design was stolen?" "Yeah, although it's true that he consequently was able to become a famous designer." "I respect his abilities as well." "In any case, I wonder what the reason was behind the huge popularity of this case at the time." "The mystery that was seemingly easy to understand, yet was not, and sensational events kept happening, with excellent timing." "You do say intelligent things sometimes." "The fact that Serano's president wasn't exactly cooperative also fell into that area, didn't it?" "It's still suspected that he made a deal with the Laughing Man, too." "Still, what spoke to me the most was the heroic mentality and solitary image presented in the first incident." "Yeah, for me too." "This recent incident started during the press conference over the interceptor's illegal use, but was that also an indicatio of a "heroic mentality"?" "And, it was none other than Serano Genmix Corporation itself that developped the interceptors in question." "Don't you feel that there are some connections to those in power?" "Just as I thought, this is very interesting!" "How should I say it?" "A ten-million-individual-strong collective entity acting as a detective?" "It's no wonder that the spectators all unite!" "How about this: everything was a self-scripted and self-acted farce by the micromachine industry, and the Laughing Man was a "program" designed to manipulate stock values from the beginning." "That's too boring!" "The Laughing Man does exist!" "Maybe you just want him to exist." "But according to information I obtained from my source..." "Heh, "source" again." "This incident generated two hundred billion dollars in the economy overall." "That's a pretty good raison d'etre, wouldn't you say?" "Everyone, since you all don't seem to want to join in on my discussion very much," "I'll now present a special tidbit of information I got from my own "source"." "The police's official report that the simultaneous multiple faild assassination attempts were all due to the virus that Nanao A unleashed is a lie." "On what basis?" "Yeah, identify the source of that information!" ""Source" yet again." "By the way, how many times has JD used the term "source" since he arrived in this chatroom?" "I'm curious myself." "To tell you the truth..." "At the time, I"d hacked my way into the scene of the incident." "Are you seriuos?" "!" "Then, are you saying that you were also thinking of attempting an assassination?" "N, no, that's not it." "I was just peeking in because I wanted to know what would happen." "So, I think that the other 39 people who were caught were not being manipulated by the virus and were just there of their own free will." "There were other hackers just like me." "I think that there may be those in the audience who tried to crack in as well." "Although... everyone else seemed to be failing in their attempts for some reason." "Did you... see it?" "If that were true, it would be a huge scandal." "We wouldn't be able to trust anything." "So that's it?" "!" "I'd also thought of going to the ceremony hall that day!" "Dammit..." "Hey, wait a minute." "Then, isn't it possible that the Laughing Man was among the 39 who were arrested?" "I don't think so." "Those who were caught were either passionate fans like us or mimics." "Then, you're saying that those people went there in response to Nanao A's assassination threat?" "It's not exactly that..." "I actually have another piece of special information..." "I was net-diving after the incident occurred and I found a server registred under Nanao's name that had been overwritten by him." "That is the one." "You're right!" "Please be careful." "It is guarded by firewalls with offensive capabilities." "If you dive in there at Level Six, you'll see that there are many simulations of plans left in there." "Renewed threats to micromachine heavyweights..." "There is also a plan to target the cyborg food industry, as well." "All programs have a common point:" "their success hinges on a delayed fragmented virus." "But after that, there was one question left." "Nanao's commissioner assassination plan doesn't actually exist among the simulations." "While having so many meticulous plans on hand, why did he suddenly move to assassinate the commissioner?" "You've done good research." "It's all I do, so..." "But, why?" "Are you trying to say that Nanao A was yet another mimic who was affected by the assassination threat?" "There is no other way to explain why he threw out the rest of his carefully constructed plans and used his ace-in-the-hole on a careless assassination plan." "Who was the one who made the assassinaion threat, then?" "You're trying to read too much into this." "Let's try to decipher something more substantive." "Still, doesn't his story seem pretty plausible, after being shown something like that?" "Well, let me ask you this, then." "Why was it that there were no other cybernetic attacks aside from Nanao's despite the fact that many others were caught trying to assassinate the commissioner?" "It could be that only Nanao was supposed to attack that day." "And, it was already predetermined that he would fail and be caught, thus also making him the perpetrator behind the Laughing Man Case, six years ago." "Who would benefit by creating such a scenario?" "That would be, of course, the pol..." "H, hey..." "You've been creating some pretty roundabout explanations, but you've got it figured out to a good degree." "Did you see my sacrificial firewall?" "W, were you by any chance that lady who was keeping the Security Police in control?" "Well?" "Yes, I was watching." "That firewall was quite dangerous." "Do you have a fragment of it?" "Yes..." "This is it." "Thank you." "You're welcome..." "May I ask you a question, too?" "I thought at first that the Police were behind it all." "But that offensive firewall was clearly different from the police's firewall that was set up through out the ceremony hall." "I've never seen such a firewall..." "Then, it WAS the Laughing Man, after all...!" "As a sign of my thanks for giving me that fragment, let me warn you:" "if you know too much, you'll end up getting wiped out in real life." "Hey, did you get disconnected or something?" "No, I'm all right." "I'm sorry but I think I'll excuse myself for the day." "What are you saying?" "You haven't finished what you were saying." "I'm sorry about all that." "Geez, what was that about?" "It all feels lame all of a sudden." "Well, not that getting worked up in a place like this would let us get any closer to the heart of the matter." "Who knows?" "The real Laughing Man could be watching us right now!" "You're already too far gone if you're thinking that." "Nonetheless, this case is just all too difficult." "We're all going to get tired of it eventually." "I think that the Laughing Man is a phenomenon that was created as some symbol by something random that was given birth to by this corrupted world." "Even this group, which is being lead around in circles, is already a mimic." "Still, even if all of this was nothing but a random phenomeon, just as that "Babe Ruth" guy said, I do feel that there are some commonalities between the first kidnapping incident and the assassination threat six years later." "I feel that only those two specific incidents were executed by perpetrators possessing the same ability." "With regard to the scope, goal, and mentality, the others were but copies created in the hero's absence." "Although it is quite doubtful that the perpetrator behind the two incidents is the "original"." "Lady, you're a sharp one!" "Is this a forced transfer?" "What is that?" "Hey, why?" "We're at a good point right now." "Can't we stay connected a bit longer?" "You miser!" "So, yeah." "What do you think?" "Dammit..." "I couldn't trace him." "Hey." "What, did you say something?" "Were you actually net-diving all this time?" "God, you're so dangerous." "Eh, I can drive in my sleep around here." "Well, what was it?" "Forget it." "I'm not going to say it again!" "A phenomenon created by mimics without the original..." "Two pieces that don't fit into that picture..." "What are you talking about?" "Nothing."