"Poet?" Sun Jack looked at the person standing before him in surprise, feeling utterly unexpected.
"No, with so many cameras at the door, how did you get in?"
It wasn't just surveillance, from the entrance to his office, so many people coming and going, and yet this living, breathing man just walked in?
The poet didn't answer the question, but instead started to complain to Sun Jack.
"Jack, did you forget about me completely? I stood there waiting for a day and a night, just waiting for you to pick me up, and where were you?"
"Cough..." Sun Jack cleared his throat somewhat awkwardly, of course, he had forgotten about this guy, but he couldn't very well say that in front of someone else.
"You're such a big guy, can't you find your own way? Look, you found your way here, didn't you? Let's add each other as friends first."
As he spoke, Sun Jack sent his communication code directly to the other person's system. "Why are you still using this FFP meat chicken? Wait, I'll help you swap to a new body."
"No need for that, just give me a new face, I feel a woman's body can bring me more inspiration." As soon as the subject changed, the poet started to skr, skr again.
"Hold off on your creation for a moment, hungry? Let me take you to eat something."
Sun Jack took the poet to Ke Family Cuisine and ordered a rich meal, watching as the other devoured eyeballs and tentacles with great relish.
Sun Jack eyed the poet before him, weighing up the poet's abilities.
Obviously, having survived Cell #3 without dying, and sneaking up on him unnoticed, this guy clearly had some skills, and most importantly held a grudge against FFP. If he could get the poet to help him, it might be of some assistance.
However, to get him involved and help with his own matters, the poet's loose screws were one thing, and the other was his unknown background, which was best to investigate clearly.
"Poet, can I ask you something? Why were you locked up before?" Sun Jack asked.
The poet's mouth was stuffed full, and after a muffled round of mumbling, Sun Jack understood nothing.
"What? Swallow what's in your mouth and then speak."
"Because I wrote a great poem, that's why they locked me up," the poet said after swallowing the food in his mouth.
"A poem? Are you talking about that jb poem of yours again? Writing a poem got you into Cell #3? I don't buy it. Even if you used FFP's Chairman Lan Meng as material for a poem, you still wouldn't qualify," Sun Jack said, lighting a cigarette and taking a heavy drag.
The poet shook his head and slurped a sausage coated in white mushroom sauce. "You're mistaken, it wasn't them who locked me up. They didn't know that I created that great work. It was voluntary, I locked myself up."
"What was the poem then?"
"A great poem, but I think it's beyond someone like you, a mere mortal," he said. "You're not qualified enough to understand."
Sun Jack scratched his head and sighed. Talking to a madman is exhausting. "Forget it, I won't beat around the bush. You saved my life before, so let's be straightforward—I need more hands. Are you willing to help me, Ancient?"
He decided to keep the man around and later let a professional like Linda Linda coax more words out of him. Bickering with this guy was just a waste of time.
"If you join, I'll pay you a salary and a share equal to what the top Lone Wolf Mercenaries at Utopia Security Company get."
The poet finally understood. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve, looked at Sun Jack with some surprise, and after a few serious seconds, he asked, "What's your purpose? Why are you doing this?"
"For what else? For self-preservation. Or do you want to get caught by the FFP again? We're like grasshoppers on the same string, with the same enemies."
However, the poet shook his head and then raised a finger to point at the table. "No, JK, it's not just self-preservation under the FFP. You have other motives. Otherwise, you wouldn't qualify to be held in Prison Number Three."
He paused, then leaned in closer, staring intently at Sun Jack. "You want to achieve the Rat Alliance Battle Line's goal; you want to change the entire world!"
"What do you mean?" Sun Jack asked, now looking serious as he regarded the poet before him.
"You've said it yourself. Ordinary people don't end up in Prison Number Three, and you're no ordinary person," the poet said as he continued to eat. "But I think humanity doesn't need you to save them. They are lustful, gluttonous, lazy, envious, proud, angry—it's in their nature. They like it that way."
After finishing, he leaned back, "Ah, Metropolis, the City of Greed built on Electronic Currency, where souls are devoured and reality blurs with lies. In the data's endless abyss, I greedily grab every dog's B of light."
Upon hearing this, Sun Jack was first taken aback, then drew a breath of smoke. "Well, you've got to admit, these few lines are leagues better than those JB poems you wrote earlier."
The poet didn't pay any attention to Sun Jack and suddenly rushed to the window, climbing onto it, looking out at the multitudes living beneath the acid rain in the Metropolis.
When he saw Xiaoying sitting in a car on her way home, he was struck by inspiration once more and continued to shout without regard for himself, "Ah, Metropolis, an orgy of desire, where reason's defenses crumble at the slightest touch. Wandering in the abyss of pleasure, but forgetting where the soul's true home lies."
He then turned his gaze to the crowds silenced in the network inside a subway car, "Ah, Metropolis, a junkyard of fragmented information, knowledge, entertainment, gossip filling the emptiness within us at the digital feast. At the end of an ocean of data lies a spiritual desert of poverty!"
His gaze rapidly pulled away, focusing underground on a group of four-wheeled robots hauling cargo. "Ah, Metropolis, a breeding ground for automation, mechanical hands weaving a net of laziness. We lie on a bed of intelligence, no longer pursuing, no longer longing. Laziness, like a cancer, eats away at the soil of our souls."
Next, he focused on some corporate elites sitting in hover cars, their golden ties and accessories displaying rolling deposits. "Ah, Metropolis, an arena for comparison. We measure each other by data, every figure like a sharp blade slicing through our spirits. We forget the true essence of happiness, leaving only resentment and vanity from the comparisons behind."
Then his attention moved to Linda Linda, silently staring out the window. "Ah, Metropolis, the City of Loneliness. Pride is like a wall, cutting off my connection with others, leaving us all in solitude, gradually losing the warmth of humanity. Arrogance, like armor, protects my vulnerability, yet also isolates me from the world, making me hard to approach. In a castle of my own making, I rule alone in loneliness."
And finally, in the distance, two gangs were roaring and clashing.
"Ah, Metropolis, a volcano of anger. The flames of fury make me lose sense and direction. Rage has me struggling in the whirlpool of hatred and revenge. As I wield violence for self-protection, it also shatters the beauty all around me."