Days passed quickly, and the Cerebrum Shift project was nearing its final phase.
Everyone involved in the experiment knew that time was their greatest enemy. Each passing day held equal chances of failure—or success. Professor Laksana was rarely seen on campus anymore. He spent most of his time underground, in hidden chambers filled with advanced equipment and interconnected computer systems.
In the conference room, high-ranking officials from the Emergency National Strategy Committee gathered to discuss the latest developments. Their final plan was clear—the Interlink would be the key to uniting cognitive power into a single central network. It would be an unstoppable tool for societal control.
Laksana stood before a massive blackboard, covered in complex diagrams outlining the project's architecture and the interactions between each system element. His expression was calm, unreadable. As always, he showed no sign of tension or anxiety. Everything in front of him was just data—objects to be analyzed and manipulated.
"Our next step is to ensure full integration between each unit in the network," he said flatly. "We've come too far. One mistake could bring the entire system down."
A military officer seated at the end of the table raised a hand. "Professor, are you certain this system is ready for human testing? We need results. Immediately."
Laksana met the man's gaze, then continued, "This system isn't just about control. It's about the ability to reconfigure thought patterns—to redefine how humans think and act. We're not merely building a controlling device. We're creating a machine capable of dictating every decision and action."
A silence followed, until a younger intelligence officer finally spoke up. "And what if it gets out of control? What happens if someone abuses this power?"
Laksana frowned. "That's a risk we must accept," he replied, eyes sharp. "The government has granted us full authority. We've reached the point of no return."
The silence that followed marked a critical moment. Everyone in the room understood—after this, there would be no stopping the Cerebrum Shift project, especially with full military and intelligence backing.
But even as all parties agreed to proceed, Laksana knew the hidden danger was far greater. This project might reshape the world—but it could also bring forth horrors they could not yet imagine.
In the quiet of his mind, one question echoed endlessly: If human thought can be controlled, who truly controls the world?
They, the ones now mastering the technology to map and alter consciousness, were standing at the edge of a cliff they could not see. In the silence of the lab, Laksana felt the immense power they had harnessed—and he knew it came at an unbearable cost. There was no room left for doubt. The system would soon be tested on human subjects.
Narey, who was still searching for clues behind the students' disappearance, might have uncovered fragments of the truth—but Laksana knew, no matter what, nothing could stop the wheels already set in motion. And within the dark shadows of the project, Laksana's confidence only grew. This would all belong to him.
In its early years, Cerebrum Shift was not the monster it later became.
In a secret laboratory built from the ruins of a Cold War–era bunker, Professor Vellan and Professor Laksana once stood side by side in front of tube consoles, cables crawling like wild roots across the floor.
At the time, the government had just approved initial funding through Delta Division—a covert unit under the Ministry of Defense tasked with "securing national cognitive stability." State support came in tactical forms: equipment supply, soundproof labs, access to prisoner medical data, and full legal immunity for the research team.
Vellan, still idealistic and ethically grounded, saw this partnership as a compromise. He believed the project could become a medical breakthrough—a tool for healing neurodegenerative diseases, not a weapon for mind control. But Laksana—much younger, much colder—never spoke of healing. To him, the human brain was nothing more than a biological machine: hackable, modifiable, exploitable.
"Don't get too attached to morality, Arlo," Laksana once said as they reviewed the first subject's beta wave data late one night. "Ethics are illusions created by those too weak to make hard decisions."
Vellan didn't respond immediately. He just stared at the monitor displaying irregular brain activity—the subject was experiencing induced visual hallucinations. He knew then that Laksana had injected the experimental neural patch into the subject's limbic system without internal ethics board approval.
But back then, it wasn't too late to walk away. Still, Laksana only climbed higher in the eyes of state officials. He delivered spectacularly polished progress reports, burying fatal failures in technocratic jargon. And the officials—hungry for a tool to control a volatile political climate—adored him. Every death during experimentation was labeled a "biological anomaly."
Every mental breakdown was written off as a "temporary side effect." And each minor success, no matter how small, was glorified as a national scientific leap.
The Delta Division eventually proposed Laksana as the official Project Coordinator, giving him powers equal to top-ranking military officers within the Cerebrum Shift oversight structure. Vellan was never offered that role. He remained the "senior scientific advisor"—a title that gradually became purely symbolic.
From then on, the divide between them grew wider. Vellan began secretly copying data, recording conversations, and archiving every procedural breach. He knew the project had evolved into something far more dangerous than anything they had envisioned. But Laksana didn't care. He wasn't chasing academic prestige, nor scientific awards. He wanted something far greater, rarer, and more absolute: control. To him, knowledge was merely a tool. Science was just a medium. What truly mattered was who commanded the system. And Cerebrum Shift, the project he had created and cultivated for years, was no longer just a scientific endeavor—it was the foundation of a new power structure. With full government backing, Laksana knew he was virtually untouchable. He had special budgets, sealed facilities, unrestricted permits—everything handed to him, so long as the promised results kept coming.
He could command researchers, recruit foreign experts, even conduct human trials without ethical review. The state needed him. The elites craved results. And Laksana gave them a vision of the future: a world where humans could be controlled without violence.
To Laksana, every implanted wire, every manipulated impulse, was a step toward systemic domination. Control was no longer about weapons or propaganda—it was about neurons, about programmable consciousness. He was no longer just a scientist. He was the architect of a new era. And in his mind, there was only one truth: Whoever controls the mind, controls the world.