Those Who Evolve Toward Divinity

Shinjo and Purin Ezaki watch from a parked van as Takashi Shimamura faces down a line of soldiers. When Shinjo reaches for a 3D-printed rifle, the soldiers unexpectedly break down in tears and retreat, and Purin senses they have been ghost hacked even while locked in Autistic Mode. Shinjo presses on until dawn, but with the city finally in view Purin seizes the van and drives away alone. Stranded, Shinjo is grabbed by a crowd branding him a Like N and dragged off to Room 101.

A Tachikoma carrying Batou, Saito, and Togusa, along with Standard, rides a lift platform to the upper reaches of the district. Standard explains that the post-humans run the nuclear submarine and that his unit had been sent to prove these beings actually sleep, roughly fifteen minutes out of every otherwise wakeful day, so deeply that nothing rouses them. Even so, the post-humans dictated terms to the American forces: should either Suzuka or Takashi die, or both at once, the submarine's warheads launch, while inaction guarantees no strike. At the top, Batou restores Standard's sealed memories, jolting him, and Standard climbs aboard Batou's Tachikoma as the group moves out.

Purin, still hunting Takashi, stumbles onto an unfamiliar system she dubs the N-Network and uses it to track him. Togusa glimpses her van in the distance, though his Tachikoma insists she cannot be there because she is dead. Standard renounces his NSA contracts and triggers a blue beam from a pen-shaped device, calling a long column of tanks into the city. Ishikawa spots the advance and alerts Kusanagi, who is closing in with Pazu, Boma, and several Tachikoma. The Major redefines the objective as capturing Suzuka and has Boma tap a spy satellite to pinpoint Batou's team. When Ishikawa's aircraft moves to link up, GSDF units warn it off, then shoot it down; he survives only by sheltering inside a Tachikoma. The soldiers open fire and vanish into camouflage, forcing the group to flee and leaving Standard to give chase.

Sheltered and regrouped, Batou's team plans Suzuka's capture around Standard's knowledge of post-human sleep. They move on her resting place, Saito perched as a sniper while Batou, Togusa, and a Tachikoma slip in to find her lying still. Kusanagi warns that Suzuka is on the move, and the pursuit reveals the sleeper was a decoy in disguise; the real Major arrives firing, only for Suzuka to escape. With the team reunited, Batou has the virus purged from his system. A Tachikoma then decodes local graffiti as a trigger for switching off Autistic Mode, prompting Batou to suggest disabling their Vision Enhancement AI. As Kusanagi opens the mission briefing, Takashi silently studies them from afar, and Purin at last fixes his position.

Purin abandons Shinjo and takes the van, leaving him to be seized as a Like N. Standard reveals the post-humans' sleep cycle and the launch rule tying Suzuka and Takashi to the submarine's nuclear payload. Batou unlocks Standard's memories. Standard breaks with the NSA and summons a tank column into the city. Ishikawa is shot down but survives. Section 9's assault on Suzuka's hideout snares only a disguised double, though Batou is cleared of the virus.

The chapter sits deep in the second season of Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045 and pushes the twin threads of the post-human threat and Takashi's role toward their climax. Its Room 101 reference and the fixation on evolving beyond humanity underscore the season's preoccupation with what the post-humans are becoming.