He unplugged it anyway.
The installation took seven seconds.
Leo didn’t believe in curses. He believed in benchmarks.
That was the first impossible thing. One moment, a black screen. The next, a desktop. No welcome animation. No spinning circles. Just a stark, charcoal-gray wallpaper featuring a spectral, translucent window pane. The taskbar was empty. The start menu was a monolith of raw, unadulterated speed.