Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
The narrator is a “Calcutec,” a human data processor/encryption system who has been trained to use his subconscious as an encryption key. The Calcutecs work for the quasi-governmental System, as opposed to the criminal “Semiotecs” who work for the Factory and who are generally fallen Calcutecs.
The relationship between the two groups is simple: the System protects data while the Semiotecs steal it, although it is suggested that one man might be behind both. The narrator completes an assignment for a mysterious scientist, who is exploring “sound removal”.