Chapter 119
On the way back, Si Chen was inevitably somewhat quiet, looking very worried.
Zhao Zixin cheered him up. “Although the afternoon class was a bit disgusting, this time Turing obviously wanted the Carolians to realize the danger and change the result of the referendum. If this results in voting not to shut down Turing, we might be able to get out this time.”
Si Chen said, “I was just wondering, since every time the world restarts, it will return to the starting point, will Turing resurrect the people who died in the previous cycle?”
“How can he bring them back if they’re dead?”
“What if this is a virtual world like a holographic online game?”
Zhao Zixin’s mouth opened slightly.
He had been in this world longer than Si Chen. What Si Chen had thought of, he’d actually thought of as well.
There are similar technologies in the real world, they have yet to mature and have many limitations.
First of all, players can clearly discern that they are in a virtual world; secondly, their sense of pain is not made overly realistic; and finally, this technology cannot control the flow of time.
Zhao Zixin pinched his own face. “If this is a virtual world, then it’s too realistic. We get hungry, feel pain, feel tired.”
“I am an employee of Eight Directions Technology. We produced the semi-holographic game, High-Dimensional Invasion, the one used to evaluate the level of Evolutionaries. I may not be part of the R&D department but I’m familiar with principles behind it.”
“All holographic technology rely on brain-computer interface and brain wave control technology. The biggest disadvantage of this technology is that it disconnects when the player falls asleep. But we’ve fallen asleep many times. I’m not ruling out that this may be some black technology from a high-dimensional universe. It is possible, but who would dare bet that this is some virtual reality god’s game?”
“At least, I haven’t seen any of dead come back to life. You’d best not take any chances.”
Si Chen remembered what the teacher had said in class.
-In this world, supernatural disasters spread through dreams.
He stared into Zhao Zixin’s eyes. “In all these years, have you ever had a dream?”
Zhao Zixin was momentarily stunned, then shook his head. “No, now that you ask. Is it because I’m an outsider? Have you ever had one?”
Si Chen turned his head and looked at the scenery outside the window.
Although the buildings here are monotonous in form, the scenery actually wasn’t bad. The sky was blue and beyond the tall buildings were snow-capped mountain ranges. The peach blossoms on the mountainside were in bloom.
Although the Carolians here clearly knew that it was a simulated image.
Si Chen murmured, “Me neither.”
*
-Ji Chuyao turned into Turing after his death.
-And came into my dreams.
Because of this possible theory, Si Chen did not sleep immediately after returning to his dorm room that night.
He lay on the bed, unwilling to close his eyes, staring at the ceiling close at hand, thinking about the information he’d collected.
The first abnormality was that help message from Ji Chuyao.
Si Chen received the message in Baidi City, then drove to Jiangchuan; then from Jiangchuan to the Space Fold. He spent almost 9 days on the road.
According to the flow of time ratio, 1 day outside was 5 years inside. It was about 45 years ago in the virtual world that he received that request for help.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts. This was about the time Ji Chuyao failed to break through the 13th level of the Clearance Plan.
At that time, the whole world was in its second cycle, and the Turing Clearance Plan was in full swing.
When Si Chen entered the Space Fold, he’d seen people fallen to the ground by the road, thin metal wires connected to the backs of their heads. That was probably what Zhao Zixin called the “brain-computer” interface.
Some were still breathing, while others weren’t. It was proof that this Space Fold was capable of killing people.
And what the robot teacher said before it left….All these things kept running round and round in Si Chen’s mind.
The Carolians were physically too weak. Si Chen’s own body was brimming with energy, enough to last him three days and three nights. And yet, now, close to midnight, he was starting to feel sleepy.
Fortunately, his willpower has always been good. After noticing the drowsiness, he simply sat up and fought against it.
It was particularly difficult during the wee hours, at around 3 to 4am. Si Chen got off the bed and walked around the small dormitory.
His brain had given up thinking about the current puzzle and he simply began to automatically solve math problems in his head.
Back when Si Chen was a middle school in poor health, he would often experience unbearable pain at night and be unable to sleep. Anxious about wasting time, he developed the skill of solving math problems in his mind using short-term memory.
Truth be told, this skill hadn’t been very useful in improving his academic performance, but it did successfully alleviate Si Chen’s anxiety.
Whenever he felt unwell, he would also use this method to distract himself.
This method was still effective. Gradually, he was able to totally ignore his sleepiness and after a period of time, Si Chen’s brain became more and more awake.
Si Chen lowered his head and looked at the time, 6:57.
Last night, Turing hadn’t come.
The whites of Si Chen’s eyes were bloodshot from staying up late. His eyes looked somewhat reddish.
7 o’clock was the usual time when the dorm room doors open. But today, the door didn’t budge.
An audio announcement came from Si Chen’s watch. “Everyone, please be patient. The dormitory supervisor is conducting a routine inspection of the dormitory. Today, everyone is excused from tardiness.”
There were a total of 6 dormitory supervisors on each floor. They each departed from different offices and were equipped with a weapon and containment bag.
They had on composed expressions and faithfully carried out the instructions given them by the main system: clean up all high-dimensional creatures.
The dormitory supervisor would open the door to a dorm room using a key card. Inside would be a normal Carolian. Before the Carolian even had time to register anything but surprise, the dorm supervisor would have already closed the door again.
Off it went to the next room to repeat the same sequence of actions.
A few minutes later, the dorm supervisor No. 1 encountered the first abnormal room.
The moment it opened the door, the smell of blood hit its sensors. The entire room was like a slaughterhouse, with internal organs scattered on the ground, blood smeared all over the room.
It seemed that this high-dimensional creature was a bit picky about its food.
The black monster sprang out in an instant. But the laser guns in the corridor were already ready to go.
The lasers made an inescapable net and this high-dimensional creature was cut into pile of fine shreds.
The cleaner immediately stepped forward and used a vacuum cleaner to suck the garbage into the sealed storage box it carried in its abdominal cavity.
This dorm room was sealed. The dorm supervisor will clean it up after the inspection.
The door was closed once again. It was as if nothing had happened.
Devoid of emotions, unable to dream and unaffected by any horrific scene — these were the Machines’ greatest advantages in their fight against Planet Carol’s supernatural invasion.
They were quickly able to dispose even these unbodied high-dimensional creatures.
For example, dorm supervisor No. 2 heard singing coming from the 37th room.
This sound was delicate and ethereal, enough to affect anyone’s mind.
And thus, dorm supervisor No. 2 sealed the door immediately and transmitted the data back to the main system.
The main system had the authority to activate emergency measures. The movement mechanisms of this room were permanently destroyed. No one would ever open this room again.
The dorm rooms themselves were large storage boxes.
There were also some special circumstances. Some rooms seemed fine but the occupants were missing and peculiar items would be found inside instead. For example, mirrors, dolls that looked exactly like the missing Carolians and wardrobes that kept making noises.
In these cases, the dorm supervisor would taken the items and throw them directly out the building, through the openings at end of the corridors.
The walls at the end of the corridors could be opened. Far below would be billowing black mist.
They sent them back from whence they came.
…
…
The mechanical dorm supervisors worked very efficiently. It only took half an hour to clear all the floors, hundreds of rooms.
At 7:30, Si Chen was about to fall asleep as he leaned against the wall, when his watch finally sounded a reminder.
“The door is about to open, please leave the dormitory within 3 minutes.”
Si Chen walked out of room and made his way to the train.
He walked slowly and stayed at the end of the line. He was the last one to get on the train but there were still a lot of lunch boxes reamining in the dining car by the entrance.
After entering the carriage, Si Chen’s face turned a little ugly.
He couldn’t see Zhao Zixin.
He walked towards the conductor and said directly, “I want to know where the person with citizen number *** is.”
Under normal circumstances, Machines would not refuse a request from a human.
The conductor replied, “He is no longer here. Sir.”
Si Chen’s expression was stunned. “What do you mean…?”
“High-dimensional invasion.”
Si Chen still remembered Zhao Zixin’s nostalgic and happy look when talking about his daughter.
Just a few more days and they could have made it out.
Si Chen was about to blurt out that Zhao Zixin couldn’t have dreamt anything but when the words reached his mouth, he steadied himself and changed his words, “Why is he not here?”
The conductor replied sternly, “The person living in the room next to his dreamt that the room next door was haunted.”
Breakfast was saucy noodles. The ratio of minced pork to noodles is about 3:7. Every bite was saucy and meaty. The taste was very delicious.
Only that, because he’d stayed up all night, Si Chen felt like throwing up.
If it had only been a guess before, now, Si Chen was certain that Turing, who had been conversing with him every night, had actually already taken the form of a “Nightmare”.
Si Chen thought back to what Turing had said.
-Come or don’t, either is fine.
-This place contains data that I abandoned, creating a “Level 3 world”.
-I’ve already gotten control of the authority here. Nothing can hurt you.
-Turn off the power supply here and you can leave the Level 3 world.
-When the energy is exhausted, you can leave the Level 3 world.
“What Turing said before I entered the Space Fold, should be a bit more trustworthy. He said he could handle it himself…”
“But after I entered the Space Fold, is the ‘Turing’ I’ve been seeing the in-instance Turing or the out-instance Turing? If the first cycle was what actually happened to Planet Carol then what was the second cycle? Why did Turing launch the ‘Turing Clearance Plan’? He must know that no one would pass. The Clearing Plan was simply to watch the simulated Carolians die.”
The in-instance Turing pertained to the “Turing” simulated by the abandoned data found in the Space Fold. After all, within this data, Turing existed.
Historically, Turing worked hard to protect the Carolian, but was stabbed in the back by very people he was protecting.
The abandoned data, through repeated cycles, formed a “Turing” that was hostile to the Carolians.
The out-instance Turing was the “Turing” that Si Chen had seen and come into contact with before.
Before, Si Chen believed them to be the same person. But now, he suddenly realized something was wrong.
Turing didn’t seem like someone who could enact that sort of ‘Clearance Plan’.
Zeus, though, was someone who could have.
“But if he is an in-instance Turing, then how is it had he recognizes me?”
Si Chen thought of a possibility and the chopsticks he was holding slowly slipped from his grasp.
“Ji Chuyao…?”
Artificial intelligence can learn on its own.
If the fake Turing had absorbed Ji Chuyao’s memory, not only did it make sense that the in-instance Turing knew him, this entire matter would also make sense.
“No, that’s wrong. Ji Chuyao doesn’t know that he’s Turing, let alone about Turing’s deal with the House of the Mind.”
“……A hybrid?”
Si Chen endured his sleepiness and came to a decision: “Better to ask him directly tonight.”
After all, even if this Turing was an electronic ghost from the underworld, it was still a ghost that would never harm him.
I’ll admit I needed to backtrack a few chapters to understand where this mystery was going.
Thanks for the chapter!!
damn my head 🤣
I mean, he’s still believe in his boyfriend
Thank you for your translation 💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜
So glad for the translator’s notes!