Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

by <unknown>

  Professor Mo Xuan's research on artificial intelligence had never been a secret. The 'old grandpas', educational artificial intelligences who played with the little kids in the Tinder Base, were fully open to the public.

  Other than Professor Mo Xuan, a lot of specialists of crystal processors in the federation had been working on artificial intelligence. The development center of the game 'Civilization' under Professor Xie Wufeng's lead was also devising more vivid and life-like artificial intelligence in the enormous and sophisticated DLCs to be at the service of the players.

  'Xiao Ming' and 'Wen Wen', the game assistants, were their masterpieces but far from their limits. The 'Acolytes' in the game of the latest generation, with their unique algorithms, could already completely simulate the actions and speech of humans to some extent. It was barely possible to distinguish them from real persons. However, it was still within the bounds of the law.

  In the meantime, it was a completely different case for the Hyper Spirits, which were the super artificial intelligence with databases ten thousand times more enormous than common artificial intelligence and brand-new algorithms and logic provided by the extraterrestrial devils, allowing them to be highly perceptive and destructive.

  Professor Mo Xuan had crafted nineteen Hyper Spirits in total. Other than the two failed experimental subjects, the remaining seventeen were used to invade the important nodes of the Grand-Unified Spiritual Nexus and to disrupt and corrupt the most critical mainframe crystal processors. They were the key to the whole scheme.

  Although the extraterrestrial devils' scheme had failed, it was still necessary to find out the common artificial intelligence, the Deviant Spirits; the evolved, super artificial intelligence, the Hyper Spirits; and also the laboratories where the Hyper Spirits were generated.

  In that regard, the experimental data that Professor Mo Xuan offered to Li Yao in his final repentance before his death proved to be of tremendous help.

  With the detailed experimental logs and all kinds of control passcodes, the investigation team was able to follow the traces. After three months, the super crystal processor where the 'Hyper Spirits' were fertilized at the beginning was finally found, making it possible to lock onto the features of the core data of all the 'Hyper Spirits' so that there would be a way to contain them.

  Today was the day when the core database of the last 'Hyper Spirit' was retrieved. Its fundamental operation logic had been reset, and the user with the highest permission was changed from Professor Mo Xuan to the investigation group.

  "This is the No. 14 Hyper Spirit, code name 'Moonlight Bringer'."

  Professor Xie Wufeng had already connected his mini crystal processor to the super crystal processor where the Hyper Spirit was running, allowing him to retrieve part of the permissions and interfaces remotely. He typed quickly on the mini crystal processor for a while, and a stream of blue brilliance immediately formed a woman wearing an indifferent expression and a light gauze on his wrist.

  "To report to the lords in parliament, we have revised its interface so that it can understand most of the illegal orders and respond in a way that even outsiders of the trade can comprehend. For example—"

  Professor Xie Wufeng paused for a moment and asked, "Moonlight Bringer, what was your last mission?"

  The shadow of woman in light gauze replied casually without any hesitation, "My mission was to invade the mainframe crystal processor of the 'Space Jump Coordinate Center' in Hundred Flowers City to control all the sailing routes for space jump that passed near Hundred Flowers City, thereby navigating the starships that were transferring to the Heaven's Origin Sector through Hundred Flowers City to a pair of nonexistent coordinates."

  While speaking, the gauze on her body suddenly turned into layers of thin mist, from which oceanic data, formulas, and runes surfaced. They were all the specific methods to hack and control crystal processors.

  The formulas fell quickly at a speed of more than five hundreds lines per second. Despite Li Yao's dynamic visual abilities, he felt his head going dizzy. He asked in amazement, "Controlling the transportation hub of the entire federation and forcing all the starships to listen to its commander? Is it really possible?"

  "By the preliminary analysis of our experts, it is indeed possible," Professor Xie Wufeng replied. "The extraterrestrial devil that resided inside Professor Mo Xuan's body was very likely born in the Star Ocean Imperium's era. You too know that the Star Ocean Imperium was the peak of the civilization of mankind. A lot of technology of the Star Ocean Imperium directly originated from the legendary 'Book of Revelations'. They were the real primeval technology!

  "The extraterrestrial devil that once got in touch with such technology—or rather, that was created for sabotaging such technology—had a more profound understanding in the fields of artificial intelligence, machine sabotage and control, cyberspace infiltration and defense, and so on.

  "The seventeen Hyper Spirits each had a database as vast as an ocean, a most amazing architecture, and the most unbelievable algorithms. Truth be told, despite the wisdom of all our specialists here, the mysteries have not been fully cracked even after three months.

  "However, once we fully grasp their mysteries, we will certainly be able to improve the level of crystal processors and the Spiritual Nexus in the federation for a hundred years. I have no doubt about that."

  "Indeed."

  After studying the tremendous experimental logs left by Professor Mo Xuan, Li Yao understood it very well. He dared not underestimate the horror of the extraterrestrial devils at all.

  "How immaculate…"

  Looking at 'Moonlight Bringer', which was obscure when covered in the smoke of infinite data, Li Yao could not help but ask, "Professor Xie, you are a specialist in virtual life. In your opinion, can such a powerful 'Hyper Spirit' be considered a virtual life?"

  "There's still a long way to go," Professor Xie Wufeng replied. "It is true that the Hyper Spirit's abilities in computation, analysis, and deduction far exceed normal humans, but that is not the difference that marks humans from nonhumans. At best, it can be called a 'super artificial intelligence', not a real virtual life. As for the disparity between the two concepts, you will understand it better if I ask it a few very simple questions.

  "Moonlight Bringer, tell me everything about the sailing routes near the home planet of the Heaven's Origin Sector. Everything."

  Without any hesitation, almost the moment Xie Wufeng finished the last syllable, the mist around Moonlight Bringer turned into brand-new information streams and started to flash at a super high frequency again.

  Professor Xie Wufeng did not bother to read it at all. He asked the Hyper Spirit about the features of a few planets, the best sailing routes among them, and the energy consumption of the starships, which would make the best specialist in the field consider for a moment before they could reply. But Moonlight Bringer gave the most perfect answers in the blink of an eye.

  "Very good." Professor Xie Wufeng nodded in great satisfaction. Then he said, "Now, tell me the name of your favorite singer."

  The information streams that had been running like a flood a moment ago came to a stop abruptly.

  Moonlight Bringer looked at Professor Xie Wufeng in a daze. Its lifeless eyes were even more unresponsive than before. After it was stuck for a long time, tremendous data flowed out again and glittered.

  They were singers and their albums, ordered by download frequency, in the last ten, fifty, and a hundred years. The most subtle algorithms had also been adopted to calculate the 'favorite' singer for the people of different areas, different professions, and different ages. Detailed introductions to the singers and the valuable remarks on their songs were attached, too. It was yet another ocean of data.

  "No, no, no," Professor Xie Wufeng said, "I am not asking who the favorite singer of the people in the federation is. I'm asking who your favorite singer is. You do not need to give me so much information. One simple name is enough. One name!"

 
; The information streams in front of Moonlight Bringer froze again. It was silent for a long time as if it were caught in an infinite loop.

  "If you are not a fan of songs, that's fine," Professor Xie Wufeng said. "You only need to tell me that 'you' do not like music or any singer. It will count as an answer, too."

  Moonlight Bringer looked at him. The data was still frozen without offering any answer.

  "Look." Professor Xie Wufeng turned around to speak to Li Yao and Long Yangjun. "It is capable of illustrating the best sailing route to jump among seven planets in a row, yet it cannot give the name of its favorite singer. It is not human. It does not have the concept of 'ego', much less the feelings of 'fondness', 'love', and 'hate' that are derived from 'ego'.

  "At best, it is just a smartly-designed tool. It does not possess the ability to evolve into a 'virtual intelligent life'. Only cells can evolve into humans. Rocks certainly can't, however big and hard they are."

  Looking at Moonlight Bringer, Li Yao was suddenly caught in mixed feelings that he could not explain. There was no telling whether it was relief or regret. Taking a long breath, he said, "It seems that there's a long way to go before we can create real virtual life, isn't there?"

  "It's more than a long way. I'm suspecting that the journey will be endless." Professor Xie Wufeng smiled bitterly. "At the very least, we now know that even the extraterrestrial devils that resided inside Professor Mo Xuan and Lu Qingchen were incapable of creating real virtual life, which means that it will only be more difficult for us to accomplish the task."

  Li Yao was slightly dazed. "What do you mean?"

  Professor Xie Wufeng opened his hands and said, "Isn't it a very simple logic? If your virtual life has similar definitions to us, it will certainly boast a soul with feelings and emotions, won't it?"

  Li Yao frowned. It was certainly a big question whether or not intelligent lives were certain to have soul waves and emotional fluctuations.

  However, by the standard of human beings, if they were to create a virtual life as a 'child civilization', such qualities should be a necessary part.

  "The extraterrestrial devils feed on the waves of soul and feelings," Professor Xie Wufeng explained. "If the extraterrestrial devils could create a virtual life that has a soul and all kinds of emotions, why would they bother asking for trouble from human beings? They can totally create a virtual life and hide in a certain virtual space where they can feed on the virtual life in a self-sufficient way. Wouldn't all their problems be resolved? Why would they have to fight the Pangu Civilization and the civilization of mankind if so?"

  Li Yao blinked quickly and realized that it did make sense.

  Professor Xie Wufeng smiled. "Forget it. We will not get anywhere even if we keep on talking about such groundless issues for decades. I invited you here today not exactly because of the No. 14 Hyper Spirit 'Moonlight Bringer'. There are still the two…"

  Brilliance suddenly beamed out of Li Yao's eyes as he interrupted the professor. "Are you referring to the two 'experimental subjects' that were thrown into the Virtual Spirits Sector after failure?"

  Chapter 1854: The Dying Spirits Sector |

  "Yes," Professor Xie Wufeng said. "According to the records of Professor Mo Xuan's experiment logs and the confessions of the specialists of crystal processors and the Spiritual Nexus, the two Hyper Spirits code named 'No. 17' and 'No. 18' were the products of failed experiments. Their core databases had long collapsed, and their operational logics were quite chaotic. In the end, Professor Mo Xuan abandoned them and sealed them in the Virtual Spirits Sector.

  "However, as you have seen, the Hyper Spirits are all the most terrifying artificial intelligences. A single 'Moonlight Bringer' is capable enough of seriously disrupting if not completely controlling the transportation hub of the entire federation.

  "Even if 'No. 17' and 'No. 18' are only broken clips of glyphs and code right now, should they fall into the hands of malicious parties, there could still be dire consequences.

  "Therefore, we must find them and eradicate them completely!"

  Li Yao nodded cautiously. "Indeed, we must. However, I'm confused about one thing. Judging from their code names, 'No. 17' and 'No. 18' must've been the Hyper Spirits that were developed at the end. Before them, sixteen Hyper Spirits were produced successfully, including a Hyper Spirit as complicated and powerful as 'Moonlight Bringer'.

  "Logically, Professor Mo Xuan had accumulated abundant experience in modification of the Hyper Spirits. Also, he had the enhancement of the extraterrestrial devils. Chances were low that he could make a mistake. Why did he experience two failures in a row?

  "Professor Mo Xuan did not mention the problem much in his experiment logs. In the rare cases where he did bring up No. 17 and No. 18, he never cared to give more details. It seemed that he was quite baffled about the outcome himself. Over the past few days, you have cracked and analyzed all the crystal processors in Deep Blue Super Brain Hospital, and you interrogated so many Spiriters. Did you find any leads?"

  "We may be onto something now," Professor Xie Wufeng said. "According to the confessions of the specialists involved, it was mostly because Professor Mo Xuan was too ambitious. After the success of the first sixteen Hyper Spirits, his confidence expanded crazily and prompted him to produce an ultimate version that was stronger than all the 'Hyper Spirits'.

  "Despite the weird life form of Professor Mo Xuan as a star spirit and the abilities of the extraterrestrial devils, the techniques that they intended to endow to the ultimate Hyper Spirit far exceeded their limits.

  "They seemed to have tried almost ten thousand radical algorithms and revolutionary operational logics on No. 17 and No. 18. All of them were the most cutting-edge virtual technology. However, every person has their limits, and even the extraterrestrial devils are not omnipotent. Because of the overwhelming untested new technology, the failures were unavoidable.

  "After the two consecutive failures, they realized this point themselves. Therefore, the No. 19 Hyper Spirit was produced dutifully based on regular algorithms and operational logic. No. 17 and No. 18 were absolutely unique.

  "I'm afraid that Professor Mo Xuan sealed them in the Virtual Spirits Sector instead of completely destroying them for the same reason. He probably intended to continue the studies of the two ultimate Hyper Spirits after he seized absolute power and gathered all the specialists and resources of the whole federation."

  Li Yao and Long Yangjun looked at each other and could not help but ask, "What kind of missions were No. 17 and No. 18 designed for that could only be supported by the techniques that were even unrealizable for the extraterrestrial devils?"

  "The game 'Civilization'." Professor Xie Wufeng took a deep breath and said, "The mission for No. 17 and No. 18 was to control every platform, every DLC, and every player of 'Civilization' instantly.

  "If the mission succeeded, they would be able to seal all the players dwelling in the worlds of 'Civilization' inside the immersive game cabins forever. Without the permission of them or the extraterrestrial devils, the players would never be able to return to reality."

  Li Yao was greatly alarmed. He could not help but feel that his blood was freezing.

  'Civilization' was the greatest game platform in the federation. No. In fact, it had far exceeded the category of 'game'. It was more like a virtual platform of communication that included the entire federation. Entertainment, socialization, work, and even the functions of the government could not have been done without the platform.

  According to the statistics, more than ten billion people were online in Civilization every second. More than ninety percent of the population logged into the child platforms that derived from the platform on a daily basis. Almost a hundred percent of the population logged into Civilization at least once a week!

  If the extraterrestrial devils had indeed controlled the game 'Civilization' with 'No. 17' and 'No. 18', the entire federation would essentially be under their control!

  Howev
er…

  "How is it possible?" Pondering for a moment, Li Yao shook his head quickly. "The computational load is too heavy. Also, it involves the mysteries at the deepest part of human souls. The mission is more difficult than counting the stars in the sky!"

  "It is indeed practically impossible," Professor Xie Wufeng remarked. "That was why the two experiments both failed. Later, even the Professor Mo Xuan possessed by the extraterrestrial devil realized that it was a complete waste of time and resources and put the project on hold.

  "Based on the experiment data that we collected, No. 17 and No. 18 had only one percent of the virtual pieces left after collapse. That being said, it is still necessary to locate them, partly to prevent them from falling into the hands of ambitious schemers and partly because the central glyphs and the fundamental operational logic would be helpful for us to analyze other Hyper Spirits."

  Li Yao thought for a moment and asked, "Does it mean that we have to enter the Virtual Spirits Sector?"

  "Regarding the super crystal processors that were involved in the 'Virtual Spirits Sector Project', the specialists have a lot of ways to unravel the deep mysteries in them," Professor Xie Wufeng said. "However, it is indeed the most time-saving and most straightforward way to have someone check the collapsed Virtual Spirits Sector first."

  Li Yao frowned. "Won't it be dangerous?"

  Professor Mo Xuan, Lu Qingchen, and even Su Changfa in the beginning were all involved in the violent virtual turbulence during the collapse of the Virtual Spirits Sector. Their souls were heavily wounded. Some of them were dead, and some were corrupted.

  Li Yao did not want such a tragedy to happen again.

  Wei Qingqing smiled. "Rest assured. Although the Virtual Spirits Sector is a broken mess right now, it is still rather stable. As long as we do not modify the data on a large scale, there shouldn't be a second collapse."

  "Of course, it can be dangerous," Professor Xie Wufeng said. "That is why we are hoping that you and Fellow Cultivator Long can lead us to inspect the Virtual Spirits Sector together. Both of you are super experts close to the Divinity Transformation Stage, and you demonstrated enormous soul power in the fierce fights against the extraterrestrial devils. If you come with us, even if we are trapped in the Virtual Spirits Sector, there should be a way for us to break the illusion and return to reality instead of panicking, right?"