by N. Heller
As if he'd heard the most hilarious joke in the world, the teenager sneered coldly. "The reason I did not attack you is that I know you're completely out of my league. If I could, what I wouldn't give to see you rot and die in the most gruesome way. Just as I did to Yunqian."
The dark figure sighed again. "I'm just helping you shed your burden and clearing your path. You will understand in the future."
"What the hell do you want from me?!" Yun screamed out his question.
The dark figure did not reply. He crouched down and slung an object toward the teenager's feet.
With the help of the moonlight, he saw the real face of the object. Yun was startled. He tore his gaze away from the object on the floor and asked tentatively, "What do you mean by this?"
"Nothing. As I said, I'm here to offer you my help." The dark figure giggled. "I'll leave that in your hands. I know you might want to use it to attack me right away, but I advise you not to. Anyway, it's all yours now. Use it to your heart's content."
Holding the palm-sized tablet in his palm, the teenager could not come to terms with the fact that the man had given it to him with good grace. He even doubted if the thing in his hand was a replica. When he finally came back to his senses, the dark figure was already gone.
Gritting his teeth, the teenager glanced around, and his fingers danced gracefully on the tablet. Then, he stopped and waited with bated breath. However, a few minutes passed, yet nothing happened. The governor's mansion remained silent, and only the yelling from the square could be heard. The teenager remained impassive at his failed attempt, as he'd already anticipated that the man would have something up his sleeve.
He tightened his lower jaw and straightened his back.
Standing at the sideline, Lin Sanjiu quietly looked on as Yun walked step by step onto the balcony.
The moonlight drew a long shadow of the lonely teenager on the white arctic tile, which stretched all the way into the room and merged with the darkness inside. He was thin, pale, and frail-looking, but his face was full of determination and coldness. The yelling outside suddenly stopped. Nobody seemed to expect Yun to show himself so readily. They remained stunned for a few seconds until the impasse was broken and the silence shattered when a woman shouted, "Where is Mr. President? Bring us Mr. President!"
The momentary pause in the square turned to chaos. The masses exploded into a conniption, and for a moment, the air was filled with yelling, crying, cursing, sobbing, and all sorts of other noises. The scene was chaotic, anarchy ruling.
"Let us see Mr. President!" A voice slashed across all other sounds. More and more people joined that sound to press the teenager. "Let us see our president! We want to know how he is now!"
"How dare you show yourself up there! How dare you stand where he stood! Tell us! Did you do something?" someone in the corner near the balcony exclaimed at the top of his lungs, and then a black shadow flew up. A shoe grazed past the teenager's cheek and hit the door to the balcony with a loud thud, startling Lin Sanjiu.
Yun smoothened his face into a nonchalant expression. In the past, this balcony was the place where the mayor or the higher echelon of Mistral held all kinds of ceremonies, thus the public address system was always in standby mode. Yun looked left and right a few times before setting his eyes on a corner of the balcony.
"You all seem to hold Yunqian in high esteem."
The words the teenager said spread across the square, silencing the crowd. Their cries faded away, leaving only some murmuring.
"Fair enough. I understand why you all would think that." Yun's faint voice was amplified through the clip-on microphone that he nipped in between his fingers. He nestled in a chair near the corner, his legs on the bal.u.s.trade. He sounded as if he was talking to himself.
"I know all of you have tasted despair, and none of you wish to go back to those days after having seen the light. Under Yunqian's guidance, Sector 9 has gotten better and better. You no longer have to do anything. The AI get everything done and bring it to you. Just like the good old days."
"Yeah, so what?" a voice raised amongst the crowd. "This is all thanks to Mr. President!"
"Have all of you already forgotten how the Golden Age came to an end?"
"Mr. President is different! He is one of us!"
"Such loyalty." Yun scoffed, not sparing an eye to the crowd below. "I'm touched, truly. Unfortunately, I killed him three hours ago. Well, technically, he is not dead yet, but I guess it should be not too far from that."
The moment the sentence escaped Yun's lips, the clamor that burst forth from the square almost flipped Lin Sanjiu away. She did not know why Yun would go so far as to antagonize the people. Without thinking twice, she rushed out to the balcony, wanting to protect the teenager and bring him back to the room before the people could harm him. However, the moment the moonlight fell on her, she once again realized that she could no longer interact with the world.
"Calm down, people. Take a look at what is in my hand."
The teenager stood up and waved the tablet in his hand. He did not bat an eye at the people who were climbing up the bal.u.s.trade, merely inspecting his fingers. A bored expression graced his face.
The enraged crowd was stunned.
"That… Isn't that…"
"A controller." The teenager threw himself back on the chair as if standing up tired him out. "This is the controller for Sector 9's defense system and Artificial Intelligence system."
As his voice faded into the corner of the square, all sound left, and the crowd immediately turned quiet.
Thud, thud, thud, thud. A few of the mob members fell from the bal.u.s.trade to the ground.
"Sector 9 is my home, and you all watched me grow up. I'm not an unreasonable person, so I'll now propose two options for you all. First, let me be the next president of Mistral. Everything will stay the same, but nobody shall ever mention the name Yunqian. Whoever is bold enough to break this rule, I'll throw him out and let the beasts maul him to death. Oh, there's one more condition. Since he is still alive, I want you all to parade him through the streets to expose him before the public. And when I say public, I mean every single citizen in Sector 9 has to see with their own eyes what has become of him."
Nobody spoke in the square. It was so quiet that even a drop of a needle could be heard.
"Now, here is the second option — a life for a life. Tonight, I'll burn myself to atone for the sin I have committed..." Then the teenager stopped speaking. Everybody held their breath and waited, as they knew that he hadn't finished his sentence yet.
"... along with this controller. Just next to your beloved Mr. President."
Lin Sanjiu closed her eyes, turned around, and went into the room.
She did not need to observe this farce any further since she knew what would happen next. She went to the stairwell and threw herself on the staircase.
Initially, Lin Sanjiu thought she would feel pity for them. However, after she'd settled down, she realized that her heart had nothing and her brain was blank. She sat on the staircase, waiting numbly for the inevitable to happen since everything she was experiencing now was merely a fragment of a memory the Veda extracted from Puppeteer's mind.
Somehow, images of Xueqin and the girls in the Garden of Eden began to enter her mind. She stared at those images like watching a trotting horse lamp. After that, the photos bobbed out and turned into those of Rena and Reno. She kept watching and watching and watching until the retrospection completed with the smile of Nüwa.
The noises outside flooded into the mansion like tidal waves washing up the shore. Yun did not speak much, but every time he said something, the clamor would get louder.
She rested her chin on her palm and waited. Time ticked by slowly.
"Although the people here make up less than half of the population of Sector 9, I'll take it as a yes. Then… following the old rules, what should you guys say now?"
A cacophony of noise rang out from outside. There was such a lack of di
ssonance that nobody was able to tell what they were chanting.
"What? I cannot hear you. Repeat yourselves."
Following this, all the noise slowly and gradually converged and formed into a bright and resonant sound. Thousands of people shouted in chorus, their voices so high it tore through the air and spread far into the sky. "Hail the new president. May the prayers of God be with you."
The teenager let out a sigh and shut off the microphone.
"It's the same congratulatory message as when we're fighting the Vindice. Can't they be a bit more creative?" He spoke to himself. Tapping, a few times on the tablet, he then went into the mansion.
There were shouts of horror and fear as dazzling laser beams filled the air. Lin Sanjiu shut her eyelids to protect her eyes from the blinding light. Amidst the chaos, Lin Sanjiu could only see the figure of the teenager silhouetted against the light as he walked towards her. The glaring white light lasted for five minutes, and when it finally died down, silence prevailed all over.
The governor's mansion had blacked out.
All of Sector 9 had plunged into darkness.
'Perhaps the laser destroyed the electric grid as well…' Lin Sanjiu thought to herself while sitting in the dark.
Tonight, Yun died, but Puppeteer survived.
Puppeteer's footfalls stopped not far away. Then he smacked his hand hard on the handrail as he slopped down onto the floor. Lin Sanjiu listened to the noise behind her and said softly, "I know you can't hear me… But I still want to say this.
"I think I now know why you refuse to let go of the grand prize. What I'm going to tell you is that you don't need the grand prize. This is because I know the man you want to find.
"His name is Gong Daoyi.
"I can help you… I'll do everything to help you find him…"
But nothing happened; there was no response from behind her. She was merely a watcher, a ghost in this world. Thus, there was no way Puppeteer could hear what she had said.
When she thought about this, she suddenly raised her head. Little by little, she turned her head to look over her shoulder.
Her gaze met with the teenager's expressionless face. There was an arm inside her c.h.e.s.t.
There was no blood, and she felt no pain. Her surroundings began to bend out of shape and fall apart. Everything was turning into blocks of color, and the teenager was losing his human form as well. It wasn't long before the entire world shattered.
The world coded by the Veda had collapsed; all the matters in that world vanished. When Lin Sanjiu came back to her senses, she found herself floating in a void.
Countless white threads emanated from her body, stretching far into the void. Aside from the beam that looked like silk, she could not see anything, not even her body.
"This is… the Data Stream Library?" she muttered in her heart. "I.. I'm back?"
"Impressive, I must say." A thought in the form of words bumped into her mind. "In the face of a crisis-laden situation, your barrier is virtually indestructible. It was absolutely out of our expectation that a replay of someone's memories would, in the end, help us get what we wanted. Your humanity, for better or worse, is a huge burden. We can get rid of it for you, but of course, it's up to you to decide."
"Puppeteer… He…"
"The two Puppeteers you interacted with after you came out of the convenience store were created by us through coding."
Lin Sanjiu was stunned for a moment before understanding dawned upon her.
"You say you can help me delete my humanity?"
"Affirmative. Oh, by the way, thank you for your information. We've already gotten what we needed."
Chapter 591 - Which Paths Would You Choose?
"No. I don't want to remove my humanity, but what—what the hell is happening?"
A thought kept coming back no matter how many times Lin Sanjiu shoved it away. Her mind was a mess.
'Puppeteer never showed up in Sector 9 after he turned into a package of potato ch.i.p.s? Then, does he know that he has relived his memories?'
"Where is Puppeteer? Is he still alive?" Lin Sanjiu asked. "What do you want from us?"
However, this time, she received no response from her counterpart.
Lin Sanjiu couldn't help but ask again, but her question fell on deaf ears. It was as if the Veda that had been talking to her had already left.
Her brain was in total disarray. Peering at the shimmering white silk that filled the void in front of her blankly, she sank into her anxiety.
'Have the Veda gotten all my information?'
In other words, Lin Sanjiu was an open book for the Veda. They knew every one of her attacks and body parameters. They could effortlessly add or delete her abilities. With all their information, they could even recreate another Lin Sanjiu that looked exactly like her inside out.
She immediately killed those thoughts, as she couldn't be sure whether she could accept the consequences if she kept thinking down that line.
The Veda had gotten her information, but they chose to spare her life. Why?
Although she seemed to be in an endless void, Lin Sanjiu could not travel far. She took a tentative step forward, yet she was immediately pulled back by the white silk closest to her. She looked at the other directions, but it was the same.
"Sorry for the wait. I'm back."
The line came into her brain all of a sudden, shocking her. She still couldn't get used to this kind of communication method. It was as if somebody had bypassed her shell and physically touched her soul.
"You don't have a soul," the Veda said, "At least not when you're alive."
'They can read my thoughts?'
"Affirmative. One thing you may not fully understand yet is that you are now an open book to us. You're like a public swimming pool, accessible to everybody. All I need to do is take a look, and I can gain access to all the information your body holds. For example, do you not realize that we are now using the language that you did not know to communicate?"
Lin Sanjiu came to a halt, as she just realized this. The Veda did not need language as their communication tool anymore. They could just send their messages directly to the receiver's brain with clarity and accuracy that transcended the language.
"Where have you been? Why do you need our information?" Lin Sanjiu waited until her emotions settled down before shooting her questions.
"Why does humankind keep exploring outer space? The answer is the same." It seemed that the Veda had indeed completely obtained her information. Hence, it was getting better at using human activities as an elaboration for its explanation. "The more information we have from different dimensions, the more we know about the unknown dimension. It's understandable, right?"
'Dimension. Do they happen to know about the Dimensional Rift as well?'
"Oh, you mean that one. Yeah, from your memory, we can finally prove that the concept of multidirectional existence is real… But that is not important," the Veda answered the questions indifferently, "What's important is the choice you will make next."
"What, what do you mean by that? What choice?"
The Veda turned a deaf ear to her queries and replied with another question instead. "Can you see these white fibers? They are known as cords. They're our data storage, as well as our connection channel. All of the information we've collected, including our own, is kept in here."
'Including their own?'
"Affirmative, because fundamentally, we're data, too. That's why we can travel through them, treating them as some sort of transmission pathway. As long as there's a cord, we can transfer our data to our intended destination with speed beyond your imagination."
"Why are you telling me this?"
"We found out that deep in your mind, you treat us as some kind of extraterrestrial life. And your idea roots from the different technologies we possess, and the form and way we exist… am I right?"
'Are you not?'
"Now, think about it. As a race, how do we maintain our population and kee
p our species from going extinct?"
'So the Veda could—'
Something clicked in place in Lin Sanjiu's brain after a momentary stunned silence.
'Since they could basically create anything by coding, is there a possibility that they propagate in such a way as well?'
"Perhaps the things that concerned her are different, but so far, Soulsqn has only asked us this one question. I have already told her the answer, so I'll repeat it to you now. First thing first, the human reproductive process is a Daedalian process that's too hard to control, so it is not suitable for maintaining the numbers in our group. Secondly, we cannot create a sentient being through coding. The data mapping of every sentient creature is one of a kind, and no matter how meticulous we are in the coding process, the end-product would eventually end up as a defect. I can tell you very straightforwardly that among all of our research, this is the only project that we failed and made no progress at all. Maybe it's true that humanity is God's masterpiece, after all."
Lin Sanjiu listened to the Veda's explanation in a trance. She had even forgotten to ask about the wellbeing of Soulsqn.
"But that doesn't mean that our race will slowly die out as the souls do." The Veda kept calm, speaking at a slow and steady pace and offering a prompt answer. "Theoretically, we're immortal. However, accidents and things tend to happen when there are too many hours… Hence, we picked the third route to maintain our population."
Lin Sanjiu tensed up.
"Immigration."
Although she already had an inkling about it, she was still slightly shocked.
"Immigration?"
"Why do you sound so surprised? In the Data Stream Library, every visitor we have analyzed is nothing but a simple set of open data. With some modifications, we can get rid of the unnecessary parts of you and give you all the knowledge and ideal we have. Then, the moment you come back to your senses, you will have already become a full-fledged Veda.
"Exactly so. This is the choice you need to make: Are you willing to become a part of us?"
For a moment, all thoughts were bumped out of Lin Sanjiu's mind. The Veda could not get an answer from her in her current state, so it just waited quietly. Just as Lin Sanjiu's thought process slowly reconnected, she began to feel that the situation was a little bit too unreal and hard to believe.