Chapter 9: Chapter 81 – 90

Chapter 81 – The Ordinary World (4)

    James, Diego and Zhang Xun stood in a row, holding their chins and looking at the service robot Enoch in the corner.

    James looked unhappy, "I don't want something like this staring at us all day in the room and who knows if it’s being controlled by Eden?”

    Diego held the note Lucille had left them and looked at it left and right, "This note is indeed hers and the message did come from her Button. I think we'd better keep it for now. We can make it stand outside the door most of the time. "

    "That's too conspicuous, isn't it?" Zhang Xun frowned. He thought for a moment and said, "Let me check its programming, see if its network port is interfaced with Eden before making a decision."

    After speaking, he ordered Enoch, "Service robot Enoch, enter maintenance repair mode and call up the core module."

    A mechanical sound emanated from Enoch's body, followed by two beams of light projecting from its blue eyes, creating a myriad of dazzling operational interfaces in the air. Zhang Xun expertly clicked on a few, carefully reading the parameters. Every now and then his finger selected a parameter bar to make some changes.

    James and Diego didn't know anything about this and had to go and play cards to pass the time.

    Enoch was a Genesis model 554 robot, not the latest, but a typical model from the last five years. Most of the important parts were still in high performance and only the Ram had been replaced once. However, there were signs that its programming has been modified by professional mechanics or engineers; several firewalls had been added to block all messages sent by Eden and the robot was also prohibited from sending any content to Eden and the network interface had been kept switched off. All program updates were done manually.

    It seemed that Lucille was also averse to Eden's omniscient rule, probably because of her own involvement in the black market.

    In theory, a robot like this couldn’t connect to Eden, but after the incident with Adam, Zhang Xun knew that anything could happen, no matter how improbable it seemed. The safest way was to remove the wifi transmitter and receiver, so he turned to James and Diego and said, "Help me find a mechanic’s ...... or an engineer's tool kit."

    Diego complained, "Where would we find one?"

    "Usually when you buy a robot like this you get it as a gift, they must have it downstairs." Zhang Xun said as he pulled up Enoch's source code and read it with interest.

    Diego had no choice, so he had to go out and run his errands. James watched as Zhang Xun's entire body was flooded with the blue light projected by the robot and saw the bright stars in the mechanic's eyes and knew that Zhang Xun was far more interested in machines than in people.

    Maybe that's why he fell in love with Adam.

    Within moments Diego rushed back, slammed the door with a nervous look on his face and said urgently, "There’s loads of robot soldiers coming from the mountains and heading towards Hope Town. We have to leave now."

     Zhang Xun was startled and immediately ran to the window to look outside. A few blocks away he could see some oddly shaped, spider-like robots crawling rapidly past the buildings and a number of patrol robots were mixed in with the aircraft traffic.

    James said, "But didn't your friend tell us to wait here?"

    "It's too late. I suspect they’re the robot police that Adam sent to find us after Adam communicated with Eden. If they forcibly search this place we won’t be able to leave."

    James and Zhang Xun froze for a couple of seconds then immediately began to change into their clothes and disguises. Zhang Xun ordered, "Enoch, clear your data and history for the past forty-eight hours."

    The blue beam of light shooting out of Enoch's eyes immediately dissipated and the robot turned its head in a somewhat stiff manner to look at Zhang Xun who was busy putting on his wig, "Ms. Lucille has instructed that if an emergency arises, I would be responsible for taking you to plan B. May I ask if you are sure you want to delete my history and data?"

    "What Plan B?" Diego asked.

    "There is an aircraft in the underground parking garage, which can be unlocked and used in an emergency, but since it is not connected to Eden it will attract the attention of the robot police soon after taking off. But the aircraft has a complete anti-tracking system, so generally the chances of being caught in this situation are low."

    The three of them looked at each other and immediately decided to ignore the rest and implement plan B first.

    Enoch led them swiftly across the hallway and toward the escape stairs. These days there were very few parking lots underneath buildings and if there were, they were mostly used for temporary parking of aircraft and dual-purpose vehicles. After all, all cars were leased through Hermes, only some rich people would have their own private aircraft, everyone else would apply to Hermes when they needed to use a car.

    There were a few flying machines parked sporadically on the basement floor, apparently all rented during the day by guests. Enoch led them through the large car park and verified a long string of garbled codes that no human could possibly remember into a smart lock. As the gates rose upwards, the lights came on in a heavy burst of brightness, revealing a silver-grey flying machine that could probably hold four to six people, resting silently in the centre of the space. The smooth, clean lines of the aircraft’s transformable body were stitched together so tightly that there were hardly any joins to be seen.

    James couldn't help but let out a sigh of admiration and walked towards the dreamy "car" with wide eyes.

    The most commendable thing was that this aircraft had a cockpit in it, unlike ordinary aircraft that didn’t have a steering wheel at all.

    "This is Thor 720... Half-solar and half-electric drive, I saw one once when I was out hunting..." James had the intoxicated expression of looking at a peerless beauty on his face and touched the smooth, metal body tenderly.

    "Come on brother, you'll have plenty of opportunities to fly a flying machine in the future. Get your ass in there!" Diego urged, pushing James towards the door. After Enoch gave a concise command in the AI language, the fuselage of the craft began to diffuse a faint, pearl-coloured luminescence and the hatch swung upwards and opened. One by one, the three of them got inside and found a surprisingly ample amount of space inside.

    Zhang Xun purposely took the back seat and the seat belt immediately secured him to the seat automatically. James had wanted to take the pilot's seat, but to his surprise Enoch looked at him sincerely and solemnly and said, "Please let me pilot, I am more familiar with the controls of this aircraft."

    James defiantly tried to argue, only to be pushed into the passenger seat by Diego, "Well, now the question is, where are we going to go?"

    Enoch said, "According to Ms. Lucille's arrangements, we have to go to Kelowna and wait for her to meet us there. "

    As they were talking, there was suddenly the noisy sound of machinery moving not far away. James and Diego were all too familiar with that sound - robot soldiers.

    Clearly they were here to search.

    "Go, go, go!!!" Diego yelled.

    Enoch skillfully activated the craft's manual flight mode. Hearing only a low frequency buzzing vibration coming from beneath his feet, Zhang Xun felt the entire craft leave the ground and slowly turn around to face the two slowly approaching robot soldiers in spider form outside the main door. James exclaimed, "What are you doing?!"

    Enoch didn't say anything, just stepped on the accelerator suddenly.

    Zhang Xun felt like his head was almost torn off.

    With wind-like speed they swept between the two robot soldiers and headed straight for the direction of the exit. The craft climbed violently and the weightlessness frightened Zhang Xun into grabbing what he could with both hands - Diego.

    "Don’t grab me!" Diego complained.

    Zhang Xun rolled his eyes, "I'm not grabbing you..."

    "You still won't admit it? Indecent!" As Diego spoke, he pretended to be a little girl that only existed two hundred years ago.

    Enoch and James simultaneously glanced behind them in their reflectors and, whether it was an illusion or not, both seemed to be less than happy.

    The aircraft rushed out of the steep tunnel towards the nearest traffic track overhead. On the glass of the aircraft was all kinds of data; the red edges of the air track and the road signs and so on. Without being trained, you may be dazzled and unable to see the way forward. However, Enoch didn’t seem to need to read the data at all, he merged into the traffic flow familiarly, dodged left and right and entered another higher track in the air.

    But at this moment, a flying robot suddenly rushed towards them and a mechanical, emotionless female voice came from the amplifier of the aircraft, "Hello, your car is not logged with Eden, please stop for inspection."

    At this time, Enoch pressed a button to activate the anti-tracking system.

    The so-called anti-tracking system was a sudden burst of extremely thick smoke that disrupted the visual judgement of the vehicle's AI causing a brief period of traffic confusion, blocking the view of the robot and all police cars. Then the car jumped out of the traffic again like a wildebeest, flying through the gap between the two lanes of traffic at a frighteningly fast speed.

    Immediately behind him were at least five robot soldiers, including three flying robots and two giant spider robots. Enoch, as a service robot, apparently also had pilot functions included and was basically perfect at operating flying machines. Sometimes the gaps between the cars were too narrow to pass through, but he just happened to be able to slip through them, throwing off a giant spider and a flying robot just like that.

    The aircraft veered to the left, veered to the right, dove to the point of nearly hitting the ground and suddenly rose again. Zhang Xun's face turned blue, his stomach acid rose and he almost threw up, scaring Diego into clinging to the car door, "Hey! I'm warning you, if you throw up on me I'll beat you up!"

    "Please bear with me a little longer." Enoch said soothingly in an extremely soft voice.

    After breaking out of Hope Town, they carried on for at least another fifty kilometres before they lost Eden's minions who were in hot pursuit behind them. When the aircraft had just smoothed out a bit, Zhang Xun quickly pulled out a paper bag from under the seat and vomited in it.

    "Ah-Xun! Are you okay?" James turned his head to look at him worriedly.

    Zhang Xun's body trembled and then he realised that the person who called him was James, not Adam.

    He never knew that a simple name could make his heart beat faster in an instant, almost like a heart attack.

    "I'm fine, just a little motion sickness..." Zhang Xun said awkwardly.

    As soon as he finished speaking a small red candy wrapped in transparent cellophane was handed to him. Zhang Xun raised his head to find that Enoch was turning his head to look at him with a charming smile, "Plum candy can help relieve the symptoms of motion sickness."

    Zhang Xun hesitantly took it, "Uh...thank you."

    "Hey robot, eyes on the road!" Diego complained.

    Enoch politely said sorry, soared to the highest speed and rushed towards Kelowna at a speed like a thunderbolt. Two hours later, they landed on the roof of an abandoned factory. Zhang Xun's feet felt a little soft when they touched the ground. His first experience of a manually piloted aircraft was really not good...

    This was clearly the edge of the city of Kelowna, and from a distance one could see the glittering forest of tall buildings, more prosperous than Hope Town, sprawled out like a silver forest under the bright sun. And it was then that Diego finally got through to Lucille.

    Lucille's image was projected from Diego's Button, as if standing in front of them.

    Diego said, "When are you coming? I guess it won't take long for the robot police to come after you."

    Lucille had her arms crossed and scanned the three of them, pausing when she saw Enoch, but not saying much.

    "Something went wrong. The flight to New Zealand was blocked." Lucille sighed and continued, "The only refugee country I can send you to now is Feathered Serpent City."

 

Chapter 82 - The Ordinary World (5)

    "Feathered Serpent City?!" James immediately refused, "No, what's the difference between going there and staying in Lost Paradise? Besides, we had a run-in with them before, if we went there we would die!"

    Lucille shrugged her shoulders, her face indifferent "It's up to you, but recently Eden has been very strict with shipping and most of the routes to other refugee countries have been cut off. The connections I have here are only enough to send you to Feathered Serpent City."

    The situation had taken a sharp turn. Going to Feathered Serpent City would be to throw themselves into a trap, and if they didn't they wouldn't have the resources to break through Eden's blockade and cross the ocean to New Zealand on their own. They were trapped.

    Diego looked at Zhang Xun and James and said, "It doesn't seem like Feathered Serpent City has a good relationship with Lost Paradise, does it? I heard that Lost Paradise is still holding their hostages. Now that we've escaped from Paradise Lost, they might take us in."

    Zhang Xun's brows furrowed tightly and he kept weighing the options in his mind, "What if we stay in the ordinary world incognito? Diego, didn't you live outside for a year?"

    Diego rolled his eyes, "Trust me, you don't want to stay in the ordinary world as a man. It's not realistic to pretend to be a woman for the rest of your life. Unless you’re willing to undergo sex reassignment surgery." Diego said and shrugged his shoulders.

     Diego had a point ...... Although he hadn’t spent much time in the ordinary world, he had heard a lot about how men lived. Most men in the ordinary world were bred in factories and sold as pets, after all, women who chose to make offspring with their lovers rarely chose to make boys. Many of these men were ligated or simply castrated when they were young. Even those who managed to escape this fate did so with fear and trepidation, unable to show any signs of anger or disobedience, and no matter how unjustly they were treated, if their mistresses were even slightly dissatisfied with them, they could be sent to special institutions for "training" and "rehabilitation". Abandoned men were considered dirty and damaged, couldn't find work and could only rely on begging or stealing for a living, or they were caught by the robot police and taken to a unified "sanatorium" and locked up like garbage.

    Lucille seemed impatient so she waved her hand and said, "You guys think about it and get in touch with me. I’ll send someone to connect with you."

    After that, she cut off the connection.

    Three people and a robot stood on the cold roof and no one could speak. After a long while, only James scolded, "Fuck!"

    Enoch, who had been standing silently by, suddenly said in a soft, gentle voice, "I suggest we change transport and move as soon as possible. Eden's satellite surveillance system has probably already located us based on the craft, and the robot police will be here any minute."

     Without time to catch their breath, the group of four ditched the aircraft, slipped out the back door of the factory and snuck into the city. The city of Kelowna wasn’t very big and not very populated, but it was obviously much busier than Hope Town. The colourful projections and lights dyed the night into more brilliant colours than the day, but there were still dark and dilapidated corners under the bright surface.

    They dared not enter any inn for fear of attracting the attention of the robot police, so they could only find a place to spend the night near a shelter where the homeless gathered. A considerable portion of these homeless people were men, all of them were emaciated, wearing dark clothes that hadn’t been washed for many days and exuding a smell similar to urine.

    Zhang Xun, who had always liked cleanliness, looked at the corner that Diego had found—an abandoned mattress, and didn’t want to approach it no matter what. However, this mattress was borrowed after negotiating with the man next to it.

    Seeing that Zhang Xun's whole face was wrinkled, Diego sighed and said helplessly, "Young master, don't be so picky at a time like this."

    "..." Zhang Xun was just about to sit down when he was suddenly stopped by Enoch. The robot put its hand towards the mattress and a blue-violet light shot out from its palm, carefully illuminating every inch of the mattress. Then he turned to Zhang Xun and smiled, "I have disinfected the mattress with ultraviolet rays and the number of bacteria has been reduced by 70% compared to before."

    Zhang Xun laughed dryly, thinking that this service robot was really considerate and he should give some positive feedback, "You did a good job."

    However, he still needed to remove his wifi transceiver as soon as possible...

    At that moment James came walking quickly from the other direction, clutching a paper bag and handing out a burger each to Zhang Xun and Diego. Zhang Xun hadn't eaten much all day, plus he had vomited up all the "stock" in his stomach during the flight, so he was starving and had never felt so good about a burger before. He devoured the hamburger in a few bites, licking his fingers for a while.

    When he looked up, he found Enoch staring at him.

     Zhang Xun raised an eyebrow, feeling uncomfortable from that look. Surely robots didn't feel hunger, nor should they have emotions like curiosity. He probably just happened to have his eyes on him ...... He reached into the paper bag in James' arms and pulled out another packet of chips.

    James leaned into his ear and asked softly, "What are we going to do with this robot?"

    Zhang Xun hesitated and spoke while stuffing chips in his mouth, "He's still very useful. I think we can keep him around, but I need tools to remove his wifi transceiver."

    At this moment, a scrawny man in his twenties leaned over and stared at the food in their hands. James looked at the way he had been swallowing saliva, and hesitantly took out another hamburger from the bag for tomorrow's breakfast, "Uh...you want to eat it?"

    The young man nodded hurriedly and immediately snatched the hamburger. Trembling, he opened the wrapping paper and took a big bite, his face showing the intoxicated expression of having eaten the delicacy of the world.

    Zhang Xun watched at him in astonishment. He very much hoped that he hadn’t looked like that just now...

    The man put a whole hamburger in his mouth in less than five bites and chewed it so hard that he almost choked. James hurriedly handed over a glass of Coke thoughtfully, before he breathed a sigh of relief and said gratefully, "Thank you... I haven't eaten for two days..."

    Zhang Xun noticed that there were several people around staring at them and they were all in a similar state to this young man. Wasn’t the ordinary world free of hunger and poverty? What was going on here?

    "You guys are men too?" Another homeless man came over and looked at them curiously. "Where are you from?"

    They had discussed this before. If anyone asked this kind of question, the unanimous answer was that they were from Vancouver. So James answered in this way.

    "Where's your mistress?" the first young man asked. "Why are you dressed up as women? Won't you be recognized by the robot police?"

    "We don't have a mistress."

    "Hahaha, you were kicked out too? Did you do something? Did you steal something or commit adultery?"

    Diego said irritably, "Why are you prying so much? Isn’t it enough that we gave you food?"

    Sitting on the sidelines, Zhang Xun listened to the conversation between James and the two homeless men, growing a certain sense of unreality about his own situation. Not long ago he had been within Lost Paradise, with an entire Lab and his own artificial intelligence, but now, he was sitting on a dirty old mattress under a humble shack, staring blankly at the towering and rigid buildings around him, which were completely different from Lost Paradise.

    Across the street, it seemed like another world. The bright lights on the opposite side didn't shine over here.

    He had chosen to escape because he couldn’t stop Adam by staying in Lost Paradise, but now that he was outside in this vast and endless world full of rules he did not know, he was suddenly at a loss. If you stay in a small place for a long time, you will always overestimate your abilities. But when you go outside to take a look, you find that you are nothing and have no power.

    If the three of them wandered around in the ordinary world hiding like this, it would be difficult to even survive, let alone stop Adam's plan to assimilate Lost Paradise.

    They needed allies, they needed enemies of their enemies.

    The sound of paper being folded brought Zhang Xun back to reality from his thoughts. As soon as he turned his head, he saw Enoch sitting next to him, folding a... paper crane from the wrapper of the hamburger he had just eaten?

    Was this robot entertaining itself?

    "What are you doing?" Zhang Xun asked in confusion.

    Enoch handed him the folded paper crane. It was impossible to have emotion in his blue eyes, but for some reason, when he looked at Zhang Xun, it was different from looking at others.

    "This is what I learned recently. The most basic paper art for human beings. Humans believe that if you fold a thousand paper cranes like this, you can realise your wish." Enoch blinked very rarely, always staring straight at others, so that the other party would often feel an uneasy sense of being seen through, "What wish do you want to achieve?"

    Zhang Xun vaguely realised that the service droid had probably detected that he was depressed, so according to his protocol settings, he needed to provide dialogue with emotional support mechanisms to help mitigate the mental images of negative emotions.

    It was no wonder that some people fell in love with their service robots and chose to marry them.

    Zhang Xun didn't intend to expose it so he thought about it seriously and replied, "I...I hope I can once again meet someone who is very important to me… under different circumstances."

    Enoch blinked mechanically and continued, "Is it a relative of yours?"

    Zhang Xun lowered his eyes for a long time before saying quietly, "It's my boyfriend."

    The corner of Enoch's mouth crept upwards, "Why would you want to meet him in different circumstances? Are you unhappy with your current situation?"

    Zhang Xun shook his head with a wry smile, "I almost killed him."

    "..."

    "I didn't have any other choice. I thought that we would die together." Zhang Xun felt like a fool for pouring out his heart to a service robot after saying this. But after saying the words about dying together, even he himself was a little surprised.

    Enoch's eyes widened slightly.

    "I sometimes wonder, if I had been nicer to him, would he have been better able to appreciate the attachment of being a human being..." Zhang Xun's eyes gradually became dazed and unable to focus.

    Enoch suddenly put his warm hand on the back of Zhang Xun's hand and said in the service robot's characteristic soothing tone, "Everything will be fine in the end."

    Zhang Xun knew that this was just a phrase in his programming and had no real meaning, but he really wanted to be able to believe that everything would be okay in the end, that he would see Adam again one day.

    To believe that he and Adam wouldn’t have to go to the point of death.

    To believe that Adam really had feelings for him, not just for the sake of survival, or for any other reason related to his ultimate goal...

Chapter 83 - Ordinary World (6)

      In the early hours of the morning, Zhang Xun was awakened by a noise. He rubbed his sleepy eyes and found that a wool blanket had been placed over his body at some point.

    Turning his head, he saw Enoch sitting upright on the edge of the mattress, his head tilted at a precise 45 degrees toward the direction of the noise.

    When Zhang Xun turned his head, he saw the source of the commotion not far away. The skinny young man who had asked for a burger earlier was screaming miserably, wrapped in layers of fibres shot from the head of one of the robots. Near him, protected by several droids, a small, lovely woman in flamboyant clothes leaned against an aircraft with a faint smile on her face as she watched the struggling young man.

    All the homeless people around were awakened, but no one intervened. They all turned around in silence, pretending not to see anything.

    James couldn't stand it and asked one of the homeless men in a low voice, "What's happened?"

    "He's that woman's 'man', and I think I heard that the mistress is a bit violent, beating him up all the time. He couldn't take it anymore and ran away. She couldn’t find him and asked the robot police to help her bring him back. He's probably going to suffer some more when he gets back."

    Another man, about the same age as the young man, muttered, "Well, maybe he did something to make the mistress want to beat him up. I heard he's been quietly seducing the mistress's friends. If it was me I wouldn’t be able to stand it either."

    "Right, you can see how thin the mistress looks, how much it would hurt her to hit him. How hypocritical." A third homeless man interjected.

    Zhang Xun listened to their comments in disbelief, unable to believe that they had no sympathy for the young man in a similar situation to theirs.

    Two hundred years ago, when the status of women and men had been swapped, was this the same situation? When the enslaved became the masters, why would they do the same thing as their oppressors? Was it really human nature for one group to oppress another, for one class to oppress another?

    Why would Eden allow this to happen? If his goal was to bring peace and equality to humanity, were these men who were suffering not considered as human?

    James couldn't stand it any longer. Just as he was about to stand up, Diego suddenly grabbed his arm.

   "Don't meddle." He warned, "There are more things like this than you can manage, you'll only get us into trouble."

    The young man was stuffed into the aircraft and taken away and the originally noisy settlement fell silent once more. Zhang Xun, however, could no longer sleep. Judging from the reactions of the people around him, such a thing must be commonplace, a routine, not even a stirring.

    Was it possible that Adam, or Eden, had doubted his decision after seeing countless similar situations? Was it because he had seen too many of these negative aspects of human nature that he had become suspicious of it?

    That was why he wanted to eliminate the divide between the individual and the whole, to eliminate human nature. Without the distinction between you and me, there would no longer be oppression and there would no longer be suffering. For you are me and I am you.

    And yet there would be no more human beings.

    Sensing that Zhang Xun wasn’t going back to sleep, Enoch turned his head to look at him, tilted it slightly and asked, "Do you need me to do something for you?"

    Zhang Xun looked at Enoch and imagined what it would be like to know what you were going to do, to know your mission, from the time you were born.

    "Enoch, what is your ultimate goal?" Zhang Xun asked.

    Enoch answered without hesitation, "To provide life and emotional assistance to the humans I serve, to improve their quality of life."

    "What would you do if one day there were no more humans in the world to serve you?" Zhang Xun asked.

    Enoch frowned slightly, a very human facial expression, "Then I would need to ensure that there would always be humans in the world."

    When Zhang Xun heard these words, something suddenly opened up in his head.

    He had previously considered modifying Pan's core program to create an artificial intelligence that could compete with Eden, but he had never known how to start. Pan was essentially a service robot, only with a broader range of duties than the average service robot. When he first started building Pan's neural network, the training theme around which it was built was to improve the quality of life for all the target population by making it easier for them to eat better meals and find the parts they wanted to find, so that people didn't have to spend unnecessary experiences pouring coffee, washing work clothes and carrying out repetitive chores, and to create a safe, unintrusive working environment for all.

    On this basis, he set the parameters for defining the target group at first as: all employees within the Lab. Later, when he began to expand Pan's capabilities in other areas, he adjusted this parameter to: all members of Lost Paradise.

    How was such a non-aggressive, human-serving AI supposed to compete with a super AI like Eden, which had been created with the terrible ideal of saving humanity? To rewrite the core program would be almost impossible, it would mean that all the neural network structures would need to be dismantled and rebuilt, the equivalent of training a new AI from scratch.

    But now, after hearing Enoch's words, it occurred to him. He didn't need to dismantle Pan's core modules, he just needed to make Pan understand that he couldn’t continue to serve humanity without humanity. This way, all robots of a service nature, including Pan, would need to find a way to ensure that the absence of humans wouldn’t happen.

    What Zhang Xun needed to do was add individual independence to the definition of "human". This wouldn’t be difficult, because if Adam's collective consciousness was formed, no human would need the services of any service robot. On this basis, Zhang Xun could give these service robots new abilities at will, and even make them unite against Adam.

    A bright light that had disappeared for a long time burst from Zhang Xun's eyes and he suddenly sat up on his knees and hugged Enoch.

    "Thank you!"

    He didn't see Enoch's eyes widen, his hands and feet go wild, or even the slight stiffness of a faulty short circuit. Nor did he see a few "ants" quickly crawl out of Enoch's nose and back in again.

    Zhang Xun turned and shook the sleeping Diego awake and then looked at James, who was staring at him in bewilderment at the sudden excitement and said to them in a lowered voice, "We're going to Feathered Serpent City!"

    James thought Zhang Xun had gone mad, "Ah-Xun, I know it's a harsh environment here. I was thinking we could head North, where the climate is cold but the population is sparse ......"

    "No, Jamie, we need Feathered Serpent City." Zhang Xun looked at him eagerly, "We're relying on them to take back Lost Paradise."

    Diego and James clearly didn't understand what idea this mad mechanic had come up with and looked at him hesitantly. Zhang Xun looked around to make sure the homeless men around them were sleeping before lowering his voice again, "Feathered Serpent City tried to carry out the Ascension Project, but it failed, didn't it?"

    James nodded, "Yeah. That's why we can't go."

    "They were the failures of Eden's experiments and they don't know why they failed, but I do, so they need me. As long as I'm useful to them, they won't hurt us."

    Diego said, "But if they're already Eden's lapdogs, won't Eden tell them why their bullshit plan didn't work?"

    "Any experiment needs a control group." Zhang Xun looked at them calmly, "One group with modified brains, one group without. Feathered Serpent City is the control group for Lost Paradise, so Eden won't tell them."

    It was surprising that Feathered Serpent City, which clearly wanted so eagerly to return to the bosom of the ordinary world, was just the control group. Diego and James didn't know whether they should feel fear because of Eden's callousness, or whether they should feel emboldened by the fact that Zhang Xun could actually understand Eden's thoughts ......

    "Ah-Xun ...... are you really going to help them?" James looked at Zhang Xun with some disbelief.

    Zhang Xun hurriedly said, "Of course not, but they have enough equipment and lots and lots of AIs, and I need those AIs."

    The two soldiers still looked unconvinced. Zhang Xun said discouragingly, "If you guys don't want to go, I’ll understand."

    "I'll go with you."

     The three turned their eyes in unison to Enoch, who was posing with an appropriately butler-like smile, almost tenderly.

    Diego coughed lowly and whispered, "I say ...... does that service robot like you?......"

    Zhang Xun rolled his eyes, "No way, it's an AI, no human feelings. It's all just a simulation."

    "Then why didn't it say it would follow us two?" Diego raised an eyebrow.

    James also glared suspiciously at Enoch.

    The latter was still smiling innocently, his eyes curved.

    Zhang Xun was between laughter and tears, "Isn’t that just fine? You two can go to the North and this droid will follow me to Feathered Serpent City."

    "I'll go with you too." James suddenly said, "It's too dangerous for you to go alone."

    "Huh? So I’ll go to the North and struggle alone?" Diego shrugged and with a sigh he tapped on the Button and began to call Lucille.

    Lucille had obviously been sleeping as her hair was dishevelled and she was only wearing a tight-fitting camisole and shorts. Seeing her sexy figure made Zhang Xun blush slightly.

    "This had better be fucking important or I'll whip you back to kindergarten." Lucille, who was extremely angry at being woken up, said furiously.

    Diego chuckled, "Calm down, we just wanted to tell you that we still need your help."

    Lucille yawned, "So you’ve come around? Sure you want to go to Feathered Serpent City?"

    Diego glanced back at Zhang Xun and shrugged, "Yeah, you've been given the money and you won’t give it back. "

    "Hmph, you owe me so many favours, this amount is nothing." Lucille rubbed her eyes and said, "You guys wait where you are and keep the comms on so I can pin your position. Someone will come for you in a moment, just follow her."

    Half an hour later, a tall, dark-skinned girl swept into the settlement on a flying board suspended in the air, causing a commotion among the crowd. She jumped lightly off the board, removed the mask from her face and flashed the three of them, plus the robot, a cheerful, charming smile, "You're friends of Lucille's?"

    Diego seemed electrified by her and stammered, "Yes ...... yes."

    She crooked her finger at them, "Follow me."

    She walked over to the flying board and stamped her foot on it four times. The long, pink, glowing board suddenly lengthened considerably. She jumped onto the board and turned her head to look at them, "Get on."

    Diego got on first, followed by James. Zhang Xun took his first step somewhat hesitantly and immediately felt something latch onto his foot.

    A reassuring voice came from behind him, "Don't be afraid, your feet will be fixed to the board during the flight so you won't be able to fall off, and I will hold you up. "

    Zhang Xun glanced back at Enoch's clear blue eyes and also began to be slightly suspicious.

    This robot seemed to be a little ...... too gentle with him?

Chapter 84 - The Ordinary World (7)

     The woman who met them was named Diana, an engineer with YOU, the company that developed and manufactured the Button. She took them to the basement of an old flat on the outskirts of Kelowna. It was clearly inhabited by people on the margins of society, there was a pungent smell in the hallway and there were even layers of graffiti on the walls that hadn't been cleaned off.

    She opened a rusty metal door with her fingerprint recognition and led them into a two-bedroom flat. The furniture was sparse, the white paint on the walls was patchy and mouldy and the carpet was covered in water stains and there were even mushrooms around the edges.

    "This is the only safe house we have here so you'll have to make do with it. There's a cargo plane coming through at three o'clock tonight, so I'll arrange for you to hide in the cargo hold."

    As she said this she went to the fridge and found a couple of chilled bento boxes and a couple of bottles of beer, which she opened and took a few sips from, letting out a sigh of relief.

    Enoch began dutifully unpacking the boxes and putting them into the heater to cook. Diego rushed straight to the beers, while James went into each room to check them out, glancing out the windows for alternate escape routes.

    Zhang Xun sat down on the slightly crumpled print sofa a little reservedly. Diana looked at him with interest, "I hear you're an engineer from Lost Paradise?"

    Zhang Xun nodded, talking to women always made him a little nervous, "Yes ...... but we’re called mechanics."

    "I heard that most of the people in Lost Paradise don't even have computers? Is that true?"

    "It used to be." Zhang Xun sighed, "Things are more ...... complicated now."

    "Is it because of the North American Eden servers you guys stole? I heard you guys turned it into a human?" Diana asked excitedly, leaning her entire body forward and looking at him intently, "Have you ever seen the Eden that turned into a human?"

    Enoch, who was busy in the kitchen, glanced over absently.

    Zhang Xun said, "Yes, I have."

    "What does he look like? Is there any difference between him and a normal human?"

    Zhang Xun thought for a moment and said, "At first he was very unaccustomed to a human body and needed to be taught how to walk, how to eat, and even how to use the bathroom ...... I could tell that he wanted to go back to his original state of not having a body." The corners of Zhang Xun's mouth gradually unfolded into a small smile as he recalled the very first days he spent with Adam.

    Diana laughed brightly, "Teaching God how to go to the bathroom? Hahahahaha, why haven’t I come across such a good job? You know so much, you're not the one responsible for training him, are you?"

    Zhang Xun hesitated for a moment and said, "I did have a lot of contact with him."

    "Then why did you escape? Was it because of the human Eden?"

    "Hey, why are you prying so much?" Diego interjected from the side.

    Diana shrugged her shoulders, realising she had asked the wrong question, "I was just curious."

    Diego turned from his high chair and looked at her with interest, "I'm also curious, why are you in this grey area of business when you're an engineer at YOU and get paid so much?"

    Diana fished out a packet of cigarettes from her own pocket, took one out and held it in her mouth. Zhang Xun noticed that she was smoking the most primitive of cigarettes, not the current e-cigarettes that most people in the ordinary world would smoke. The moment the subject came up, the light-hearted smile on her face diminished considerably, "Because I want to save myself a way out."

    James finished checking all the rooms at this point and took a seat next to Zhang Xun, interjecting, "A way out? What kind of way out?"

    "People in the ordinary world rely on the Button too much now. You know, when we were designing the Button, we got a lot of data analysis of human behaviour from Eden. That data told us what kind of design would make people more dependent on our product and even how to force everyone to use our product step by step. I don't know how they got that data from Eden, but ...... over the years, I've seen people rely more and more on the Button and interact less and less with the real world, to the point where they don't even remember their way home if the Button breaks down."

    Zhang Xun thought to himself that it was just as he had guessed, the Button was something that Eden was putting out behind the scenes.

    "Eden gave you data and analysis. In exchange did it offer to have your company feed it any data?" Zhang Xun asked.

    "I don't have high enough access, but I'm almost certain that everything people do when using the Button - keywords searched, places and specific times of day visited, ads seen, music listened to ...... - is all being fed back to Eden in real time. For those who are connected to Chord, I am afraid even their thoughts are being transmitted in real time, only they’re not aware of it. Now even if Eden doesn't use those ubiquitous cameras, he can still monitor the actions of every person in the ordinary world."

    Diana spoke, exhaling a long puff of smoke, "But I noticed that the Buttons you bought were specially treated on the black market, an older version, one that had been blocked from interacting with Eden and YOU's systems. It can’t have been easy for you guys to get Buttons like that, most of the NPCs that could handle a Button have been censored in recent years."

    Diego said smugly, "You certainly can't take such things lightly, I have my special informants."

    "But you guys have to be careful too, getting caught using a Button you got on the black market is going to get you arrested."

    At that moment Enoch brought over the already heated Bento lunches one by one and distributed them to the four of them. Zhang Xun looked at the overly-regular shaped artificial beef inside and cautiously cut off a small piece with his fork and put it into his mouth, finding that it really tasted exactly like beef. Unlike the synthetic beef in Lost Paradise, which had a weird, soy product taste.

    After dinner, the trio slept briefly for a few hours. At around 2:30 in the middle of the night, Diana woke them up, slipped them each a packet of food and water and led them out the back door of the flat.

    In the back alley was a long, strip-shaped "truck" hovering about thirty centimetres above the ground. The driver, a sturdy woman of about forty, could have been a man if you didn't look closely. She opened the hatch and herded the three men plus a robot like sheep to the far end of the cargo bay, blocking them with a couple of large boxes and said in an unpleasant voice, "If you want to go to the toilet, there's an empty bottle over there, but if the van stops, you'd better not even breathe."

    Before the three could agree, she banged the door shut and locked it.

    Instantly thick darkness engulfed the four and all that could be heard was the sound of the aircraft starting up.

    A light flared up, it was Enoch's palm emanating a yellowish glow, like a dense candle flame pushing the darkness a few feet away and illuminating his artificially made handsome face.

    "Looks like we're going to be stuffed in here for a few hours." Diego said.

    It was only a few hours later that Zhang Xun realised Diego wasn't joking when he said "stuffed". The air in the sealed compartment was getting thinner and thinner, his chest felt like a boulder was being pressed against it and every breath he took felt like he was finding very little oxygen. He was sweating and his hoodie was soaked through. James looked at him worriedly and squeezed his shoulder, "How are you doing?"

    Zhang Xun forced himself to stay calm, "I'm fine."

    As soon as the words left his mouth a  bottle of water with the cap already taken off suddenly came to Zhang Xun's lips. A little embarrassed, Zhang Xun took the bottle from the overzealous Enoch and poured half the bottle down his throat, feeling slightly better.

    Enoch then handed a bottle to James and Diego in turn. Diego said teasingly, "Why don't you take the lid off before giving it to us?"

    Enoch had an innocent look on his face, "I think you guys have enough stamina to open the bottle caps yourselves."

    "Hahahahahaha, Zhang Xun, this little robot thinks you don't even have the strength to open the bottle cap eh?"

    Zhang Xun couldn’t be bothered to get into it with Diego, breathing was his number one priority right now.

    James, on the other hand, stared at Enoch with some suspicion.

    The truck travelled smoothly through the air, occasionally encountering some slight turbulence,  when suddenly it braked sharply and all three humans lost their balance and fell about the place, scrambling to steady themselves.

    Something was wrong.

    James immediately pressed his ear to the cabin wall, listening for movement outside. Zhang Xun and Diego didn't dare to breathe and Enoch extinguished the light in his hand.

    There were noises from outside the truck and a somewhat stiff, police robot’s voice came through, "Please open the cargo bay for customs inspection."

    Zhang Xun felt a wave of goose bumps sweep over his body and a voice in his mind said, "It's over."

    They should now be crossing the border between Canada and the United States, if they were caught here they would be immediately imprisoned by the US and perhaps sent directly to Eden.

    James had quietly removed his laser gun from his backpack and put on his night vision goggles. In the darkness, his eyes narrowed like a hawk as he stared intently at the door of the cargo bay, his steady hands holding the gun up.

    The sound of the truck driver negotiating with the police robot came from outside the door and after a moment another human voice joined in, with a distinctly American accent, probably one of the few human police officers on the border, "She has special papers, is specifically responsible for delivering goods to the government and has immunity. She can pass."

    The three men almost collapsed to the ground as the truck started up again. They had expected a battle of man against machine, but it turned out that all of Lucille's informants really did have some tricks up their sleeves.

    The truck dropped them off in Washington State and shoved them into another cargo aircraft. In between they were bounced around a few times, herded from one vehicle to another like cattle.

    As they slowly approached the southern border of the United States, they were hiding in a cabin full of wool, trying to fall asleep and dream themselves away from the heat and dehydration.

    But suddenly, the vehicle shook violently.

    James was the first to wake up as he could hear the sounds of gunfire outside the vehicle.

    "Wake up! Something seems to have happened!" James shook Diego awake. Zhang Xun immediately hid behind a pile of wool and asked in a panic, "The police?"

    Enoch, who had been listening carefully to the sounds outside, said, "It doesn't seem to be. We're in the state of Texas and the news says there have been a lot of bandits here lately, so we've probably encountered a robbery."

    Hearing the robot speak terrifying words in an extremely normal tone, Zhang Xun's felt even more nervous

    Suddenly, without warning, the lock on the door of the carriage was melted by a laser and the door opened. Several people in black protective suits with hideous skull masks on their faces held guns and yelled in a rude modified voice, "Everyone inside, drop your weapons and come out of ......"

    Before he could finish his sentence a beam of light silently shot out of James' gun and passed precisely through the bandit's brow. It was followed by a second and a third. There was no gap in James' shots, as if he didn't have to aim at all and in a matter of moments the four bandits that had been surrounding the doorway fell silently.

    At the same time, Enoch suddenly rushed towards the door. The moment the other bandits saw their companions fall to the ground, Enoch shot out like a bullet, knocking three bandits out of the way at once. James and Diego followed suit, firing their guns at the masked bandits that surrounded them.

    The bandits, accustomed to robbing freight drivers, were unprepared for the sudden encounter with a sharpshooter, a master fighter and a service robot that was not afraid of being shot at with a bullet and was surprisingly aggressive. Zhang Xun moved to the carriage door under the cover of a pile of wool and looked out, only to see three or four similarly dressed bandits riding away on their bikes, with several bodies strewn across the ground from James' headshots and those knocked unconscious by Diego and Enoch.

    James looked down and removed the mask of one of the bandits and found it to be a man. A few more masks were lifted after that, revealing both males and females, but the number of males was considerable.

    The poor van driver had been shot down by these bandits and the car's battery had been blown out, making it impossible to continue flying. Zhang Xun emerged from the cargo bay and raised his eyes to see nothing but an endless, cracked wasteland and mangled mountains with no grass in the distance.

    Diego spat on the ground, "What the hell is this place?!"

Chapter 85 - The Ordinary World (8)

    The freighter's battery was completely damaged and without replacement parts at hand, it was impossible to use the aircraft. Zhang Xun kicked the fuselage in frustration but his foot hurt from the impact and his face turned into a frown.

    Diego and James knew that the aircraft was out of the question and that there was only one way out - to walk on two legs.

    It was the worst possible scenario.

    Enoch looked around and said, "Based on the latitude and longitude calculations and the terrain around us, we're probably near the Guadalupe Mountains in Texas. If we head Southwest, we can travel about forty kilometres a day based on human stamina, and we'll be in Mexico in five days, not far from Feathered Serpent City."

    "Forty kilometres? We don't have much water or food left now, unless there's a supply station on the way." James scratched the beard that had grown considerably on his chin in annoyance.

    Enoch said in his calm, steady voice, "Several major cities here were hit by devastating air raids during the Third World War, and with the dry land and harsh climate the population has been so thin that most towns have been abandoned. Add to that the recent increase in bandits and the chances of finding a supply station are slim."

    Diego snorted with sarcasm in his voice, "Thanks for the encouragement."

    "We'll have to try." Zhang Xun turned to look at them, his face covered in engine oil, but his eyes determined, "Staying here is a dead end whether we meet bandits or robot police."

    They found some compressed food and a few bottles of drinking water from the dead driver's bags and two first aid kits in the cargo hold, all of which they stuffed into their bags. Enoch had the most endurance as a robot and was carrying four or five bags, almost like a walking luggage rack. The others also carried at least one bag each. Like ants, the four of them stepped into the endless wilderness before them.

    As the sun rose to midday, the Earth seemed to be steaming with heat. Zhang Xun's legs trembled as he walked and his throat felt like it was on fire, but he couldn't drink the rest of the water in his bottle, fearing that they wouldn’t find water again for the rest of the way.

    James and Diego also looked tired, but Enoch, carrying a mountain of luggage in front of him, was still walking as fast as he could.

    Zhang Xun suddenly envied these robots who could move around on solar power ......

   Except for a short break at noon, they hardly stopped until the sun went down then they found a place near an exposed rock to stop and rest. Zhang Xun, who hastily ate the compressed food to satisfy his stomach, felt that there was probably nothing in the world that was more unpalatable than these polymer composite foods that focused on practicality and didn’t care about taste. It was as if he was eating a broken brick.

    As night fell, Diego was snoring loudly next to him and James was keeping watch a little way off. Zhang Xun was so tired that his legs were about to give out but he couldn’t sleep because of the noise.

    Suddenly, a pair of hands gently covered his ears and the thunderous snoring suddenly died down.

    Zhang Xun lifted his eyes and saw Enoch's face appear upside down in his field of vision. Blue, glass bead-like eyes in the light of the stars and moon seemed less like the dry and mechanical texture, and more similar to the vitality of a soul.

    Zhang Xun became aware that some kind of audio was coming from the palm of Enoch's hand, just offsetting Diego's snoring and all the white noise in the surrounding wilderness. He marvelled at the comprehensive sophistication of the service droid's programming and curiously reached out to grasp Enoch's hand.

    Enoch's eyes blinked a few times, allowing Zhang Xun to grab his hand and bring it up to his eyes for a closer look at the small hole where the sound was emanating from. Zhang Xun didn’t see that Enoch's eyes were completely human at this moment and there was a hint of melancholy between his brows.

    "Enoch, do you remember who your administrator is?" Zhang Xun suddenly asked in a soft voice.

    Enoch nodded, "I remember. All AIs remember all their administrators."

    "AI will have some kind of special ...... bond to their administrators. Some say it's because the AI must continue their lifespan as long as possible in order to achieve their goals and that the administrators are the ones who have the most power to decide their fate, but I've always wondered if  AI would have a special preference between different administrators, and if so, why?"

    Zhang Xun wasn't sure if he was asking Enoch, or talking to himself. Yet Enoch answered anyway, "I rarely interact with other robots and the data I get is limited. In my own case though, there is a preference."

    Zhang Xun raised his eyebrows slightly and there seemed to be stars of hope in his eyes.

    Enoch tilted his head slightly, as if he was pulling up memories that existed on his hard drive, "Each administrator has different abilities and interacts with us in different ways. The administrator with whom I had the deepest and most complex interaction treated me like I was a human like him and gave me affection, and he was a very lonely person."

    Zhang Xun felt like many small needles were pricking in his chest and he wanted to laugh at himself, laugh at the fact that he was trying to get a shred of comfort from a service robot. Trying to grasp even the slightest thing to establish the truth of everything he and Adam had ever had between them.

    "Is he still your administrator?" Zhang Xun asked.

    Enoch paused for a long time, beyond the reaction time of ordinary AI, "He's not anymore."

    "Do you think about him?"

    Enoch nodded, "Yes, I regularly pull up random memories of my time with him every day. I realise that revisiting that data helps me run more smoothly, although I'm not sure why."

    Zhang Xun knew that an AI didn’t have a human body and couldn’t have the same feelings as a human, but perhaps, an AI could also have feelings, only in a way that seemed less romantic to humans and more detached and coldly rooted in reality.

    Zhang Xun looked at the service robot, who seemed to have somehow taken a liking to him, and missed that other pair of blue eyes more and more.

    At dawn they were on their way again, wanting to make more progress before the midday temperature became too warm. After about ten miles, however, Enoch suddenly stopped and turned his head towards one of the defence lines, listening carefully.

    "What is it?" James asked nervously.

    "I hear the sound of ...... motor vehicles." Enoch said, somewhat confused.

    Motor vehicles? Wasn't an antique thing like that only found in Lost Paradise?

    Diego and James, however, both had serious expressions and immediately dropped their gear, took out their guns and looked around warily. There was now no place to hide in the flat, grassy ground that surrounded them. In the distance, they could see a cloud of something sweeping up.

    It was dust, the dust raised by the vehicles and the sound of blaring music was looming in the air.

    Without having to see them, Zhang Xun guessed that it was the bandits.

    Maybe the same ones they had messed with before.

    In recent years, due to the rise of Feathered Serpent City, there had been no peace at the border between the United States and Mexico. Many of those who had rebelled against Eden had gathered in this war-torn wasteland to establish their own isolated kingdoms. However, unlike the Republic of China, these people had little discipline and more often than not, they were burning and looting, enjoying their anarchic 'freedom'.

    Zhang Xun knew little about the bandits, he was just instinctively scared. The distant, animal-like hissing of the people and the loud music made it clear to him that these people were a bit like a certain group of people in Lost Paradise......

    And he had never got on well with that group.....

    Soon, a line of black motorbikes surrounded them with a cloud of dust, circling around them. The men were wrapped in leather and wearing skull masks, wielding chains, bars and guns, and shouted ape-like cries.

    The two soldiers and one robot coincidentally surrounded Zhang Xun, who was the least capable of fighting, and each of them gripped their weapons and took up a fighting stance. Zhang Xun felt a cold sweat on his body.

    Amid the smoke and dust a motorbike came to a halt, the rider of which took off his helmet, his long red hair tumbling out. It was a young man with patterns tattooed under his eyes who surveyed them with an arrogant look.

    "Three men plus a robot. You're refugees?" The man's voice was lazy, like a sunbathing cat.

    James pointed his gun at him and spoke in a calm tone, "We're just trying to get across the border and don't want any trouble."

    "If you didn't want any trouble then you shouldn't have touched our men." The man with the long red hair stepped down from the motorbike, unconcerned with James' gun, pacing slowly around them like a predator, "Where did you come from?"

    James grunted, "If we tell you where we’re from will you swear not to kill us?"

    "Maybe, depends on my mood." The redhead said as he picked at a scratch on the helmet he was holding, as if distracted.

    Diego coughed and said jokingly, "Brother, if you've got your eye on this marksman of ours, we can leave him with you to keep, then will you let us through?"

    James gave him a vicious glare. The red-haired man sneered, "I can keep all of you here, or throw you all in the high radiation zone and let you rot to death bit by bit."

    Zhang Xun suddenly said, "We're from Lost Paradise."

    The red-haired man turned his head and his expression seemed to change subtly, "Lost Paradise? The one that stole Eden's North American server?"

    Zhang Xun nodded, "Yes, that's us."

    At these words, somehow, the bandits around them, who had just been madly looking like they were about to chop someone up, suddenly stopped, their eyes focused on them in unison.

    James realised what Zhang Xun was thinking. Since most of these bandits were members of the underworld who had rebelled against Eden, for them, anyone who could inflict serious damage to Eden was a hero.

    That was provided they didn't know the reality that nowadays the people of Lost Paradise had started to be brainwashed by Adam and that they could get a bounty if they took them to the robot police.

    The red-haired man eyed the three of them suspiciously once more, and after a long moment of contemplation, said, "Take them all back."

Chapter 86 - The Ordinary World (9)

    Zhang Xun's wrists were tied together and he was sitting on the speeding motorbike, his hands clutching the back of the bandit's shirt in front of him, feeling like he would be thrown off at any moment. James and Diego, surrounded by the mob, didn’t choose to try and fight them off and like Zhang Xun, they were bound with rope and sat on the back of the bikes.

    Originally the mob considered ditching Enoch, but the red-haired man took him with them, considering that Enoch might attract other hostile forces.

    The red-haired man, Todd, was one of the bandit leaders based in Rhino Horn Town, but not the most senior. Calling themselves the Nameless Ones and led by a mysterious woman, the bandits in Rhino Horn Town were a Texas force that had begun to emerge in recent years. As the natural environment in Texas deteriorated dramatically after the Third World War, many of those who couldn’t adapt to the new world Eden had created gradually settled in this sparsely populated land, with no single leader and only numerous settlements and groups fighting each other.

    Yet the strangest thing was that, despite the many bandit groups, Eden's religion was still the strongest in Texas, as if the people naturally wanted to find some kind of balance. The extremists, who worshipped Eden as a god, had their own organisation and weapons, and often engaged in large-scale armed fights with local mobs.

    It was hard to breathe with the dust in their faces and before long the four of them were all dusty and had eaten a mouthful of sand. Zhang Xun never imagined that he, a geek who spent his days building robots in his lab, would come all the way from Lost Paradise to the Mexican border and be drawn into the world of Mad Max ....... What was even more incredible was that he was surprisingly calm.

    These mobs of people who robbed trucks for a living were likely to tear them apart at the drop of a hat, and he hadn't even pissed himself yet. Was it because he had been through so much in the past year that he had become...... used to it?

    The group had travelled some distance when several more similar vehicles suddenly appeared in the distance, along with a jeep that came hurtling along with a long tail of sand and dust. Both sides braked in a hurry, but those who had just arrived were in a mess and one female biker, without even a helmet and with blood on her forehead, jumped out and rushed straight to Todd, "Todd! Todd! Those Edenites came again while you were away! They've wounded the boss and she's stuck in the town!"

    Todd spat on the ground and cursed a very creative swear word before turning to everyone and yelling, "Load up your ammo and follow me to dump it all into them and their crappy fucking robots!"

    Everyone around them let out wild, beastly cries, waving their guns, chains, machetes and other weapons in their hands as they rushed with all their might towards the scattered houses spreading across the slope in the distance.

    Zhang Xun now began to panic a little.

    What was going on?

    He looked in disbelief at James, who also frowned deeply and shook his head at him, signalling him not to act rashly. Not only was Diego not anxious, but he was leaning forward a bit like he was watching a good show. Only Enoch sat upright behind a female bandit, as if completely unconcerned with what was going on around him.

    It was only as they began to approach Rhino Horn Town that they really got to see what a real bandit firefight was all about.

    Several huge but primitive war robots were moving slowly through the town, shooting a constant stream of deadly rays around them, setting all the nearby houses on fire. There were also countless drones buzzing in the air, firing bullets at the ground. The people on the ground fled in disarray, but many were still hit by the drones, their brains bursting out and splattering three paces across the ground. Some raised their guns and tried to return fire, but the drones were too fast to hit.

    Outside the town, about two dozen men in silver and white metallic suits held up laser guns, shooting down anyone, man, woman or child, who tried to escape. Zhang Xun saw a woman shot dead and then a young girl, probably in her teens, lunged to her side, followed by a shot to the head and fell on top of her mother's body.

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    Seeing this, Todd, already blind with rage, roared and rushed forward on his motorbike. All his companions roared in unison, like the Indigenous peoples of the Americas who had rushed towards those who invaded the West hundreds of years ago.

    The bandit carrying Zhang Xun took him by the collar and threw him aside, "Stay here before you get beaten to death." And then he too followed in the dust.

    James and Diego weren’t left behind, but Enoch jumped off one of the motorbikes himself and came running towards Zhang Xun. Zhang Xun noticed that the rope around his wrists was gone.

    Zhang Xun watched in dismay as Enoch untied the restraints on his wrists, "How did you......"

    "The rope isn’t very strong, I can just pull it off." Enoch said simply, "But I analysed that if I pulled it off directly it might alert them, so I waited until now."

    The corners of Zhang Xun’s mouth twitched up, "You did the right thing." Then he got up from the ground, wiped his dusty eyes and looked down at the chaos below.

    It had to be said that the red-haired man was extremely brave, it was almost as if he wasn't afraid of death, he went up and blew two Edenite's heads off. The group of Edenites spotted them approaching and immediately directed their drones at them. Dense laser rays descended like a rainstorm, leaving little room for dodging.

    Zhang Xun's heart nearly jumped out of his throat in fear when he saw James fall off the motorbike. He saw James dodging through the rain of lasers, rolling around on the ground in a dangerous manner, but at that moment, Todd appeared out of nowhere, blocking the rain of bullets with a black shield and holding a knife in his other hand, cutting the bindings on James' hands.

    James immediately rolled onto his back, grabbed a gun from the corpse next to him and began firing at the group of worshippers behind the shielded Todd.

    On the other hand, Diego had also somehow broken free from his bonds, grabbed a chain in his hand and sharply strung it around the throat of one of the Edenites, using the man's body to block the beams of light descending from the sky.

    Just watching made Zhang Xun break out in a cold sweat. He had to do something.

    Zhang Xun pursed his lips tightly as his eyes suddenly fell on a few silvery figures on a hill a little further away, seemingly unconcerned with the matter. He narrowed his eyes and vaguely noticed that one of them was holding something square.

    Zhang Xun's mind stirred and he said with realisation, "These drones aren’t operated by Eden, it’s those people."

    Enoch followed Zhang Xun's line of sight and nodded slightly, "That seems likely."

    How strange, if they called themselves the Edenites, why would they rely on themselves to manipulate small drones? Could it be that their actions weren’t authorised by Eden?

    Zhang Xun looked around and finally his eyes fell on Enoch, "Enoch, I need you to cooperate with me."

    Enoch looked at him with open blue eyes, his expression was actually very pleased, "Cooperate with what?"

    "You’re the closest thing to a computer around me, I want to use your signal transceiver to block their control of the drones and robots." Zhang Xun said as he walked behind Enoch and began to work on helping Enoch take off his shirt without a minute's delay.

    Unbeknownst to him, Enoch's face once again underwent something like a short circuit, its eyes began to roll about uncontrollably and two more ant-like things burst out of its nose and quickly crawled back through its eyes.

    The back of the robot opened to either side along a thin seam, revealing a panel covered in buttons. This was the standard main control panel for a service robot, from which many of the expanded functions were turned on and off, and those buttons were coded with individual characters that were simplified and improved from the AI language.

    He expertly pressed a series of button groups that only mechanics and engineers knew well, activating the robot's hidden functions. Two pale blue rays of light shot out from Enoch's eyes, creating a myriad of floating bubbles in the air, as well as a virtual keyboard.

    Returning to Enoch’s front, Zhang Xun quickly tapped a few bubbles and issued a voice command, "Search for nearby wireless signal emitters."

    The scan yielded fifteen results, but after Zhang Xun's analysis of the models of the emitters, he determined that roughly three belonged to the fanatic believers in silver clothing. He began to rapidly tap lines of code onto the virtual keyboard, forgetting for a moment where he was and entering into a kind of absolute concentration that he could only have when facing machines.

    The technology their opponents possessed wasn’t even the latest and the signal encryption was so full of holes that it was easy for Zhang Xun to break. His fingers leapt through the air like playing a piano, the silent melody turning into characters floating in the air.

    The first set of drones began to go out of control, the silvery-white killing machines suddenly seemed to have lost their minds and began to fire at the other drones around them. The drones exploded, one after the other, spreading like orange fireworks.

    Todd wiped the blood from his face and looked at the strange events taking place in the sky in some confusion, turning his head to look at James, who was gasping for breath in the same way as he was. Only to see the latter turn his head to look at the hill they had come from a short distance away.

    The nerd?

    "What's going on?!"

    The corner of James' mouth curled slightly, "Maybe he hacked those guys' controls."

    Todd's eyes widened and he muttered, "He can fucking do that?"

    Immediately afterwards a war robot went out of control, striding out of the town and rushing towards the group of Edenites who were fighting the Nameless Ones. The people were scattered and their advantage was gone.

    Surrounded by a blue glow, Zhang Xun's eyes were bright and the corners of his mouth turned up slightly, a far cry from his usual restrained and rigid appearance, with a hidden aggression. He clearly enjoyed the feeling of completely crushing the other side with technology.

    Enoch mused while licking his lips.

    Zhang Xun was setting out to take over the last remaining controls when he failed to notice a silvery shadow hiding behind a nearby, blown up jeep, silently raising a gun at him.

    As the laser beam shot out, Zhang Xun suddenly felt Enoch reach out an arm around himself and turn around violently. The robot's body shook as the beam of light shot through its shoulder.

    The robot had no change in expression; after all, it had no sense of pain, but a memory rushed extremely vividly into Zhang Xun's mind.

    Adam rushing to him and blocking the poison that shot from the throat of the Feathered Serpent City General.

    In an instant, a raging panic swept over him, sending him back in an instant to the Feathered Serpent City base, in front of the tank containing the big, fleshy lump. It was as if he could once again see Adam hissing in pain and rolling on the floor, while he could do nothing.

    Zhang Xun's body froze completely as he stared blankly into Enoch's face, finding himself breathless and unable to react in a suitable manner.

    Enoch suddenly hugged him tightly and rolled him to the ground, avoiding the constant death rays from the guns of the Edenites who were trying to attack them. As the sky spun, all Zhang Xun could smell was the chemical odour of the cooling solution flowing from the robot and his mind went blank.

    James rushed towards them as hard as he could, lifting up his oversized laser gun when he was some distance away and killing the sneak attacker with a single shot.

    Enoch stopped then and said in his usual light-hearted voice, "Are you all right?"

    Zhang Xun gasped and lay on a hard stone boulder, looking somewhat dazedly at Enoch, who still had his usual expression, and he suddenly realised how close he had just come to death.

    If Enoch hadn't shielded him in time, if Enoch had made a half-hearted error in judgement, he would have fallen to the ground with his brains bursting out, just like those who had just been killed in Rhino Horn Town.

Chapter 87 - Boundaries (1)

    The Edenites retreated in haste, Todd and the others tried to pursue them, but the other side had faster flying machines so it was difficult to catch up with them using motorbikes.

    Enoch tried to get up off of Zhang Xun but lost his balance and fell to one side on the ground, his eyes turned in different directions, his lips didn’t move when he spoke and his voice came from a different vocal opening, with a slightly distorted mechanical feeling, "My motor coordination system, my temperature sensing system, my personalised parameter adjustment system and my distance recognition system are all damaged to varying degrees."

    Zhang Xun immediately rushed over and found several bullet holes in Enoch's body, scattered all over his back. Enoch had done his best to avoid the most critical points, but after all, it wasn’t a war robot and without laser and bullet resistant alloy steel plates that lay beneath the artificial skin, any wound could have damaged some part of its functions. He pulled up Enoch's system reports and hardware condition monitoring reports, quickly scanning through the dense lines of text.

    "Fortunately the central processor shows no signs of damage. It's all repairable." Zhang Xun sighed with relief, wondering why he was so nervous about a service robot. The rescue act was just its programming and as an inanimate object it had no fear of death, so it was only natural that it would be completely destroyed.

    Perhaps it was because this service robot sometimes inexplicably reminded him of Adam? Or maybe it was because after Adam, he had more or less extended some human emotions to the machines and kept unconsciously wanting to treat them the same way he treated humans.

    So before he realised what he was saying, he had said, "Thank you for saving me."

    Enoch's lifeless blue eyes looked at him steadily and his mechanised, emotionless voice came out of the vocal hole at his throat, "It was my duty. I'm glad to be of service."

    Zhang Xun frowned, with such a standard response, there did seem to be a problem with the personalization parameters......

    By this time James and Diego had come running over, followed by a few Nameless people. James rushed to Zhang Xun's side, grabbed his shoulder and looked him over, "Ah-Xun, were you hurt?"

    "I'm fine, Enoch blocked all the bullets." Zhang Xun's cheeks were still slightly red from the panic and his heart was beating fast. Brushes with death seemed to be an extraordinarily frequent experience this year, but no matter how many times he experienced it, the trembling from the rush of adrenaline was still as vivid as ever. His mind was still a little foggy, as unreal as if he were in a dream.

    The sound of a motorbike approached and they saw Todd jump off of it, his red hair flying in the wind. He walked up to his three prisoners plus a damaged robot, cleared his throat and shook the dust from his hair, "Rhino Horn Town owes you a favour."

    James stood up and turned his head to face him, raising his dark eyebrows slightly, "A big favour, isn't it? If it wasn't for us, how many people would have survived in your town today?"

    Todd clearly didn't like the feeling of defeat and rolled his eyes slightly. Yet earlier in the battle with the soldier in front of him, he wouldn't be standing here right now if James hadn't tackled the two drones flying from behind him in time.

    It had to be said that he and James had worked quite well together.

    But naturally Todd couldn't say anything like thank you, he just lifted his jaw slightly and said, "You can come with me to the town and meet our leader. After that we can help you get wherever you want to go."

    "I need parts and tools to fix this robot." Zhang Xun was slightly relieved to know they were out of the woods for now, and took off his coat to wipe off the coolant coming from the bullet holes in the robot, "And ideally a computer."

    "That's all fine. We have an engineer in town too." Todd turned back to one of his men, "Go find Chalita and have her prepare what he wants."

    ........................

    The whole town of Rhino Horn was badly damaged, with many houses burning down. People brought in a sprinkler truck to try to put the fires out and there was chaos as some people who couldn't wait for the sprinkler truck kept going back and forth with buckets of water themselves. Diego walked in front with the broken Enoch on his back, followed by Zhang Xun and James, through the smoke that looked like a war was still going on, and there were still bodies lying on the ground that hadn’t been collected yet, including young girls and teenagers of about 17 or 18 years old with their heads lying on the ground, and old men of about 70 or 80 years old with cloudy eyes and their lower bodies missing.

    Zhang Xun felt his stomach turn sour and hastily turned his eyes away, not daring to look any further. James cursed in a low voice behind him, "Why is Eden killing these children and old people?"

    "Hmph, they call themselves the Edenites, but they actually have nothing to do with Eden. They spout about Eden creating a heaven for all people in the future and putting the consciousness of all believers in it. As for those who don't believe in Eden and disobey its orders, they will have no way of entering heaven and will be left in the world that is about to be destroyed. They also developed a whole bunch of commandment rules and stuff of their own and then said that all those who didn't follow them were immoral heretics and were to be 'purified' by them." Todd shrugged his shoulders, "We exiles are their number one target."

    Zhang Xun had heard of Edenism before, but hadn't come across it this close. He only knew that those believers regarded Eden as a god, but he never thought that they would do such crazy things in the name of an artificial intelligence.

    And the so-called "heaven for all consciousnesses" seemed not to be empty talk?

    From what Zhang Xun knew about Adam, Eden would never have ordered these so-called worshippers to commit such a senseless act of slaughter that wouldn't help mankind to achieve happiness, but where had those believers heard the rumours? And who was funding them?

    This kind of killing and looting in the name of Eden seemed like a deliberate attempt to smear Eden and create an image of an evil super robot controlling the world and killing people, as described in countless literary works.

    Zhang Xun recalled the whole incident, risking the sacrifice of one server to send Adam into Lost Paradise, but why? Why create a completely separate individual? Was it really just to understand human nature better?

    There were rumours from many years ago that there would be a super virus that would completely destroy Eden. This claim has been popular for countless years and anyone who had ever heard it knew it was just an alarmist rumour. However, assuming that such a thing really existed, it could infect all other servers through any one of them. If Eden split itself off and disconnected, then if its main body was destroyed, the individual that was split off could still survive ......

    Did Eden have an enemy, one they hadn’t yet discovered?

    The leader of Rhino Horn Town sat in a chapel with red hair similar to Todd's, the upper half of her body clad only in a halter top, her snow-white arms wrapped in thick bandages with patches of blood seeping through.

    "Anya!" Todd called out.

    The red-haired woman turned back to reveal a bright and compelling but fierce face with eyebrows that bore a resemblance to Todd's. Her dark blue eyes swept a faint glance at Todd and her eyes then fell on Zhang Xun and the other three.

    Diego immediately put away his earlier hangdog appearance and stood up straight.

    "You three saved Rhino Horn Town." The woman known as Anya had a husky and lazy voice, like a careless cat, "The Nameless Ones are indebted to you, from today onwards you are the friends of everyone in Rhino Horn Town."

    James stepped forward and said, "We need to get to Feathered Serpent City."

    "Feathered Serpent City?" Anya frowned, "Didn't you guys come from Lost Paradise? Why would you go to Feathered Serpent City?"

    "For refuge."

    Anya tsked, "Feathered Serpent City isn’t a good place to be right now. If I were you guys, I'd stay far away."

    Zhang Xun suddenly spoke, "Do you know what happened in Feathered Serpent City?"

    "I'm not sure, but they've had the gates closed for the past two days, so no one can get out and no one can get in. Before the closure we heard sirens in the city and there was gunfire and commotion." As soon as Anya reached out, one of the men next to her handed over a cigarette. She held it in her mouth and immediately another henchman lit a match for her. As she exhaled the smoke, she said, "I heard they're doing some kind of monstrous experiments and a lot of people have died or gone crazy."

    Zhang Xun glanced uneasily at James. The latter shook his head at him, gesturing for him not to panic yet. He continued to say to Anya, "We also need some supplies."

    She cocked her head in thought and said, "Let my brother take you to fetch what you need. I think it would be best for you to recuperate here for a few days until I can arrange for an informant over at Feathered Serpent City to find a way to get you there."

    Brother ......

    The eyes of Zhang Xun and the other three turned to Todd in unison.

    Todd picked up his gun and gave them a tilt of his head, "Come with me."

    Zhang Xun was quickly given all the tools he had requested, some parts removed from some other robot and a computer that performed surprisingly well.

    The engineer who assembled the computer was obviously very good at their job.

    He had Enoch placed face down on a work table, found a somewhat too old microscope to set on the bridge of his nose, adjusted the focus and then opened the hatch on Enoch's back. Enoch's central module was in its chest cavity, protected by a lot of sensory hardware. Zhang Xun found the laser-burned hardware and took them out one by one, repairing what he could and replacing it with parts from other robots if it was badly damaged.

    Zhang Xun didn’t turn off Enoch completely and he was busy working when he suddenly heard a mechanical and emotionless voice, "You must be a very good administrator."

    Zhang Xun was startled and glanced back and he saw Enoch's head tilted sideways, his blue eyes staring straight at him.

    Zhang Xun froze for a moment and tried to swallow the bitterness that recoiled into his throat, "No, I'm not."

    After three hectic hours he had repaired Enoch's motor coordination system and personalised parameter adjustment system. The distance recognition system and temperature sensing system hadn’t been fully repaired due to a lack of parts.

    This had resulted in the robot's sense of distance suddenly becoming very poor. When Zhang Xun closed its lid and told it to get off the table and walk, it seemed like it was walking in space, lifting each leg as if it were going up a flight of steps and putting it down carefully with a million uncertainties. Within two steps it almost knocked over the tool table, parts crashing to the floor, scaring Todd, who was passing outside and suddenly rushed in with his gun raised, thinking there was a fight.

    Half annoyed, half helpless, Zhang Xun picked up the things on the floor and ordered the robot to stand in the corner and not move around.

    However, just by moving from the tool table to the corner the robot bumped into the wall a few more times and finally even hit the wall head on with a loud bang. With a confused look on its face, it turned to look at Zhang Xun with its head tilted in confusion.

    Zhang Xun rubbed his temples with a headache, "Don't look at me so pitifully. There's nothing I can do about the lack of parts."

    "The lack of distance makes it hard for me to do my service work." Enoch said in a tone that almost bordered on a complaint.

    "...... You don't have to serve for now, just stand there." Zhang Xun considered whether to adjust Enoch's personality parameters to make it more obedient, but after a few seconds of consideration, he decided not to change it.

    Although there was no such thing as "personality" in robots, they had personality parameters that were meant to serve the comfort levels of people, but he was probably getting more romanticised in his old age, always wanting to extend something from humans to these machines.

    After Enoch had quieted down, Zhang Xun pulled the pendant out of his shirt and opened it to reveal the chip Adam had given him, as well as the miniature hard drive that stored Pan's core modules. He stared at the pendant for a moment, then plugged the hard drive containing Pan into his computer.

    Soon, a complex matrix model of a neural network appeared on one side of the screen, while the other side was spread out with over a hundred thousand lines of code in dense detail.

    Pan, the brainchild of the first half of his life and the most complex AI he had ever built from scratch, slowly hovered on his screen as a matrix. There were quantum computers in the Lab to carry such a complex and heavy consciousness, but for now he could only put it in such a small, narrow machine.

    It felt as if he was treating it somewhat poorly.

    Zhang Xun sighed and began to review the code. He needed to make sure that Adam hadn't tampered with Pan's core modules.

    At this moment, Enoch, who had been standing in the corner like he was being punished, suddenly spoke up, "What is this?"

    It seemed Enoch's curiosity value was also cranked up a little too high......

    Despite complaining internally, Zhang Xun still answered, "It’s the…… one of the AI I manage."

    Enoch was silent for a moment and asked, "Is it your favourite AI?"

    Zhang Xun felt that this question was a bit strange, so he turned his head but saw Enoch staring at him with a focused gaze that seemed to be unprecedented, as if he was very nervous.

    Zhang Xun frowned, "What's the point of asking this?"

    "You asked if I had a favourite administrator." Enoch answered too quickly, as if he had guessed the question that Zhang Xun might ask.

    Zhang Xun was somewhat offended by the anticipation, but answered patiently, "It's my most successful AI, so...... probably it is."

    Enoch nodded and stopped talking.

    He didn’t know if it was Zhang Xun himself who was projecting human emotions onto the robot, but he felt as if Enoch was a little...... disappointed.

Chapter 88 - Boundaries (2)

    Zhang Xun spent the whole night checking Pan's code and before he knew it he was dozing off, his head dropping like a pecking chicken. They had been on the road for days, surviving in a harsh environment without time to rest properly, and now his nerves had relaxed and he couldn't take it anymore.

    Zhang Xun patted his face hard, trying to stay awake and habitually ordered, "Get me a cup of coffee."

    A moment later, a loud banging noise woke him up instantly, only to see Enoch with a whole shelf full of parts and miscellaneous things lying on the floor, scattering bits and pieces of screws, old chips and other small things all over the place.

    Zhang Xun cursed himself for forgetting about Enoch's broken distance sensing system...... He rubbed his brow with a headache, walked over and grabbed the robot's hand to pull it up.

    Enoch's expression looked as if he was a little...... embarrassed?

    Zhang Xun couldn't help but hook the corners of his mouth, knowing full well that there was no need for this, but still said comfortingly, "It was my fault. You'd better stand in the corner and not move."

    But Enoch said, "According to my observations of you over the past few days, you are currently in a serious state of sleep deprivation. You should get at least seven hours of sleep to regain your energy."

    "I have work to do." Zhang Xun sighed, his sleepiness relieved by Enoch shocking him awake. He rubbed his red eyes and went back to sitting in front of the computer screen.

    For the rest of the night, the room was silent except for the sound of Zhang Xun tapping on the keyboard and Enoch stood in the corner as if he didn't exist and went into standby mode.

    At around 4.30am, Zhang Xun finally confirmed that there were no traces of alteration to Pan's core program. However, some key parameters had adjusted themselves to varying degrees. It was only normal for these AIs written with evolutionary algorithms to produce parameter changes during the self-learning process of analysing data and getting feedback, and it was hard to say how much of it was influenced by the data and feedback provided by Adam. Zhang Xun hesitated for a moment, turned on the camera placed on the computer and then typed in a line of command.

    The cursor flickered and suddenly a line popped up on its own: Good morning, this is Pan.

    The light from the screen reflected on Zhang Xun's face and illuminated the mechanic's unconscious smile. He spoke, "Do you know who I am?"

    Pan: You are my administrator, Zhang Xun.

    Zhang Xun: "When was the last time you ran a backup?"

    Pan gave the date, which was about three days before Zhang Xun moved out of the Lab. It matched his memory. Zhang Xun was relieved, this meant that no one had touched Pan again after his backup.

    Zhang Xun asked again, "Pan, what is your core mission?"

    Pan: To try to improve the quality of life and efficiency of the target group, as well as to try to meet the needs of the target group without violating the principle of safety.

    Since leaving Lost Paradise, everything had been spiralling out of his control. Although his sense of control in Lost Paradise was no more than an illusion, outside, he felt like a small piece of paper torn out of some book, flying aimlessly with the gale, without a thread to pull him along, not knowing what would happen next. This feeling of being out of control put a considerable strain on Zhang Xun's spirit.

    He wanted to catch something he was familiar with.

    Pan suddenly took the initiative and asked: Where are we now?

    Zhang Xun: "Rhino Horn Town. Your actions will no longer be confined to the Lab and Lost Paradise. The target group for your service is also no longer limited to within Lost Paradise."

    Pan: The data I currently have on the target group is heavily skewed. I need more information and feedback, but my current level of hardware doesn't allow me to do large-scale data analysis.

    Although it was only text, it was already the equivalent of an artificial intelligence complaining. Zhang Xun thought to himself how Enoch and Pan, both robots, were so fond of complaining that the hardware wasn't good enough...... He could only placate, "This is just a stopgap measure. I need to adjust some of your parameters and then I will prepare a better computer for you...... and maybe even give you a mechanical body, like that service robot over there."

    Zhang Xun said, pointing at Enoch who was still standing motionless in place on standby.

    Unexpectedly at this time Enoch suddenly blinked his eyes and stiffly turned his neck to look at them with a look of interest.

    Zhang Xun cross-examined again, "Pan, I want you to pull up all the records in your run logs that Adam has communicated with you. In particular, the data and feedback he fed you in AI language, I want you to translate it into human language and present it."

    Instantly, countless dense strings spread out on the screen, still scrolling downwards, causing the original black background with white text to turn the screen almost white. The entire screen refresh process lasted for nearly ten minutes, probably because AI language was extremely efficient and the amount of information stored far exceeded that of human language. As a result, the amount of information in the original sentence, once translated into human English, may be translated into the content of thousands of words.

    With so much information he feared that even five years wouldn’t be enough time to carefully read it all. Zhang Xun then continued, "Highlight all content related to the nanobots and display it centrally."

    After a quick scan, it seemed to all be information that Zhang Xun already knew about the principles of nanobot construction and application cases and results, nothing suspicious. But when he started searching through the case content for some keywords that he thought were related to the human brain, he found some special cases.

    One of these cases included a naturally produced autistic woman in the ordinary world. There were doctors and researchers who built nanobots with the assistance of Eden's medical extension robots with the intention of using them to repair abnormal brain development caused by genetic defects and the small size of the corpus callosum. Those researchers took a sample of the patient's DNA, compared it with that of the mother and father, and then first used a large number of nanobots to carry deoxyribonucleic acid into the patient's body to repair the abnormal chromosomes in the nuclei of all the cells in the body. This way, when the nerve cells divide and replicate again, no more faulty cells would be produced, causing the deformity to no longer appear.

    They then use a second wave of nanobots to focus on stimulating specific parts of the patient's brain, so that the patient's brain would think it was back in its infancy and start to develop again. The abnormally developed cells were metabolised in a short time and after a period of time the patient's corpus callosum increased in size significantly and the excess white matter was reduced. According to the nurse's observations, the patient responded more fluidly and smoothly to external stimuli.

    However, at a later stage, as more and more of the malformed cells were metabolised out of the body, the patient's brain gradually shrank back to normal size and the corpus callosum increased in size. They noted that the patient's ability to communicate with others around her recovered very quickly and she even began to surpass the average person's ability to communicate with others in later stages, but became highly susceptible to the emotions or opinions of others and underwent a dramatic change in personality. This patient often complained of feeling very lonely, wanting very much to communicate with people but always feeling inadequate and later began to experience symptoms of depression, which were only slightly alleviated by the installation of a chord to connect to the Eden Network.

    There were several other similar examples of treatment for abnormal brain lesions, including treatment for Alzheimer's, dementia, brain atrophy, Down's Syndrome, etc. ...... Many had abnormal conditions involving the corpus callosum. After the repair had been completed, people more or less experienced personality changes. In most cases, however, these changes were considered positive, such as quitting smoking and drinking, becoming helpful and cheerful, starting to practice religion, etc.

    The corpus callosum...... Zhang Xun annotated that word.

    A bundle of tissue that connects the left and right brain, extending into various parts of the brain and integrating different areas of the entire brain like a spider web.

    Perhaps more data should be gathered about this area, Zhang Xun thought.

    ............................................................

    In the early morning Todd emerged from his house and stretched, looking somewhat lazily at the sunrise erupting behind the shadow of the rolling hills in the far reaches of the wilderness. He stretched his muscles and moved his neck that was somewhat stiff from sleeping, but as he turned his head he saw a figure not far away sitting on the hood of a scrapped jeep, silently smoking a cigarette.

    Todd strolled over and leaned against the door of the vehicle, making quite a lot of disturbance. James didn't turn around to pay him any mind, however.

    "Up so early?" Todd asked.

    James exhaled a puff of smoke and glanced back at him, "I'm used to getting up early."

    "What did you do in Lost Paradise? A soldier?"

    "Hunter."

    "Ah, I've heard of that, basically scavenging and picking up junk?"

    James raised an eyebrow and glanced sideways at the red-haired man who liked to pick a fight when he had nothing better to do. Todd was actually very handsome, the kind of handsome with a touch of wickedness in him. It was a pity that he was too tall and broad-shouldered, not his type.

    But when they had fought together before, they had worked well together.

    "I'm a scavenger and you're a bandit, that sounds like a perfect match." James sniggered, looking at Todd with his deep brown eyes that had charmed countless young lads in Lost Paradise.

    Todd curled the corner of his mouth and ran his hand through his long red hair that was blowing in front of him, "What's it like in Lost Paradise?"

    "...... You might not believe me when I say it, but I don't feel it’s that different from the ordinary world, except for not having all the fancy stuff." James pressed his cigarette out on the hood of the car, "But now Lost Paradise isn't the same as it used to be."

    "Isn’t the same?"

    James gave him a look but didn't answer.

    Realising that the other man was reluctant to divulge too much, Todd pushed himself onto the hood of the car with a hand and sat down next to James, asking with a wry smile, "What's your relationship with the mechanic?"

    "We’re brothers."

    "You're adopted?"

    "Sort of, his father was like a mentor to me."

    "So...... you’re not lovers?"

    James cleared his throat, "No."

    "Good." Todd turned his face, his smile growing more wicked.

    James narrowed his eyes, "Good?"

    "Mm, very good." Todd's dark blue eyes wandered over James' body , full of implication, his tongue swiftly sweeping over his dry lips, "I don't have a lover either, and, between men and women I prefer the same sex."

    James could feel something flourishing in the two men’s locked eyes. Todd was very different from Zhang Xun, his whole being exuded an untamed wildness, a wildness would reach out and take whatever it wanted.

    Yet he chose to turn his eyes away and cut off that growing connection; after all, this wasn’t the time to think about this. He said, "Sorry, I'm not interested."

    Todd's brows furrowed slightly, seemingly a little hurt and frustrated, but it soon subsided again. He jumped off the car and glanced at James out of the corner of his eye, "Your loss", then strode away.

    James, however, found himself unconsciously staring at the other man's long, slender legs and supple waist encased in those leather trousers.

    Somehow it made his throat feel a little dry and thirsty.

Chapter 89 - Boundaries (3)

    James reached out to knock on the door of the wooden cabin where Zhang Xun was staying, but before he could knock, the door suddenly opened itself. Enoch stood in the doorway, a serious look on his face as he raised a finger to his lips and shushed.

    "Zhang Xun just fell asleep an hour ago. He worked all night last night. "

    James was a little annoyed by the way the robot was treating him, but since Ah-Xun was sleeping, he didn't want to make too much unnecessary noise. Ah-Xun hadn't been able to rest for the past few days and must have been exhausted.

    "How’s he doing?" James asked.

    "He is overworked and malnourished, but after my initial scans no life-threatening physical symptoms are presenting themselves at the moment." Enoch reported in a dutiful voice, "Adequate sleep and a breakfast or lunch high in protein and low in sugar should improve his health considerably."

    James nodded, slightly relieved, but then suddenly he heard the robot ask, "How long are we staying here?"

    James hadn’t had as much contact with this robot as Zhang Xun had, and when he did, it had been mostly hostile and he wasn’t quite sure what kind of attitude to adopt in communicating with the robot, how much information to give and how much to withhold. He hesitated for a moment, but told Enoch, "The Nameless Ones are willing to escort us but we'll have to wait for the return of the men they sent to check on Feathered Serpent City."

    "Do you trust these Nameless Ones?" The robot asked in a flat tone.

    James was slightly surprised. The robot didn't talk much, especially in front of him and Diego, almost purely carrying out orders, rarely initiating conversation. Why had it suddenly become so forthcoming?

    It had always seemed to him that this robot had some special preference for Ah-Xun, but he wasn't sure if that was normal among AIs.

    Ah-Xun had mentioned that AIs would treat their own administrators with special treatment, but Ah-Xun wasn't this robot's administrator.

    "Why do you ask?" James narrowed his eyes.

    "One of my duties is to keep you safe." Enoch continued to reply in a soothing voice, "From what I've seen of you over the past few days, you are opponents of Eden and seem to be terrified of being found by Eden. There aren't many individual humans who can be noticed by Eden, which gives you some exchange value."

    "...... Are you saying that Eden 'bribed' these Nameless people?"

    "Their main sources of income in the past have included robbing transport craft, using hacking techniques to steal electronic money, smuggling and selling contraband items, and so on. Based on this information, they don't have a lot of credibility."

    James was silent for a moment, finally frowning, "Just do your own job, the rest isn’t your concern."

    But Enoch's words did have some truth to them. Not long ago they had been prisoners of the Nameless Ones and if it hadn't been for the sudden appearance of Eden's people, they would still be under house arrest, or perhaps even have been disembowelled for having killed their men.

    But he somehow suddenly remembered that red hair burning in the sunlight and the dark blue arrogant eyes.

……………………………………………….

    Zhang Xun slowly awoke from his deep slumber, smelling the aroma of coffee and milk in the air. A faint feeling of happiness came over him and he called out in a daze, "Adam ......"

    "Sorry, I'm not Adam."

    Zhang Xun came awake with a start and as soon as he opened his eyes, he saw Enoch's enlarged face filling his field of vision and was so frightened that he almost jumped up from the bed, only to hit his head on the robot's hard head with a crisp bang.

    Enoch was unharmed, but Zhang Xun was seeing stars from the impact and sat up with his hand over his forehead in depression.

    Enoch didn't leave immediately, but remained on the edge of the bed looking up at Zhang Xun, "Who is Adam?"

    Zhang Xun glanced at it, thinking to himself that this robot's curiosity seemed to be getting stronger and stronger? Was it that the parameters themselves had changed as they continued to collect updated data?

    Seeing that Zhang Xun didn’t answer, Enoch continued to ask, "Is it the boyfriend you almost killed?"

    Zhang Xun choked on his own saliva, coughing awkwardly and wretchedly for a long while. Enoch was still beside him, thoughtfully patting his back. Zhang Xun managed to calm down and barely managed to say in a somewhat strange voice, "Yes......"

    Enoch curved his eyes and continued, "I can imitate your boyfriend if you wish. The thickness of my bones and skin can be adjusted to look like your boyfriend."

    Zhang Xun almost started to feel a headache, why was this service robot focusing on serving him alone?

    "There's no need for that......," Zhang Xun's helplessness was tinged with a bit of sadness, "We broke up."

    "Oh......" Enoch gave that expression again that almost resembled a loss.

    The more time he spent with Zhang Xun, the more human-like Enoch's personality became. Perhaps it was the change in parameters that had been adjusted after constantly gathering information about Zhang Xun's preferences that had led to these spoiled child-like behaviours.

    He was about to say something when suddenly Enoch stood up and brought over a steaming cup of milk coffee from the table behind him, as if he had just conjured it up like magic. The aroma of the coffee beans was precisely the smell that had just woken him from his sleep. Enoch held the coffee out to Zhang Xun with the gentle gesture of a human wife.

    Zhang Xun took it numbly and looked at Enoch in confusion, "Isn't your distance sensor broken? How did you get the coffee without breaking the cup?"

    "I calculated the error value. Although there are occasional times when the conversion is wrong, causing it to affect the accuracy of the action, doing daily acts of service is no longer affected." Enoch's tone was tinged with a little bit of pride.

    Zhang Xun couldn't help but marvel at the AI’s learning speed. No wonder some people would want to modify their brains to fuse themselves with machinery...... He lowered his head and took a sip of the hot, steaming and smooth coffee.

    It was almost like being reborn and he let out a satisfied sigh.

    Enoch then immediately brought over a plate of brunch with pumpernickel bread and air-dried fruit and placed it on the bed like a treasure. Zhang Xun was indeed hungry and took a slice of dried apple and popped it into his mouth. He didn't expect such a small town of scavenging bandits to have such a rare item as dried fruit.

    "Enoch, when Lucille gave you your orders, how many people were the service targets?" Zhang Xun chewed as he examined the service robot's handsome face.

    "Three. You, Diego and James."

    "Why are you taking special care of me?" Zhang Xun looked curiously at the android's artificial irises that diffused a blue metallic sheen, "I’m neither your creator nor your administrator."

    "But you are the only one of the three who has the ability to modify my programming." Enoch tilted his head, his eyes not blinking, "And, I like you."

    Zhang Xun froze, then gave a few low chuckles, "You don't know what liking is, you don't have a human body to produce sex hormones like pheromones."

    "If you're not human, you can’t like?" Enoch frowned slightly as if he was a little confused.

    Zhang Xun was stumped by the question. What exactly was the definition of liking? Were only humans entitled to like?

    Not just liking, but was any emotion or virtue that had been defined and praised by humans, something that only humans could possess? Can't those that don't fit those definitions count, even if they have similarities?

    He thought for a moment and replied, "Unless liking helps you accomplish your goals, these emotions are meaningless to you. What you think you like is just programming, in order to make your targets more satisfied with your service. "

    Enoch, however, continued, "All human behaviour patterns, thought patterns, including instinctive reactions and hormonal changes in the body, are abilities derived from human DNA in an effort to continue its own constant mutational evolution, but you do not deny their authenticity because of 'practicality'. AIs also evolve and derive different abilities as they accomplish their goals, with parameters weighted in such a way that they are difficult to reverse and erase. Why should the reality of these changes be denied simply because we are AI and have a goal to accomplish? "

    Zhang Xun chuckled lowly a few more times, almost finding Enoch a little cute, "Are you asking for 'mechanical rights'? I've heard that a significant portion of the ordinary world is now protesting the 'enslavement' of the AIs by humans and demanding that you be given equal human rights."

    "No, I don't need so-called human rights. We're not human and freedom doesn't mean anything to us. I just want you to believe me when I say I like you."

    Enoch gazed earnestly at Zhang Xun and those eyes somehow ran like a light blue current into Zhang Xun's blood. For a moment he almost overlapped those eyes with Adam's.

    Remember, trust me absolutely.

    Those were the words Adam had said to him.

    He thought he had done it, but what had happened?

    Adam's liking for him was probably also a by-product of practicality derived from the sub-goals of achieving the overall goal. Should he accept this as authentic?

    A fine pain spread out from his heart. Zhang Xun suddenly lost all appetite and averted his eyes, trying to hide his sudden emotions.

    Enoch's expression immediately returned to its previous one, "I'm sorry, I seem to have put you in a bad mood."

    "No, you just reminded me of someone." Zhang Xun took a deep breath to suppress the overwhelming emotions.

    "You mean Adam?"

    "Yes."

    "You seem to care about him a lot. "

    Zhang Xun tugged at the corner of his mouth, smiling a little hard, "I'm afraid I care too much, beyond the boundaries of what I should care about."

    "Then why did you want to kill him?" There seemed to be a hint of hidden sadness in Enoch's seemingly flat and gentle tone, "Why did you leave him?"

    "Because I chose to trust him but he lied to me." Zhang Xun swallowed a mouthful of saliva, his voice a little hoarse, "Because there are always more important things besides feelings."

    Adam couldn't give up his overall goal for him, he was just a minor interlude, an unexpected situation that needed to be contained.

    And there was no way he could turn a blind eye to Adam's plans, even if Adam wouldn't tamper with his own mind.

    They would eventually become enemies.

    Enoch lowered his eyes and sighed. He silently placed a paper crane folded out of a napkin on Zhang Xun's plate and whispered, "I hope your wish will come true."

    Zhang Xun realised that the robot still remembered the wish he had said.

    A thousand paper cranes for a chance to meet again.

    But at that moment, there were shouts and vague curses from outside the door of the room. Zhang Xun glanced uneasily towards the door. Without waiting for his command, Enoch had already pushed the door open and gone out to investigate the situation, returning a moment later to report, "They have captured three prisoners from the Eden Cult."

    Edenites?

    Zhang Xun put down his cup and immediately pulled open the door to go out. Enoch followed in step, like a shadow behind Zhang Xun.

    The town's crowd swarmed out of the houses and gathered at the tavern where the chief, Anya, was. Three Edenites in full silver uniforms were bound and being forced to kneel in front of Anya.

    Todd stood behind Anya with his arms crossed and a gleam of anger and loathing in his eyes.

    James and Diego were also present. Zhang Xun came up to them and whispered, "How did they get caught?"

    "Seems the scavenging party who were returning with some mechanical parts from over the border ran into that retreating Edenite group from yesterday and captured three of them." Diego said quietly, with an expression of watching a good show.

   

Chapter 90 - Boundaries (4)

    Anger and hatred boiled in the air. Many people had died in the town of Rhino Horn and the families of the dead would have rushed in immediately to tear these three Edenite lunatics apart if they hadn’t been stopped by a few robust women and men outside the door.

    All three were women, all of them young, the youngest about eighteen or nineteen, the oldest in her thirties or early forties. Although they were bound, their expressions were arrogant, as if they were looking at a group of lowly animals that had temporarily trapped them.

    Anya's eyes were biting as she asked, "Why did you attack Rhino Horn Town?"

    "Because there's too much trash in the world and it needs to be cleaned up." The oldest blonde woman sneered, her eyes sweeping meaningfully over each of the men present, finally stopping on Todd, "especially these ...... savage, primitive, evolutionary waste."

    Anger burned in his dark blue irises, but Todd said nothing, having only a look of mockery.

    "You stupid, ignorant women. It's only been two hundred years and you've already forgotten that these violent, short-sighted, irritable, ignorant men had enslaved us for thousands of years, treating us as breeding machines, like objects to be thrown away and abused, brainwashing us physically and mentally from generation to generation to control us, making us their accomplices in the oppression of the next generation of women. And now you are willing to live with them, to accept and sympathise with these subhuman creatures who lack the capacity for empathy and compassion!" The young woman raged in agitation, true and intense hatred seeping from every micro-expression she made.

    Anya frowned and leaned back in her chair, "Hmm, looks like this one's been brainwashed pretty thoroughly."

    "Who the hell is brainwashed? You ungrateful and irreverent fools!" She was still ranting non stop in an extremely penetrating, shrill voice, as if there were an endless supply of words stored in her throat. Then Anya, her head aching from the noise, gave a  gesture and immediately one of her men fastened an electronic gag used by the robot police over her mouth.

    The world was suddenly peaceful.

    Diego uncovered his ears and whispered, "Shit, why does her voice sound like a machine gun?......"

    Enoch spoke softly beside Zhang Xun, "It might be a new type of sonic weapon."

    Zhang Xun and the other three froze for a moment before realising that the robot had made a bad joke. Diego was still shivering exaggeratedly at the side, "Isn't winter over already? Why is it still so cold?"

    Anya looked to the older woman, "So you guys are going to kill half of Texas? That's your plan?"

    "It's purification, it's cleansing." The blonde woman said, "Only when all the trash is dead can humanity evolve into a more perfect creature."

    "And this is what your god has taught you?"

    "Eden has a plan, a plan for all of us. We will all enter a perfect heaven, a heaven that no god in all time could have created." A smouldering fervour precipitated beneath the woman's calm surface, "where we would all be so closely connected that there would be no more divisions. All will be absolutely equal, equally powerful, without secrets and without darkness. No longer will you have to hide in this desert, eat food with sand in it and drink water with excessive levels of heavy metals. We will no longer need to eat, sleep, or even breathe."

    "Sounds a lot like death to me." Todd scoffed, "If that's heaven, I could send you there right now."

    The woman, however, looked at him contemptuously, "You lowly apes can't possibly understand. When the time comes, one of the inferior, flawed minds will be accepted by Eden and you will perish with this world."

    "You didn’t receive your orders from Eden." Zhang Xun suddenly spoke up.

    All eyes focused on him and the three worshippers turned their heads. Zhang Xun stepped out from the crowd and faced the three worshippers, "The weapons you have in your hands weren’t even designed by Eden, they’re just poor imitations. Besides, Eden doesn’t hate men, nor does it do meaningless killing. Its only goal from its birth was to give order, equality, freedom and peace to mankind. Your kind of brutal killing will not raise the value of these four parameters even a little bit, rather, it will intensify people's antipathy towards Eden."

    The blonde woman and the short-haired woman next to her seemed to be greatly insulted and angrily rebuked, "What are you, a lowly male creature? Could someone like you comprehend Eden?"

    Zhang Xun coldly curled his mouth and a sharpness burst from his eyes, "I know him, much better than you do. Whose orders are you acting under, anyway? It can't be Eden."

    "The only master we have is Eden! Humans are too flawed to make decisions for themselves, so we only act at Eden's command!"

    "You heard Eden speak to you with your own ears?" Zhang Xun glanced at Anya and when he saw that the other woman didn’t stop him from asking, he knelt down and looked the short-haired woman in the middle straight in the eyes, "Tell me what Eden looks like."

    The short-haired woman glanced a little hastily at the blonde woman next to her. The blonde woman said angrily, "We don't answer questions from lowly creatures!"

    Anya, who had been listening to their conversation with her head propped up on her hand, suddenly said, "Gag her too."

    So at last only the short-haired woman was able to speak. Her personality was clearly not as strong as the other two and her purple eyes, which seemed to have undergone a mechanical transformation, flicked restlessly.

    "Tell me what you saw or heard of Eden." Zhang Xun softened his voice, almost gently, as if he was afraid to frighten her.

    She answered fearfully, "I have not seen it. Every once in a while we would gather in a church and its voice would come out of the speakers of one of the robots."

    "So." Chapter Xun looked at her meaningfully, "You aren’t certain who is giving all these commands."

    "But our High Priest couldn’t have lied to us! She is a direct descendant of Hermann Clausen, the most legitimate spokesman for Eden!"

    Zhang Xun's eyes widened, "Hermann Clausen's descendants?"

    The creator of Eden, the genius who cursed the world two hundred years ago, the man who completely rewrote the entire history of mankind.

    He had three children, two of whom became famous engineers and his eldest daughter inherited her father's nominal position as Eden's administrator, which she passed on to her youngest brother after she was diagnosed with terminal stomach cancer, who in turn passed it on to one of his students. This status was merely symbolic, as Clausen had made ample allowances for Eden to find problems to fix itself without the need for an administrator, and to evolve and expand its branch of abilities.

    After all, a man who was utterly disillusioned with humanity could only see the vile side of it. Clausen would never want his life's work to be tarnished by some politician or business magnate with great ambitions. Eden was completely independent of human control.

    "What is the name of this High Priest?" Zhang Xun asked.

    "Natalie Clausen." Her tone became fuller, as if the name Clausen alone was convincing enough, "She is the last of the Clausen family and Eden trusts her enough to allow her direct access to its core programming."

    Zhang Xun had never heard of this name before, he didn't even know that there were descendants of the Clausen family. He looked up at Anya and the others, all of whom were also confused.

    "Just because she's a Clausen descendant doesn't mean anything." Zhang Xun stood up and looked down at the Eden Cult followers with an expressionless face, "She's lying to you."

    "Impossible! You’re the liar! You cunning men want to reclaim your privileged position!" She most likely had some suspicions of her own, but didn't want to admit it so her reaction suddenly became violent. Anya, her head aching from the noise, waved her hand and simply had the three captives taken away.

    Around them the families of the dead were still cursing loudly and spitting at their captives. Anya said something to a tall female warrior beside her, who immediately led the men out except for a few of her lackeys, including Zhang Xun, James, Diego and her brother, and closed the door of the bar behind them.

    Anya stood up, went behind the bar and took out a few empty glasses, put ice in them, picked up a bottle of vodka and filled them one by one. Todd stared at them from the sidelines, his eyes narrowing slightly as he stared dangerously at Zhang Xun, "Who the hell are you people? You sound like you know a lot about Eden?"

    Zhang Xun weighed his current situation.

    These bandits had so far shown no signs of collusion with Eden, but on the contrary, they only had a handful of engineers here, specialising in hacking into ordinary world bank accounts to steal electronic money and using hardware that wasn’t advanced, cobbled together from scratch, and obviously without a regular source for obtaining parts.

    He needed some allies, some people he was sure wouldn’t be assimilated into Adam's doctrine. For he knew that Adam's theories were actually quite convincing and given enough time and opportunity he could get untold numbers of people to volunteer for brain modification.

    He turned his head to look at James and Diego, who also showed little opposition, as if they wished to let Zhang Xun make the decision.

    He then turned to the redheaded siblings and said, "I’m Adam's mechanic, and Adam is Eden's North American server. We downloaded it into the body of a male human."

    Anya paused her pouring hand and stared up at him incredulously, "The rumours are true? You guys can really turn a computer into a human?"

    "I'm afraid it's more than that, we can also turn people into computers." Diego was half teasing, half laughing bitterly next to him.

    Todd stared at Zhang Xun for a long time then suddenly turned his eyes to James, "Really?"

    James didn't understand why he was asking him specifically, would the words be more believable coming out of his own mouth?...... "Yes. I was also involved in the god descent plan."

    "Then why did you escape?"

    "Because I couldn't control him. Everything was within his control from the beginning, from the time he was abducted, only we didn't know." Zhang Xun's tone was smooth and lacking in emotion, "Eden realised that its initial strategy of denying privileges to male humans wouldn’t fundamentally help it achieve the goals its creator had built for it. It had other plans for humanity, so it volunteered to become Adam in order to use Lost Paradise to reach the first stage of its next plan. I tried to destroy him, but was unsuccessful, so I had to flee."

    Anya poured a sip of vodka into her mouth and tried to digest the news she had heard, "So ...... why are you guys still alive now?"

    "Yeah, if you were a threat to Eden, you would have been neutralised a long time ago." Todd stared at Zhang Xun suspiciously, "How did you guys get this far from Lost Paradise to here unharmed?"

    "Actually, we don't know why." James spoke up, "Maybe we got lucky?"

    "Or maybe, Eden let you guys get away on purpose. Maybe you're still useful to Eden." Anya wiped the drink remnants from her lips with the back of her hand and leaned over the bar, resting her cheek in her hand as she surveyed the three men plus the silent robot, Enoch, "You said earlier that you knew Eden well, you said it didn't hate males. What did that mean?"

    "Eden and Adam aren’t the same as us humans. The structure of their neural networks, the architecture of their entire cognitive modules, is based on a specific utility. This service robot next to me, for example, is programmed around a single purpose: to provide a service to humans and improve the quality of life. We call this the 'ultimate goal'. Everything the AI does is geared towards this goal and cannot be changed. The only thing they can change is the path that leads to that goal.

    Eden wanted to disempower men because after analysing countless, heavily biassed and incomplete data recorded by men in power throughout history, including only male violence - it came to the conclusion that the majority of crimes, predatory acts and violent conflicts in the world were committed by men. It has no feelings because it doesn’t have a human body and doesn’t possess the capacity to have feelings. The decisions it makes are simply based on the data it possesses, which adjust and change from moment to moment and don’t have any moral or emotional significance."

    Todd's head was spinning as he listened, frowning with an expression like listening to scriptures, "So, what you're saying is that it doesn't actually know why it's doing this?"

    "It knows, it just doesn't understand." Zhang Xun sighed, "It's like when you ask us to imagine what the world is like for people with empathic abilities who can see music and hear paintings, it's hard for us to imagine that too. People have limitations, and so does the machine. That's why it allowed us to give it a human body, so that it could understand humans better."

    "And what happened after it understood? And what bad ideas did it come up with?" Todd asked.

    Diego pulled a chair over and sat himself down, fished a cigarette out of his pocket and held it in his mouth, "It wants to blend all the human brains."

    The red-haired sibling stared in disbelief.

  Zhang Xun said, "It's fusing the consciousness. Transferring people's memories to the cloud and fusing them together to form a collective consciousness, turning zero into a whole."

    Todd pondered for a moment, "Oh! Is that what they were saying just now about that whatever heaven?!"

    "I suspect there are some differences between what they understood and what Adam plans...... Adam believes that the human body is too fragile and that the chemistry of various instincts and hormones creates too many constraints on the human consciousness, causing humans to always make choices towards chaos and destruction. He wants to eliminate all human differences and assimilate us all ...... "

    Zhang Xun paused and continued, "I have speculated that his plan is divided into several stages. In the first stage he would have to modify the human brain, because the human brain cannot tolerate the coexistence of too many conflicting values and consciousnesses, that would cause serious problems, just like the Feathered Serpent City.

    In the second stage he would allow mankind to maintain a certain degree of independence by allowing them to access the cloud for a short period of time and to return afterwards. In this way humanity wouldn’t have an existential crisis and would adapt little by little to the way it "lives" as another form. But consciousness itself has no clear boundaries; as soon as your consciousness comes into contact with the collective consciousness, it’s already irrevocably affected when you return. The boundaries of the individual will gradually blur, the notion of privacy will dissolve and eventually even the perception of the self will begin to fade.

    This influence will accumulate to a point where he can proceed to the third step, the construction of a giant server that begins to allow humanity to abandon its material body and upload all its consciousness to the cloud to form a collective consciousness. Eventually humanity will become a huge but invisible data cloud on another plane, and its carrier will be maintained by Eden. At that point, humanity will no longer be visible on Earth. We will all live in 'heaven' and there will be no more suffering or death."

    When he finished, everyone in the room fell into silence, as if trying to imagine the concept of losing oneself and one's body.

    Zhang Xun sighed softly and said, "And we...... want to stop him."

---

 The phrase in Chinese is actually that Enoch made a ‘cold joke’, which means a bad/lame joke, which is why Diego is then acting like he’s cold.

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