Abyss Express

[You are about to enter Community Zero, which is a huge public space, are you ready? ]

Everything is being reorganized. In Meteor's eyes, there are countless color blocks and pixels that are gradually distorted and deformed. They exchange positions with each other, hiding the memory fragments of Hot Wind, and will become a new space.

Meteor said: "I'm ready, everything is according to your arrangement."

At this moment, he formally stepped into the Internet of Shinto City from the jester's review agency. The earth and sky of virtual space emerge, and buildings and public transportation systems are recoupled.

Pedestrians with different expressions [rising from the ground]——

——Why do you say [rising from the ground]?

In the eyes of Meteor, these characters are part of the material separated from the soil, and then evolved into the bones, muscles, internal organs, fascia, skin, and hair of the characters, and put on clothes from the inside to the outside, and finally run smoothly and naturally.

Information, information, endless information.

Everything comes alive and becomes a society with everything in it.

This is the living Guandong City, the streets are buzzing with people, there is a long queue in front of the Regent International Grand Theater, and a sightseeing tram is slowly passing by on the city track ahead.

Farther away, you can see the outskirts of Kanto City, and the advertising light board of [Oriental Hollywood] is placed on the mountainside.

Looking up, the sky was blue, and it was a cloudless and sunny day. All I could see was the warm and dazzling sun, and those striking linear airplane clouds.

Discussion, quarrel, laughter, chase.

The cooking oil boils, the bass roars in the stereo shop.

The sweet recitation of car advertisements, and the revelation of missing people at the broadcasting terminal.

Meteor was almost dazzled by the turbulent and chaotic information flow. He turned around in a full circle before he could see where he was. From the strange pedestrians, he saw different clothes that had passed through thousands of years—— When I shifted my gaze to the street sign, I realized that this is Kujukurihama in Kanto City in [Elysium Space].

[Take your heart back, Meteor Boy, don't forget what you're here for. ]

Meteor is very honest: "What am I doing here?"

[Look for a dog! Looking for your black brother! And your big brother Ping An! ]

Meteor was stunned for a while, and finally came back to his senses.

"Oh oh oh oh! You're right!"

Even so, he still couldn't take his eyes off——

——There is a talk show in the program preview column of the Grand Theater.

Meteor stopped in front of the small window of the talk show while listening to Hot Wind's advice.

He didn't dare to deal with these strange and weird souls, so let's start with their cultural repertoire and see what people in this era really like?

When he stood before the window—

——The show host immediately stood up and came to the camera, as if doing a live broadcast.

"Boy! I have a story to tell you!"

Meteor was infected by the other party's passionate demeanor, and he immediately forgot about Hot Wind's warning, and buried his head in the window.

The host said vividly.

"Judging from your face! You should be a hateful and angry youth! I have to teach the right medicine according to my aptitude! Tell you the story of Banker (banker)!"

Meteor didn't quite understand what the host meant—

——Could it be that part of the electronic signal in the body that belongs to the hot wind, which made the host make a wrong judgment?

Hatred of the rich? Angry?

Meteor is a child born with a golden key in his mouth. He never thinks that wealth can be equated with evil, and he is not a cynical person.

The moderator starts babbling, talking about things [Jester's] quiz questions talked about.

"What's going to save unemployment? Save poor people from eternal poverty?"

"At this point there may be a small group of people who say - they should have a baby."

The host winked at Meteor, even though the guy looked like a sloppy bearded uncle in his forties—the man was in good spirits, as long as Meteor lost his patience and tried his best to catch Meteor's attention.

"Children are durable consumer goods. To raise them, you need to buy all kinds of things. It costs a lot of money, right? It must be more expensive than raising a dog!"

The host said with a smile.

"But why don't we raise a dog? After all, if you raise a dog, it will know how to repay you - if you raise a child, they will only complain about you."

Yin-yang onomatopoeia emerged.

The host squeezed his throat, pretending to be a shrill female voice.

"Dad!~Why is there a sum of money coming into our bank account every month?"

"Oh! My daughter! That's my wages."

"Oh! So that's salary? I thought it was a meal fee. After all, the uncle next door invited me to dinner, and it cost so much for a meal! He is a banker! He is a successful person!"

"Damn it! I'd rather have a dog—at least my dog ​​won't hate dog food."

The host returned to normal, even a little hysterical. He lay down in front of the camera, grinning with Meteor.

"What is a loser? Listeners?"

"What makes us losers? It seems like there's no such word in society - there are no losers."

"Are you unworthy of being a human being because you fail?"

"Let's skip this heavy topic! Let's hear how to write Shuangwen?"

The host squeezed a smiley face, and winked at Ah Xing again——

"—Fuck economists, fuck public opinion."

"We should carefully select their legal representatives and board members from the top 500 companies in Shendao City, and then invite these bankers to the TV show."

"You must have seen it!"

The host pointed to Ah Xing's nose, smiling ambiguously and obscenely.

"You must have seen, like Korean stars, eating salad and fitness meals every day, nurturing every piece of meat on their bodies, making them look bulging and curved, and have an elegant figure."

"From these BANKERs, select the ones that have contributed the most to mankind—"

"—Oh! I didn't say irony! I never meant to be ironic! I'm just that simple and straightforward!"

The host emphasized.

"The elites support human society! It is the elites that save the poor! It is the most powerful and greatest essence of all mankind that brings happiness to mankind! This is what BANKER said!"

"So we have to choose the ones who have contributed the most to mankind! Any number will do! Five? Or ten?!"

"Have these men lined up, hang the noose, and face the cameras, ready to be hanged."

The host poked at the lower left corner of the screen, emphasizing.

"We can add a window for purchasing value-added services here! Every citizen can purchase this service, and the execution will be executed immediately if the number exceeds as many as possible."

"There needs to be a good-looking, well-spoken anchor to participate in the execution ceremony."

"They will shout loudly—family members! Today's price! Is it okay!? No, I'll talk to the organizers! Buy two bankers, get an economist for free! Three heads, buy two get one free!"

Meteor's eyes widened, almost touching the screen.

"Now you don't have to worry about economic problems!" The host said with a smile: "After all, so many people are willing to spend! This advertising effect is much better than Elon Musk's farting on Twitter!"

"And if hanging isn't exciting enough, how about moving out the guillotine?"

The host's saliva almost splashed out of the window.

"We will also launch a sixteen-to-one toy model, audience friends! You will definitely be willing to buy this kind of souvenir! Every day at home, chop off BANKER's head by yourself! How enjoyable it is!"

"No no no! No no no!"

"One more thing! There is a very important ceremony!"

The host said seriously.

"After Banker's death, no one will question you, no one will belittle you."

"Your boss will immediately become a good girl, like an innocent high school student who has no sexual experience in school, I'm afraid you will send him to the gallows one day."

"He won't talk to you about artificial intelligence anymore and make you feel vulnerable—"

"—After all, BANKER's job is to make people feel vulnerable all the time."

"You will always feel that your labor is cheap or even meaningless."

"Hey! Dude! Why am I working here?"

The host frowned and complained to the air.

"Why am I turning these screws? I don't understand? I don't understand? What am I doing?"

"Why do I have to deal with these reports? Why do I have to write these words? Why do I build more than thirty engines, but what do these engines mean to me?"

"Why can machines do my job? They do it quickly and well? Have I really become a failure? But society does not allow failure. Have I lost my qualifications as a human being?"

The painting style changed, the host showed a bright smile, and blinked with Ah Xing again.

"BANKER always says this - your labor is worthless, as if artificial intelligence grows from the ground."

"We will waver, doubt our abilities, and worry about being replaced by something novel. We will eventually become half-dead machines like artificial intelligence."

"I"

[gone! meteor! ]

Ah Xing opened his mouth, almost stunned by this abstract entertainment.

"Is what he said true?"

[Of course it’s fake—the bankers in Shinto City have long been killed by artificial intelligence. In finance, how can a human brain compare to an electronic brain? ]

Ah Xing scratched his head vigorously: "Then why is there still such a play?"

[Because people like to read it, just like your martial arts novels. ]

[An era that needs heroes is sad, because where there is oppression, there is a need for resistance. ]

[Like the era when American comic heroes emerge in endlessly, the crime rate is the highest. ]

[If we no longer need martial arts stories, it means that society is thriving. ]

[In the [Elysium Space] in Xiaoguandong, you can see this kind of story, which actually shows that in our history, there has been a huge gap between the rich and the poor. When artificial intelligence technology just started, its ownership was in the hands of BANKER. ]

[Consortiums with huge productive forces monopolize all walks of life - people's lives are trapped in eternal poverty. ]

[So this kind of short play became popular, and our daily entertainment is to buy this kind of talk show in the form of storytelling in the virtual space to satisfy our inner fantasy. The repertoire just now was actually written by artificial intelligence - there are many, many copies of similar templates. ]

Meteor: "What happened later? Did this sub-program come true?"

[Of course it happened, what reason do you think I did? Turned into a heinous criminal? ]

Meteor fell silent—

——Ranfeng's few words seem to contain a huge amount of information.

The ghost living in his body may have been a great reformer during his lifetime.

His DNA blueprint is still regarded as a very precious resource by the gods of Shinto City. The soldiers of the violent organization are all copies of him.

But this kind of destructive power seems to be too powerful, too terrifying.

In order to dispel this horror, Refeng has become the number one enemy of the security center, his wife has become the number one oiran in the entertainment industry, and a replica that everyone can have.

Once the serious characters in history seem ridiculous, it seems that any negative feelings about them will naturally evaporate.

[We have to go, Meteor. ]

Meteor breathed hard, and he was still immersed in the onslaught of information in the streets and alleys of Kujukurihama—it was like a color-blind person who regained the ability to recognize colors, and it took a while to get used to it.

This Internet public space is really too crowded and too narrow.

People who come and go are interacting all the time, using various body language and actual behaviors to communicate and interact.

There are a wide variety of module advertisements, and Meteor was surprised to find that various modules representing basic functional skills have become commodities available for purchase.

For example [Electric Guitar Interpretation - Jimi Hendrix] this module.

Its advertising space plays the playing skills of guitar masters in a loop, and the graphic description shows that as long as VNEOM installs this module, users will get the corresponding music theory knowledge and playing skills. Can have a rock and roll life.

Many module product advertisements are like rushing rivers and oceans, almost drowning meteors.

But he felt that he was trapped in absolute poverty and nothingness——

— It seems that having everything is equal to having nothing.

[Let's go! Walk! ]

Meteor finally woke up: "Where are you going?"

[I'm going to find an old friend of mine, find him to buy some weapons, and find out information. ]

Meteor: "Good!"

[Go to the nearest phone booth. ]

Meteor immediately ran to the nearest public phone booth. He didn't understand why the landscape of the last century still appeared in this virtual space of the Internet of Everything.

[This is a sense of peace and part of ghostology. ]

[Many products that are behind the times are giving us a feeling of warmth and hope. ]

[We will miss the things in the past, miss a non-existent era, we have not personally experienced this era, but we can experience the beauty of that era from related works of art. ]

[The role of the phone booth in [Elysium Space] is a bridge to access the private space of other users—just because the phone booth has a relatively private space, its red paint, its guardrails, and all its designs have been preserved. The unique location in the history of art has made it a landmark of [Elysium]. ]

Meteor pushed open the door of the phone booth.

[Include the street scene you see, the sky and the earth, the sun and the mountains. ]

[It's like your era, there are many trendy music genres, but very retro-such as vaporwave and dream core. ]

[These intentionally noisy LOWFI audio are the voices of ghosts. A post-zero generation like you, unless you have awakened the supernatural power of regret medicine—otherwise, why would you miss the 1970s? Do you miss the 80s? ]

Meteor picked up the microphone: "Okay, Hot Wind, what should I do?"

[Access user 808141. ]

After dialing the number on the dial, Meteor asked one more question.

"The Matrix, huh?"

[That’s right, the Matrix used phone booths to transfer consciousness, and [Elysium] pursues a people-oriented lifestyle. ]

[What the people need, the Shinto congregation will provide. If people agree that the phone booth should be a portal, then it should be used as a teleportation beacon in terms of ergonomic design. ]

Meteor: "No one answered the phone."

[play one more time. ]

Meteor then turned the dial, triggering the automatic transfer service.

The [Jester] from the information review center greeted cordially: "It seems that this user does not want to interact with you. You are a newcomer-this is a rare thing."

Meteor: "What's so strange?"

Fool: "Because a newcomer is a new joy to [Elysium Space]. No one will refuse a new joy."

Meteor: "What if I have to visit?"

Fool: "I'm afraid not. Everyone should have a private space where they can restore their spirit and find peace."

[Hung up the phone. ]

Meteor immediately followed Hot Wind's instructions and hung up the phone.

[I hate this sissy, he always likes to tease me with a naughty smile on his face - try another way. ]

[Press right hand on dial! ]

Meteor does so—

——In [Bliss Space], everyone lives with their own spiritual energy body, or the physical form of digital life consciousness.

Meteor's right arm was already in hot air, and when he held the phone with his palm, he could see that the black mist began to erode the dial of the phone, and penetrated from the receiver into the inside of the phone.

[I'm in, try calling again. ]

Meteor did as he did, took down the receiver and pressed the button——

——This time the visited area was successfully connected, and Hot Wind cracked the lock with violence.

After a short period of clutter, the entire world split open again, and a thick black mist enveloped the entire space. When it dissipated, the meteor had come to a strange place.

It was a crypt, and there were piles of corpses piled up in the open space.

Meteor didn't dare to speak, he could smell a strong smell of rust, and it was hard to imagine what kind of monsters lived in this place.

The old acquaintance of Hot Wind is now hiding in this crypt, and he doesn't know what kind of black technology he is working on.

The corpses piled up like a mountain, and the corpses did not rot. Like the strange corpses seen in the Howling Ridge tunnel before, they all stayed at the moment before death, neither rotten nor rotten.

Getting closer, Meteor finally saw a small room in the crypt.

It was a stone building built on the rock wall, with three floors.

[You knock on the door and call him. ]

Meteor hesitated for a moment: "What are you calling?"

[Old man Shicun! My heat is back! ]

Meteor knocked hard on the door and shouted loudly: "Old man Shicun! My hot wind is back!"

After a while, I heard heavy and flustered footsteps coming from the wooden door.

An old man with white beard and hair tremblingly opened a crack in the door, and looked at Bu Meteor outside the door in surprise.

[Don't hesitate to grab his hair. ]

Meteor asked: "Really? Are you serious?"

[Believe me, this guy is not honest when he doesn't hit. ]

The old man who was called the old man of Shicun by the hot wind scolded angrily.

"Where did you come from, you little bastard! Playing tricks here! Did I allow you to visit my private space?! What nonsense were you talking about just now? You said you were a hot wind?! I'm bah!—"

Before he finished speaking, Meteor grabbed the little old man's hair and punched him in the head.

The fierce boxing was like a DDOS attack, hitting the head of the old man in Shicun, causing shocks visible to the naked eye, and a series of codes were knocked out of his head-the scene was very magical.

Old man Shicun's glasses flew far away, he tilted his head, and said arrogantly when he came back to his senses.

"It turned out to be a hot wind! Hit me earlier! How can there be so many troubles! Can I be dishonest?!"