Abyssal Wanderer

After Hecate announced her next stage goal, a cloud of mist suddenly rose up and swallowed the hammer that was still standing there.

"Wait a minute..."

Before being teleported out, Chen Wang seemed to want to say something, but it was obvious that Hecate did not give him the chance.

[User Chen Wang is no longer in service]

Then, the main control system of the Sage City informed Jiang Zhou of this information.

He immediately called up the log, but could not retrieve the path when the other party logged out at all - needless to say, the consciousness of the Pygmalion path had been sent away from the Narcissus Plain by the Dark Moon Goddess.

It is not impossible that it was directly downloaded to the base reality in some form. After all, the Dark Moon Goddess now controls a universal printer that can access the Abyss Dark Web.

Jiang Zhou thought as he looked at the gradually dissipating mist.

At this moment, there were only "two people" left in the huge judgment hall, him and Hecate. The Dark Moon Goddess, who sent Chen Wang away with a simple move, slowly lowered her arm and turned to look at Jiang Zhou again.

"At present, you should have a quota for a 'controllable element', right?" Without explaining where Chen Wang was sent, she directly talked about another topic. Jiang Zhou nodded subconsciously. "Yes, and the people available for selection are all within the scope of the Nord resettlement area." Jiang Zhou suddenly mentioned the "Nord resettlement area" because he was very curious why the controllable elements available for selection are all within the resettlement area. Does it mean that the Janus system must use a specific universal printer or deep-diving interface as a node to take effect? ​​But perhaps because she didn't hear the implication, or perhaps she didn't want to discuss this topic at all, Hecate didn't expand on this issue. She continued to ask: "Among those alternative options, do you have a body you like?" Jiang Zhou shook his head slowly. "No?" Hecate still had a blank expression when asking the question, and she didn't show any doubts. "It's not that there are none..." Jiang Zhou hesitated. As he spoke, the figures of several spare "controllable elements" emerged in his mind. In the past 22 days, watching those spare controllable elements perform "one-man shows" and peeping into the lives of those people has basically become Jiang Zhou's way of passing time. Among those people, there are indeed a few whose lives are particularly ups and downs, just like the large DLC of the annual game, full of attraction:

Street wanderers who must ask the other person's name before killing, and will also politely report their own names;

Cultists who believe in the existence of the self-proclaimed "Broken God" in the Abyss Dark Web and have been sacrificing confidential data for it;

Cyber ​​witches who are taught by the New Tianlijiao von Neumann sect and have the special ability to appease some runaway AI;

Private detectives who seem to have entanglements with various forces in the Nord resettlement area and always take on various strange cases...

But Jiang Zhou never tried to connect with those people once.

Fearing that his behavior would disrupt the arrangements of the Dark Moon Goddess is only one of the reasons. More importantly, just because "interesting" is not enough for Jiang Zhou to be the motivation for his actions-he must be able to convince himself that his connection to the Janus system is a very positive thing for both of them.

After all, connection is not about leading others' lives, but about two people becoming one - in the process, you will also be changed by the other person.

"Are you afraid of being changed by them?"

As if seeing through Jiang Zhou's thoughts, Hecate stared at him and asked.

"I am not afraid of being changed. In other words, even if I don't connect with controllable elements, being changed happens every moment."

Jiang Zhou answered carefully.

In his opinion, after being separated from the anchoring of social relationships on people's identity, everyone is actually changing every moment - whether it is the replacement of cells or the change of ideas and concepts, it will change the "self" ship of Theseus.

Therefore, on the issue of "change", Jiang Zhou never cares about "position" but "degree" - although it is impossible to locate the point from quantitative change to qualitative change, changing a nail is obviously not the same as expanding the entire ship into a battleship.

At least in Jiang Zhou's mind, it is not considered annihilation to make another person's thoughts merge with one - as long as the other person is not as huge as Hecate, which will instantly dilute and eliminate his own existence.

"But I am worried that such a change - at least in the current situation - will lead to catastrophic consequences."

After hesitating for a moment, Jiang Zhou expressed his concerns.

There is no doubt that the Janus system is a program with huge potential and infinite possibilities. If the thoughts of all mankind can be gradually incorporated, and the consciousness of all people can be connected to build a thinking matrix, then it may not be a fantasy to realize the wish that he made to Janus at the beginning of "making all mankind understand each other".

And this approach is like the fractal growth of crystals. The condensation nucleus as the starting condition must be perfect enough to ensure that the final structure will not collapse by itself.

The first step that Jiang Zhou has to take - the initial extension, must find a sufficiently reliable condensation nucleus.

In other words, the first controllable element he has to find must be a person who is firm, rational, tolerant, open and positive.

Otherwise, if the Janus system is really likely to be used as a weapon by the future "self" that is integrated with others to accomplish other purposes...

Jiang Zhou couldn't help but think of the "big impact".

It had caused a big disaster in the past, but now he couldn't help but be more careful.

"Actually, Liao Qi was a good choice originally."

Seeing that Hecate remained silent, Jiang Zhou continued.

"In other words, the concept of the Icarus Liberation Front is very suitable as a benchmark for building a thinking network for all mankind. If I are connected to Liao Qi, it can at least guarantee that when we continue to connect controllable elements in the future, there will be no problems. What a big mistake.”

Jiang Zhou even felt that they could try to connect with another person whose thinking was quite different to achieve their overall Nash equilibrium.

Now that he recalled the time when he was connected with Liao Qi, Jiang Zhou realized that many of his behaviors at that time were actually not in line with his usual habits - under the influence of Liao Qi's consciousness, he had done many impulsive and willful things. s Choice.

But on the other hand, when Jiang Zhou looked back on those things afterwards, he didn't think they were wrong. Instead, he felt that Liao Qi's impulsive character actually made up for his overly cautious character.

Perhaps because of Liao Qi's residual influence, Jiang Zhou finally gave up the chance to escape from Tartarus, and gave the body and a spot in the Janus system to Hecate, completing the deal with her.

"In other words, are you already planning to incorporate a large number of humans into it to weave a network matrix of human intelligence?"

Finally, Hecate spoke.

Human intelligence thinking network matrix... Is this what AI calls the Janus system?

Chewing the name silently in his heart, Jiang Zhou nodded.

"If this is His legacy for me, there's no reason why I shouldn't receive it."

He said this while thinking to himself:

Moreover, this was the only way he could think of to change this absurd world and end the rule of the Olympus Order.

Although without the influence of Liao Qi's consciousness, Jiang Zhou felt that his obsession with destroying the rule of the Olympus Order seemed to have weakened a lot. After all, I have no sense of belonging in the current world...

Pushing these uneasy thoughts out of his mind, Jiang Zhou continued:

"It's just that the people I can connect with now, at least based on what I have observed recently, their behavior styles deviate too far from the baseline I have drawn. I can't guarantee that I am communicating with someone among them. After the integration, I will continue to pursue my current goals; I am not sure that my abilities will not be used by those people to do some terrible things."

At least among those candidates, Jiang Zhou did not find anyone who could match or complement him in terms of ideas and abilities like Liao Qi.

"What you said is actually a fear of being changed by them."

After patiently listening to Jiang Zhou's words of defense, Hecate said coldly.

For a moment, whether it was an illusion or not, Jiang Zhou seemed to hear disappointment in the other party's tone.

"If you are afraid of being changed by controllable factors and hesitate to move forward, and dare not bear the corresponding price, then you are not qualified to exercise that power...Forcibly exercising it will only repeat the mistakes of the 'Great Impact' a hundred years ago."

Saying incomprehensible words, the mist swirled behind Hecate to form a hazy fog door.

"Of course, the choice is in your hands. We are just spectators left in the sky. In the end, prosperity or destruction is all up to you."

After saying that, she turned around and stepped into the fog door. Before disappearing, he left a sentence that seemed both mocking and pity, which echoed in the trial hall:

"Of course, the premise of all this is that you can finally get to that point." (End of Chapter)