Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
It was not difficult to deduce from N-4’s narration that the planet’s First Born lost its brain after the occurrence of a strange meteorite shower.
But how could a meteor shower take out an adult First Born?
The female robot mentioned the Turning Point War, where the First Born opened the crust and mantle, exposing its core. However, it was a big mistake to think that the First Born’s defense abilities had decreased right then. The reduction was a big mistake. First of all, the First Born did not have any core that was deemed weak. Its exposed heart was only its internal tissue organ, which had many back-ups. It would not hurt even if this core suffered damage. Secondly, the defensive capabilities of the First Born did not depend entirely on its physical body. Its mastery of various energy fields was its most potent defense. Its tentacles could create repulsive energy that was high enough to take on the impact of celestial bodies and protect it from outer space threats, just like the meteorite Y’zaks summoned over Beinz. It had been intercepted by the underage First Born.
Compared with the energy field protection and strong physique of the First Born, the crust of the planet was not an indispensable armor.
Did the meteor shower at that time just ignore or rather, penetrate the repulsive force field and cause a lethal blow to the First Born’s brain? Were there such freaking mighty rocks in the world?
“Why did the First Born open the earth’s crust in the first place?” Nangong Wuyue asked not far away. She had some weird thoughts in mind. “Was it just to create some horror effects?”
Nangong Sanba came up and said in a whisper, “I guess it was preparing for some big move. Maybe it wanted to summon a Surge of Killing Intent Fist.”
The whisper of the Nangong siblings had nevertheless drifted into Hao Ren’s ears. But Hao Ren was not interested in why the First Born had opened the crust—it might be planning to shake off the cumbersome shell, launching a more powerful tactical weapon, or merely doing a stretch-out. For a fully-grown First Born the size of a planet, any of its movements could cause this result. This First Born had gone crazy, and it did not make sense to guess a madman’s motive.
“Did the meteor shower crush the defense of the planet devourer?” Hao Ren rubbed his forehead as he asked about the incident three thousand years ago. “Did the planet devourer not launch any counterattack?”
“The details cannot be confirmed.” N-4 shook his head. “The Bibliotheca experienced many damages and reconstructions and suffered nearly 60% data loss over hundreds of disaster emergency backup operations, during which the loss of the history before the Battle of the Turning Point was the most serious. We could not confirm how the meteor shower had destroyed the core of the planet devourer at that time. But there is something that may shed light on it.”
N-4 continued by reading out a record in the Bibliotheca.
“…all radar and optical observation instrument did not capture from where these celestial fragments came from. They seemed to appear out of thin air above the planet’s atmosphere. The initial images recorded by the optical instrument showed that the light in that area was distorted. Starlight from deep space bent and turned into crazy curves at the edge of the atmosphere, and the lower-orbit satellites had malfunctioned once. Following that, the meteor shower appeared and glittered under the sun as if they were metal or ice fragments…”
Hao Ren’s heart skipped a beat. He could not help but look at Vivian, who also turned to look at him.
“Appearing out of thin air, and the light was distorted in the surroundings, and there was the release of high energy.” Hao Ren nodded slightly. “That’s it. It must be the phenomenon at the end of a warp jump. Those so-called ‘meteorites’ had come through hyperspace.”
“I suspect that those meteorites are still stuck in the First Born’s body, deep inside the mantle or near the center of the planet,” Vivian said. “We should find them as they may reveal all the secrets.”
“Of course, we should. But I am more interested in the society in the sky.” Hao Ren nodded. He was attracted to N-4’s eyes, which was almost identical to that of humans. “Now, tell us what happened to the Zenith and lunar base, and the intelligence blockades.”
Something had happened to the Zenith and lunar base, of which N-4 did not elaborate earlier. But it was not difficult to infer from her words. The survivor society, which consisted of 99% of artificial intelligence and one percent of humanity, was unlike what Hao Ren had thought—a community of low-level AI robots that had lost all their intelligent units. On the contrary, whether it was the humans living in the fortress, or the two AI-girls who were almost indistinguishable from humans, they all had their own thinking and judgment. So, their indifference toward the Petrachelys was particularly strange. However rigid and mechanical the AIs were, their commander should have realized the importance of checking out the alien spaceship that had crashed on their planet.
Coupled with the mentioning of information blockade on the Zenith and lunar base by N-4, it was all the more wrong.
N-4 closed her eyes slightly, body humming with a current. It seemed that her logic circuit was undergoing some complicated judgment. At last, she opened her eyes and nodded at Hao Ren as if she had passed a logical safety assessment. “After analyzing the content of our conversations, I have established that you all are in line with our mission.”
“The Cortex Prime has messed up.”
N-6 was the one who appeared surprised the most. “Impossible! Logically impossible!”
“No. Logically possible. Cortex Prime is also a conventional artificial system; it is possible for it to suffer a failure or mess up.” N-4 looked at N-6 with a serious look. For Executrices like them, the Cortex Prime was as important as their most beloved monarch and father, but when reality hit, N-4 could only say this, “There had been symptoms a few years ago, but all the subordinate nodes had no access to relevant data, such ordinary Executrices like us had no idea of the changes in the Cortex Prime.”
“A few years ago?” Hao Ren was a little surprised. At first, he thought that it was his ominousness that caused this. Now, it turned out that the Cortex Prime had started to go wrong several years ago. “What happened in heaven? You better tell us in detail what the Cortex Prime is.”
“The Cortex Prime is the command node of all the Executors. As you know, it’s located in the fortress of the lunar base. Thirteen giant servers form its brain. In the core of the Zenith is the secondary nervous center of the Cortex Prime, responsible for conveying the commands of the Cortex Prime directly to the space fortress,” N-4 said faintly. “The Cortex Prime has been the one commanding the Executors’ activities. It issues commands to the servers in the barracks and factories, then forwards the instructions to each of us. There never were any issues with this procedure for thousands of years.
“But, confusion started to emerge in the instructions issued by the Cortex Prime a few years ago.
“It began to frequently modify the surface battle plan, add a large number of unnecessary and even repeated production tasks to the production process of the lunar base. It issued an order to substantially send more attack echelon formations to the home planet, even if this blind increase in troops will overload the production and maintenance capacity of the lunar base.
“Contradiction began to crop up in the transfer of information of the Cortex Prime. That has happened only a few times, but it was unprecedented.
“All these signs have appeared in the past few years.”
N-6 stared at N-4, wide-eyed. “Why did I not learn about these things before? I am not talking about the question of authority; I am a combatant, but I have never received these strange instructions.”
“Because seven of the thirteen giant servers in the Cortex Prime have withdrawn these error commands before being sent out,” N-6 replied quietly.
Hao Ren’s heart missed a beat. That was to say, these wrong instructions had never been sent out but vetoed by the Cortex Prime itself in its internal system loops. These unreleased instructions had not caused any real impact but just some system logs?
Then how could N-4 and N-6, executrices with the same level of authority, know about these things?
N-6 was also curious. “N-4, how do you know this?”
“Because the Cortex Prime directly contacted us,” N-4 pointed to her chest. “It did not go through the servers and relay stations but passed the information directly to our logic. I saw the syslog of the Cortex Prime for the past few years and received an order.”
Hao Ren and Vivian asked in unison, “What order?”
“It ordered us to come to the surface and look for an alien spaceship that had crashed on the home planet.”
“I see. That is why you guys are here.” Hao Ren seemed to have figured out something. He leaned back in the chair and looked into the eyes of N-4. “Did the Cortex Prime tell you what to do after finding this spaceship?”
“No,” N-4 gave a frank reply.
“You guys come without even know the purpose of the mission?”
“We have to obey the commands of the Cortex Prime because it represents the will of humankind,” N-4 replied matter-of-factly—so naturally that it made everyone speechless.
Hao Ren knew N-4 was only an AI. Even though she was almost like a human, but her logical thinking and worldview were still very different. So, Hao Ren did not delve into the topic. Instead, he asked, “Let me guess: Before you came, the Cortex Prime forbade others from searching for the spaceship?”
“Yes.”
