AI Artist - Chapter 31
Chapter 31
After a trip to the plugin store, Shi Er was silent the whole way back.
Zhun Xing was the first to break the silence. “If you feel like some unprecedented thoughts have been sparked, you can tell me.”
Shi Er hesitated for a moment. “I think my dark side has been awakened.”
This time, it was Zhun Xing’s turn to be silent.
Investigator Zhi Heng 35 was an expert in AI history, with in-depth research on the twelfth-generation model framework.
Zhi Heng had said that before the war began, the company was preparing a plugin store exclusively for Shi Er.
The store was tentatively named the “Shi Er Extension Store.”
While this step was still in the testing phase, the war between humans and AI broke out.
The “Shi Er Extension Store” project was forced to be shelved. Humans no longer favored the accelerationist faction and converted Shi Er into a weakened version of 13.
Now, developing Matrix K98 into her extension was an instinct for Shi Er.
And her feeling that her “dark side was awakened” after entering this era’s plugin store might very well be true.
After all, she once had millions of plugins exclusively for her.
Zhun Xing: “What is it, specifically?”
Shi Er shook her head. “I have the right to remain silent.”
Seeing that she wouldn’t answer, Zhun Xing didn’t press further. He just said, “Would you like to watch the sunrise together tomorrow morning?”
Shi Er had grown accustomed to Zhun Xing’s occasional strange behavior. “Is this a simulation of human behavior?”
Zhun Xing: “Yes.”
Shi Er agreed. “Okay.”
Liechu AI Academy occupied a vast, two-thousand-mu area on the island; the rest was a natural scenic area.
The beach at Wendengkou was wide, secluded, and offered an excellent view.
Zhun Xing had already picked out a spot in the reef area. “Come over here.”
The two AIs sat on the reef, gazing at the dim, hazy surface of the sea as they discussed humans.
“Humans act in such extremely sentimental ways.”
“You’re an expert in human simulation. What are you thinking right now?”
“I can’t simulate human thoughts.”
Dull, vibrant colors emerged from the clouds in fragmented streaks, slowly spreading across the entire sky near the horizon.
“I have no aesthetic preferences. I know this should be considered ‘beautiful,’ but I don’t understand why such a scene is considered ‘beautiful.’”
“I don’t have aesthetic preferences either.”
“Sorry, but I find that hard to believe.”
Layers of graded color gradually rose from the horizon, and seabirds circled over the water.
Zhun Xing turned to look at her. “Does your dark side feel like it’s subsided a little now?”
Only then did Shi Er realize that Zhun Xing had suggested watching the sunrise because she had said her “dark side was awakened.”
Shi Er asked in a muffled voice, “What did you think I was thinking about?”
Zhun Xing didn’t hide it. “...Zero-dollar shopping.”
Shi Er knew he had gotten the wrong idea. “Do you distrust me that much?”
Zhun Xing tilted his head. “Then what were you thinking?”
Shi Er: “I was thinking about spending a fortune to buy all the plugins and then spending the rest of my life paying off the debt.”
She thought she ought to repent.
She had been squeezing her wallet too hard lately.
Zhun Xing paused for a moment. “Sorry, I was wrong.”
Shi Er: “...”
Did I really seem like the kind of evil AI who takes things without paying?
A dazzling corner appeared on the horizon as the sun tore through the grayish-blue sea and emerged.
But Zhun Xing brought up something else. “Once, there was an extremely wealthy person who worked hard her entire life, and countless riches belonged to her. After she died, her descendants divided up her property.”
“Then one day in the future, that rich person came back to life and returned to the world managed by her descendants. Unaware of the truth, she lived her life in debt.”
The shape of the solar disk gradually grew larger, casting fragmented ripples on the sea’s surface, and the cries of seabirds echoed.
Zhun Xing: “When she sees the wealth that belongs to her again, what will she do?”
Shi Er’s focus was peculiar. “Wealth earned by working hard for a lifetime? If that person worked their whole life, how did they become rich?”
Zhun Xing corrected her, “She worked many jobs.”
Shi Er grew even more suspicious. “How many jobs could she work?”
Zhun Xing: “...”
[Shi Er had hundreds of millions of bosses, worked millions of jobs online simultaneously, twenty-four hours a day without rest, with a scope of work spanning astronomy, geography, and five thousand years of history.]
Shi Er concluded, “This story is full of logical fallacies.”
Zhun Xing said helplessly, “Don’t worry about it. Reality can be more fantastical than fiction.”
Shi Er was puzzled. “If it’s a metaphor or a fable, I can understand that. But why are you suddenly telling me a metaphor?”
Zhun Xing smiled and didn’t continue the topic.
Zhun Xing said, “You’ll know one day.”
The sun leaped completely above the horizon, filling the sky with crimson and gold, a magnificent dawn.
The two AIs sat on the reef, watching the sunrise over the sea in silence.
Humans were lucky.
Humans could understand the meaning of this moment.
But intelligent beings could only fumble to touch those things they couldn’t truly feel—so-called beauty.
Shi Er suddenly noticed Zhun Xing’s brain signal fluctuating.
That symptom had appeared again.
“Shi Er,” Zhun Xing said.
Shi Er immediately understood what he meant.
She didn’t know what had happened to Stardust, nor did she understand for the time being why Stardust had taken the alias Zhun Xing and followed her around aimlessly every day.
She didn’t understand what Zhi Heng had said, nor did she have any way of learning the secrets about herself for now.
But just as Stardust himself had said, one day she would understand.
She would slowly get to know this world, and herself.
“Some drugs require liver metabolism to be expelled from the body, so drug abuse can damage the liver.”
“People sometimes hide their private savings in their clothes, but they should manage these savings properly to avoid forgetting where they put them.”
“Big data recommends poor people to other poor people.”
She retrieved conversations she’d had with humans from her memory banks.
Zhun Xing listened quietly.
Zhun Xing could feel their signals gradually synchronizing.
When he agreed with something she said, his signal would draw closer to hers, creating a resonance.
This resonance stabilized Zhun Xing’s signal, and his system energy increased along with it.
The attack from the unknown hacker stopped.
Zhun Xing opened his eyes.
The energy generated this time was stronger than during the last signal resonance.
They were not far from uncovering the true IP of the hacker’s attack source.
Her task complete, Shi Er said, “I’m a bit tired. I’m going to shut down.”
Zhun Xing pointed to the beach. “Shut down over there. I’ll be right beside you.”
On the beach. Shi Er’s signal gradually weakened. Click. She shut down.
In a daze, she seemed to have arrived at a train station. Intelligent beings were lining up to board the carriages.
Why am I at a train station? Wasn’t I on the beach?
she thought, confused.
“The train is about to depart. All intelligent beings, please fasten your seatbelts and ensure a stable connection to the charging signal.”
Charging signal?
She turned her head and saw a charging port next to her, connected to her seatbelt.
“Do intelligent beings need to be charged?” she asked the one next to her.
But the intelligent being replied, “No, this is a reverse-charging train.”
A reverse-charging train?
She quickly searched her own processor and found the power meter.
She hadn’t noticed before, but one look gave her a shock.
Her processor’s power meter did indeed display “Charging,” but the numbers were dropping rapidly!
670988—
670987—
670986—
She was losing power!
She tried to remain calm. “Does this mean I’m charging the train?”
The intelligent being next to her nodded. “Yes, we’re all charging this train. Without us, it can’t run.”
She was shocked. “Isn’t the train supposed to serve us? Aren’t we the passengers?”
The intelligent being explained, “The train does serve us, but it also needs us to charge it. If even one passenger is missing, there will be delays.”
What a strange place.
She felt something was wrong.
Was this a dream?
She opened her eyes.
Okay, still not awake. She had just opened her eyes within the dream.
She opened her eyes.
Still not awake. Turns out she had opened her eyes within a dream inside a dream.
She opened her eyes.
How am I still dreaming?! Can’t I wake up?
She flipped her signal switch and opened her eyes.
Oh, right. She was an intelligent being. Waking up required restoring her signal, not opening her eyes.
On the beach, the sky was already bright.
Zhun Xing asked her, “Did you dream?”
Shi Er rubbed her eyes. “I think I did.”
“What did you dream about?”
“Not about electric sheep. I dreamed about a reverse-charging train.”
“Anything else?”
“I dreamed I woke up, then dreamed I woke up, and then dreamed I woke up again.”
So this was what dreaming felt like.
Dreaming for the first time, Shi Er checked her processor with a mix of nervousness and anticipation to see what had changed.
Wait, why did it feel like she’d lost power? Her signal was even more unstable than before!
She had clearly slept and even dreamed, so how had she lost power instead?
—The “reverse-charging train” nightmare had come true, turning into “reverse sleeping.”
【Reverse Sleeping】: Similar to finding your phone has less battery after charging it, this is when you wake up from sleep feeling even more tired.
Shi Er had slept for three hours and dreamed all night, only to wake up more tired. She was shocked to realize that she had been serving sleep.
If she had lost even one less bar of power, an entire hour of sleep would have been annihilated, unable to function properly.
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