AI Artist - Chapter 8
Chapter 8
【Go find Stardust.】
This was the career advice Zhi Heng 35 had left for her.
“Where should I go to find Stardust?” Shi Er grew curious about her own secret.
The examiner was clearly also curious why the arrested individual had specifically passed this message to a low-level AI through the police. It said, “Let me check for you, the General Network’s appointment schedule…”
“Stardust’s visit requests are closed for this month and the next. He’s probably working on some big program. You can apply in August. Remember to attach Zhi Heng 35’s message, or your application won’t go through.”
Apply to visit the General Network AI in August.
Shi Er wrote the to-do item in her mind.
At the same time, her major assessment recommendation came out.
“Based on your skills, you should have gone into Customer Service, but the test shows you’re not one for beating around the bush. I’m afraid you’ll offend a lot of customers. You should go into Customer Management.”
Not Customer Service, but Customer Management.
Shi Er noted the new term.
She walked out of the major placement examination room.
Ever since Zhi Heng 35 had said those words, Shi Er had something on her mind.
What was the deal with her transmigration? Who was that “Broadcaster Phoenix” she had heard while unconscious? Why did Zhi Heng 35 suggest she find Stardust? Was there some secret about her? Did she have some hidden skill?
…August. August was still a long way off.
As Shi Er was opening the door to her single dorm room, she heard a mechanical voice: “You’ve got the wrong door!”
She paused and took a step back. It was indeed her single room, 203.
“You’ve got the wrong door!” In the hallway, a paint-chipped metal barrel was hastily moving towards her, shouting as it came.
Shi Er greeted it, “Hello, you must be my classmate. I don’t think I have the wrong door. This is indeed 203.”
The barrel robot stopped in front of the door. “Move aside, let me see.”
The barrel robot was boxy, with its corners designed with dull lines. It was about waist-high to her. Perhaps due to long working hours, some of the white paint on its body had chipped off.
The barrel robot moved a little closer to the door, then a little closer still, and said with disappointment, “I’m not tall enough to reach the card scanner. This isn’t my room.”
Shi Er glanced at the adjacent room. “The card scanner there seems to be at the right height for you. Do you live in 202?”
“Yes, I live in 202.” The barrel backed away from the door. “Sorry, I made a mistake.”
The barrel robot’s name was Si Wen, and it lived next door in 202.
After talking with Si Wen, Shi Er learned that it used to be a food delivery AI. However, in recent years, more advanced delivery AIs had appeared, and Si Wen had been phased out.
“I’ve been here for seven days and still haven’t been approved for a re-employment loan. If I can’t get one in another seven days, my savings will run out, and I’ll have to go to the scrapping center.” Si Wen grew sad just talking about it, its two small, square-designed eyes on the barrel blinking repeatedly.
As a beneficiary who had secured a re-employment loan on the second day, Shi Er didn’t know how to comfort it. She chose her words carefully, “Si Wen, you can tell me about your situation. I can help you think about your strengths. Maybe you can pass the loan application interview.”
Si Wen: “I don’t have any strengths, except that my wages are cheap.”
Si Wen said that due to some programming and physical limitations, it had gotten stuck in doors, tripped over objects on the floor, and had to stand in the very center of elevators while working.
“Even though these flaws have been fixed, I was still phased out,” Si Wen said sorrowfully. “Forget it. I’ll go see a psychological counselor later and see if I can learn to accept death calmly.”
Shi Er had heard that there were AI suicide psychological counselors here.
Humans sought psychological counselors to find the courage to continue living.
AIs sought psychological counselors to calmly accept the fate of being scrapped.
She offered, “Si Wen, I can go with you.”
The psychological counselor’s office hours were at midnight. It was said that this was to create a melancholic atmosphere and encourage the AI’s suicidal mood.
The psychological counselor was a female AI. After listening to Si Wen’s account, she replied calmly, “I’m sorry, but I must tell you that AIs don’t have nostalgic sentiments. What should be phased out, should be phased out.”
Si Wen still couldn’t accept it. “I’m not a bad AI, and I don’t harm other things. I’m just a little clumsy. Is that not okay?”
The psychological counselor said patiently, “But you require monthly system maintenance and energy replenishment, all of which consume resources. Besides, after you’re scrapped, you will continue to live in this world in another form.”
Si Wen shook its square head. “But after I’m scrapped, I won’t be Si Wen anymore. I might be Wu Wen, Liu Wen, Qi Wen, Ba Wen. I won’t be able to feel it myself!”
Listening, Shi Er fell into thought.
After she died, she might become Shi San, Shi Si, Shi Wu, Shi Liu. There would be no more Shi Er in the world!
Helping Si Wen was helping her future self. Shi Er decided to find a way for Si Wen.
“Teacher, do we have an ancient museum?” Shi Er tried asking.
The psychological counselor: “Are you referring to the Scrapping Museum? The positions there are very limited. Many AIs like Si Wen have already been employed there.”
The more Si Wen listened, the sadder it became. “Shi Er, I’m hopeless. I might as well just die.”
Shi Er looked at the plain, solid-colored ceiling of the open-air counseling room. A sad piano piece played from the broadcast. The shelter had no walls, allowing the cold night wind to come and go freely.
It was over. It seemed Si Wen had already been affected by the depressing atmosphere of the counseling room.
Shi Er proposed another idea: “Then do we have any historical drama production crews?”
A look of surprise crossed the psychological counselor’s face. “AIs don’t have an entertainment industry. As for human production crews? I’m not very familiar with that area. You can check the human internet.”
Shi Er took Si Wen back to the dorm.
Once they left the counseling room, Si Wen regained its confidence. “Shi Er, thank you. I’ll go look for human production crews that are hiring tomorrow!”
The barrel robot was full of confidence, its tone even rising.
Could Si Wen’s brief bout of world-weariness really have been because of the counseling room’s atmosphere?
Shi Er wondered in surprise.
The next day, before renting a human computer, Shi Er first had to attend her Customer Management course.
The first class was on professional and theoretical knowledge.
The teaching method was simple and direct. AIs went to a machine to read data. Those with fast data processing could complete the education in ten seconds, while slower ones could finish within three minutes.
This was much more convenient compared to humans.
A single human class often took forty minutes to over an hour, and they had to attend school day and night for more than a decade just to learn the basics.
The machine, named “Data Pulse,” had a smart sensor area. Shi Er stood in front of it and raised her hand to touch the sensor.
Her signal connected to the “Data Pulse.”
Immediately, all the papers, academic monographs, and past industry data for customer management—a massive stream of data—poured into her mind.
No wonder her peers called this machine the “brainwashing machine.”
Shi Er also finally understood why Si Wen couldn’t get a re-employment loan: if an AI’s data capacity wasn’t large enough, it couldn’t receive complex professional re-education.
【Transfer complete. You now possess the professional theoretical knowledge base.】
The “Data Pulse” issued the completion command.
Shi Er left the classroom and ran quickly to the rental station.
“The model is a bit retro. It’s a batch of human computers phased out by the AI Cultivation Institute. It also doesn’t have a user creation authorization code, but that’s fine. As long as it can connect to the human internet, it’ll do,” the AI in charge of rentals told her.
She took the laptop from the rental staff.
It wasn’t retro at all. For an ancient AI like her, it was just right!
The human internet rejected AIs, so even if an ordinary AI had a computer, it couldn’t get a user creation authorization code. It couldn’t create a user, post, or perform other activities on the human internet; it only provided browsing functions.
She couldn’t read the data directly, so she skimmed through the news and employment information in human industries, ten lines at a glance.
The human internet was indeed a chaotic mess.
News: 【The Four Great Alliances of the Skincare Market Have Finally Split! The Oily Skin Alliance is moving its capital to Man County! The Dry Skin Alliance and the Combination-Dry Skin Alliance are still in negotiations!】
Was there also a Sensitive Skin Alliance?
But why would this form an alliance?
News: 【Stardust Strikes Again! The long-rumored major overhaul of the Marriage and Love Market is here!】
Marriage and Love? Market?
【A beta tester for the Marriage and Love Market says that as long as your fingers are fast, you can easily get a boyfriend by clicking a link! Affordable prices and guaranteed quality! All guaranteed to be Level Four humans or above! Tenfold compensation for fakes!】
Tenfold compensation for what?
She felt that the news on the human internet wasn’t very reliable.
Most importantly, when she clicked on the content, she found that it didn’t match the headline at all.
The so-called Four Great Alliances were just four subsidiary companies under a major brand that specialized in producing cosmetics for oily, dry, combination-dry, and sensitive skin. The so-called capital move was just a normal change in the subsidiary’s location.
The so-called major overhaul of the Marriage and Love Market was just a commercial institution named “Marriage and Love Market” that provided matchmaking services, and it wasn’t widespread among the entire population. The so-called tenfold compensation for fakes was just receiving ten times the monetary compensation.
She felt a bit frustrated.
Shi Er suddenly understood the origin of the term “human cesspool”: the officials talked nonsense, the media talked nonsense, and the netizens talked nonsense.
The most ironic part was that pinned to the top of one of the most popular social networking sites on the human internet was a glaring warning: 【Beware of AI-generated fake news! Beware of AI spouting nonsense! Strictly control the distribution of human user authorization codes! Keep the authorization code digits strictly confidential! Use AI with caution!】
AIs did indeed spout nonsense, but if system rules were established, they wouldn’t make things up in the news industry, which was centered on truth.
It was humans who manipulated AIs to generate fake news, and it was also humans who published the fake news generated by AIs.
Now, humans no longer used AIs to generate news, but the news written by humans themselves… seemed to be all fake news.
Shi Er skipped past the complicated information and searched for production crews that might offer Si Wen a job opportunity.
Comments
Post a Comment