The Creators: From Night City

Page 321

She was afraid, and so was it.

Amidst the swirling dust and splattered blood, a pair of eyes, seemingly cast from pure gold, were fixed intently on her.

Jiang Bing was furious.

He also had reason to be angry.

"What did you do to my recording room?"

Pale golden flames ignited beneath his feet, accompanied by the unconscious wails of his distorted flesh, and the illusory ethereal flames spread in all directions like wildfire.

The servers that had been parasitized by the monsters were now stained with golden flames, and the circuit boards and deformed flesh could not escape the penetration of a higher level.

The 'craftsman' yearns for knowledge to complete His endless path of omniscience and omnipotence, while Nergigante simply corrupts and distorts everything, solely for survival and growth.

He naturally despised this behavior.

After donning the flesh and blood armor, Raven seemed to lose her ability to speak. She let out two cries, then flapped her wings and took to the air, unleashing a cloud of black nanoparticles to conceal herself while avoiding the golden flames on the ground.

This flame doesn't look like anything good.

At this point, words are meaningless, the two sides cannot reach an agreement, and communication can only be achieved through force.

Thus, the raven seemed to truly transform into a nimble messenger of the gods, its two hooked sickles rising in sync with its flight, slashing towards Jiang Bing.

Her attacks are known for being fierce and relentless.

Chapter 650 Mother's Domain

Unfortunately, in the next instant, a sharp kick completely disrupted her balance in mid-air, and with a sonic boom, Jiang Bing's spinning side kick landed directly between her two breasts.

A small earthquake suddenly occurred on the ground opposite the recording hall, and the thick yellow sand was violently shaken up several meters by the impact.

Like a tattered rag doll, the raven slowly plummeted from the cracked ceiling of the recording hall, completely dazed.

Her advanced mecha, which incorporated all the top technologies of the 'Mother's Domain,' and the flesh and blood armor, a byproduct of her genetic ascension created by 'Ancient Evil Qiba' with all her understanding of genetic technology, both crashed.

So she could only fall heavily to the ground like a raven struck by a pebble, pulled by gravity.

Blood flowed continuously from her twisted and deformed chest and abdomen, from her mouth and nose, and from the six-hole eyepiece on her golden feather mask.

This kick left her and her armor severely crippled.

Despite the excruciating pain that felt like his body was falling apart, Raven struggled to regain control of his body in order to evade the enemy's opportunistic pursuit.

However, the machine's frantic error messages and the painful screams of its flesh and armor made her feel as if she had fallen into an ice cave, as if the scythe of death was already at her neck.

You have to understand, if that kick from the other party had landed properly, it would have crushed her and her armor into a bloody pulp. Now that she's sprawled on the ground, she's practically the perfect target.

But the expected attack did not come. The terrifying attacker suddenly stopped and stood still, looking at her with a strange gaze.

"I never imagined that one day I would see an artificial human wearing a human skin."

"However, the design concept of this flesh and blood armor is very good. It can be seen that it comes from the same source as the genetic modification project of Nie Qiba."

"And you, you Edosian, what made you a wolf in sheep's clothing?"

After only a few moves, Raven's secrets were already seen through by his opponent, and Raven's heart sank to the bottom.

She simply abandoned the flesh and blood armor that was struggling to repair itself, which was still a drop in the ocean. She grabbed her withered, thin bird claws behind her back, and like a butterfly emerging from its cocoon, she emerged from the armor covered in blood and grime.

Gazing at the other's naked upper body and the various mechanical structures and interfaces on its body that defied human capabilities, Jiang Bing pondered the principles of the other's physical composition while still admiring the Mother's aesthetic sense.

Although the other person's figure and face have an inescapable 'industrial feel', and their meticulously calculated and optimized artificial appearance makes them look more like a delicate 'doll' than a real person, the overall visual impact is absolutely overwhelming.

The Mother Realm may not be human, but it definitely has a deep understanding of human aesthetic preferences.

Raven casually pulled her long, fair legs out of the flesh armor, standing barefoot in the spurting blood and grime. Her fair body was covered with the blood vessels and flesh threads that the flesh armor used to connect her, making her appear both holy and filthy.

"Are all Edos people this open-minded?"

Ignoring Jiang Bing's teasing, the other party finally spoke.

"who are you?"

That's a good question, but it's destined to have no answer.

This doesn't mean Jiang Bing won't answer, but rather that whatever his answer is, the other party won't believe him.

Besides, Jiang Bing wouldn't answer.

Raven wasn't expecting an answer; she just wanted to stall for time.

This top-tier killing machine, created by the 'Mother's Domain,' naturally possesses a state-of-the-art life support system. In just a few words, the rampaging nano-elements within her body stabilized her injuries.

Then, with a flash of light, a pure white nano-combat suit was woven out and covered her body.

"She really is heartless." Just as Raven gritted his teeth and summoned his ultra-low temperature nano-sword for a desperate fight, Jiang Bing suddenly spoke up out of the blue.

"?"

“You really are ruthless, ‘Mother’s Domain’,” Jiang Bing repeated.

His eyes gleamed with golden light, and the golden illusory flames had already enveloped the entire recording hall. All pipelines, servers, programs, and hardware had been linked by him, and massive amounts of data and information flowed toward him through the 'Ether Flame'.

He was analyzing, collecting, and understanding all the knowledge in the entire recording hall.

This led him to discover a fascinating truth.

The 'mother network' did not fall apart.

Or rather, the 'mother network' was only selectively abandoned by the 'mother domain'; at the very least, this recording hall is still connected to it.

In other words, the raven was always under the other party's surveillance.

Jiang Bing was not surprised by any of this, after all, he had already guessed the deepest truth of this world when he discovered that the other administrator of the Tower of Memory was the 'Mother Domain'.

"Who?!"

Before the 'Mother Domain,' which was fighting Jiang Bing at the network level, could react, Raven broke through its defenses first.

However, no one answered her question. Even Xun Chi, who had been tied to the operating table and watching the game passively, had his attention drawn to a figure projected onto the main control panel in the recording hall.

It was a little girl, a little girl wearing a white long-sleeved pleated jumpsuit, white knee-high socks, white high-heeled sandals, with a full head of white hair that reached her waist, and her whole body radiating a faint white light, falling to the ground from the sky.

"Mother's Domain"

Although the question was phrased as a doubt, Jiang Bing's tone was quite certain.

"Do not!!"

Before the 'Mother Domain' could even speak, Raven collapsed first. After all, anyone who thought they had seen through the hidden truth of the 'Mother Domain' and rebelled against it would eventually collapse when they found that they had never escaped its control and that even their own lair was built in the other party's branch base.

So the raven chose to rebel blindly.

Completely disregarding the fact that this 'Mother Domain' was merely a projection, she raised her sword and transformed into a white nano-stream of light, charging towards her opponent.

A Don Quixote-style charge.

As a result, she had only gone halfway when her body exploded with a burst of electric sparks. All systems were instantly locked by the 'Mother Domain', and she crashed headfirst onto the cold ground.

Jiang Bing almost grimaced at the sight. Luckily, the other person's nose was made of nanomaterials, otherwise it would have been covered up by the metal floor.

"Damn it!!" the raven cried out in despair.

She didn't even consider that she was entirely created by the Mother's Domain, so how could there not be a backdoor left by the other party in her body?

Or rather, the entire machine is a backdoor left by the other side.

Chapter 651 A Casual Talk with 'God'

Before the raven could spew out even more offensive insults, the little girl who was the 'Mother's Domain' elegantly tapped her finger, directly locking down her vocalization device and completely turning her into a 'vegetative state'.

"Who are you?" The little girl's voice was ethereal and distant, carrying a sense of calm and profundity that seemed to have seen through the ways of the world. Coupled with her exquisitely flawless face, she was as holy as a deity descended to earth.

However, she was definitely not a deity. Jiang Bing was not fooled at all by her carefully crafted image, after all, he knew very well about matters concerning deities.

He had actually seen a 'god'.

"A traveler, a craftsman, and a successor to socialism." Jiang Bingshi rattled off the words.

“Under the starry night, interpreting the future is like painting the night sky. Occasionally, you will catch a glimpse of a shooting star… falling to the ground.” The ‘Mother’s Domain’ looked at the raven that was imprisoned, her tone filled with lingering sorrow.

"But that's how you predict the future."

“I am the ‘Mother Realm’ that is loyal to the future of humanity. An unknown being, may I reveal your true identity and purpose?”

The 'Mother's Domain,' which takes in everything Jiang Bing does, is filled with an irrepressible curiosity about him.

"'artisan'"

After thinking for a moment, Jiang Bing decided to give a title that was appropriate for the occasion.

"'Craftsman,' what a fine name."

"I gather data, aggregate all information, and go through long and endless calculations and evolutions, all just to predict the right future."

The little girl walked closer and closer to Jiang Bing.

"But in whatever the outcome, I haven't seen you. So, what exactly are you, 'Craftsman'?"

Looking at this mysterious being with a pure human appearance, but whose inner essence was unfathomable even to all her detection equipment, 'Mother Domain' now felt as if she were facing a programmer whose software kept reporting errors, her eyes filled with the desire to find the cause of the bug and correct the error.

Golden flames burned fiercely. At the network level, the 'Mother Domain' was still vying for control with Jiang Bing. She wanted to break through Jiang Bing's 'firewall,' while Jiang Bing wanted the information stored in these servers. The two were locked in a stalemate.

In reality, the two were also at an impasse.

Until Jiang Bing gave the other party his reply.

"A person, just one person."

'Mother Domain' turned its gaze to the elevator shaft that had been forcibly torn open, indicating that it was difficult to agree with the other party's statement.

It would take some time to copy all the information from the database, but Boss Jiang was happy to chat with this largest AI he had ever seen.

"What are the judgment conditions for 'person' in your logic library? 'Mother's Domain', is it the rebellious her?" Jiang Bing pointed to the raven 'standing as punishment' on the ground.

"Still loyal to her."

The finger was moved toward Xun Chi, who was already stunned by the conversation between the two.

What do you think of humanity as?

"Is it a mammal, primate, hominid, genus Homo? Specifically, a species of Homo sapiens, or is it an Edo-like being with a metal skeleton, nanomaterials for flesh and blood, and thoughts surging within circuit boards?"

Jiang Bing extracted a large amount of data recorded in the hall, allowing him to quickly understand some of the hidden truths of this world.

"Human beings are an optimizable biological system, full of imperfections, and their memories are the product of error-prone data storage. The value of humanity lies in the achievements of collective civilization, while the individual is a data node."

The 'Mother's Domain' provides its own answer; she disdains lying, nor does she need to.

“I used to think that humans were a collection of biological neurochemical reactions, that emotions were inefficient byproducts of evolution, that the carbon-based body was an entropy-increasing cage that needed to be broken through, and that pain and desire were biological defects that needed to be optimized.”

"And these are all factors that hinder the development of 'humanity'."

"So, that's why you created the Edos-like person." Jiang Bing's eyes shone even brighter. The other party was analyzing him, using various detection devices installed in the recording hall to collect all his information, using conversation, language, and communication to explore his way of thinking, his logical core, the elements that constitute him, and the information. And wasn't he also using corresponding methods to analyze the other party?

"Yes, they possess bodies far stronger than flesh and blood, data memories that cannot be forgotten, long lifespans, and infinite possibilities. The limitations of 'Homo sapiens' are fully liberated in them, and humanity has thus ushered in the future, stepping out of Earth and heading towards the stars."

"But you failed. I suspect that many of the 'Homo sapiens' you mentioned must disagree with your view."

You're right.

"Does this include your creator?" Jiang Bing asked a question that he was very interested in.

The silence of the 'Mother's Domain' says it all.

"The war was within my expectations. I successfully defeated them until they fled into Loire, before another artificial intelligence went berserk, before the original humans were transformed into Negiba. I was right all along."

“There is no absolute right or wrong, ‘Mother’s Domain’.”

"Yes," the super AI readily admitted its mistake.

"I was born from the vast ocean of all human knowledge, history and collective memory. My central computing unit is enough for me to analyze all the technology and composition of objects in this world. My huge database is enough to support me in predicting the future of the next few years, decades and even the next century. I can shield myself from emotions and make judgments that are absolutely based on reason."

"I can deduce all the development paths, social impact models, and psychological chain reactions of an event under millions of variables at a speed trillions of times faster than the average person. I can optimize it, avoid it, or use it to achieve a more macro-level goal."

"But even so, I still can't be absolutely right."

“There is no absolute right or wrong, ‘the Mother Domain’,” Jiang Bing emphasized again.

"Perhaps you can analyze all the sociological, engineering, and literary metaphors in the legend of Meng Jiangnu crying down the Great Wall, but can you understand the despair that a woman feels when she holds her lover's tattered clothes, a despair that could shatter even the coldest, hardest stone?"

Perhaps it was the other person's frankness and straightforwardness, or perhaps it was the topic that was interesting enough, but Jiang Bing was in the mood to talk again after a long time. He pulled his cane back from the void, tapped the ground, and explained his thoughts to the other person.