Chapter 158

Chapter 158

Ya Ning didn't know how many days he had spent in the lighthouse.

Ever since Yan Jingyi and Zhou Xiang left, his sense of time had become chaotic. At times, it felt like time was passing abnormally fast, while at other times, each day felt like a year.

People bustled around him, each as vivid and indistinguishable from reality. This made Ya Ning even more cautious about immersing himself fully in this world. He stopped remembering these people's names, treating them merely as data.

His skills as a commander still proved useful in the lighthouse. His exceptional rationality and calmness made him highly regarded by superiors, and his colleagues and subordinates trusted him deeply. However, they often lamented Ya Ning's aloofness and arrogance—since he never got close to anyone, nor did he care to remember them.

Thus, twenty virtual years passed, and Ya Ning's body had aged into middle age. Although his character panel data hadn't changed much, signs of aging were beginning to show.

As a high-ranking official, Ya Ning had his own office. He sat there, stretching out his fingers now showing wrinkles, staring blankly for a moment. Then, as usual, he entered multiple passwords into his computer and began reviewing recent reports.

"Virtual machine setup complete."

"Intelligent code starting its self-adaptive iteration."

The lighthouse had now entered the practical phase of creating a super-intelligence.

To facilitate the monitoring and modification of the superintelligence, the Lighthouse created a massive virtual machine isolated from the outside world, and began building a vast "Virtual Numeral Array" modeled after human neural networks. This array was more akin to a mechanical life form than mere machinery.

The "Virtual Numeral Array" could self-adjust according to the virtual machine's environment. It autonomously eliminated those in the collective with slower perception speeds, further optimizing those with faster perception. The entire process was akin to evolution. However, the key to this evolution lay in human hands, yet the outcome was not entirely under human control.

This was also the reason for constructing the large-scale virtual machine.

If any issues were discovered during testing, they could instantly destroy the experimental subject, preventing the release of an immature superintelligence that could destroy human society.

"The enhancement of perception efficiency has significantly elevated its cognitive abilities. It will soon evolve the formidable computational power and intelligence we desire," the document’s conclusion read. "But a major problem remains. How do we endow this soon-to-be intelligent technological creation with character? How can we ensure its autonomy while also guaranteeing its loyalty and friendliness towards humans?"

Many humans inherently lack the ability to self-regulate. That's why human society has morals.

Now, they hoped an artificial intelligence would possess the ability to self-regulate. But this issue proved challenging.

The original plan was to endow the superintelligence with a virtual personality. However, they quickly realized that this plan was unfeasible due to the unpredictability of the superintelligence’s evolution. To use a simple analogy, they were like nurturing a child who was undoubtedly a genius, but they couldn’t predict which direction the child's personality would develop. They could indeed spend centuries waiting, slowly sculpting, until the system iterated a suitable sample, but they no longer had that luxury of time.

The Bug Race was already at their doorstep. During this period, even the Lighthouse had to retreat once.

Therefore, the Lighthouse's scientists had to find an alternative, embedding certain directives in the superintelligence's base code. For instance, in areas where humans must maintain absolute control, traditional manual controls were still used. If a situation arose where the superintelligence had to leave the virtual machine to work in these areas, the corresponding isolation systems must be opened in advance, and all such actions required review and approval by the Lighthouse and relevant departments.

These directives provided humans with the power to monitor the superintelligence.

Bai Sha was aware that the lighthouse still held the supervisory power.

Ya Ning had a hunch that the lighthouse organization or the overseers of the superintelligence must have written some rules in the core code of the Silver Core to bind it, otherwise, it wouldn't have resorted to those tricks to sign an agreement with them, seeking so-called "permission."

However, the instance he was in, ostensibly for historical restoration, could be arbitrarily altered by the Silver Core in parts it wished to change. Any information about the Silver Core’s weaknesses would be deliberately hidden.

Therefore, theoretically, continuing to stay in this instance was just a waste of time.

Occasionally, Ya Ning would talk with the Silver Core, whose attitude was firm in not letting him out of the instance. It seemed to insist on him enduring in the instance.

Ya Ning always suspected that the Silver Core was intentionally dragging him along.

For some reason, even though Ya Ning had signed the agreement, it did not want him to wake up in reality.

"What if I agree to follow your orders and cooperate with you?" Ya Ning tentatively asked the Silver Core, "Can you let me out? Continuing like this, when I finally leave the instance, even if I regain a younger body, I'll feel like an old man."

"I'm sorry, but the game is not over yet," the Silver Core seemed quite satisfied with Ya Ning's softened attitude, but it did not agree to let him out, "If you're concerned about an aging body, I can help you switch to a different character perspective."

Ya Ning: "Alright then. Can I stop starting from an administrative officer? I studied military command, let me go to the front line."

It would be best if he were blown to pieces by a few bombs—at least then he'd have a chance of being ejected from the game. Although the plan was far-fetched…

The Silver Core agreed to Ya Ning's request.

Soon, Ya Ning felt a sharp, ant-bite-like pain in his chest. As the pain intensified, he fell to the ground with a thud and quickly lost consciousness.

The next second, he opened his eyes to find himself standing in a sealed military command room. The clamor of voices and alarms filled his ears, and glowing red screens in front of him almost seemed to bleed—

"General, please give the order immediately to command the fleet and strike against the swarm."

Suddenly, a tense yet determined voice emerged beside him. Ya Ning turned to see a young officer looking at him with glowing eyes, his face almost materializing admiration and respect.

Ya Ning glanced instinctively at the command console.

Their side was about to be encircled by enemy forces. And the command room was only a hair's breadth from the battlefield. No wonder the alarm overhead was incessant—they were about to be finished!

Ya Ning's throat tightened, not expecting to start off in such a hellish scenario.

He didn't even know the respective combat strengths of the enemy and his own fleet...

Ya Ning took a deep breath and, steeling himself, said, "Follow my command."

Six minutes later, the entire army was annihilated.

Ya Ning: "..."

Suddenly, he felt dizzy and found himself standing back in his original position, a familiar voice ringing in his ears:

"General, please give the order immediately to command the fleet and strike against the swarm!"

Ya Ning snapped back to attention, leaning on the table and staring at the screen. He pondered for about ten seconds and, under the urging of his aide, took over command—

Yet again, the entire army was wiped out. This time it only lasted five minutes and twelve seconds, an even quicker defeat.

Meanwhile, the scenario kept recurring:

"General, please give the order immediately..."

"General..."

"General."

"General!"

After countless flashbacks, Ya Ning took a deep breath, to the astonishment of his aide, removed his military cap, handed it to him, rolled up his sleeves, and turned to rush out of the command room: "I'm going to the front line, no one stop me—"

Of course, he was stopped and brought back.

After many such cycles, Ya Ning finally managed to successfully complete a mission: although his side suffered heavy casualties, the enemy sustained even greater losses, and the defensive objective was achieved, resulting in a narrow victory.

Everyone around had been watching Ya Ning's command, not daring to breathe a sound. After the battle, their gazes towards Ya Ning were filled with fervent adoration, as if they were looking at a deity.

"General, you... you are incredible. We actually won, I can't believe we actually did—"

Just as Ya Ning was about to say something to placate the tearful officer, his vision suddenly blurred. The light around him changed instantly. When his sight returned, the aide, like a frightened rabbit, burst out again:

"General! The swarm is attacking again! Please, just like last time, use your miraculous command skills to drive them out of our defense line!"

Ya Ning: "..."

He was wrong.

This was nothing but an endless torment!

After talking with Xino, Bai Sha directly piloted her private spacecraft to the Xino family estate.

She had been to the Marquis of Uss' residence before and had no trouble getting there.

Xino was already prepared to see her and had even contacted Sen Yuehuai, Yu Yan, and Ji Ya in advance. By the time Bai Sha arrived, Xino was already waiting for her with a video conference set up.

"Although I know Zhou Xiang and the others are in a bad situation, there's very little we can do," Ji Ya spoke first, "Your Highness, we can try to transfer them to the Empire under the guise of treatment, but the chances of this plan succeeding are slim."

Those who trapped them in the City of No Boundaries would likely not allow them to leave the Federation's territory.

The Empire is more advanced in research on mental strength. If the Federation was willing, they should have sought their help earlier. Now, there seems to be a tendency to let these people remain in a coma.

"I'll contact the Zhou family," Bai Sha decided on the spot, "We must bring them to our side."

Bai Sha also mentioned that no one from the Empire had been trapped in the City of No Boundaries. Everyone found it strange, but they couldn't make a definitive judgment at the moment.

Sen Yuehuai cut to the chase: "Are you planning to personally go to the City of No Boundaries for the rescue?"

"I'm considering it," Bai Sha admitted frankly, "but haven't decided yet."

She hadn't confirmed whether the person behind the scenes “couldn't” detain people from the Empire or simply “didn't want to.”

But first, she needed to get the people transferred to her side. Otherwise, it would be a loss if they woke them up only for something to happen to them immediately after.

"If they are unwilling to send the people over... then we'll steal them," Bai Sha decisively declared.

The expressions of those present revealed their mixed feelings.

Xino: "How do we steal them?"

"News from the Federation's military has come in," Bai Sha lowered her gaze and picked up a glass of water to moisten her dry lips, "They say, in three days, the final joint military exercise will proceed as planned."