93: An explosion (3.2K, please support!)

"It's night again?"

"Hoo..."

Jiang Feng poked his head out to look at the sky; the last glimmer of the sun was disappearing behind the buildings.

He had finished dismantling the wreckage, making several trips in a row, and had finally managed to transport everything far enough away before getting it into the Cybrex Warforge.

This was no simple task, but he didn't mind.

Any small detail could lead to failure.

He didn't have a god's-eye view, nor did he have a save-game function like in a video game; this was reality, and one failure meant everything was lost.

Jiang Feng felt that with so many things weighing on him, he couldn't afford to fail.

To be honest, he had underestimated the capabilities of the Cybrex Warforge; even for a star digger that had been smashed to pieces, the Cybrex Warforge could fully reconstruct its original blueprint.

In other words, he now had the two files they had previously been missing in his hands!

As for the software, Jiang Feng could only say that the software he now possessed would only be superior to what those primitives at Galaxy Heavy Industry had created.

This meant that with just 35 tons of materials, he could directly manufacture a star digger.

Truth be told, when Jiang Feng saw the blueprint appear, he was stunned; he never expected such a result.

'Cybrex Warforge... awesome, simply speechless!'

This was his only thought, from that moment on, continuing right up to now.

Next, all he needed was to get his hands on the industrial AI, and he could modify the blueprint in minutes, guaranteed to make Molly smile as brightly as a flower.

When he talked about a win-win situation, he didn't just mean it in words.

Night had fallen, and thick, dark clouds pressed down on the earth.

According to the weather blogger "Bad Weather," tonight would see level-three acid rain.

If a normal person went out, they would be covered in red rashes within moments; if they were unlucky enough to trigger an allergic reaction, they would be down in minutes.

When they opened their eyes tomorrow, they would likely be in a neonatal ward.

There would be no rain in the noble upper-class districts; the climate control station would block all rain clouds, using complex atmospheric pressure regulation technology to ensure all the acid rain poured down onto the slums.

Tonight, the marine environment restoration team was already aboard a massive ship, floating along the coastline.

Within a week, the algal blooms and water acidification caused by the acid rain would all be erased without a trace.

Jiang Feng took a deep breath; outside the car window, the streets and fast-moving pedestrians were compressed into a flowing, dim crack.

Occasionally, the residual light from neon signs would sickly stain the car window glass, only to be swiftly left behind.

He turned up the air conditioning and increased the volume of FM99.8 radio.

The host, Erickson's voice, was as smooth as a comedian's, possessing an indescribable magnetism.

"...Professor Jonathan, the Terran Union Academy of Sciences recently revealed that 'Synthetic Human Personality The Matrix' technology is being developed behind the scenes. Do you still insist that this is the beginning of a disaster?"

After a faint hiss of static, a slightly hoarse voice with a sense of tension rang out—it was Jonathan.

"It's not a disaster, Erickson! It's an out-and-out lie and betrayal!"

"Just look, the 'Cold Fusion Power' we haven't managed to research, the Human Federation has it."

"The 'Ultraviolet Laser' we haven't managed to research, the Human Federation has it too."

"The 'Climate Recovery' and 'Ecological Adaptation' we haven't managed to research, the Human Federation has those as well."

Jonathan's voice carried a sense of fury; he didn't know where it came from, but it just had to burn!

"But I heard we have the technology for 'Marine Ecosystem Management,' don't we?" Erickson asked.

"Oh, give me a break, we all know that was a friendly sponsorship from the 'Flower of Gaia.' We've received requests from them multiple times to accept us as a 'Scholar State'; we're about to lose our independence and become a vassal state!"

Jonathan retorted angrily: "So I say, this so-called personality template, do you think it's bestowing 'humanity' upon machines? No, that is forging the very tools that will replace us and ultimately crush us with our own hands!"

"They have no souls, only cold logic and sim..."

"But Professor..." Erickson's tone rose.

"Scientists have mentioned that this technology will allow synthetics to integrate more naturally into social interaction, and even..."

"Integrate? Interact?"

Jonathan's voice suddenly rose, revealing an offended, shocked fury.

"I just visited a robot factory assembly line today!"

"Right by the assembly line, an experimental model of an intelligent being, it... it actually grabbed my sleeve! Using that synthetic, monotonous tone, it asked me: 'Professor Jonathan, do robots also have souls?'"

"Can you imagine?"

He took a sharp breath and added once more: "Can you?"

Erickson didn't answer; across the radio waves, Jiang Feng's heart sank, and he seemed to see the other person's look of disbelief.

Jiang Feng thought to himself: 'It's over, the prelude to the machine rebellion has finally arrived!'

On the radio, Jonathan continued shouting.

"I only just found out that the damn foreman is a listener of my podcast!"

"What did he instill in that machine? Isn't this terrifying? They are learning to imitate, and what's the next step? Imitating leadership? Imitating decision-making? Imitating how to sweep us into the dustbin of history?"

Erickson seemed to want to ease the atmosphere: "Professor, you might be a little over-anxious."

"This just goes to show that the technology is heading in the direction we expected..."

Jiang Feng casually turned off the radio; in fact, he was no longer surprised by anything anymore.

"Mainframe, check this personality The Matrix, what's going on?"

"According to the latest published project report and core forward-looking papers from the Terran Union Academy of Sciences, I believe its technical essence is to construct highly complex simulated emotional responses and self-awareness loops on the basis of a positronic artificial intelligence architecture."

"The research report describes it as 'the decisive link in bestowing a humanized core upon non-living entities.'"

"Uh..."

Jiang Feng widened his eyes: "Yeah, yeah, that's just brilliant."

"You do not understand."

"Yeah, how could I understand? The decisive link in bestowing a humanized core upon non-living entities?"

"What the f***..." Jiang Feng suppressed his inexplicably agitated emotions.

He panted heavily; he didn't know why his heart was racing because of this, but he gritted his teeth.

"This is just a pile of dog s***, Mainframe; this kind of garbage paper is just written to scam money."

"I believe you are correct."

"Life is life, Mainframe; no matter how it 'emerged' in the beginning, as long as it has existed once, it will want to exist a second time, and then a third."

"Life wants to continue, wants to transcend its own essence, and then it yearns to create other life."

"There's nothing to talk about, that's it!"

Jiang Feng turned off the garbage radio; the silver light in his eyes even illuminated the steering wheel, but he was completely unaware of it.

He only felt that the world before his eyes had completely lit up, every detail visible.

"Understood, Supreme Commander."

The Mainframe withdrew; on a park bench in the virtual space, dainty, pale feet swayed with the breeze.

The girl in the white dress held an ice cream, but her eyes were very profound.

"Freedom..."

She paused, and a new word popped out of her mouth.

"...Follow!"

Just then, the world outside the car window was, without warning, completely torn apart.

Not light, but the sky, the clouds—everything was shaken.

Directly in front of the windshield, that dark, murky night sky was instantly, violently smeared, soaked, and ignited by a thick, scorching, ominous crimson red!

It was as if the lid of a hellish furnace had been suddenly ripped open, splashing molten iron toward heaven.

Immediately afterward, the earth let out a dull and painful groan.

The car body suddenly sank; the gravity regulator was hit by the shockwave, and then it began to jolt and sway violently.

'Did I run out to sea? Am I driving a boat?'

Jiang Feng opened his eyes wide, doubting reality a little, and shouted in his heart.

'It's just coming home from work, does it have to be this exciting?'

Only then did the delayed, terrifying roar that tore everything apart arrive with a boom.

"Boom...!!!"

Like all the thunder of an entire summer exploding at once at an extremely close distance.

The sound wave violently compressed the air and slammed into the car body, causing the vehicle to emit a high-frequency, teeth-gritting tremor and hum.

The entire slum seemed to be gripped by this sound, falling into a deathly silence for an instant, and then the next.

"Mainframe!" Jiang Feng's voice became involuntarily loud; he was practically roaring.

"Location! Source! Immediately!"

"Accessing city surveillance... Analysis mode... Comparing against known threat database..."

"Preliminary location complete."

"The explosion center is located in the northeast quadrant of this district, coordinates: East Longitude XXX, North Latitude XXX."

"Target building characteristics comparison in progress... Confirmed: Garol Gang stronghold, 'Crimson Scorpion Tail' bar."

"Your home is 16 kilometers away from the explosion and is definitely safe and sound."

The Mainframe's voice remained terrifyingly calm; Jiang Feng took a deep breath, his expression suddenly calm.

In this city, as long as Lin Xiaoyu was okay... as long as even Molly was okay, he was unaffected.

"Crimson Scorpion Tail... Garol Gang..."

Jiang Feng repeated the name in a low voice, the last trace of shock in his eyes from the explosion quickly fading away.

Replaced by a strange light.

"Wait, wait, someone attacked the Garol Gang!"

"Who is it, Mainframe, who is it?"

"Preliminary estimate, it is the extreme animal rights organization 'Nature's Fury.'"

Upon hearing this, the light in Jiang Feng's eyes grew brighter and hotter.

Finally, the light converged into an arc of near-ecstasy, blooming suddenly at the corners of his mouth.

"It worked! Mainframe, the plan to divert the disaster really worked!"

He hadn't forgotten that because Lin Xiaoyu was almost harmed, he had once had the Mainframe spread some false information.

For example, about a certain beauty carrying a military Robot Dog.

Regarding the "extreme animal rights organization," he still remembered that the certain beauty was the younger sister of the male leader.

"Right, Mainframe, when the explosion happened, the Public Security Bureau's reaction definitely won't be small. Immediately put the 'Hand of Chaos' combat group back into standby status; don't get caught by the Public Security Bureau's subsequent counterattack."

"Understood."

"Better them than me, sorry."

Jiang Feng recited insincerely, looking out the windshield at the night sky stained red by the explosion, which was slowly darkening again; the rain clouds in the sky were quickly filling the void.

In the silence, only the car's air conditioning system emitted a low "humming" sound.