157: Chapter 156 Dreams and Poison

System Status Snapshot (15 hours post-ruling):

divine remains Pain Index: 1.32% (collaborative creation continues to be effective)

Regional Chaos activity: 0.5% (tending toward a stable low value)

"Emotional Plague" archive access status: forced partial decryption, download progress 42%, warning indicator flashing continuously.

technology tree system mutation: Deep connection activity abnormally increased, began autonomously cross-indexing "emotional conversion technology" with existing "damping resonance protocol".

validator report feedback: Received, not evaluated. Assessment countdown: 33 hours 10 minutes.

Pruning Faction information dust: Low-frequency resonance detected, 0.7% similarity with the "Emotional Plague" archive key structure.

Lin Shen stared fixedly at the scarlet warning on the light screen before him, his fingertips turning cold. Forbidden experiments, Emotional Plague, Flower of Despair... these terms combined to emit an ominous aura. He immediately shared the summary with Chu Yunshen and the Cradle Node team.

"Converting emotions into artistic energy... and the final backlash?" Zhou Zhe's voice was hoarse. "Isn't that what we're doing now? Letting the divine remains use pain as creative material, diverting its attention to lower the pain index."

"The essence is different." β-2's voice rang out; she was remotely analyzing the archive fragments. "The civilization recorded in the archive conducted 'industrialized predatory conversion,' crudely extracting emotional energy while ignoring the health and will of the conscious subject, leading to the exhaustion of the emotional source and the generation of highly toxic byproducts. Our collaboration with the divine remains is based on invitation, feedback, and centered on expression and reconstruction. An analogy: the former is squeezing a tree dry for juice, while the latter is inviting the tree to participate in the brewing process and share the results."

The metaphor was vivid, but the unease in Lin Shen's heart did not subside. The "autonomous cross-indexing" the technology tree system was conducting at this moment spoke for itself—the system judged that the two had a technical correlation, perhaps even... complementarity.

"The archive mentions a 'beautiful and fatal Flower of Despair,'" Chu Yunshen mused. "Are there any descriptions of its specific form or effects?"

Lin Shen retrieved more decrypted fragments. A few lines of intermittent text appeared:

[...Initial results were significant; artistic output of the civilization exploded, and energy was abundant. In the seventh cycle, the first batch of deep participants began to experience 'detachment from reality,' calling the real world 'colorless' and 'lacking depth.']

[...In the tenth cycle, the phenomenon of 'aesthetic absolutism' spread. Ordinary creations not subjected to emotional conversion were destroyed in large numbers, viewed as 'profane.' The social structure polarized around 'emotional harvesting - artistic output.']

[...Precursor to final collapse: A kind of extreme 'beauty' capable of inducing deep pleasure and a sense of belonging was synthesized, which was actually a highly concentrated, disguised form of collective despair. Those who came into contact with it would abandon all resistance in their happiness, actively merging into the 'eternal beauty,' becoming silent sculptures... known as 'Blooming Extinction.']

The command cabin fell silent. Li Lin instinctively hugged her arms.

"This is an addiction," Zhao Yan suddenly spoke, his voice low. "A high-level addiction targeting the soul. It wraps the most toxic core in the most beautiful things, making you willingly sink into it. It's more terrifying than any weapon."

"Analysis correct," β-2 confirmed. "The essence of the 'Emotional Plague' is a super-weapon of cognition and values. It doesn't destroy the body, but rather alters the underlying standards of a civilization's 'judgment of meaning,' causing it to self-destruct. Our collaboration with the divine remains must strictly set boundaries to prevent either side from sliding into 'addiction' or 'absolutism.'"

Just then, a strong, unprecedentedly steady fluctuation came from the creative resonance interface with the divine remains, even carrying a hint of... satisfied fatigue.

Data showed that in the collaborative creation just now (the divine remains provided a small segment of "profound loneliness" "texture," and β-2 and the Scavenger mixed it with a segment of "silence of the forest after rain" extracted from Earth's natural sound library), the pain index of the divine remains dropped by another 0.08%, and it actively played the newly generated "thought fragment," which mixed loneliness and tranquility, in a loop within its own Chaos Domain, as if listening to a piece of music that put it at ease.

This was originally excellent progress. But combined with the archive just seen, this "looping" and "satisfaction" made people instinctively vigilant.

"It... has started to enjoy this process," Zhou Zhe said in a low voice.

"Enjoyment isn't the problem; dependence is," Lin Shen took a deep breath. "β-2, pause the introduction of new, intense positive emotional elements. In the next stage, try to guide the divine remains to identify and express the 'non-painful' parts within its own chaos. For example, its vast energy itself, or the 'resilience' contained in its long existence."

"Understood. Adjusting the creative direction, shifting from 'emotional harmonization' to 'trait mining and affirmation.' This helps establish a healthier self-cognition rather than relying on externally input emotional substitutes." β-2 executed immediately.

After dealing with the divine remains, Lin Shen's attention returned to the technology tree system's anomalous indexing. He discovered that the system was not simply copying the technology of the "Emotional Plague," but was attempting to build a "safety guardrail"—reversely deducing a series of risk thresholds and early warning protocols based on the failure paths recorded in the archives. One draft was titled: "Safety Threshold Model for 'Art-Energy' Conversion Based on Consciousness Activity and Diversity Indicators."

"It wants to... turn poison into medicine?" Lin Shen muttered to himself. This idea was too bold, and too dangerous.

Chu Yunshen's communication cut in: "Chief Engineer Lin, there's movement from the validator. Although it didn't directly evaluate the report, it just sent an extended data request list to the Cradle Node, requiring the provision of all raw consciousness fluctuation samples generated from 'non-standard interactions' with the divine remains over the past 24 hours, including edge perception data from participating humans."

"It wants raw data? What does it want to analyze?"

"Not sure. But the list specifically notes that it needs to include subtle data from dimensions like 'changes in aesthetic evaluation,' 'sense of fulfillment of meaning,' and 'tendency towards reality comparison,'" Chu Yunshen said with a grave tone. "The validator might also be assessing whether we have crossed the risk red line of the 'Emotional Plague.' It wants to see for itself whether our 'non-standard' collaboration is healing or burying a landmine."

Pressure surged. They had to effectively reduce the pain index within the assessment countdown while ensuring the "healthiness" of the entire process could pass the validator's deep inspection, while also guarding against the Pruning Faction's "logic dust" that could explode at any moment, and the unknown risks that might be brought by the technology tree system's own overly "active" cross-learning.

"It's like dancing on the edge of a knife, and having to keep smiling," Zhou Zhe summarized.

In the next few hours, the collaboration entered a subtle stage.

β-2 strictly followed the new guidance direction. She no longer provided external emotional templates like "tranquility" or "hope," but instead, like a patient archaeologist, helped the divine remains find those "non-negative traits" that belonged to it, which had been covered up by pain, within the "ruins" of its own chaos.

The process was slow and difficult. The divine remains was accustomed to the expression of pain; it was initially confused, even somewhat repelled, by neutral or even positive traits like the "vastness of chaos energy itself" or the "stubborn inertia endowed by long existence." This was like asking someone with long-term depression to suddenly describe their "strengths"—they would feel strange and awkward.

But β-2 was extremely patient, using the Scavenger as a "probe" and "paintbrush" to gently outline and magnify those energy regions in the chaos that were relatively stable or had regular changes, and "presenting" them intuitively to the divine remains.

"Look, the energy vortex in this area, although complex in structure, has a very stable pulsation cycle that has lasted for at least thousands of years in human calendar time. This in itself is a powerful 'existential inertia.'" β-2 converted the data into a peaceful, observational thought.

The divine remains "observed" silently. Gradually, it began to try to "touch" these highlighted traits with its own consciousness. A strange, slightly awkward sense of "self-examination" began to sprout in its consciousness.

The pain index decreased slowly but firmly; the speed was not as fast as when external emotions were introduced before, but the curve was more stable. More importantly, the "satisfied fatigue" in the fluctuations fed back by the divine remains decreased, replaced by a sense of exploratory desire mixed with confusion and a faint sense of recognition ("So... not everything here is a terrible mess?").

This seemed to be a healthier sign.

However, the warning issued by the technology tree system did not stop. It monitored that among the human participants, especially those engineers deeply connected to the Silent Veil and volunteers providing "background resonance support" through the green soil network, a small number of people's neural activity patterns showed extremely subtle signs of "synchronization"—not synchronized with the divine remains, but with each other, showing unusual consistency in their evaluation of certain abstract "aesthetics" (such as the energy flow of a specific structure in the divine remains' chaos). This consistency was currently harmless, but the pattern had less than 1% statistical similarity to the early signs of "aesthetic absolutism" mentioned in the "Emotional Plague" archive.

Risks followed like a shadow.

Countdown remaining: 31 hours 45 minutes.

Pain Index: 1.32% → 1.18%

Chaos activity: 0.5% → 0.45%

Key progress and risk monitoring:

divine remains status: Entered the "self-trait exploration" stage, pain continues to alleviate, dependency risk initially controllable.

technology tree safety model: Completed the first version of the "Safety Threshold Model," deployed as a background monitoring protocol, scanning collaborative data streams in real-time.

validator data request: All raw data samples have been packaged and sent. validator analysis process status: Unknown.

Human participant monitoring: 3 cases of "aesthetic evaluation synchronization" signs discovered, individual difference degree still maintained above 98%, psychological counseling and rotation isolation observation have been carried out.

Pruning Faction information dust: Continuous low-frequency resonance, not activated. Similarity with the "Emotional Plague" key fluctuates, reaching up to 1.2%.

β-2 log update: "Guiding the divine remains to examine itself is like guiding a lost person to see their own shadow. The shadow may be distorted, but it is indeed a part of its existence. Accepting the shadow rather than just longing for the light may be a more solid balance."

Just when everyone thought they could take a temporary breather, a strong wave of thought suddenly came from the divine remains, mixed with surprise, urgency, and some kind of ancient sorrow.

It seemed to have discovered, deep within its own chaos, a cluster of "memory-feelings" that had been sealed by long-term pain, almost complete. It was not a failure of the laboratory, nor the despair of imprisonment, but from much earlier... a moment when it had just been "created," not yet given a complex mission, simply "existing," feeling the tranquility of the primitive energy flow around it.

That "memory" carried a kind of hazy, pure, almost "infantile" perception, which, though short, was incomparably clear.

The divine remains eagerly pushed this memory cluster toward β-2 and the creation interface, its thoughts filled with an unprecedented longing: "This... paint this! Fix it... don't... lose it again!"

This was the first clear and positive creative material it had actively provided.

β-2 finished analyzing instantly, confirming that this memory cluster's emotion was pure, without potential pollution, and had significant positive meaning for the divine remains. She responded immediately, collaborating with the Scavenger, and began trying to convert this feeling of "primordial tranquility" into a stable thought image.

However, the moment the creation started, the technology tree system's background monitoring protocol issued the highest-level flashing warning, but it was not directed at the divine remains or the humans, but at those few latent Pruning Faction information dust particles.

Their resonance frequency suddenly resonated highly with the emotional wavelength of the divine remains' "primordial tranquility" memory!

Ashes' communication tore through the channel almost simultaneously, with a hint of rare urgency: "Wrong! That's not ordinary logic dust! That's a 'Anchor Resonator'—the Pruning Faction uses it to mark and amplify specific emotional states, especially... emotions that are easily guided toward absolute concepts like 'purity,' 'stillness,' and 'eternity'! Interrupt the connection immediately! It is inducing the divine remains to 'absolutely beautify' and 'solidify' that memory; that is the prelude to 'Blooming Extinction'!"