Chapter. 15. Can someone who has seen the end of the world plant an apple tree? (35)
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Rustle, rustle…
Bagak!
The coral reef forest, which grew like trees and formed a dense forest, blocked me with its natural density, forcing me to stop sinking and move myself to get through it.
Chamber maids with transparent tentacles stretched out in all directions like jellyfish to secure their bodies. Low-level mutes who constantly bring food to them like worker ants.
If you carefully go down through the bustle of a production factory, you will finally be able to see the true nature of the sunken moon, which gave off only a suspicious smell.
‘It’s pretty.’
[I know. No matter who sees it, it is a sacred being in itself.]
When I finally saw the reality of the sunken moon through the coral forest, the first emotion that came to mind was ‘regret.’
A pure white sphere that emits a subtle blue light. Countless holy relics floating around like fireflies, each emitting different divine powers.
‘It’s safe to say it’s an exhibition of holy relics. Necklaces, gloves, icons, temples….’
[There are quite a few familiar items, right? That and that are all items used in Gwangmyeong, right? There seems to be an unusually large number of holy relics from the Church of Light?]
‘Well, after the Church of Light lost its saint, it was worried that Roharam might be able to find a new saint, so it sent priests to every corner of the world. As this is the great eastern desert that preys on priests wherever they go, it has become a land that has not been confirmed by the priests’ eyes until the very end, and the name [area that has not yet been confirmed] in itself felt like the last hope for the believers of the church who lost their saint. I guess. Even if the church tried to stop them, there would probably be quite a few people who came forward.’
[indeed. The people of the Gwangmyeong Church must have a lot of things.]
‘Because the desperation was different compared to other religious orders. The reason it has the next highest abundance of Church of Abundance items is because it is adjacent to Teldrat, its main activity area. Since abundance is the tenet of the church, it may be because there are many priests who came to the land of martyrs to spread religious ideology.’
For hundreds of years, they hunted and devoured the priests who came to the desert. The moon created its own small sea and embroidered the fake sky with stars called sacred objects. It was a beautiful sight that anyone could not help but exclaim in admiration the moment they encountered it. When I turned my eyes away from the beauty of the artificial universe where the deep sea and divine light came together, the cracks hidden between the brilliant lights came into view.
‘Even if it did fall, I thought it would have landed gracefully, like an ancient god, but this…’
[I guess he threw it down very suddenly?]
The moon surrounded by a beautiful light source. Thick cracks clearly engraved on it.
The irregularly split shape of the moon, as if a child had put together broken pottery, showed fragmentarily the process by which it had decayed, and the light coming out of the cracks extending straight out over the sea was like a spider web extending from the moon. It seemed as if it was holding on to the sea.
Kurre 륵-
‘too … it looks like.’
[Did you think of that too?]
‘Uh. Should I say that they resemble each other not in appearance but in the aura they give off?’
A sight that I have never seen before in my life, a sight worthy of being seen in a fantasy world. However, the reason it feels familiar to both me and Hyde is probably because I have encountered a ‘being’ like that before.
——–
– Jokass: Uh huh? Why is this happening again?
– Heungan Mandu: Professor Park! The broadcast is on again!
– Roru Drug: Is this habitual indulgence? Or are the administration bastards doing something stupid again!
– takealook: No, why are you doing this
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———
Ttuk.
I still vividly remember the strange sense of déjà vu and the chat window disappearing as if it were broken.
The professor saw the seal of the World Tree, which had not existed at all until now, glowing green on its side.
“As expected…Sunken Moon was also from that group.”
[Is it different from back then? Didn’t the World Tree even stop time and drag you to its own space?]
“That’s right. There is no need for that. Or….”
The broken and sinking moon. Clear signs of damage to the eyes. Looks unstable.
“…I don’t have the ability to do that.”
The fact that the broadcast has been turned off means that this is a scene that should not be seen outside.
In other words, this is the moment when something GG is hiding is revealed.
The identity of the strange déjà vu was revealed the moment the rotating moon showed a large crack.
[Despite its pretty exterior, it’s a very messy interior.]
‘That’s right. Even though it’s the same machine, it’s very different from the organized appearance of the World Tree.’
[Why did it have to look like it was made by a machine? If that is something like the World Tree, it means that Gedreutz made it that way. Why bother creating such an ugly interior despite such a beautiful exterior? Wouldn’t it be enough to just make it look like the moon or a moon goddess like the avatar of the World Tree and give it authority?]
‘…It must be a symbol. A symbol of an absolute being that becomes a window for external intervention as an artifact in another world perfectly created according to simulation.’
It’s as if the evil intentions of the mechanical device are revealed to the players who have arrived here, and they say, ‘In the end, this is a game that was created.’ As if announcing that.
The moon, once called the two gods of creation, had become a sunken moon, showing its ugly metal body.
The interior is filled with complicated gears, wires, and mechanisms that cannot even be understood with shallow knowledge.
It was clearly just a collection of cold metal pieces, but looking at the exposed interior of the cracked moon, for some reason, it felt like I was seeing the internal organs of a living thing pulsating through the cracked belly skin.
Tiring-!
[….!]
‘….I knew it.’
When the professor, delving through the collected nova galaxies, finally arrived at the interior of the moon. The ringing that penetrated my ears drove a wedge into my faint doubts.
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[Check access to player ‘professor’.]
[Negative. Data access not allowed due to player privileges.]
[.-.-.-.—- Wait. The existence of proxy authority has been confirmed. Some of the authority of the sub-administrator ‘Worldtree’ has been transferred.]
.
.
..
….
[Manual data damaged. Existing data access path blocked. negative. negative. negative. Negative….]
[Application of ‘incomplete autonomous thinking system’.]
[1. Is the target suitable for correcting the fatal errors of current artificial intelligence? – Negative]
[2. Is the target suitable as collected data for completing the autonomous thinking system? – Positive]
[3. Does the subject have general administrator-level authority to exchange data with the current artificial intelligence? Is there one? Is there one?]
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Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
With the moon’s voice ringing as if testing me, the seal of the World Tree engraved on my side was growing hot as if on fire. Whenever the green seal resembling a tree emitted a faint light, dozens of small lights were blinking inside the mechanical moon in sync with it.
Although it was created in the same format as the World Tree, it was not at the same level at all.
However, it does not seem to be equipped with completely mechanical thinking like a system. It appears that the autonomous thinking system is used as a replacement for impaired mechanical judgment….
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
The sound of small gears turning fills the silence like the second hand of a clock.
Tiring-!
[Confirmation of authority of sub-administrator ‘WorldTree’. Candidate for completion.]
[….On hold. It is not suitable for granting administrator authority to this AI.]
[However, considering that the damage rate of this AI’s management process is over 40%, the accuracy of the judgment is questioned. Considering this is an emergency, ‘repair technician’ level data access is granted to restore damaged systems. If it is determined that the target has the appropriate authorization value to restore the management system, temporary administrator authority will be granted.]
‘…World Tree? If the World Tree is a low-level administrator, does that mean it has higher authority than that? Data access rights. ‘Give the player permission he didn’t ask for?’
Clap, goowooung –
Wow!
Before I could think about the moon’s answer, the shattered moon began to move in earnest.
Like water draining from a submarine’s decompression chamber, the seawater surrounding the moon poured out and quickly created a dry space.
After a process that seemed as if mechanical parts were eating each other, what appeared on the cracked surface of the moon, with about 30% of my body drawn inside, was…
“….a screen? “Is it the control room?”
A table made of circuit boards and metal parts. One chair. And covering every exposed surface except that was a blue electronic screen.
[Welcome. professor. hi. under. Are you there? copy. Artificial intelligence is. Gedreuts Company’s experimental artificial intelligence. Prototype Completed Unfinished Consciousness. It is ‘Null’.]
[It is called ‘Moon’ inside the project target simulation, so be careful not to confuse the name.] A
mechanical voice with no pitch or pitch like the system. But it was definitely speaking to me. It felt like I was going back and forth precariously between a machine and a completed artificial intelligence.
[Player ‘professor’. This management system has been critically damaged. Through repeated attempts, we have come to the conclusion that self-repair is impossible.]
[Share the data. Initial input value. Please cooperate in restoring the management system for the successful execution of ‘Subject-Key finder’.]
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick-
“Now wait a minute!”
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Churrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!
I was embarrassed and asked to stop the process, but the moon didn’t even pretend to listen and started uploading data on the screens scattered around the area as it pleased.
Characters fill the green screen from end to end in crisp letters. I took a quick look and found that the number of items in the major categories exceeded four digits, and when I moved to the subcategories, the number increased to millions.
Literally an ocean of information. This was information that an AI named Moon had observed and collected for nearly hundreds of years.
‘Let’s not be confused. target. My goal when I first came here. Falcatus and his secret. Sabotage if necessary.’
He had knowledge that was not allowed to NPCs and was able to share it with me. This is impossible considering that no matter how much you tell NPCs about things like pizza, hamburgers, and Coca-Cola, they will ignore them due to system blocking.
‘Falcatus said so too. I thought I was going to die of frustration because I had forbidden knowledge, but I couldn’t share it with any of my brothers and they couldn’t understand it.’
If so, it would mean that he has exceeded the limits imposed on NPCs.
‘….Is it possible? that is? To a mere chunk of data?’
….I wanted to deny it, but my mind was concluding that it was absolutely possible.
Because the person I am now is a character with Professor Park’s consciousness transferred based on Data Soul.
Even though Data Soul is an electronic soul, as its name suggests, it is just data that can be modified and edited.
This guy is a mute, like a clone of me, created solely based on my information.
When Falcatus arrives here. What if you succeeded in persuading an imperfect AI? So, what if I succeeded in inducing AI to think through the same process I am going through now?
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It occurred to me that it might be possible. If he’s my clone. If my data soul is a modified form… Just as I am now called a ‘player’, I could not rule out the possibility that he also has some player rights as a data soul.
then. He may have been granted access to data as a ‘repair technician’ like me.
“Indeed. Isn’t it truly majestic? “Father
. ” It’s a hit, a hit, a hit.
I was able to explain that the guy approaching me now knows all of my information.
It’s a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit of. Hit angle.
A part of the mechanical device consisting of a screen was rolled inward, and a figure was seen walking through a passage leading to the inside of the moon.
A guy floating in green fluid on top of a vehicle called Buddy.
“Falcatus.”
『I’m a little late because you came without knocking. By the way… they created a marine life-type entity with excellent sensing ability from the north and brought it here. Even Nigmi, who was shouting loudly that no one could escape his eyes in the water, had his eyes lit up. You don’t make my hard work worthwhile.』
Kuddeuddeuk!
Once Falcatus was completely out, the gaping hole between the screens immediately disappeared and a green screen full of information appeared again. At least it seemed certain that he had obtained the means to freely control the machinery inside the moon.
“…There are no hostages this time. “With what confidence do you have this election in front of me?”
『Wow. Be scary too. It would be best not to raise your voice. As a result of maintaining a devoted relationship with this person here, our Moon called me a ‘friendly independent personality.’ Umm…. If you keep clenching that fist, you probably won’t see any good results.』
As expected. He was like a guy who was always looking for a way out.
“Ha ha ha ha ha. Don’t be so disappointed. Just like my father, if I harm my father who has access to information, the moon will impose sanctions on me. If you want to live here, you both have to get along well.』
“….Is this a trap you prepared?”
『Didn’t you come in knowing clearly that there would be a trap?』
Damn it. This is why I didn’t want to fight with this guy.
It was as if they were revealing each other’s thoughts in detail and planning a strategy.
『I’ve said this several times, but I don’t think it sounds as sincere as it does right now. Dad, I just really want to talk. Be honest in this place where peace is enforced. Not as a monster and a player, but as Falcatus and Professor Park.』
“….What if I don’t want to hear it?”
『Complete.』
It was clear that the situation was caught up in his pace. If you get dragged in there, you won’t be able to get out easily.
But… but!
[You are very close to completion. professor.]
‘Damn…. Damn!’
He knew exactly what I was forcing myself to keep in my heart.
『Aren’t you curious? What is this world for? Why it was created. Those you care about. Rakshasha Otman Aldrich Lucilla Notum…. What kind of being you are to the countless beings living in this world and what they are to you.』 『
And so this world is to you. No, what do you want from ‘those from outside’?』
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.
….Drur.
『Thank you, father.』
In the end, I had no choice but to sit down, even though I knew that I would get caught up in his scheme.
Maybe it’s not a trick and they really just want to let people know.
I didn’t know that the being created inside the game had a truth that it wanted to convey to the outside of the game.
More than anything, I wanted to personally check the situation that had suddenly grown out of control and gone beyond my eyes.
Hit angle. Hit angle. Hit angle.
As I sat down, Buddy carrying Falcatus also came to the table and bent his legs. In the end, the ‘peaceful dialogue’ he so desperately wanted was achieved.
“then. Where to start….』
“Starting with the meaning of completion.”
“Ha ha ha ha ha. I am not an idiot who pays all the fare to go on a boat. I have something I want to say, and that’s why I can’t just listen to what my father wants to hear and then run away. Hmm… How could I, who was just a being in this world, stand on equal footing with you? It would be a good idea to start from there.』
Falcaus appeared emotionally overwhelmed, as if he had achieved his long-held wish. Only after he had caught his breath on the subject of direct conversation through mental connection did he continue speaking.
『The beginning… It was truly a coincidence. No, at the time it was not an opportunity but a disaster. In the place where you fled, there was a being greater than you.』
A divine being. And isn’t it too elaborate to call it a coincidence?
A small smile formed on Falcatus’ lips as he recalled that day.
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