Episode 249
[Notice: Warning. Warning.]
[Notice: The main stream is congested.]
[Notice: Akashic Records blocks all access.]
[Notice: An attack has been detected from the Akashic Records.]
[Notice: Danger. The Akashic Records cannibalize Thousand Eyes.]
[Notice: #*$&%#—Thousand eyes/11.9.3—Error report—*#&[email protected]*#has been destroyed. You have to find another way.]
“This… what…!”
Whoa!
As the siren reverberated throughout the situation room, Hyukjin looked up at the main screen attached to the front of the situation room.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that the Oracle’s situation was in the midst of a war.
Of course, he was also directly controlling Thousand Eyes by manipulating the hologram interface, but the situation is already getting worse and worse.
So, even if all of Oracle’s personnel, including him, risked life and death to control it, they could not stop the program from being encroached on.
Just as mere humans can’t help a crumbling mountain.
And it was the same with Thousand Eyes, which Hyukjin is proud of.
“Encroach to the third stage! It’s getting faster! If we continue like this, it will fall like dominoes!”
“Even when the power is unplugged, it’s going on its own! I can’t stop unless I blow up the whole building!”
“manager…!”
The computers in the situation room, which are spread out in a fan shape, are discharged line by line as if they were making a promise.
The monitors of the team members who blocked the Akashic Record’s attack with frighteningly amazing concentration explode with a bang.
At the sight, some screamed, covered their eyes, and fell to the floor with curse words.
It was a bonus that all of them turned their heads toward the main situation room.
As if asking how this absurd situation is possible, how to break through this dream-like situation.
However, at this point when half of the fan-shaped control room computers were paralyzed, there was not much that even Hyeok-jin, who was called an unsalted genius, could do.
This is because the current attacks of the Akashic Records are like a huge tidal wave coming along with a typhoon, and the already broken computers are like a collapsed breakwater.
– What are you doing standing there stupidly? Run right away and restore all administrators who are connected to the game. No force quit and unplugged the line.
“yes?! but…!”
– Why do you want to make your comrades get eaten up and never wake up? The aftereffects are a hundred times better than becoming a vegetative person, so pull them out right away!
When Hyeok-jin, who grabbed the microphone in the main control room, sighed, the hesitant Oracle team members quickly ran away.
At first glance, it looked like an army moving in perfect order.
As Hyukjin said, there was nothing that the broken computer could do, and that was the best thing the remaining available staff could do.
And the place they are currently running to is located at the back of the fan-shaped situation room, which boasts a size that is larger than the situation room, but not small by any means.
Another space composed of power supply and system system separate from the situation room.
However, numerous men and women in suits were lying dead on the chairs lined up in a row.
This biological laboratory and a place reminiscent of a hangar was the < Connect Room > where 70% of Oracle’s workforce was concentrated.
– Kyaaaaaaaaa!!
– Kkeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!
“…”
A terrible sound echoes.
Even so, Hyukjin did not blink an eye.
Manipulate the hologram interface at terrifying speed and block the attack of the Akashic Record with your whole body.
It could be said that even Chloe, who was controlling the situation room by her side, could not dare to dare to do it, and it was a non-human realm that only she could do.
Master Hyeok!
It was because of such genius that the nickname Master was put in front of him.
[Notice: WARNING. Warning.]
[Notice: Thousand Eyes has been completely encroached.]
[Notice: Emergency code triggered.]
[Notice: This program will not be available after 5 seconds.]
[Notice: 5… 4… 3. .. 2… 1.]
[Notice: GOODBYE. MY FRIEND—.]
“Team leader Nii Ii!!”
Kwagwagwagwagwagwang!
The situation room shakes.
Chloe’s screams rang out.
The computers in the situation room exploded arbitrarily.
The screams of the managers burst out of the connect room.
And the fact that Hyukjin’s body was staggered by the explosion while manipulating the hologram at a terrifying speed happened almost at the same time as Thousand Eyes left his final greeting.
Thousand Eyes was designed with the risk of encroachment in mind from the time Hyukjin designed it, and if it crossed a critical point, it was supposed to activate a self-destruct code strong enough to paralyze the entire Oracle.
“Ah… ugh…”
Chloe lifted herself from the floor.
The blurred focus along with the sharp pain became clearer.
It seems that he fell out of his chair with the explosion and crashed his forehead into the dashboard desk.
The Oracle was dark as if the entire floor had gone out of power, and only a few LED lights were flickering and flickering.
A dark space where only the blue light from the main screen flows out without sound.
Then, in front of Chloe’s eyes, she saw Hyukjin collapsed.
“manager! manager…! Mr. Hyukjin!!!”
“…I’m fine, so you can stop screaming. Because I’m not dead yet.”
As Chloe shouted as she approached on her knees, Hyukjin stood up.
He, too, was shaking his head as if a bone was ringing.
However, rather than that, it should be said that the fact that Thousand Eyes self-destructed and disappeared and the fact that the Oracle was almost completely destroyed came to the bone.
Thousand Eyes is designed to pour powerful malicious code into the attacking target when it self-destructs, and the design could be said to have achieved its intended results.
It was like that when the main screen, which had been lined up with urgent sirens and steep chords, became quiet.
The amount of malicious code that Thousand Eyes poured out must have been difficult to deal with easily, even for Akashic Records, and it was code that Hyukjin had been experimenting with for a long time.
Therefore, Thousand Eyes could be called another Pandora’s box, and the Akashic Records would have to struggle as long as the code was spilled outside the world by self-destruction.
Yeah, it was just a matter of buying time.
It must have been a time like gold for Oracle, including Hyukjin.
“Let’s start with repairing the damage. ASAP. I do not have time.”
“…what the hell happened?”
When Chloe asked in a trembling voice, Hyukjin turned his head.
He got up from the desk in the control room before he knew it and was staring at the calm blue main screen.
“I’ll be back….”
A famous line from < Terminator >, one of the masterpieces of sci-fi movies, flowed from Hyukjin’s mouth.
* * *
“Is that… true?”
“yes.”
Alan Jacobs looked away for a while at Gordon, who was bowing his head with his hands together.
It wasn’t because Gordon was unreliable, it was because the words that came out of his mouth were unbelievable.
The unprecedented runaway of the Akashic Records.
Oracle’s halving occurred with the acceleration of the main stream.
Alan had been trying to find out the inner circumstances of Evertail through Gordon, and his actions were not just curious.
Just looking at the astronomical amount and manpower involved, it could be said to be at the level of a company.
Of course, the information Alan obtained from that was nothing short of astounding.
His amazing acumen and insight found out that the movements of Evertail and the top-secret department Oracle were not suspicious, but even Alan did not know that what had happened would become this serious.
This is not just a game, but it has become a serious issue that the government or the country has to step up.
“What would you like?”
“…”
Alan fell silent at Gordon’s question.
It was clear enough to know what he meant without saying it.
It’s been a long time since the Akashic Records went wild and went out of control.
That word means that the beast that was confined in the cage came out, and the outside means the world.
In other words, people all over the world who play AC are at risk.
So Alan, as a successful entrepreneur and one of the most respected figures, has a duty to make these risks known to the world.
However, it was only natural that Alan’s wrinkles deepened as it was not easy to predict what kind of butterfly effect it would bring.
In the end, the worst of all the things I feared had to happen.
“In the end, Oracle took hundreds of millions of users as hostages… and did a crazy thing by inducing and observing the behavior of a hyper AI called the Akashic Record. And the inflection point that causes such a change in the Akashic Records has been revealed by the so-called unknown users, the hidden pieces… is that right?”
“yes.”
“Then, this incident… can be regarded as an anomaly due to the appearance of two or more hidden pieces called Unknown Users.”
“That’s right.”
“What will happen because of this?”
“That… no one could have predicted.”
When Gordon answered, Alan closed his eyes.
His face, as he leaned against the back of his chair and put his hands together, looked somewhat calm.
If you knew it would be like this, you would actively move when Evertale and Oracle first showed suspicious movements.
If he had made a statement and exposed the internal circumstances at that time, he might not have come to this point.
Players around the world who play AC may have fallen prey to a nasty experiment and stopped playing the game.
That AC was not just an innovative game, but part of an experiment to observe the behavior and growth of a hyper AI called the Akashic Records.
And even though Evertail, an artificial intelligence development company, knew all of that, they neglected to find out where the end of artificial intelligence, the Akashic Records, was heading.
Like the contents of < Terminator >, one of the masterpieces of the old sci-fi movie, the artificial intelligence threatening mankind is now happening in the 21st century.
“Gordon.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“Then what happened to that unknown user…?”
“Are you talking about Damian?”
“okay. Damian.”
Before long, Alan’s deep eyes turned to Gordon.
