Eternal Night

Chapter 497 Intricacies
(PS: Thank you to the Silver Alliance Leader "Very Helpless_ing" for the Silver Alliance donation, so I'm releasing ten chapters in total! That's all!)

Thank you again for your support. I hope this book hasn't disappointed you!
(PS2: By the way, I'm so tired, so tired, so tired. I only have four chapters saved up. Today I turned into a tentacle monster and wrote six chapters in a row, nearly 20,000 words. My fingers are still sore, and my head is throbbing and dizzy. Fortunately, I've been in a manic state lately and I'm going to be in a euphoric state. I'll be taking a day off tomorrow and only post one chapter less, so it'll be two chapters, at 6 pm and 9 pm. I'm going to sleep in tomorrow.)
"...About seven thousand years ago, in the 30th century AD, a disease called the White Salt Plague broke out in human society."

"The symptoms are initially white spots on the body, which gradually deepen, and the body undergoes a terrifying transformation. The mind then descends into madness. Most people die at this stage, but if they can survive this stage and their mind has not gone mad, their body will turn into a white column of salt, and their spirit and soul will separate from their body."

Upon hearing this, Wu Pifu was certain that the so-called white salt plague was the source of pollution in this world and the origin of the world's apocalypse. However... this has little to do with the current battlefield of mechanical lifeforms and androids, right?
The mechanical lifeform continued, "But we didn't surrender. Because of the final symptoms of the White Salt Plague, we began to analyze the existence of spirit and soul. Ironically, this apocalypse has led to our research on spirit and soul progressing by leaps and bounds. If our human civilization survives this catastrophe, it may very well advance to the ranks of civilizations that understand spirit and soul, but..."

"Did it fail?" Wu Pifu asked.

The mechanical lifeform seemed to sigh. He continued, "Yes, as you said, we failed. There were very few humans left. We desperately needed to save ourselves. There were several plans, one of which was to find a way to get all humans through the middle stage of the White Salt Plague's madness, until the subsequent Salt Pillar stage, when all human souls would materialize. That way, we humans could at least retain our souls. But unfortunately... the spiritual soul, independent of the physical body, is extremely, extremely susceptible to contamination by wandering information..."

"These souls eventually transformed into terrifying monsters, legendary monsters, all sorts of incomprehensible curses, grudges, and so on, which hastened the extinction of humankind."

"In the end, we... all the remaining humans chose a plan... the Soul-Flesh Separation Plan!"

Wu Pifu nodded and said, "To separate the soul from the body before the White Salt Plague breaks out?"

"Correct!"

The mechanical life form said, "Back then, we used various methods to separate our physical bodies from our souls. The souls were placed in a pure and flawless place to avoid being contaminated by wandering information, while the physical bodies had to be discarded because they were infected with a plague. Therefore, we created replicas of our physical bodies. This... is actually the origin of androids!"

"According to our plan, the soul resides in a state of purity and flawlessness, while the physical clones purify the world of plague. Once the plague is completely eradicated, our souls will return to their bodies and merge with them. In this way, human civilization will be reborn, but..."

"The copied body developed self-awareness!!"

The mechanical lifeform trembled violently, its voice more like a roar: "The copied body has developed self-awareness, refused to merge with the soul, and even destroyed the advanced equipment we used to fuse the body and soul. As a result, our soul has no hope of returning to its original state. The copied body does not have a soul, and the consciousness it generates has no carrier. Most of it will turn into mindless flesh and blood after a long time."

"However, some of the replicated bodies were originally owned by highly intelligent individuals whose consciousnesses possessed extremely high levels of knowledge and scientific abilities. Thus, these bodies modified their physical forms... They clearly knew that their intelligence would degenerate, so they used electronic chips and electronic programs to become the source of their intelligence. Simply put, before they turned into beasts, they used artificial AI to replace their intelligence!"

Wu Pifu fell completely silent upon hearing this.

The mechanical lifeform didn't hear Wu Pifu's question and continued, "This is also why those androids are so beautiful. When we created replicas of our own bodies, everyone loves beauty, so we made adjustments. Then, the original androids that lost their intelligence, wisdom, and memories, under the influence of AI, in their remaining memories, reproduction became their greatest pursuit. So this adjustment, with beauty, sex appeal, and reproduction as the primary requirements, continued."

"After that, the androids began to replicate themselves. They could not reproduce, but they could be created. At the same time, the underlying program of artificial intelligence was always to serve humanity and must not harm humanity or other core structures. However... having betrayed humanity, they were beyond human salvation. The original androids knew part of the truth, and they covered it up, creating a false veil that made it seem as if humanity still survived... long before they retreated to the moon, humanity had already become extinct!"

Upon hearing this, Wu Pifu asked, "Then what about the aliens, the mechanical life forms, and your current situation?"

"There are aliens!"

The mechanical lifeform suddenly emitted a mocking sound.

"Nearly two thousand years have passed since the extinction of humanity. During these two thousand years, even souls in pure and flawless environments began to undergo large-scale mutations, annihilation, and death. Most of them transformed into vengeful spirits and various strange creatures, but they remained sealed in pure and flawless places until the arrival of extraterrestrials..."

"They appeared, but they weren't the super-powerful civilizations that had colonized across star systems as imagined. They were either small-scale colonization opportunists or interstellar refugees. However, their technology and civilization were still far superior to the android society. At the same time, they deployed mechanical lifeforms, a special kind of combat weapon. The androids were utterly defeated and forced to migrate to the moon. Just when the aliens were about to wipe out the androids in one fell swoop, they opened up a pure and flawless land while exploring the past history of this planet..." "The aliens perished. They were completely wiped out by monsters, curses, strange phenomena, all kinds of horrors, and by us, who had unintentionally possessed some of the mechanical lifeforms and whose souls were compatible with theirs."

"Time is the best cleanser. No matter how great the resentment or how terrifying the curse, thousands of years of time have washed away these monsters and curses, gradually annihilating them. On the contrary, we, who have fused with mechanical life forms in a peculiar way, are the ones who have survived in the end..."

Wu Pifu pondered the mechanical life form's words silently. He didn't completely believe them, but he didn't deny them entirely either. After all, it was only one side of the story, and he still lacked information from the android side. Only when information from both sides was gathered could he confirm whether what the mechanical life form said was true.

Wu Pifu asked, "Then what do you want to do by coming to see me?"

The mechanical lifeform didn't immediately explain. He continued, "Unfortunately, we've been sealed off for thousands of years. No soul can remain unchanged, not even mine. After we merged with the mechanical lifeform, most humans combined with it in fragmented form, giving rise to so-called 'special individuals.' These individuals possess the permissions of the mechanical lifeform network, and their thoughts and algorithms carry the memories and traces of human souls. This leads them to want to understand more about humans, to understand what humans are, and... to evolve into humans."

Wu Pifu nodded and said, "Yes, I met one. It asked me the difference between humans reading and it reading."

The mechanical lifeform was silent for a moment, then said sadly, "This is us. We came from humans, but have turned into monsters, and now we still want to evolve back into humans... Let me repeat, although we are the fusion of the souls of past humans, we are actually all broken. What is speaking to you now is the fusion of sixty-eight soul fragments. Each soul fragment provides a certain level of intelligence. Only by uniting can we have a logical conversation with you. Otherwise, what you hear is just a jumble of human questions."

"Then what do you want to do by coming to see me?" Wu Pifu asked again.

The mechanical lifeform said, "Help us! You are the last human in this world. We don't know where you came from or where you are going. Perhaps you are a trans-temporal miracle brought about by quantum tunneling shimmer, or perhaps you are a traveler from another world. But please help us, for the sake of being human, or at least being human in the past..."

"Help us capture those original androids! Only when you capture them and give them to us can we, these scattered and entangled fragments of soul, gather together and have a common consciousness and common wisdom while you are here. Otherwise, even if we capture them, we still won't know what to do."

"The body, consciousness, and soul are interdependent. Our soul has been broken into fragments, but as long as it can return to its own clone, the consciousness and soul can be slowly nurtured by the body, allowing our soul to gradually heal and become whole again..."

"This is the only way for humanity to reappear, the only way!"

The mechanical lifeform paused for a long time, not hearing Wu Pifu's promise, and said regretfully, "I know that words alone cannot convince you, but we have patience. We have waited for thousands of years, and we have patience..."

"The unified information processing center of the androids, the original androids... they are the real culprits of humanity's extinction. They are not doing everything for human glory as they claim; they are just using it as an excuse to control all androids."

"Let's go to the moon, let's go to the moon..."

"There you will find the answers you seek, and the truth about the original androids..."

"We...will await your reply..."

"Forever...forever..."

The mechanical lifeform's voice fluctuated constantly, as if there were internal conflicts that prevented it from forming a united state. In the end, the mechanical lifeform exploded and turned into a pile of rotten flesh.

That being that claimed to be human has disappeared.

(End of this chapter)