Orange God

In the real world, dozens more enormous cultivation tanks had been added to the massive laboratory. Many brains wrapped in translucent membranes floated within them. After the first few cloned brains, Li Heng had successively cultivated over a hundred more. They possessed nearly identical genes, yet had been implanted with different memories.

There were now over a hundred real lives participating in the virtual world, and actors had become increasingly scarce.

Apart from the first four brains containing memories from different stages of the researcher's life, all the others were in that Red Moon Map. Many of the residents in that city were genuine brains.

Ai Liyuan sat in a chair nearby, gently stroking an orange cat. It was the Little Fatty Orange from the researcher's office. Having just eaten its fill, it yawned lazily.

The Little Orange Cat in the virtual world naturally had not been transformed from it. A cat's brain structure was destined to be incapable of carrying thoughts as complex as those of humans, unless Li Heng could alter its genetic structure and give its brain human intelligence.

But then, would the Little Orange Cat be a cat with human intelligence, or a human who looked like a cat? That was another complicated question.

Li Heng could not yet control changes in genetic structure, but he could completely copy an Orange Cat's memory data into a human brain.

After undergoing several months of accelerated growth in the virtual world, that brain had become Little Fatty Orange, an intelligent creature with the Orange Cat's memories.

The old academician sat in his chair, stroking the Orange Cat like an ordinary old man. Through the black thread at the back of his head, he shared Li Heng's God's-eye view.

This entire virtual world had been calculated and constructed by Li Heng's brain. That made him truly realize that this creature was even more incredible than they had previously imagined.

Immortality was merely one small part of his traits. This terrifying amount of computational power was what truly shocked people.

A silicon-based computer capable of performing hundreds of quadrillions of calculations per second could already be called a supercomputer. Although the human brain remained a mystery, it was generally believed that its calculations per second were no fewer than those of a supercomputer.

In fact, given the current technological level of the Hong Alliance and the Commercial Alliance, if they could obtain the black threads capable of directly connecting to the brain that Li Heng possessed, they could indeed build a similar five-senses virtual world, even if it might not be so realistic.

However, current technology could only determine what a person wanted to do, not what they were thinking.

Humanity could interpret the signals the brain sent throughout the body, yet did not know why the brain could send those signals. The process by which the brain thought remained difficult to understand.

Li Heng could freely read an individual's memories, thoughts, and emotions, then transfer them whole into another brain. This ability had completely surpassed the scope of what existing technology could comprehend.

Many people had once imagined uploading their memories to the computer network for preservation, achieving a form of immortality. If bearing descendants was the continuation of one's genes, then uploading memories meant the continuation of one's will.

Although an individual life born from a brain would still ultimately die, one's will could continue forever. To others, that would be another version of oneself.

And now, Li Heng had achieved this. If he wished, he could use cloning and memory modification to copy one person into countless identical individuals.

They would possess the same genes and memories as the original. Nearly all current methods of identity verification would fail before such a method, and it would undoubtedly create enormous chaos throughout society.

Li Heng could sense everything Ai Liyuan thought. After having his moral bottom line shattered under Li Heng's coercion, the old academician unconsciously analyzed Li Heng's abilities every day and assessed the threat he posed to Human Civilization.

Ever since Li Heng had completely taken control of the island and brazenly displayed his abilities before Ai Liyuan, the old academician had removed the label of human from Li Heng.

In his eyes, this was a terrifying and completely unknown creature.

Li Heng could fully understand everything Ai Liyuan thought, yet Ai Liyuan could not fully trust Li Heng's words. The barrier between individuals meant they were destined to never understand one another.

Humans would not feel understood by an intelligent creature capable of completely interpreting their every thought. They would only feel fear.

Only a dozen or so minutes had passed outside, but a whole night had gone by in the virtual world.

All the brains in the cultivation tanks received information at dozens of times the normal speed. This rapidly reduced their neuron count, giving them extremely short lifespans and a sense of time vastly different from ordinary people.

In truth, the images the old academician saw had all been processed by Li Heng before being transmitted to him. Otherwise, he would only see images flashing past at high speed, like watching a movie at thirty-two times speed.

The morning sun rose. In the old town, the researcher was still snoring on a battered sofa. A metal rod came down, striking his rising and falling belly and jolting him awake.

The awakened researcher scratched his bald head. Looking at the shabby apartment and the Orange Cat sitting across from him, he finally remembered that he was in an unknown world, with no one here but himself.

Little Fatty Orange still wore a sour cat face, glaring at the middle-aged man impatiently. "Get up already. While it's light out, hurry and chant Orange to build up strength. We still have to go farm outside town this afternoon. We're busy."

A night of sleep had cleared the man's mind. Thinking back on everything that had happened the previous night, he suddenly asked, "Can Orange be chanted in another language?"

Upon hearing him, the Little Orange Cat twitched both ears and said strangely, "You may be ugly, old man, but your brain works pretty fast."

Being called ugly by the cat he had raised made the researcher smile bitterly. Unfortunately, the cat was taking care of him now rather than the other way around, so he could only endure it.

The Little Orange Cat explained, "Any language will do. Even cat meows and bird calls are fine. The key is to think of an Orange, then say it aloud."

"Actually, that sparrow's Mandarin isn't standard at all. It came from some rural village outside town and learned Mandarin from an old man. Its accent is incredibly thick."

The middle-aged man asked again, "Then what if your understanding of an Orange is mistaken? For example, what if you think an apple is an Orange?"

Little Fatty Orange shook its head. "No. Here, as long as you think of an Orange, it can only be the Orange floating before your eyes. In fact, there's an identical Orange in the center of town. The residents here all call it the Orange God."

The man was somewhat surprised. He had been utterly exhausted last night and had not thought carefully about it, but now he tried imagining an Orange in his mind. Sure enough, he could think only of the Orange before him. Its size, color, and shape were all exactly the same. It seemed that only it could be an Orange.

That made the world seem unreal to him again, and his mind began wildly considering more plausible explanations, like The Matrix and alien experiments.

Unfortunately, he still could not bring himself to give up his life and try to escape all of this.

In fact, if the man chose to kill himself here, Li Heng would erase all the memories in that brain and implant it with memories from some animal, turning him into a new resident of this town.

The other brains containing memories from different stages of the man's life had already allowed Li Heng to gather most of the data he needed. Whether this one still possessed human memories no longer mattered.

The man's caution allowed his current self to remain intact. Dying here would not cause brain death in the real world, but it would mean losing all his memories, as though he had completed a cycle of reincarnation.

After putting on several worn-out pieces of clothing, the researcher stepped into a pair of dull leather shoes and followed the Little Orange Cat out the door toward the center of town.

Sparrows in the sky chirped away in a southern-accented dialect. On the ground, two Little White Mice hugged together as they rode forward in an electric toy car, while a pink pig slowly waddled along the roadside, swaying its rear.

Watching this absurd scene, the researcher suddenly thought of an important question. These animals did not have human vocal structures, so how could they speak Mandarin?

But when he saw the Orange floating before him, he shook his head and gave up on those messy thoughts. There were too many unreasonable things, leaving him with nowhere to begin.

Many animals had gathered in the square at the center of town. On a raised platform in the middle stood a glass box containing an Orange identical to the one before the researcher's eyes.

A Crow flapped its wings and landed before the animal residents. In standard Mandarin, it loudly declared, "Praise the great Orange God!"

Voices rose all around the man—Mandarin, dialects, and all sorts of chaotic animal cries. The disorderly atmosphere felt less like a religious ceremony than entering some zoo.

However, as all the residents began chanting, the Orange on the platform actually emitted a white glow. Though it was broad daylight, the researcher could clearly see the gentle, warm white light on its surface.

He began chanting "Orange" as well. The number on the Orange floating in the upper left corner of his vision began ticking upward, just as it had the night before.

More than a hundred times a minute, several thousand times an hour. The animals chanted there for the entire morning. The researcher's mouth had gone dry, yet the animals continued earnestly repeating "Orange" in their various voices.

When the sun neared the center of the sky, the Crow finally spoke again. "The Orange God has heard our words. When night falls, Their great power will protect us from the monsters."

All the animals cheered, then dispersed. The Little Orange Cat also pulled the researcher in a certain direction. Before long, they arrived at farmland outside the town.

Little Fatty Orange carried a small hoe over its shoulder. As it tilled the soil, it said to the man, "Old man, watch carefully and learn. Almost all those machines that used to move by themselves are broken now. If we want to eat here, we have to grow food ourselves. These Seeds will grow and ripen in a week, so we'll have food again soon."

The researcher had grown accustomed to the Orange Cat's attitude. Somewhat puzzled, he asked, "Won't those monsters come and destroy it?"

Without turning around, the Little Orange Cat replied, "No. They're idiots and aren't interested in anything else. They only come out beneath the Red Moon at night, then get kept outside by the Orange God in town."

The man watched the Little Orange Cat's small figure swing its hoe, then picked up a hoe from the ground beside him and began working as well.

Undying monsters, talking animals, food that ripened in a week, and the Orange God. Many things about this world seemed unreal, and much of it felt wrong.

But those were questions he would only have the energy to consider later. For now, he needed to fill his stomach first.