Chapter 326
"Besides, it's just arresting a group of kidnappers, how dangerous could it be? I'm Sealed Rank Valkyrie, even if we're the weakest Sealed Rank Valkyrie... but would Sealed Rank Valkyrie be defeated by mere criminals?"
It's worth noting that many in the Alliance consider Sealed Rank Valkyrie to be half Herrscher.
In other words, anyone whose strength reaches half that of Herrscher, as long as their achievements are not low, can basically receive a title from the Saintess.
There aren't many Valkyrie in the Apocalypse Knights who have received titles, but over the years, their numbers have exceeded the number of two hands.
The most famous are naturally the two Valkyrie squad that also serve as knight squads: the Assault Team led by Laguna, the "Knight of Victory," and the guardian squad led by Lewis, the "Knight of Protection."
The girl who received the name 'Nameless' commands a Covert Mobile Force called the Shadow Knight Order, and she is quite powerful.
Other Valkyrie who received titles also formed knight squads. Of course, for Valkyrie belonging to the Anti-Entropy faction, receiving titles was mostly an honorary one.
Conversely, despite Bianca and Sophia receiving titles and performing various extraordinary feats, Freya still did not allow them to form a knight squad.
The reason was that everything had gone too smoothly for the two of them.
While it's normal for a hero to overcome obstacles and defeat challenges, a hero who hasn't experienced setbacks lacks the opportunity for rapid growth.
Freya clearly wanted to groom Bianca, and even assigned the adorable loyal dog to be her vice-captain.
It's important to know that every Sealed Rank Valkyrie can form her own knight squad, but Freya tacitly allowed Bianca and Sophia to continue their partnership.
Freya herself had also considered forming a personal guard.
Let's get back to the main topic.
Bianca started from a very high point, even though she witnessed many hellish scenes, Freya actually protected her very well.
Rita was naturally worried that Bianca might get into some dangerous situation.
Although Rita was jealous of her Saintess's affection for Bianca, she would not let envy or jealousy lead to any accidents involving Bianca.
Rita ignored Bianca's arrogant speech and was about to suggest that she first gather all the crew members of the Caledonius, but the next moment, Champollion's little assistant had already smelled the scent of Jimmy's room on the Caledonius, and while showing off like a puppy wagging its tail to its master, he shouted that anyone who wanted to find the prisoner first should come with him.
Bianca rushed over immediately, Champollion smiled and comforted Rita, saying that he would keep an eye on this irritable girl who was "full of inappropriate personality traits".
She didn't dislike this young girl who had a strong sense of justice and responsibility.
Rita was quite helpless. She could only let Bianca leave first, and had Sophia secretly follow her. Then she found a place, took out the Black Cube, and began to contact the people in the main world.
Meanwhile, Jimmy, who had just woken up from his coma, encountered a girl dressed in Rita- style dress who called herself 'Alice'.
This name is a bit too common.
The girl then introduced herself to Jimmy, explaining that the 'Alice' in front of Jimmy, who was no different from an ordinary human girl, was a machine created by a certain doctor— Unit 4.
Of course, what Jimmy sees as 'Alice' is just a terminal interface of this machine, although its appearance is indeed very similar to human flesh.
Jimmy was shocked by the girl's somewhat strange way of speaking.
Alice stated that she would reveal even more sensational facts in the future.
As a tech geek, Jimmy should have been excited to see the so-called robot girl, but Alice's words made him, who was already timid, shrink back, feeling a strange sense of having suddenly stumbled into a supernatural story.
Seeing Jimmy's frightened expression, Alice continued to explain that there had been two scholars who had been kidnapped. After seeing what she was about to show them, one of them refused to listen to any explanation and tried to escape no matter what she said, while the other kept chanting prayers and spells, making it impossible for them to communicate.
Jimmy asked them what they saw, and after Alice was silent for a moment, she said it was her 'brain'.
Of course, both scholars died afterward, Alice looked at Jimmy, indicating that he was her last hope.
As Jimmy grew increasingly frightened and confused, Alice remained calm... As a robot, perhaps she herself was incapable of emotional fluctuations due to anything.
She calmly recounted a story in which everyone died. First, the day before yesterday... about 50 hours ago, the doctor she was referring to suddenly collapsed after working continuously for 20 hours. The assistants were in a panic, frantically trying to 'treat' the doctor, but to no avail.
In an attempt to continue using Alice after losing the doctor, the assistants took a desperate gamble and kidnapped Jimmy and two other scholars. As Alice had predicted, a conflict broke out between the two scholars and their kidnappers, leaving only Alice and Jimmy behind.
Jimmy suddenly felt dizzy.
He was still unconscious at the time, so he wasn't involved in the disaster; otherwise, he doesn't know if he would have survived.
Led by Alice, Jimmy arrived at a rather unremarkable metal door.
Alice pressed her hands tightly against the door, her body trembling slightly. She kept emphasizing that she hoped Jimmy would remain calm and composed when the door opened...
Perhaps Alice was frightened by the behavior of the two scholars earlier.
Alice stated that the experiment itself may be unethical and absurd, but the life created by it wants to live.
Alice opened the door, and on the other side of the door were countless metal cabinets.
Jimmy was shocked by what he saw, while Alice beside him spoke slowly.
"This is my thought center... I don't have access to the maintenance data, so after the doctor passed away, I had to find someone else to learn the maintenance process first, and then hand it over to me... No, to be precise, it doesn't matter if they don't teach me the maintenance method, but... I really hope to receive regular maintenance... Otherwise, I... I can't even last 200 hours."
"Wait, wait a minute, so you mean... you're a thinking machine... and this place is equivalent to your brain?"
Jimmy's eyes widened as he realized the meaning behind Alice's words, and Alice nodded.
After Jimmy a few questions, Jimmy roughly understood the situation, but he still couldn't understand why the doctor wouldn't give Alice the means to protect herself.
However, the reason the doctor didn't grant Alice reading access was simply to retain a few means of controlling her in case of emergencies.
Seeing Jimmy's somewhat surprised expression, Alice said, "... because I'm definitely not a 'clean' machine."
"??"
Despite Jimmy's confusion, Alice remained calm. She continued, "These cabinets don't look particularly special, so do you think they just contain some complex circuits?"
Alice's question puzzled Jimmy. He said, "Since you previously referred to yourself as 'mechanical,' it's natural that you would think that way..."
"However, I only call myself 'mechanical' because there is no 'more appropriate word' to use."
Alice's answer only made Jimmy more and more confused.
"What... does this mean?"
"... If I were allowed to coin a word, I think I would be a 'brain-computer interface'."
"???"
Jimmy was even more confused.
"I am 'Unit 4.' Unit 1 was a simple electronic computer, Unit 2 incorporated artificially cultivated coupled neurons, and Unit 3 incorporated the brain of an octopus—and the proposal to build me, this 'Hybrid Super Bio-Computer,' was precisely the reason the Doctor was expelled from the country by the citizens. I must confront this inescapable 'original sin,' if I... would like to receive your help."
The girl's slender finger pointed to a cold metal cabinet door.
Jimmy felt a suffocating heaviness from the silence.
It seemed that once he touched the key on the cabinet door, something deep within his heart would shatter like a vase...
Jimmy fell silent, finally understanding why the two scholars had reacted that way.
Although Jimmy realized that he was nothing more than a clump of gel living in a container called a 'skull'.
They also emphasize their own existence with the idea of "I think, therefore I am," but this does not solve the immediate problem.
After he awoke, Alice introduced herself and also introduced the doctor who created her.
The doctor who created her was an eccentric person, not only in his reclusive nature, but also in his thinking, which was very different from that of the people in the city.
The people in the city disapproved of the doctor's proposed way of social development, considered him a dangerous person, and therefore expelled him from the country.
In Jimmy's opinion, the people in the city were too kind to this doctor.
After all, this doctor used his knowledge to trade with all sorts of people outside the city and built this experimental base from scratch. Considering the "components" used in Alice's "brain", Jimmy felt that the doctor's methods of starting from scratch were equally unclean.
But when Jimmy accidentally touched Alice's cold fingertips, Alice reflexively withdrew her fingers, and the shattered 'vase' in his heart vanished in an instant. Without hesitation, he turned the key and opened the cabinet door.
In the center of the culture tank filled with various electronic components, he saw a mass of 'gel', which was undoubtedly once a part of a body.
Although Jimmy couldn't determine what animal the 'gel' belonged to due to his lack of biological knowledge, his face did stiffen slightly at this 'expected' sight.
The culture tank was not bright; the only light flickering was the warm orange glow emitted by the vacuum tubes.
Jimmy gently placed his palm on the glass shell of the culture tank. Unlike his cold fingers, this place was warm... like the temperature of a human body.
Alice stood to the side, watching Jimmy touch his 'brain' and waiting for Jimmy to make his choice.
371. So much has happened!
In the space of consciousness, Freya listened to Aurora recount Bianca and the others' story from that day...
"So much has happened!"
Freya realized that while she was playing with her idol, her lieutenant and knight had encountered a rather exciting adventure.
She regrets that she cannot hear their adventure stories from the people involved.
Fortunately Aurora was able to tell the story on their behalf. Of course, since it was a report afterward, the story Aurora relayed lacked a bit of flavor.
Kiana raised an eyebrow slightly; she was also quite interested in such an adventure story.
"Go on... be more detailed, don't skip over too much like before." Freya patted Aurora's head as she encouraged her to continue.
Anyway, after this investigation mission is over, Freya can have the people involved in the adventure recount their experiences again.
"Alright, second sister..."
Aurora her throat and continued speaking with great emotion.
"... As mentioned before, Bianca's fellow Pilot Jimmy was kidnapped. Bianca and a girl who claimed to be a philosopher sought an audience with the librarian. With the librarian's consent, they closed the library and brought in an archaeologist, Champollion also worked as a part-time consultant detective."
"Champollion quickly deduced that Jimmy might have been put into a robot and transported out of the library. Soon after, Champollion's assistant, who had a keen sense of smell, arrived. In order to help the assistant find Jimmy by his scent, Bianca led them back to the Caledonius."
Aurora recounted the story with great pleasure.
Freya and Kiana both listened intently.
"After the assistant located Jimmy's scent in the cabin of the Caledonius, he led Bianca and the others in pursuit of their target, all the way to the outskirts of the city, to a sulfur lake... Ah, the so-called sulfur lake..."
"I know, it was formed by volcanic activity." Freya looked at her little sister speechlessly.
Even though she is a researcher specializing in biology and Honkai, it doesn't mean she is completely ignorant of some geographical knowledge.
"Because of the obvious rotten egg smell of the sulfur lake, the assistant's keen sense of smell went numb. Due to the dangers of the sulfur lake, Bianca and Champollion had to stay temporarily, leaving the assistant to seek help from the city management association..."
"Heh heh, but to be honest, it's quite surprising that the city of Alexandria has such advanced technology."
Freya suddenly interrupted Aurora's speech.
In fact, when Aurora introduced Bianca and the others to their stay in Alexandria, Freya was going through her memories of information about Alexandria.
It must be said that once the power of Herrscher of Consciousness is fully awakened, its terrifying nature far exceeds one's imagination.
Freya even built a memory palace in her mind to store information and intelligence.
Some even understood why their past selves saved the Herrscher of Consciousness —it was because their past selves wanted to obtain the Herrscher of Consciousness's power.
"As far as I know, the power engines used in Alexandria are just internal combustion engines, and the computing devices there are all vacuum tubes; there are no extraordinary resources there that can reach the abundance that modern industry can utilize, but they do indeed have robot police, robot tour guides, and robot butlers; and because artificial intelligence is advanced enough, it has simplified the legislative and law enforcement procedures."
"You need to understand... so-called artificial intelligence is completely different from intelligence that can think. The former simply responds to certain external conditions, similar to a conditioned reflex... just like the wristwatch we use. After pressing the confirmation button, the communicator will start the corresponding program based on our voice. This is also a kind of intelligent behavior. It will also recommend information from relevant sections based on our usual operating habits. But this is very different from the robots in Alexandria..."
Freya shrugged. She really wanted to collapse onto the soft sofa in her room, but her consciousness space was empty. In reality, in the relatively backward Inca Republic, she missed that sofa terribly.
"The Alliance's robotics R&D department has manufactured different intelligent robots. Hmm, your 13th research group had such extracurricular assignments, but what you developed were only intelligent robots, which are ultimately different from 'life' that can think. Alexandria's robots, in a sense, are already a kind of mechanical life. Sister Tesla should be very interested in this."
"Yes, Tesla's mother asked the robotics R&D department to submit their latest results. If their results are not satisfactory, she plans to cut their research funding."
Aurora nodded vigorously.
Anyone who originally belonged to the Anti-Entropy organization had an inexplicable urge towards robots.
In fact, after learning about what Rita and Bianca reported, the entire alliance was filled with enthusiasm for researching self-thinking mechanical life.
Of course, like human cloning, these studies involve ethical issues, and Tesla did not blindly agree to the creation of such robots.
However, conducting relevant research is not a bad thing. It is the hope that there might be unexpected gains that urges the robotics research department to speed up the process.
The alliance does have so-called intelligent robots, but it lacks intelligent robots with artificial intelligence advanced to the point of being able to manage cities.
Freya thought of the peculiar gem in Shigure Kira's hand.
Perhaps there is more than one such peculiar gem in this world.
"Go on, that was just a digression," Freya said with a smile, gesturing for Aurora to continue.
She was very interested in Bianca and the others' adventures in Alexandria.
Aurora and briefly explained what Rita and Bianca had reported:
"The assistant ran to the City Management Association for help, borrowing gas masks and protective suits, but at that moment, the robots in the city suddenly rioted... According to the information Bianca got from Pilot Jimmy, it was a plan prepared by the doctor who created Unit 4, Alice."
"Even though the Doctor and his assistants are dead, their plan to use the created Unit 4 to destroy the city that abandoned them is still initiated. Unit 4 was originally created for information warfare..."