(This chapter is a little unhinged. I wrote this absurd little skit after memorizing English until my brain went numb, then playing Stellaris for three hours at the risk of blowing up my CPU, and finally playing a round of Arknights only to get utterly wrecked by some goddamn camper.)
"Now this is unusual... a Machine Intelligence with consciousness straight out of the factory? How is your thought structure organized? What principles does your personality matrix operate on?"
Beta's virtual avatar-a little cartoon robot-appeared on the Holographic Screen that automatically unfolded beside Xi Yan, staring curiously at the Grand Curator opposite them.
"What are you doing out here?" Xi Yan asked.
"I heard this Grand Curator was a non-Gestalt Machine Intelligence, so I came to take a look," Beta said, its Holographic Screen circling up and down around the towering machine curator.
Xi Yan leaned back tactically as realization struck him. So it's met one of its own kind. No wonder it's so excited!
Machine empires with conventional governments were exceedingly rare in this universe, and there was only one preset empire of that kind. Beta might even have been the last remaining non-Gestalt Machine Intelligence. Now that it had encountered a fellow machine in the Grand Curator, naturally it wanted to meet him.
Xi Yan couldn't help turning to look at the six-armed Grand Curator again.
"The Interstellar Human Military Junta inherited the technology of the previous Cybrex Civilization. This esteemed advisor must be the last individual Cybrex, then?"
At the sight of Beta, the Grand Curator's smile faded, and he spoke slowly.
Xi Yan suddenly caught a whiff of hostility in his words. His psionic powers sensed that something was off.
Beta's initially relaxed tone gradually grew serious as well.
"No. I'm merely the last artificial consciousness created