Mei Yiqiu shook his head and said, "According to our past discoveries, the main targets of Parasitic Consciousness are those who control resources and have the power of discourse among humans. The vast majority of human wealth and power are held by one percent of the population. To completely control and subvert human society, they would need to control at least twenty percent of that population, which is two-thousandths of the global population, equivalent to fifteen million people. One hundred thousand people is far too few!"
"Why can't 100,000 people do it?" Mei Ziqing asked curiously. "If these 100,000 people were all at the top of the power pyramid in various governments, wouldn't they be able to easily control human society?"
Mei Yiqiu said, "If humanity were unprepared, that would indeed be the case. But now the whole world knows we've been invaded. The Gray Brain Virus has been discovered, and both AST and PFI have developed drugs against toxoplasmosis. MSD's Gray Brain Virus vaccine has also received special approval from the FDA and the World Health Organization and will be available ahead of schedule next year. When all of humanity is on high alert, it's too difficult for 100,000 people to overthrow human society. Moreover, based on the data analysis, there are simply no 100,000 people!"
"How could that be? Wasn't the ratio over one in ten thousand?" Mei Ziqing said, pointing to the data on the computer screen. "Most people still treat ' Dream Guide ' as a game. Our customers in the first quarter were mainly young people, that is, the second generation of rich kids, and a large number of them were parents ordering for their children. These people are not the targets of the Parasitic Consciousness invasion. It wasn't until the third quarter that users over 25 years old started to join, and the proportion of people over 40 years old is very low, and there are almost none over 60 years old."
Those who buy the Space Box are all wealthy families. The players are mostly young people in these families who have little say, while only those who are truly influential within the families are the targets for parasitism. Among these young players, we've already found a ratio of one in ten thousand; I think the real ratio is definitely much higher."
Mei Yiqiu shook his head and said, "Our sample is already the group with the highest probability of being parasitized. As wealth and knowledge levels decrease and the population base continues to increase, the probability of being parasitized will drop sharply. So what you see now, one in 100,000, is still data that occurred in a high-probability group. According to probability distribution, the actual Parasites may be less than one in a million of the global population, which is why I think there is a problem with the data."
Mei Ziqing suddenly realized, "No wonder you priced the Space Box so high, Professor; it was to target a specific demographic."
"That's one reason," the professor said. "Secondly, its cost is indeed too high!"
Mei Ziqing asked, "When will our third-generation product be released? The cost will be much lower then, right?"
"Soon, right?" Mei Yiqiu said casually. "If the Black Box of the Space Box can't find all the Parasites, what's the point of reducing costs?" He had a cigarette in his mouth, and his fingers tapped rhythmically on the table. "I still feel like there's some problem we've overlooked. Sigh, if only Qingmu were here!"
Mei Ziqing asked cautiously, "Mr. Qingmu and Professor Su... they're not really... not coming back, are they?"
Mei Yiqiu didn't speak, just silently smoked his cigarette. After a while, he frowned and said, "Where's Xiao Bian? Have Xiao Bian come over; it's time to let his Kronos do its job."
Mei Ziqing laughed and said, "Professor, you've forgotten! You gave Bian Ziyuan a holiday. He didn't go home for the Spring Festival last year, but he went back early this year and took a Space Box with him. You agreed to all of this!"
"Oh, look at my memory!" Mei Yiqiu slapped his forehead and laughed at himself. "I'm getting old, my brain isn't working well anymore. Look, even the Parasitic Consciousness isn't coming to me, I'm not even worth being parasitized anymore!"
Mei Ziqing covered her mouth and giggled. Knowing the professor was just joking, she changed the subject and asked, "What do you plan to do with these Parasites that have already been discovered? We can't just kill them all..."
Mei Ziqing suddenly realized that many of those people were still children, and her face turned pale instantly.
"We don't have law enforcement power!" Mei Yiqiu said. "Besides, they're all only suspected cases of parasitism; further observation is needed to confirm. Anyway, once they've used the ' Dream Guide,' their information will be in our gene pool; they can't escape it. The current sample size is too small..."
Mei Ziqing felt that the professor was holding something back, but she knew the old man's temper; he wouldn't allow you to pry.
She said, "Could the small sample size mean their intrusion plan has stopped for some reason, or that they simply don't have that many people?"
"Continued invasion is certain, but the argument that there aren't that many people involved doesn't hold true," Mei Yiqiu said. " Parasitic Consciousness is different from humans. Based on current intelligence, this kind of consciousness itself has no memory, emotions, or desires. They merely take over the brains and memories of the invaded individuals. However, their conscious instincts will gradually manifest, causing certain physiological and psychological changes in the parasitized individuals, such as decreased sexual function and the formation of fixed estrus cycles. By this reasoning, their desire for power is also weak, because power is meaningless to someone who may be immortal and lacks physiological desires."
However, judging from the information Qingmu left us, they were organized. Theoretically speaking, it is impossible for a life form without memory to act solely on instinct. Therefore, they must have found a way, or some of them must have been able to recover the memories of their race.
If they are just a small group of life forms, they don't need to consider which group of people to invade. Just like ordinary parasites don't care whether the host is rich or has status, they only care whether the body can provide them with the best living environment.
We don't know if humans are the ultimate or intermediate hosts of Parasitic Consciousness, but either way, if they simply want a body and brain to inhabit, they could just secretly parasitize anyone. There's no need to forcibly invade someone like Lester, because finding a specific target increases the difficulty and cost of invasion, and such a person is far too risky for them. And indeed, it was Lester's dying words that prompted humanity to take precautions. In this respect, Mr. Lester is the true hero who saved humanity!
When Lester was mentioned, Mei Yiqiu's voice became excited, her eyes behind the smoke turned slightly red, and the muscles on her face twitched imperceptibly a few times before relaxing, revealing a tired expression.
"Since they have screened and selected Earthlings, and this selection carries enormous risks and contradicts their conscious instincts, there is only one possibility—" Mei Yiqiu, exhaling a long puff of smoke, "Their path of parasitism is not as easy as we imagine. They need to control all of humanity to open the complete parasitic channel and allow more Parasitic Consciousness to enter."
"Then what would their parasitic channels be?" Mei Ziqing asked curiously. "What kind of channels would require the entire human society to open them up? Or what are they worried about? Is there some kind of thing or force that could stop or even eliminate them when they launch a full-scale invasion?"
"I don't know." Mei Yiqiu suddenly closed his eyes and fell into deep thought. The tobacco in his pipe had burned to ashes, but the smoke still filled the room.