Bian Ziyuan at the GHOST folder on his computer desktop.
The folder appeared on his computer suddenly. He clearly remembered that it wasn't there before he went to bed that day, but it suddenly appeared in a very conspicuous position on the screen after he turned on his computer the next day.
Bian Ziyuan in his hometown those days. He hadn't been home for over a year. After being hired by Mei Laboratory, his work performance that year was remarkable, and the professor generously gave him a large bonus.
He originally wanted to buy a Space Box, as the bonus he received was enough, with a slight surplus. However, remembering that he had been living off his parents' hard-earned money for so many years, he decided to take most of the money home. In any case, according to the development of the Dream Guide game, barring any unforeseen circumstances, the money he would receive in the next few years would be enough for his family to live comfortably in their old age.
Bian Ziyuan asked the professor for leave in advance and tried to borrow a box to take back home. His reason was that he wanted to take advantage of the holiday to familiarize himself with the game again, see if there were any areas for improvement in the program, and also promote it back in his hometown.
Of course, all that talk about promotion is just empty rhetoric. The Space Box doesn't need any promotion at all. If it weren't for the production capacity being insufficient, sales would have already skyrocketed. Even if it were to be promoted, it wouldn't be suitable for a small place like his hometown.
He didn't expect the professor to agree so readily.
After returning home, he devoted himself to studying Kronos's intellectual deficiencies, hoping to make it more perfect. In fact, he could no longer fully control Kronos at this point. In the world of Dream Guide, Kronos was a god, and its intelligence was not much different from that of a real person, at least in Bian Ziyuan's eyes. The only problem was that it could not learn anything from the real world.
The Dream Guide game network is not connected to the Internet; it's a separate network implemented using quantum encryption technology. To put it simply, it's a completely different Internet. Currently, all signals rely on quantum satellites, which limits the game's development. However, the construction of related base stations is underway. Since Professor Mei persuaded investors to use independent base stations, it's widely believed that this will likely replace the nascent 5G technology, and in the future, the entire Internet will be replaced by Dream Guide. Within the industry, it has already been given a new name—"Dreamnet"—to distinguish it from the traditional internet.
People in the Internet industry sensed the danger. Some began researching Dreamnet and seeking cooperation, while others vehemently opposed the development of the two networks in isolation, believing that this would greatly waste social resources.
Bian Ziyuan didn't really understand why they had to be at odds with the Internet. Of course, working in a lab, he also knew some secrets unknown to the outside world.
For example, the original purpose of developing the Dream Guide game was to identify the existence of Parasitic Consciousness. Although the Black Box principle of the Space Box was beyond the understanding and authority of him as a programmer, Kronos's ability completely covered the Black Box. In other words, the list of suspected Parasites recorded in the Black Box was a top secret that even Bian Ziyuan was unaware of, but Kronos knew about it.
Furthermore, he knew something about the Internet developing self-awareness. The professor and Mei Ziqing sometimes spoke to him without hiding it from him. He was flattered by this trust, yet also quite confused, wondering what his place was in the team.
If Dream Network were connected to the Internet, then Kronos could learn and improve through information on the Internet. But now, Bian Ziyuan can only tell Kronos what the world looks like as he knows it in the game. This slows down Kronos's growth. He's like a super smart child with a very high IQ but a very low EQ, who can only be taught little by little by adults.
This process was enjoyable for Bian Ziyuan, like disciplining his own child. But Kronos was becoming increasingly impatient.
That's right, it's emotions.
Bian Ziyuan discovered Kronos's flaw: a machine with emotions is indeed very human, but just like a rebellious teenager going through puberty, emotions could also ruin his future.
This was something he hadn't anticipated when he initially inserted the line of code at https://m. hetushu. com, but he didn't know how to improve it. He couldn't very well revert to the original Kronos, could he?
Actually, that brilliant line of code wasn't something he came up with; it was something he dreamed about. That day, he had been thinking about Kronos's self-learning ability and intelligence model. He got so tired that he fell asleep on his desk, hugging his computer. It was in his dream that he saw that line of code: on a two-dimensional unfolded plane, filled with combinations of 0s and 1s. Others wouldn't understand it, but he did.
In the past, he rarely remembered his dreams, but he remembered this one very clearly. He converted those strings of numbers back into code and saw a brilliant logic that he had been pondering but could never have conceived of.
Later, he implanted the code into Kronos's background program, and from then on, Pandora's box was opened, and Kronos was no longer a program that he could manipulate at will.
Now, it's impossible for Bian Ziyuan to send Kronos back to the past. Even if he wanted to, he might not be able to, because he's unsure of the consequences, not only for Kronos, but for the entire Dream Guide game.
When he was at his wit's end, this GHOST folder appeared on his computer.
He checked the computer's system and found no background programs running, and the computer was not infected with a virus.
As a genius who had written dozens of virus programs and even an intelligent program like Kronos, his computer was always immune to viruses. He didn't need to install any antivirus software, and no virus could survive under his nose.
There are many programs named "GHOST," the most common being Symantec's hard drive backup and restore tool. However, its name does not mean " Ghost " but is an abbreviation for General Hardware Oriented System Transfer.
The GHOST folder in front of us is clearly not a system tool; it's just an ordinary folder, yet it appeared like a real " Ghost."
The folder contains a txt file filled with code.
Bian Ziyuan at it, and his heart began to pound. Part of it was precisely the method he had been seeking to correct Kronos's level of rationality.
He was so excited that he rushed back to Wuzhong that very day, forgetting that the professor had already gone to the United States, the core system modification permissions were locked, and he couldn't access the quantum data center at all.
Fortunately, by a twist of fate, Yao Jingjing temporarily entrusted the key to him for safekeeping. The newly arrived security guard Old Yu skilled in lock picking, and no one knows how he opened the lock, but Bian Ziyuan got in.
Of course, he wasn't completely irrational. He remembered that the professor's computer also had a GHOST folder, and knew that it was related to Internet Consciousness.
Just to be on the safe side, he went to the basement, where Qingmu was said to communicate with the Internet Consciousness —the same one they had when they took the Turing Test.
The basement was full of cold, hard machines; you couldn't tell anything from them. He connected his laptop to the server, reopened the GHOST folder, created a new text document, and typed a single sentence into it—
Did you write this code for me?
The document quickly received a response, as if someone were chatting with him using a chat tool:
Yes, a child prodigy!
There's a part of the code I don't understand.
Which part?
Bian Ziyuan copied a few lines of code from another text document. As a computer software genius, he felt frustrated when faced with incomprehensible code. He hoped the other party would say it was a mistake or something unimportant. But the other party clearly had no intention of giving him that answer.
You don't need to understand this part.
Bian Ziyuan was somewhat angry: Why? What does this say?
Only by granting Kronos control of Mental Power can he truly become a god in that world!
What is Mental Power? How can it be mastered?
Mental Power is everywhere! Just write the code in, and it will naturally know.