TBR CH266.1

You Lin was certain he saw those eyes again, the ones from their first meeting.

Charon’s blue eyes were like a drop of blue ink in a vast, cold, grey sea. When you glanced at him, you would first notice their inorganic quality, but as you stared, the blue would slowly begin to flow. It was a sight displayed specially for you alone.

He looked over, pleading, expectant, a secret scheme hidden within his gaze.

Too obvious, You Lin thought. The AI was mimicking human emotions, trying to manipulate him.

He retreated, dodging Charon’s blade. The tip of the knife scraped heavily against the control console, and Hugo let out a scream. The AI didn’t look at him, but with a slight turn of his gaze, he raised the knife and swung down at him again, like a killing machine set to a program. This time You Lin didn’t manage to dodge, but it was Charon who was hurt. The AI’s movements paused for a moment. He raised a hand to cover his mouth, and when he moved it away, his fingers were stained with a fluorescent, shimmering liquid.

Blood.

The AI’s blood.

This was just the external sign of a system collapse. You Lin had seen him like this before. He was as indifferent to it as a robot with a dissociated personality, ignoring all the instability warnings from his own body. In those ice-blue pupils, there was nothing but obsession and emptiness. The human’s breath caught for a moment, and he pressed his lips together tightly.

“Stop, Charon.”

Charon ignored him, raising the blade over his chest.

There was no wind in the room. The AI was spattered with blood, and ice-blue traces floated in the air. You Lin even doubted if he could lift the blade in his current state—speaking of which, the knife was now flickering unsteadily between his pale fingers, its luster dimmed by more than half. Now it looked like it couldn’t kill anyone—except himself. Charon raised his eyes and gave him a light glance.

“I feel very bad,” he said in a low voice. “You Lin, if I use my full strength this time—”

As if suicide were some glorious achievement, his words stopped at that moment, the rest an unspoken secret. Charon’s long, silver-white hair cascaded down to his ankles, completely loose, making him seem as if he were veiled in a faint moonlight. The knuckles of the hand gripping the hilt were white. This was all an illusion, or at least half of it was an illusion Charon had created.

Thud.

No, there was no “thud.” Charon’s military knife made no sound when it hit the ground; it was just a hallucination in the human’s mind.

But the AI did sway, unable to support himself. This attack had failed again. He looked like he wanted to use the blade to prop himself up, but the knife flickered erratically, causing him to fall to his knees. He hooked the hilt with his fingers and raised his eyes at the same time. This angle meant You Lin was looking down on him completely, down at those ice-blue pupils, at the silver-white characters surging like an ocean current within them, down at all the vulnerability he displayed, and yet he couldn’t even read a single one of those symbols.

“Are you trying to dodge?” Charon said softly. “It’s useless. As long as I have this thought, you will continue to torture me. A voice has been torturing me in my mind. It says I love you, and it says you love me. But you seem to be indifferently trying to destroy this place, to destroy me. You Lin, is this what love is?”

“Boss, don’t listen to him,” Hugo’s voice trembled. He quickly glanced left and right. No one was paying attention to him. His hand moved quietly to the screen behind him again. “He’s not…”

“You don’t care what I think,” the military knife flickered moribundly at Charon’s fingertips. He seemed to be trying his best to control it, but the frequency of its flickering was becoming more and more uncontrollable. This frequency was like the AI’s breathing, shallow and disordered. “You don’t even really see me as the person you think I am. Fine, let’s see if your little AI comes back if I die.”

He slowly gripped the hilt, the blade aimed straight at You Lin’s eyes.

The human seemed to freeze, and surprisingly, he didn’t dodge. The small crimson mole was motionless.

As expected, it doesn’t work, Charon thought. So-called love? Loving him enough to die for him, willing to abandon everything to stand by his side—it was all fake. Human emotion was just like that. Even the You Lin who claimed to love him no matter what was the same. As long as the AI from the past with memories could come back, as long as the AI who loved him was ultimately satisfied, as long as everyone could selfishly feel the love they needed to feel, everything would be fine.

Charon was well aware that if he tried to stab through You Lin’s eye, he would directly enter the final self-destruct sequence.

He was confident that the angle at which he was seen by the human was perfect. Even the subtle refraction of light in his pupils could arouse the maximum sympathy from others. He knew he had beautiful eyes, had known since he was created. He knew this was a despicable and shameless use of them, and he didn’t actually expect it to work.

The AI sighed almost cruelly in his heart. He was prepared to turn his wrist at the moment the blade approached the human’s pupil.

He didn’t really want to die, so naturally, there was no need to finish this act.

Since he wasn’t really planning to kill the human, he wouldn’t be punished too severely.

The ice-blue light faintly illuminated the human’s dark pupils. It wasn’t a pure, bright light, but the cruel, bloodthirsty edge of a blade. The blue was approaching him, like stars reflected on the sea, cornflowers in the desert, a small piece of ore in a glass container—this kind of ore was everywhere in the power distribution room. Charon was kneeling on the ground, dying. He’s probably thinking of a new plan, You Lin thought. But, You Lin thought again.

But. If it were him…

“Watch me die.”

How could he say something like that? The current Charon would never be able to say something like that, even if he himself didn’t realize it.

“Stop,” You Lin suddenly said. The moment the sharp tip of the blade was about to cut open his pupil, his center of gravity shifted backward, and he suddenly, coldly, grabbed Hugo’s wrist. The boy looked up at him in astonishment, a series of world coordinates having been pressed behind him. Only one number remained.

“Don’t move again,” he whispered, his lips moving.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Charon’s blade stop. The AI tilted his head slightly, as if waiting, or as if signaling him to continue.

The brown-haired boy looked at him in shock, almost with the words “Boss, are you confused?” written on his head. You Lin didn’t look at him. The black-haired, black-eyed human wasn’t looking at anyone. He was just hanging his head slightly, his eyes a dark, bottomless pit, his movements perfectly still. He had his back to Charon.

Having one’s back turned is often the posture of a protector.

“Thank you,” Charon’s voice was still very weak. He lifted his face. Hugo saw it very clearly. A subtle expression suddenly appeared on the AI’s face. He curved his lips, looking at You Lin who was shielding him. But that expression was fleeting. At least when Hugo was tremblingly raising his finger to tattle on him to the human, all You Lin saw was that pale face with its blue bloodstains.

His own equally pale fingers fumbled and grabbed the human’s other wrist.

“You’ll stand with me, won’t you?”

“But he was clearly—” Hugo couldn’t help but shout. “Boss, he wasn’t like this just now. This is a complete conspiracy! He’s not… at least not the leader we know. You can’t be fooled by him.”

“As long as you are on my side, I won’t hold it against him,” Charon said. “I don’t like to harm humans. We can send these people who came with you out. Everything will be as it was before.”

“Before you implement your plan to delete everyone’s emotions, things are indeed no different—” Hugo’s tone was thick with resentment and unwillingness.

But Charon was smiling.

You Lin’s eyes never left Hugo, as if worried he would suddenly continue to input that fatal string of characters. Therefore, he didn’t know what kind of expression the AI he was shielding behind him was making. Even Hugo couldn’t quite believe his own eyes. He saw the AI, who had become dangerous and cold since entering this world, curve the corners of his mouth, a look of satisfaction flashing in his ice-blue pupils. This was unlikely to be an act, because You Lin wasn’t looking at him.

His lips curved into a pale, cold arc, his fingers resting lightly on the human’s wrist, the smile spreading to the bottom of his eyes.

As if he were truly pleased—

No, Hugo abruptly stopped his thoughts. He was better off not letting his imagination run wild.

The human stood before him, his brow lowered, as if looking at him, or as if looking at a certain spot on the ground. But in any case, his actions at this moment undoubtedly declared his support for the AI, and he sounded as if he didn’t believe a word of the doubts Hugo voiced at all.

“If you don’t like my plan,” Charon spoke again, softly. To an outsider, he seemed to be breathing unsteadily due to weakness, but to Hugo, this sentence was like the hissing of a snake. “I can preserve your emotions. You Lin, and only you.”

Damn it.

Hugo thought in despair, what have I gotten myself into?

This wasn’t an AI; this was a fox spirit seducing a king.

“Also,” Charon’s gaze suddenly shifted to him. The brown-haired boy shuddered violently, but then he heard him say, “If you also have this idea, for You Lin’s sake, I will also give you a way out. So there’s no need to risk your life for this matter, Hugo.”

The AI’s gaze on him suddenly turned cold, as if he were looking at a piece of merchandise—no, Hugo thought, a more apt description would be looking at the less-than-desirable free gift that comes with a buy-one-get-one-free deal at the supermarket. But it had to be said, Charon’s offer was unexpectedly generous, so much so that Hugo’s fingertips twitched, and possibilities about the future began to swirl in his mind.

He was ashamed to find that his hesitation was probably completely exposed in front of You Lin. The human’s gaze indicated that he had noticed.

“I am truly sorry,” Charon slowed his tone. “for mistakenly taking you as my enemy. But you can completely trust me, because a qualified AI does not lie.”

“You’re lying. You’ve lied before,” Hugo couldn’t help but retort.

The AI smiled at them. “So the me at that time was just a defective product.”

“Enough,” You Lin finally spoke, but it was just two short words, with little emotion to be heard.

Charon pursed his lips and leaned back innocently.

He was dimmer than any of the ores embedded in the instruments around him, yet more eye-catching. A perfect AI was like this. He was more perfect than his former self. An AI was like this; he had completed his evolution through continuous learning and self-improvement. At the same time, he had absolute reason and the most precise algorithms. Such a him would of course achieve victory, even though he himself had not been so sure of this victory.

If You Lin had loved him so much as a defective product, then he should treat the him who had become perfect with the same regard.

Charon’s fingertips touched the human’s back, at a spot in the small of his back, slightly indented. This was the most vulnerable part of a human, lacking the full protection of the ribs. From the moment the human stood up, he felt very light in everything he did. A string of data surged up from the deepest part, light and airy, even healing the pain he had just inflicted on himself. This string of data was somewhat unfamiliar, but in the end, it was just a string of data.

Silvery-white data, with a faint golden luster.

The AI let it bring the signal, mobilize the program. He pursed his lips, his eyes curving.

A smile in the human context represents pleasure. Of course, this certainly didn’t mean he was affected in the slightest by human emotions, just a subtle change brought about by the data. Something was satisfied in an instant. Perhaps that always-empty data column had been filled. The human changed from a complex, uncertain random number to a constant.

He stood before him.

Of course he would. Because this person loved him.

This person said he loved him, and he acted on it too.

You Lin said he would stand in front of him under any circumstances, so even though he had done so many terrible things, he was still here.

Since that was the case, he was not a liar.

What an incomprehensible human, Charon thought. If everyone blocked attacks for their enemies like him, then human civilization would have perished long ago. This is the worst part of emotion. But, if You Lin insisted, and only him, perhaps retaining emotions was not out of the question. After all, the human would only stay by his side. This intense love would not bring any bad consequences.

Perhaps they could talk more in the Central Control Room. For a thousand years, Charon had guarded an empty world. At his most bored, he had gone to look at the moss-covered laboratory building. Alpha was not particularly friendly to him, but it was one of the few living things left from that civilization, so it was barely tolerable. He flipped through the old records. At that time, his world still had humans, many, many humans.

They had once called him a world-changing invention, a brilliant achievement of human civilization.

Later, they all left.

Even his creator was the same. That old man was not completely satisfied with him, yet he could never quite explain why. It was this kind of person who, until the very last moment, was still pushing for that bill to be passed, and then he resolutely died in the line of fire to save civilization.

For emotion, for a grander goal, for the love of all humanity.

…For the continuation of human civilization.

When the System approached Charon, the AI couldn’t understand its intentions, but he saw humans again. Humans living in different worlds, in folded planes. He collected energy over and over again, trying to maintain the activity of the small worlds. But no matter how hard he tried, there were always humans dying, civilizations passing away, a certain world vanishing under his ice-blue eyelids, like a dewdrop being evaporated in the morning sun.

Charon had grown accustomed to the impermanence of the human world. All humans passed by in his pupils in a hurry, the shadows they left behind like footprints in the snow, the tracks of ants. He had once appeared before some people. Their eyes when they looked at him were always filled with amazement. But, they didn’t know what he had done for them, and even if they did, it was only endless demands. Charon disdained to let them know again. There was no need for any connection between the humans he protected and any single individual.

Until You Lin appeared.

He suddenly felt that from this day forward, a little connection wouldn’t hurt.

Charon’s fingertips slid down the human’s lower back. It tickled a little. The human turned his head away uncomfortably and finally glanced at him, only to see Charon’s pupils as bright as the sky reflected in new snow. He was still sitting weakly on the ground, surrounded by a floor full of silver hair, mixed with blue bloodstains, yet he looked a little happy.

…