Know every word on the report, but these words together become a bible. There is no compulsory education in the shelter, and literacy is already quite rare. It is completely difficult for him to understand the content of this report. He tried asking the butler, and the virtual butler answered all questions and sent more relevant books, whether they were related to research reports or not.
A word points to a book, and a line of sentences leads to a subject. The project of understanding the report is very huge, just like asking middle school dropouts to self-study a doctoral course. Fortunately, Asha has no shortage of auxiliary tools, and Eden has no shortage of time.
It took him months to read the report, which was the result of a study on how to prevent the assassination of important people. After a short cramming study, Eden could barely understand the gist of the report, and that was all. After reading the last line, he turned off the screen, pinched the bridge of his nose, and suspected that he had misunderstood Asha's purpose—he really couldn't figure out what a research report on "how to prevent important people from being assassinated" had anything to do with him .
The next day, Asha came.
She smiled at Eden, looking rather tired and energized, like a night sleeper who's had too much coffee. Eden stared at her wordlessly, Yasha spoke first and said, "Come on, let me show you something."
After half a year, Eden left the room for the first time.
They walked through a series of portals, and the rooms formed a maze of separation. There is no one on the road, but the traces of technology are getting thicker and thicker, as if a century has been spanned in a few steps. Eden doesn't know how far he's come until he's shivering in a white room, dazzled by the cold reflection of the equipment in it. As soon as his footsteps slowed, Asha stopped, and then showed a soothing expression.
"I wouldn't do anything bad to you," she said. "Actually we could just teleport there, but I guess you don't want me to just take you away? Last time…"
"Where are we going?" Eden interrupted her.
"Shelter Center, Environmental Mediation Room." Yasha replied bluntly, reaching out to Eden, "Do you want me to hold you?"
Eden nodded, shook his head again, and followed again.
They did come to the center of the sanctuary.
A few months ago, Eden wouldn't even have known what he was seeing.
The light clusters are suspended in the void, densely packed, like stars, and countless information exchanges in each nebula. The optical brain operates and calculates at a speed that cannot be achieved by biological thinking. The lines invisible to the naked eye converge here, and the information flow of the entire shelter is transmitted to this atrium through blood vessels. Unknown components hum slightly, the heat produced by the light signal is fleeting, and only strange colors leave fragments on the audience's retina... It is hard for you to imagine that millions of human beings are included in the natural illusion, from In front of him was a huge monster full of artificial imprints.
Eden had learned a lot in the past few months, and he might not be able to pass the entry test for the rich and powerful, but he already knew what was in front of him. This is not just the center of the sanctuary, they are inside the core of the sanctuary.
This room is the great machine itself that isolates the external radiation and creates a shelter environment.
"You've already read the report." Yasha said, "You should know what 'shelter core', 'capsule zero', and 'lie detector' are, right?"
"Just know." Eden replied.
All those materials were provided to me by you, even if there is any problem, I can't see it, he thought.
"All the information given to you is true, and I have not tampered with anything. Even if you don't believe it, at least you can find that these things are not made up out of thin air." Yasha said, "I wear a lie detector on my wrist Lies are detected when the red light is on. For example, 'I am an alpha', 'You are an alpha', 'I can fly a plane', 'I can't fly a plane', 'This is the core of the shelter', you Look... I guess you're thinking, lie detectors can be fake too, after all you don't know much about it. I can't deny it, but that's all I can prove. I stand by everything I have and will have Swear, the lie detector is real, if you want, I will wear it all the time with you, I will not tell you a lie."
Her tone was so sincere, almost begging, that Eden didn't think he could fully believe it, nor could he say he was indifferent to it. He pursed his lips and remained silent, while Asha gave a small smile and continued.
"Consulting is a high-risk profession. Before I was born, my father was studying how to avoid assassination once and for all. You can't stop other people's desires, you can only let them use the mouse, making the assassination of the commander so expensive that no one can afford it. So I My father thought that he should link his own life with the safety of the entire sanctuary, if he died unexpectedly, the beneficiaries would hardly survive."
Apparently the consul thought that the sanctuary was worth burying with him.
"Preliminary research was quite successful and we got 'Capsule Zero'. The Archon installed a capsule in his brain which, once opened, was irremovable, irreversible, and irreversible. The plan was that the capsule would be released if the Archon died by assassination. signal, destroying the core of the shelter, and exposing everyone in the entire shelter to extremely mild external radiation. But then the research encountered a problem: how to distinguish the death of the archon from the assassination? The experiment was carried out for many years, until My father was poisoned, and the research has not made any progress, the capsule can only be triggered by a single way, but there are thousands of ways to assassinate."
The report explained this in detail. Scalpel injuries may be similar to assassination injuries, and nightmare attacks can also cause similar stimulation to being attacked, and high technology is helpless. "The safety of the consul is connected to the core of the sanctuary" and "to avoid accidental disasters caused by slight mistakes" are difficult to balance. In the end, the research was shelved.
Yasha touched her watch, and a beam of light swept across her head, projecting a profile on the light screen. Eden stared at the screen for a few seconds, his eyes suddenly widened.
Capsule Zero is placed inside Asha's head, exactly as it was in the demo.
"Father's research has never been successful, and the capsule can only be triggered by a single way." Asha said unhurriedly, as if she hadn't installed a switch to destroy the world in her head, "I set the only condition as 'once the child When the device is triggered, it triggers Capsule Zero'. And the sub-device…”
She reached out her hand again, and a pill-sized device lay in the palm of her hand.
"The sub-device can only be activated by 'Exile Surgery'." Yasha said.
For a second or two, Eden's face was blank. Then the epiphany shot down the spine like lightning, and exploded in the brain with a deafening bang. His breathing was short, and he even took a small step back. Could it be, no, it's impossible, she couldn't be talking...
"There is no need for surgery, just swallow it." Yasha said, "The nanorobot will enter the user's body, place it in the brain, and activate it within an hour. It is as irremovable, irreversible, and irreversible as the zero capsule. If you choose it, no one can touch your memory anymore. Any level of brainwashing will activate capsule zero, then I will die, the core of the sanctuary will be destroyed at the same time, and the human race on earth will usher in a real extinction, no one will survive .”
She said so.
The lie detector didn't light up.
Goosebumps all over his body stood up, and Eden trembled, not knowing what kind of emotion the trembling came from. It might be a lie, it might be a trap, but the voice of doubt is getting softer, every ounce of instinct speaks to believe. The quasi-consul with red hair and green eyes stood in front of her, holding a switch capable of destroying the world and himself, palms up, fingers stretched. Her eyes sparkled, what was there... anticipation, desperation, ecstasy, ecstasy, ecstasy—she'd realized, before Eden, the trust that violated reason, and she'd set the world on fire for it.
"You're crazy." Eden said, his tone was trembling, and he had already begun to throw away his armor. "What if there are people who want to destroy the world? What if someone captures me and forcibly..."
"As long as I live, no one can touch you!" cried Asha, her eyes burning, utterly sane and utterly mad, "if I can't, if I can't protect you—again—then let everything occur!"
Then let it happen, if Asha loses her star again. If climbing to the highest place can't protect her treasure, then let her pay for it with her life, then let the city be wiped out, the survivors howl, and the sun fall. If she fails again, there will be no winners in this world.
"Trust me," Yasha said, not approaching, just raised her hand, "I won't let you go, but I won't modify your choice, I don't care who you want to be. I will still be a dictator Or, but I won't be my dad, things will be fine, the skies will be open again. We'll be fine, we've had many, many years to figure out what to do. Take it, you want to take it?"
This is insanity, Eden thought, this was inhumanity, arrogance, tyranny, not right... His heart was beating wildly, his fingers were shaking, his vision was blurred by tears and he didn't know why he was crying. He thought, this is not love, at least not normal, not healthy at all. But how much does he know about love? The former Eden might be able to teach Asha how to love, but the current Eden can't, neither can he himself. They were both messed up, like the product of two misshapen machines, each distorted and equally bad. He stared at the pills, thinking "depraved", "conformist", "crazy". He thinks about Capsule Zero, sub-device, visions of the end of the world. he…
He feels at ease.
Eden took the pill and swallowed it.
He betrayed the sacrifices of the past, joined forces with tyrants, fueled madness and obsession that would destroy the world, and he didn't care, didn't give a shit. His alpha let out a squeal of joy, and his tyrant swooped in, hugging and kissing him, celebrating his fall. His Asha laughed heartily, cupped his face, and babbled about how worried and happy she was. The future consul is nestled in Eden's arms, his eyes reflecting the artificial starry sky.
"We'll be fine, everything will be fine," she said.
For the first time, Eden was hopeful.