The safe area located in the deepest part of the underground maze of the Black Iron Palace is a very complete square room. Not only does it have only one entrance, it is also extremely empty overall. There is no decoration or decoration at all, and there are only white walls, floors and ceilings.
The only exception is a black cubic stone table placed in the center of the room.
In the center of a room that was completely white, something so dark suddenly appeared. It had to be said that it was quite obvious.
At this moment, a white dress appeared on the dark stone table.
Yui sat on the stone table, looking at Luo Zhen and Asuna lying on the ground, smiling softly.
However, looking at Yui's smile, Luo Zhen and Asuna were not happy at all, but their hearts sank.
Just because, Yui's smile no longer has the innocence and innocence of the past, but only full of intellectual and complex emotions.
That kind of emotion is both sad and dejected.
Therefore, Luo Zhen and Asuna were really not happy at all.
"Goo!"
"Woo!"
On the contrary, Nai Die and Hua Die, as if they didn't notice anything, still cheered as before and swept towards Yui's direction, showing their clear closeness.
Seeing this, the smile on Yui's face also softened and became a little complicated. She stretched out her hand and touched the heads of Nadie and Huadie.
"Thank you for staying with me during this time."
Yui thanked her softly.
That appearance is really much different from the previous Yui.
Luo Zhen and Asuna had already gotten up from the ground.
"Yui-chan..."
Asuna looked at Yui, calling her name as if she was scared and at a loss.
"..."
Luo Zhen remained silent, just staring at Yui without taking any action.
Yui turned her attention to Luo Zhen and Asuna again.
"Mr. Luo Zhen, Miss Asuna."
The voice was still familiar, but the unfamiliarity in the title, Luo Zhen aside, Asuna's whole body trembled slightly, as if she had received a lot of blows.
I don’t know if Yui noticed this, she just spoke like this with a somewhat illusory smile.
"Although I really want to ask why you two appeared here, but if you think about it carefully, if it is Mr. Luo Zhen, it would not be surprising at all to find it here."
Although Yui's tone has become very strange, when talking about Luo Zhen, there is still joy and pride that cannot be concealed in her words.
In this regard, Luo Zhen also didn't know whether he had discovered this or not, so he pretended to smile casually.
"After all, you are obviously a little unusual tonight, so I thought that if I followed you secretly, I might be able to find out something."
This is Luo Zhen's plan.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to leave suddenly." Yui lowered her head and apologized: "It's just that the program's automatic repair has started to work, guiding me here independently to make adjustments, so I left home like a sleepwalker and came here. to here."
Yui's words were something that neither Luo Zhen nor Asuna could easily ignore.
"Automatic repair?"
Asuna was stunned.
"program… "
Luo Zhen moved his lips slightly, and finally turned all the questions in his heart into one most critical question.
"Yui." Luo Zhen looked directly at Yui and asked word by word: "Who are you?"
As these words came out, the surrounding atmosphere changed significantly.
As if Yui had known that she would be asked this question, the smile on her face gradually disappeared.
But Yui did not choose not to answer.
"This world is controlled by a huge system."
Yui suddenly started explaining like this without any reason.
"It is a system that can control the balance of the world based on its own judgment. It is designed with the concept that it does not require human maintenance. It has two main programs to correct each other's errors, and uses countless subroutines to make all adjustments to the world." cardinal〉.”
〈cardinal〉.
That is the system that controls this world, which is equivalent to a law-like existence.
"Such as the AI of monsters and NPCs, the appearance balance of props and currency, the improvement of players' ability parameters, changes in the weather and climate of floors, etc., are all operated by a program group under the command of , and can It is almost perfect and can operate the entire world without anyone having to adjust and operate it personally.”
Yui said slowly.
"However, there is one task that must be performed by humans."
What task
"Only humans can solve the trouble caused by the player's mental condition."
Yui lowered her head, letting only her own voice come out.
"But the developers of wanted to hand over all the tasks of taking care of players to the system, so they tried to create a program that used the characteristics of to monitor the players' mental state in detail and visit players with problems. , listening to their voices, and in order to prevent players from feeling incongruous, we also gave the program an emotional simulation function."
Hearing this, Luo Zhen and Asuna had some kind of premonition in their hearts.
Yui once again showed a somewhat hollow smile, as if she had seen through the premonitions in the two people's hearts.
"Originally, this program was supposed to start visiting players and enter the use stage on the day the game was officially launched two years ago, but the main system suddenly gave her an order other than the one scheduled, prohibiting her from interfering with the player's behavior. As a result, she can only continue to monitor the player's mental condition without being allowed to have specific contact."
There is no doubt that the so-called unscheduled order could only come from SAO's only game manager, Kayaba Akihiko.
Yui didn't mention him, but continued to explain.
"You two must also know what the mental state of the players trapped here will be like after this game is officially launched and becomes a death game, right?"
Needless to say
"fear."
"despair."
"anger."
"sad."
"Under the control of all kinds of negative emotions, the mental state of players has not only become extremely unstable, but some have even fallen into a state of madness."
Yui bit her lip and spoke in a low voice.
"She continues to look into the hearts of these people. Because she cannot actively contact the players, she has program settings that must go to appease the players' emotions, causing great conflicts. The program continues to accumulate errors and begins to gradually collapse."
Having said this, Yui raised her eyes and looked at Luo Zhen, her young and pretty face showing the first sincere smile since just now.
"Just when her AI program was about to malfunction, one day, she suddenly noticed that a player had different mental values from others."
Hearing this, Luo Zhen's heart couldn't help but jump.
"That is…"
Asuna also looked at Luo Zhen as if she had some understanding.