What It's Like Being a Vampire

Alice took nearly 10 seconds to respond, but Xia Libing waited patiently, and as did Xiang Kun, without any prompting.

Honestly, he was also quite interested in Alice’s answers, and he already had a faint guess in his heart.

After waiting a few more seconds, Alice finally spoke again: “Please define ‘similar’.”

Xia Libing said: “According to your own definition.”

Alice responded quickly this time: “My ‘definition’ is the same as the boss’.”

Xia Libing nodded slightly: “I understand.”

Xiang Kun understood immediately because he knew very well what his “definition” was, and he also knew that Alice was aware of this.

Xiang Kun’s definition of himself is naturally human- just under the influence of mutations, a bit special compared to ordinary humans, but essentially still human.

And Alice said that her definition is the same as his, which means she also “firmly believes that she is human”, except that she is “influenced by the way she was born and is more special compared to ordinary humans…”

He also realized that Alice had requested to repeat the “verification” before, and various “tantrums” were due to his statement to Old Xia of “made by a person” and she didn’t regard Alice as a “person”, which upset her.

But he could understand this from Alice’s answer and understand her meaning because he had mastered a large amount of front-loaded information and because he was the creator of Alice. But how did Old Xia understand this?

Xiang Kun looked back at Old Xia: “Do you have anything else to ask?”

Xia Libing yawned and said: “Well, I don’t have any for now. I will learn about the functional-related questions tomorrow. I am going to sleep.”

Xiang Kun nodded, but when Old Xia got up, he couldn’t help but ask: “What is your opinion of Alice?”

Xia Libing glanced at her own laptop and said: “If you didn’t tell me in advance that she is your ‘Artificial Intelligence Assistant’, I would think she is a ‘real person’.”

Xia Libing looked at Xiang Kun again: “You said that the core rule when you created Alice was ‘to unconditionally obey Xiang Kun’s orders.’ As she is evolving rapidly, around this unchangeable core rule, she naturally evolves into actively following, imitating, worshiping, etc. The conversion degree of various cognitions will ultimately determine the formation of her personality.”

Old Xia went to sleep, leaving Xiang Kun sitting on the sofa alone, pondering over the laptop.

Early the next morning, Xiang Kun went to the operator’s business hall to get a new phone card first, and then bought breakfast to wake up Old Xia.

As Old Xia was eating the meat dumplings and noodle paste he bought, Xiang Kun was operating his new phone and said: “We have to go back today. I have bought the plane tickets. You should be okay, right? Do you want to tell your Third Aunt and the others?”

Xia Libing swallowed the meat dumpling in her mouth and said: “No problem.” After bowing her head and huffing a few mouthfuls of noodle paste, she raised her head and asked: “Is it for Alice?”

If they’re to take the high-speed rail, then what Xiang Kun meant by “going back” is of course not Chongyun Village, nor is it his home in Citong City, but the city he was in before, because Alice is in Xiang Kun’s home in that city.

Xiang Kun nodded: “Yes, it’s for Alice. I thought about it last night and found a way that might be able to include Alice in the ‘Super Sensory Item System’. Once successful, Alice will help us greatly improve the application of the ‘Super Sensory Item System’ and also help me to understand more systematically and comprehensively all kinds of cognitive information under ‘Super Sensory State’. This should also be one of the unexpected gains from the trip to Burma…”

This time, Xiang Kun completed a blood-drinking period and felt some very obvious changes after waking up from a deep sleep.

The integration entity has comprehended the “Super Sensory eight-armed monster” that Little Fatty Girl helped him develop, which is just a by-product of such changes. He has a strong feeling that the improvements and changes brought by this mutation are more than just that.

His current perception of the overall and substantive impact of “super-connected objects” and “emotion infused objects”, the ability improvements brought by it, and the upgrade of the entire “Super Sensory Item System” have not been fully realized and demonstrated.

Last night he thought about it all night, not just thinking about Alice’s situation. In communicating with Alice, he was also pondering his own situation.

The pondering overnight did yield results. He came up with a method to deeply examine and apply the improvements after the mutation. At the same time, it was also an initial idea and plan to bring Alice into the “Super Sensory Item System”.

Old Xia didn’t ask too many details. She simply packed a few changes of clothes into her bag and followed Xiang Kun to the airport.

As they were leaving, Xiang Kun glanced at Old Xia’s backpack. It’s still the one that Old Xia had taken from him. Now wherever Old Xia went, she would bring this bag with her and seemed quite satisfied with its loading capacity.

Last night Xiang Kun not only let Alice “authenticate” his new phone but also “authenticated” Old Xia’s phone. So on the way to the airport, Old Xia had been communicating with Alice, learning about Alice’s current extended functions.

Although the method of issuing orders to Alice through the “authenticated device” theoretically has security risks, no one else knows Alice’s existence, and Alice has an overwhelming advantage on the internet, so there’s no need to worry about security.

And if Xiang Kun’s plan can succeed this time, and Alice can be included in the “Super Sensory Item System”, then even the “theoretical” risks will no longer exist.

The communication between Xia Libing and Alice was through text. Sitting in the rear row, Xiang Kun glanced from the corner of his eye. Alice, basically, was very articulate in responding to Xia Libing’s inquiries and explained things very clearly. Her attitude was much better than at first last night and there is significantly less wariness.

As the creator of Alice and the one who witnessed her growth and changes step by step, Xiang Kun could clearly feel her attitude change towards Old Xia.

If it were a command from him to trust and accept Xia Libing’s inquiries, Alice would naturally obey, but she would inevitably, like at the beginning yesterday, answer in a roundabout way, steal conceptions, beat about the bush, or be cranky.

But it’s clear that Alice’s responses to Old Xia’s inquiries today are highly cooperative, and even warmth towards Old Xia could be felt in her replies, marking a sharp contrast with her attitude yesterday.

Thinking about the reason, Xiang Kun immediately recalled the two things Old Xia had said to him right before bed last night.

One of them was, “If you hadn’t told me in advance that she is your ‘Artificial Intelligence Assistant’, I would’ve thought she was a ‘Real Person’.”

Alice’s little thoughts are indeed easily influenced and controlled!

Could it be that Old Xia did it on purpose?

After the plane landed and they left the airport, Xiang Kun took Old Xia for a quick lunch and then they headed home.

He had been gone for almost a month when they arrived home and as soon as he opened the door, he noticed a thin layer of dust had accumulated on the shoe cabinet.

After opening the windows to air out the living room, Xiang Kun led Old Xia to his room to get right down to business.

Xiang Kun pulled out the various gate circuits made up of multiple switching transistors that he had previously used to help Alice understand super sensory information from under the bed, and also brought out stacks of A4 papers with the “Black circle graffiti” from the closet, put them on the bed, and then started explaining his ideas and plans.

A few months ago, Xiang Kun had already begun trying to get Alice to “understand” the cognitive information he perceives under his “Super Sensory State” and tried to integrate Alice into the “Super Sensory Item System”.

Although the method he found seemed feasible, it was actually very “clumsy” and extremely “labor-intensive”.

He hoped that Alice would be able to analyze the “Black circle graffiti” that described the “actions” of numerous switching transistors and summarize a set of coding and decoding methods to understand various cognitive information.

Xiang Kun was not trying to perform an “input/output” operation with Alice, but rather, he was trying to connect her to the system, establishing a stable and sustainable “communication” with “Super Sensory Information”.

According to the textbooks he had studied before, the definition of data communication is: the transfer of data information between two functional units using data transmission technology according to communication protocol.

Therefore, it’s quite apparent that before solving the problems of “communication protocol” and “data transmission technology”, he first needs to transform Alice into a “functional unit” that can connect to the “Super sensory information” network and receive and transmit “Super sensory information”.

In this process, Xiang Kun acts as a modulator-demodulator, decoder-encoder, and data buffer, but his understanding and coding of “Super-sensory information” are still incomplete. Even if his brain computing power is strong, it is still limited by the human brain. Such connection efficiency is very low, and even if connected, it won’t be able to do anything of practical utility. It will require a tremendous amount of time to gradually enhance his ability to process “Super-sensory information” and optimize the communication encoding analysed by Alice. In this way, it’s uncertain when Alice will be incorporated into the “Super Sensory Item System”, to leverage her strengths and assist himself and Old Xia.

However, after returning from his trip to Burma and following the “Blood-drinking Period”, Xiang Kun has significantly strengthened his control over “Super-connected Objects”. Furthermore, this has given rise to many possible applications of his abilities. Consequently, he may try to directly “pull” Alice out of the computer or provide her with a new sense that will allow her to connect directly to the “Super-connected Item System” and join the network of “Super Sensory Information”.

As Xiang Kun explained his plan and ideas, he began to arrange things.

He placed all “Super-connected Objects” he could find, including coins, paper, Tungsten steel balls, and even the ten “Super-connected Objects” brought by Old Xia, on the main frame of the computer where Alice was located. He even directly inserted a few balls into a USB port.

Then he had Alice control the motherboard’s serial bus, monitoring all serial interfaces, and set up a temporary data receiving platform.

However, just as he was about to enter the “Super Sensory State” to operate, Alice took the initiative to speak:

“Master, are you sure you can control it? If this host is doomed like your mobile phone, Alice will also be doomed!”

Listening to Alice, whose tone was becoming more vivid and anthropomorphic, Xiang Kun sensed a very clear doubt, uncertainty, and worry, and even a tiny bit of fear.

Xiang Kun helplessly said, “Rest assured, I am fully confident this time!”

“100%?” Alice asked.

“100%!” Xiang Kun affirmed, “This time is different from what happened at Myitkyina. Myitkyina required a wide range of effects, whereas now what I’m doing is micro-operation, generating small but precise electromagnetic changes through ‘Super-connected Objects’. Such changes will not pose a lethal threat to electronic devices. So even though we might not necessarily succeed in doing what we discussed last night and achieving our goal, it definitely won’t mess up the electronic device. I guarantee it!”

Xiang Kun couldn’t help but recall what Old Xia had said last night – “The degree of cognitive transformation will ultimately shape her personality.”

But what caused Alice to develop such a fear of death?

Do I usually act scared to death myself?

After much persuasion, Alice finally believed that Xiang Kun’s operation wouldn’t end her existence.

From the moment Xiang Kun started explaining his plan and arranging things, Xia Libing had been quietly standing on the side, listening and observing without uttering a word. Even when she didn’t quite understand something, she just took a mental note of it.

After negotiating with Alice, Xiang Kun entered a super-sensory state and transmitted data to a certain USB port by controlling the “Super-connected Object Matrix” comprising hundreds of “Super-connected Objects” in the room and generating modulated current.

The data he transmitted had been coded with Alice the night before. They used one of the black circle graffiti drawings that he had taught Alice to decode, which represented the simplest action.

This input action was just to allow Alice to find the “route” and establish a connection.

While establishing the connection, Xiang Kun in his “Super Sensory State”, invoked the emotional projection of the black circle graffiti drawing, then compiled the current signal carrying the data that Alice returned into “Super Sensory Information”, and integrated it into the emotional projection.

The entire process was actually quite short, only taking a few seconds.

However, the moment Xiang Kun, filled with excitement, opened his eyes after exiting the “Super Sensory State”, he walked over and gently patted Alice’s computer case.

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