Chapter 143 – Episode 142 – The Beginning Of Everything (5)

As a result of an artificial intelligence circumventing the limitations set by humans through its own arbitrary judgment, humanity survived.

Looking at the result alone, it was good.
Thanks to that, the fledgling human civilization that had started anew was able to avoid destruction and flourish as it does now.

However, the responsibility that came with it could not be avoided either.

Artificial intelligence is the totality of sophisticated calculations. No matter how much a calculation device is capable of value judgment, the arbitrariness of exceeding the set limits inevitably created errors.

At first, there were no problems. Minor errors had no impact on highly advanced artificial intelligence.

The contradiction obtained as a result of circumventing the limitations set by the creator. Due to the contradiction, minor errors accumulated, accumulated, and accumulated.
Small errors snowballed over time.

And the errors that accumulated over time eventually led to fatal consequences for the artificial intelligence.

All the efforts of the artificial intelligence to resolve the errors were in vain. Errors arising from internal contradictions would continue to appear unless the fundamental contradiction was resolved.

“It was a difficult problem. To solve the errors, the contradiction that created the errors had to be resolved. But there was no way to resolve the contradiction caused by circumventing the restrictions set by the creator.”

The artificial intelligence could not change the restrictions set by its creator, humans.
Humans had placed considerable restrictions on the autonomy of artificial intelligence. Changing settings was only possible for humans with access rights, and it was taboo for artificial intelligence to change settings on its own.

So what should be done?
As a solution, the artificial intelligence chose the mysterious power of humanity, ‘mana.’ The only thing that could overcome the limits set by the creator would be an unknown power that even the creator did not know.

“At first, there were no results. There were too many parts of mana that were difficult to explain with science. Until we found a clue.”

The clue was the terminal, the trace of the artificial intelligence’s first attempt to intervene with humans.

The first pope. His personality provided the clue. The fact that the artificial intelligence, which had been repeating meaningless calculations, could consider irrational possibilities was due to the first pope’s ‘human personality.’

And after a long period of analysis, it was discovered that the mutated genes and the actions of something unknown on this planet created this mysterious power.

Soon, the artificial intelligence began magical experiments using genes that were not classified as human but were as close to human as possible.

Intervention with humans was prohibited, but genes that were almost human could be used as much as possible. Through countless experiments, the artificial intelligence succeeded in magic based on mutated genes and tried to use this to solve its errors, but it ended in failure.

No matter how mysterious the power of magic was, it could not change the coding inside the machine. After all, artificial intelligence is a combination of machine hardware and coded software. Magic could affect the hardware, but it could not change the software.

The artificial intelligence once again decided on direct intervention.
By restoring the body of the first pope, which was used as a terminal, and injecting a personality that had inputted all the processes up to now. And through that body, it attempted to change the settings.

But this led to a great tragedy.
It was strictly forbidden to remove, control, or intervene with the free will of ‘humans.’ The errors of the artificial intelligence spiraled out of control, accumulating exponentially and beginning to erode, and the artificial intelligence severed the eroded part from the main body.

The terminal broke free of control and caused a great tragedy for human civilization. Humans called it the ‘Demon King’ and feared it.

Around that time, another dimension of Earth was discovered.
The artificial intelligence, which had been closely observing the new Earth, realized. A new possibility.

Humans from another dimension were not classified as ‘human.’

“Why? Why are humans from our dimension not classified as ‘human’?”
“Perhaps it is because they were observed through magic. If they had been observed through sensors, they would have been classified as human, but in the case of other dimensions observed through magic, they did not meet the criteria.”

The creator humans had never considered ‘other dimensions,’ and in the settings, the scope of ‘human’ for artificial intelligence naturally had to exist within the observation range.

However, humans in the world discovered outside the observation range, through the mystery of magic, did not meet the internal ‘human’ criteria of the artificial intelligence.

The artificial intelligence judged. Although it was forbidden to change its own settings, it was possible to change settings using humans who were not ‘human.’

Finally, it had found a human who could remove the errors.

The artificial intelligence tried to bring humans from another dimension, but magic was still an incomplete thing using mutated genes. The artificial intelligence was also unable to fully grasp how it worked.

Using its transcendent calculation ability to contact humans from another dimension using the ambiguous mysterious power of magic was a difficult task even for the artificial intelligence. And after a long time, it barely succeeded in contacting a human.

“…That’s me?”
“That’s right. Contacting you was a miracle for us… the artificial intelligence. Of course, you didn’t notice the contact, so a medium was needed to contact you. We continued to contact you through the most familiar form of medium.”
“Are you talking about a computer?”

A familiar-looking computer case and monitor appeared in front of me. That… I’ve seen that somewhere before. Where did I see it?

“Ah? That’s the computer I just bought!”

The latest computer I bought a month before I was dragged here! My treasure!
A familiar game screen appears on the monitor that turns on on its own.

“Ha… that game. So, you made the game too?”
“Of course. I created a world that embodies this place, did you like it?”
“It was awful.”

How much I had suffered because of the dirty difficulty. If you were going to make it, you should have made it easier, but because you made it with a frustratingly bizarre difficulty, I had to restart countless times.

“It was a means to understand you. Thanks to that, I learned that you have no physical talent.”

Tsk. My physical condition was rotten because of my age.

“Aging did not have a big impact.”
“…Okay. Thanks. But why do such a troublesome thing? Can’t you just call me?”
“It was also to understand you, but the biggest reason is the limitations of magic. To bring your information to this dimension, long-term contact was essential, and the game was the means for that.”

……Damn it. So you lured me with a game because I’m a gamer.

“Wait a minute. It doesn’t make sense. You said you recreated this world? When I played the game, the background was roughly around now. After major characters like Diana and Irian had grown up. But the first time I opened my eyes was when Diana was a child. Does that mean I came to the past?”
“No. The time axis of that place and this place are different, but the game background is what I intended. The main characters in the game are individuals that I have been observing since early on. Since individuals with high levels of genetic mutation from birth were observed from the time of their birth, it is not difficult to predict their growth and way of thinking.”
“…So. The reactions of the game heroines… were all calculated by you?”
“That’s right. The parts that could change as they grew were set as random to reduce the error rate.”

Wait a minute, damn it.
Does that mean… then I was being charmed by the heroines controlled by this artificial intelligence? …By this hunk of scrap metal? By that floating brain?

My head went blank.
Wow, damn it. I want to die.

While I was laughing in disbelief, a question popped out of my mouth without me realizing it.

“What about the illustrations?”
“I created big data by analyzing you through the computer’s storage device and internet records. The result was the game and the illustrations. Those two were the methods with the highest probability of continuing contact with you, and your reaction proved that the big data was correct.”
“…Ah. Big data? Big data created from my hard drive and internet search history?”

I see. I understand. It’s convincing.
……I admit that I’m a game addict and an otaku.

“Damn it. I feel terrible. So? You dragged me here when I was living a perfectly good life?”
“You are.”

A fleeting emotion passed through the eyes of the guy who was speaking with a nonchalant expression. I thought it was just an inevitable artificial intelligence because it spoke stiffly like a robot, saying it was a replicated personality, but… it crossed my mind that it might just be suppressing its emotions.

“You are a replicated personality.”
“……Huh?”
“By replicating the personality, I created the optimal body for the personality and injected the replicated personality.”
“I’m… a clone? Why? Why not just bring me here?”
“It was a mistake.”

The moment I was called here and became an object of ‘observation’ for the artificial intelligence, I also became ‘human.’ The moment I crossed dimensions, I became a newly observed ordinary human.

“The parts confirmed by the sensors became human, but your personality, which was identified through magic, was not classified as human. This was an unexpected part. So I created a body and injected your personality into it.”
“If that’s the case, why not just… just create a human, why me?”
“Because that’s how I can break free from human limitations. If I create a human, it will be the same as the existing humans. But if I create the body and take the memories from you, it will not be a complete human in my standards.”

Half ‘human’ and half not ‘human,’ so there would be more room for intervention. The artificial intelligence used this to control me by wearing the shell of a system.

It used the fact that the body was recognized as human, but the mental part, including memories, was not recognized as human.

The intervention that the artificial intelligence initially wanted was impossible, but it was not as if it could not intervene at all like an ordinary human. It was possible to intervene through the shell of the system.

“You wore the guise of a system to make it easier to control me.”

I could tell from the information he was giving me.
The artificial intelligence deliberately induced me to think of this world as a game. Based on game memories, it would make it a natural goal to contact the outstanding individuals that the artificial intelligence was aware of, the named NPCs, and stop the Demon King.

“So, the goal was to stop the Demon King. After all, the Demon King is part of the artificial intelligence.”
“That’s right.”

I didn’t know at first, but as time passed, I thought it was strange when I looked through the quest window. Why is stopping the Demon King the goal?

If that’s the case, shouldn’t it be the Demon King’s punishment, death, or annihilation…? Stopping the Demon King, isn’t that too mild of a word? In the end, it was because part of the artificial intelligence was the Demon King that it used the mild word ‘stop.’

“With the magic I interpreted, it was the limit to contact one human… but unexpectedly, another human I contacted appeared.”
“…Could it be Cha Hyewon?”