As an experienced Immortal Cultivator, Heiye Ming had thought that he had seen the cruelest and evilest things in the universe. His belief had long been hardened, and he would not show any mercy to the inferior species such as the "hominoids".
However, after hearing Lu Qingchen's arrangement for the hominoids, the old Immortal Cultivator could not help but shiver in the deepest part of his heart. "Virtual partners, virtual offspring, virtual life … Is there nothing real for those … 'people' at all?"
"It is their own choice," Lu Qingchen said.
"You can't have your cake and eat it too," Lu Qingchen said. "When you choose an easy and easy life, you have to pay a small price.
"Since they will never realize that the world they are in is virtual, what's the difference between real and fake?
"If they are capable of discovering the falsehood and weirdness of the world, and if they prove that they are qualified to live in the real world through all the tests, they will naturally get a real partner, a real offspring, and a real life.
"It is a free choice. It is a fair trade. It is a matter of whether you choose the fish or the bear's paw. Don't be so greedy, General Ming.
"Of course, it is indeed a very cruel approach to cut off a person's bloodline by brute force. Besides, the mysteries of genes are infinite. Even the seemingly garbage bloodline does not necessarily contain certain interesting possibilities of evolution. Therefore, we will try to keep the seeds of every human being and preserve them carefully. When the resources are abundant, we will breed the seeds artificially as the new members of the Spiriters' Realm.
"In such a way, the survival flexibility of the civilization of mankind will be significantly improved. In the age of harsh environments and resource scarcity, we will be able to close most of the Spiriters' Realms and reduce the consumption of computational ability and resources by more than 90%, leaving only the enormous' seed bank of human beings' and part of the elites to continue fighting in the real world.
"When we discover a new world that is full of spiritual energy, or when we grasp a new way to make use of energy, we will enter an age of abundant resources. Hundreds of Spiriters' Realms will be quickly unfolded and everybody in the 'seed bank' will be hatched, starting a new round of screening and evolution.
"Think about it. Won't such a civilization of mankind's ability to resist crises be even stronger?"
Heiye Ming pondered for a moment. "However, the newly-hatched children do not have a father or a mother. Their parents were all 'closed' by you in the last period of resource shortage!"
"It's a small problem. It's easy to solve."
Lu Qingchen smiled. "Since offspring can be virtual, parents can naturally be virtual, too. We will keep the database and action patterns of their parents and slightly optimize the algorithms to become more perfect nurturers. We will ensure that the new generation of human beings develops in the direction of positivity, optimism, and perseverance in general and accelerate the evolution of the entire civilization!
The solution stunned Heiye Ming for a long time. He asked again, "How can the resource problem in reality be resolved? Although the hominoids were lowly, stupid, greedy, and lazy, they were still capable of doing most of the heavy work under the careful modification of the Imperium. Construction, mining, herding, and even the battles in the frontline required a lot of hominoids.
"If the civilization of mankind is a big ship that is sailing in the sea of stars bravely, the Immortal Cultivators will be the captain, helmsman, and sailors of the ship, and the hominoids will be the materials that are burning furiously in the engine compartment. Although the captain and the sailors are important, they cannot do without fuel.
"However, in your 'perfect kingdom', you have exiled all the hominoids to the virtual world. Then, who should finish the fundamental work in reality? Are you going to ask the carefully selected elites to mine and serve as cannon fodder? "
"With fully automatic machines," Lu Qingchen said.
"By 'machines', I am not just referring to the products of metals and crystals such as spiritual puppets, mining spiders, and Grand Illusionary Soldiers, but also the highly-controllable demon beasts and the cyborgs that are modified based on the fleshly body of human beings by activating the primeval cells and strengthening the genes.
"Both the spiritual puppets and the cyborgs are stronger, smarter, and more loyal. They are always diligent and hardworking. There is absolutely no sign of slacking or hesitation.
"Most importantly of all, there are no ethical and moral issues involved here. However we exploit and savage them, they are not 'evil' at all. Even though they look similar to human beings, what is stored inside their brains is not a real soul but just artificial intelligence. We call them 'Deviant Spirits', just like the artificial intelligence that serves the inferior bloodlines in the virtual world."
"That's impossible!"
Heiye Ming blurted out. "Artificial intelligence can't be developed to such a level. It is just an assistant. Also, the cost is too high. That's why we have to employ so many wretched hominoids!"
"That's just the Imperium's opinion, because you took the wrong path from the very beginning," Lu Qingchen said.
"It is exactly because you despise ordinary people since the very beginning and consider more than 99% of the population to be 'hominoids' that you seem to have infinite, cheap human resources that you can exploit blatantly. Naturally, you do not focus on developing the technologies in the fields of artificial intelligence and mechanical automation.
"It is a vicious cycle. The less you pay attention to the development of artificial intelligence and automation, the higher the cost of spiritual puppets and cyborgs will be, and the more you will be forced to exploit the 'hominoids' cruelly.
"Also, after you devote tremendous resources to exploiting the hominoids and form a whole set of social customs, business models, laws, and systems, fewer and fewer people will study artificial intelligence and automation.
"After a thousand years of accumulation, it is impossible to change anything with the forces within the Imperium. The Grand Illusionary Soldiers are already your limit. You do not have the need to develop more advanced artificial intelligence.
"But the Xing Yao Federation is different. We do not have so many hominoids to oppress, and we boast crystal processor technology that is on par with the Imperium's. Therefore, we have been walking on the path of artificial intelligence and automation since the very beginning.
"According to our deduction, as long as the resources of the entire civilization are devoted to the studies in the field, in a thousand years at most, most of the basic jobs that have standard procedures and are highly repetitive can be completed by spiritual puppets and cyborgs. The few jobs that cannot be completed can also be remotely controlled with telepathic thoughts!"
Watching the black jellyfish swallow his chest and throat and slowly crawl to his head, Heiye Ming could not help but moan, "What kind of world is that?"
"A perfect world!"
Lu Qingchen's voice was more and more persuasive. "Most of the mediocre, ordinary, cowardly, and lazy people can enjoy their life as much as they want in the virtual world. They consider their life to be a game where the 'newbie mode' and the 'cheat' have been turned on. Nobody will savor or exploit them. They are free to slack off and even do whatever they want!
"Those who are ambitious, have strong minds, believe in free will, and crave to be 'really alive' will train crazily in the cruel 'test battlefields', improve themselves, and prove themselves. Eventually, they will be granted one or more of the strongest bodies as the 'shells' for their arrival in reality!
"The elites of the civilization of mankind, the 'real living people', will be engaged in the cutting-edge studies, the most creative artistic work, the most arduous battles, and the most mysterious voyages!
"In the meantime, tremendous cyborgs, controllable demon beasts, and spiritual puppets will be scattered in every corner of the vast territory of the civilization of mankind to complete the heavy and dangerous fundamental work. Just like General Ming said, they will provide enough 'fuel' for the great strides of the civilization of mankind!
"Look. In such a world, the efficient utilization of resources of the Immortal Cultivators and the humanitarianism of the Cultivators are perfectly combined. This is the future!"
Heiye Ming breathed heavily and made his last struggle. "I — I still don't believe it! I don't believe in perpetual motion machines. I don't believe that the so-called future will be so perfect, either!
"Don't think that I don't know that virtual worlds have costs, too. Creating a virtual world and maintaining an enormous database require countless crystal processors of a super large scale. Don't the production, maintenance, and upgrade of the crystal processors consume resources?
"If what you said is true, the scale of the crystal processors to create a virtual world that is large enough to accommodate most of the human beings will be unimaginably huge! Regardless of how it was technically implemented, just the operating cost per second was an astronomical figure!
"Expending an astronomical amount of resources just to let a bunch of trash lead a drunken life? How can there be such a good deal? "
After hearing that, there was a brief silence in the deep ocean before Lu Qingchen's laughter echoed again.
"You have a point, General Ming. Perhaps I should apologize to them for my arbitrary judgment just now. Fundamentally speaking, there is no such thing as trash or garbage. Even the most despicable human beings have an incomparably powerful strength in the depths of their souls — that is, their emotions.
"The feelings of human beings have been suppressed for too long, to the point that we are gradually losing their strength. But as long as the seal deep inside the soul is completely broken, everybody will be able to spurt out the most abundant energy!
"Not only can the energy support the functioning of their brains and reproductive systems, it can also be supplied to the crystal processors and the Spiritual Nexus incessantly to maintain the operation and upgrade of the entire enormous system. There is even surplus energy that the elites in the real world can absorb and make them even stronger!"
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