At night, the elfins fell asleep one after another, but Pi was still sitting in front of the computer.
It was quiet outside, except for the occasional sound of fireworks and firecrackers, which sounded very far away.
Pi took off its pince-nez and rubbed its bloodshot eyes. It was very sleepy, but it couldn't fall asleep. It hadn't rested well for the past few days. As soon as it lay down and closed its eyes, the ever-increasing number of favorites and the words in Word would appear in front of its eyes. It was both excited and anxious. Its mood was very complicated, and it couldn't sleep. It was like a spring that was getting tighter and tighter, not knowing when it would break.
It put a full stop to the chapter it had just finished, moved its fingers a few times, and glanced at the time in the lower right corner of the computer screen. It couldn't remember how many times it had looked at the time tonight.
It was almost midnight, and the message from the editor was that it would charge for publishing after midnight. It was like waiting for the judge's verdict, anxiously waiting for the arrival of that time.
In addition to looking at the time, the most frequent thing it did was to refresh the author's platform. The number of favorites was approaching the 50,000 mark. But it didn't dare to click the mouse too often, because the crisp clicking sound might disturb the rest of the elfins.
The chapters that were to be uploaded after midnight were ready. There were a total of five chapters, which Pi had rushed out in the past few days. During the day, Zhang Zian had helped it check them several times, so there shouldn't be any problems. But Pi was still repeatedly reviewing the five chapters, wondering if it had used the right rhetorical method, and if it could be changed to a more appropriate way of expressing it.
Maybe it should hurry up and continue writing new chapters, but the closer it got to midnight, the more confused it became. It couldn't concentrate on writing at all.
After reading a chapter a few times, it felt that there was a sense of disconnection between a certain paragraph and the following paragraph. It would be better to add a sentence so that the plot could pass more smoothly. So it put on its pince-nez again, put its finger on the keyboard, and gently typed a line of words. However, this line of words was mixed with something that annoyed it. It was the very long string of 3.1415926...
Since the last upgrade, it had rarely typed this string of numbers, but on this crucial night, this inexplicable string of numbers appeared again like a nightmare.
After it moved the cursor to the number, it pressed the backspace key, deleted the string of numbers, and clicked save to avoid losing it.
Speaking of which, when it had first started typing in Word, it had made the mistake of exiting without saving. A manuscript of thousands of words had vanished into thin air. At that time, it had been so angry that it had wanted to stop writing. After Zhang Zian's repeated persuasion, it had suppressed its impatience and started typing again.
Actually, the feeling of typing a few thousand words again wasn't as bad as he had imagined. It didn't take long, either, because the most time-consuming part of writing a novel was thinking about the plot, not typing.
After the number was deleted, it looked at the clean and tidy document and smiled.
That's good.
That's right, that's good.
Zhang Zian didn't like that string of inexplicable numbers. The reader didn't like it, and it didn't like it either. So, let the string of numbers disappear. There was no point in its existence, and it shouldn't exist.
After deleting the string of numbers, in this quiet and cold night, its heart suddenly became empty, as if it had lost something very important.
It lowered its head and stared at its palm.
Why?
Why did he type that string of numbers involuntarily? Couldn't he be like a real human and only type what he wanted to type?
It vaguely remembered that when it first appeared in this world, it was in the big house filled with all kinds of books. However, at that time, it wasn't interested in books. Instead, its eyes were firmly attracted by the computer on the table — to be precise, it was firmly attracted by the computer keyboard.
How attractive was the computer keyboard to it? It couldn't help but reach out and press the soft keys. From its fingertips, it felt very familiar, as if it had done this countless times before.
At first, there were only one or two people around. They sat in front of the computer and quickly typed on the keyboard with great joy.
It tried to wave its hand in front of their eyes, but they didn't respond. They couldn't see it.
So, it stood behind them, watching how they started the computer, how they entered the chat room, how they communicated with others … Then, it found an empty computer in the corner and did the same thing.
It could learn most things pretty quickly, but it couldn't imitate the way they moved their fingers so quickly.
Moreover, the way these humans typed was significantly different — they mainly pressed the main keyboard area of the keyboard, while it pressed the number area of the keyboard.
Compared to the main keyboard area, which had 26 English letters and 21 symbol keys, the number area was much simpler. There were only 10 number keys and one decimal point key.
It vaguely remembered that it seemed to have its own kind, many of its kind, countless of its kind, countless of its kind, countless of its kind who liked to press on the keyboard. Each of its kind was holding a keyboard and typing. But these kind of people were like humans, they liked to press the main keyboard area, or press randomly on the keyboard, instead of like it liked to press on the number area.
Among its kind, it was undoubtedly an anomaly.
Why did it and not its kind appear in this world?
It didn't know. Maybe something was wrong. After all … It looked around. The vast number of books were all written in letters or square characters. None of the books were written in numbers.
Although its kind were typing randomly, sometimes they could coincidentally type some meaningful words, and they were ecstatic about it, as if they had done something amazing.
Regarding this, it didn't have the right to criticize them, because it was also typing randomly, just in the number area. But numbers were still numbers, no matter how much it typed, it couldn't type any meaningful words. Even typing letters was an unrealistic extravagant hope.
So, they should be more qualified to appear in this world than it was.
If it imitated its kind, it might be able to coincidentally type one or two meaningful words one day in the future, one or two meaningful short sentences thousands of years later, one or two meaningful articles hundreds of millions of years later …
In the original space, time seemed to stand still. It and its kind had an almost infinite lifespan, as if they could fight forever. They didn't know when they appeared in that space, and why they appeared. Anyway, since they appeared, they had been typing non-stop.
But what was the point?
Everything was just a "coincidence." They didn't know what they were typing, and they didn't know what they wanted to type.
What was even more sad was that it had been typing, and the possibility of "coincidence" was zero.
Why would it replace the countless others of its kind in this strange and dazzling world?
It and its kind didn't know when they appeared in this space, but they vaguely knew when they could leave — when they could type a meaningful novel.
This was undoubtedly a fantasy. Even if it used time to pile up, the probability of "coincidentally" typing a meaningful novel was close to zero, and it might not even succeed on the day of the end of the universe.
However, it had succeeded. It had succeeded in an inexplicable manner, appearing in this world without any preparation.
According to its old habits, it randomly typed in the number area of the computer keyboard and typed a long string of numbers. The second digit from the beginning was the decimal point, and the total number was 100 digits. In fact, it didn't know what the meaning of the string of numbers it typed was.
Obviously, the people in the library didn't know either. They thought that someone was playing a prank and deliberately messing with them.
At first, it was quite happy, but soon it became anxious because it found that it could only type 100 digits. It seemed to have forgotten the rest of the numbers.
That's not right. In the space, it could type infinitely. Why did it forget after coming to this world?
It was very confused.
Anxious and confused, it suddenly felt very uncomfortable and weak. It seemed to see countless of its kind staring at it with jealousy, as if saying, "Why you?"
Huge resentment, the gathering of resentment from countless of its kind, covered it across time and space, and weighed heavily on it.
Just like the belief of human beings could create and kill elves, the resentment from countless of its kind was like a black hole with a strong gravitational force, which could suck it back to the original space at any time.
In the darkness, it seemed to hear someone talking — not from a human, but from some supreme existence.
"Find the book about life, the universe, and everything, or you will return to the original space." — Someone said in the darkness, the voice was like the morning bell and evening drum, as if it could shake the entire universe.
It didn't want to go back. Once it went back, it was afraid that it would be torn into pieces by its kind full of resentment. Later, it learned a saying that could explain this mentality — don't worry about scarcity, but worry about inequality. If everyone else was the denominator, why should you be the numerator?
So it tried to ask the people around it to help it find the book, but they couldn't see it, couldn't hear it, and didn't take it seriously. And it couldn't understand the words they typed.
Just when it was about to give up, Zhang Zian appeared.
It could never forget the look of Zhang Zian holding the nameless book high in front of it. No matter how other people looked at it, it thought that he was really handsome.
Pi moved its eyes from its palm to the nameless book placed next to the laptop.
It reached out its fingers and gently touched the hard cover of the nameless book.
On the scarlet cover, except for the circle of metal around it, there were no words or pictures. It was bare and not very beautiful.
For the first time, it had a similar thought — if there were words or pictures on the cover, it would be great.
Just then, a hand, a human hand, pressed down on his hand.
It raised its head and saw that Zhang Zian was standing behind it, looking at it silently.
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