Yi Heye stood blankly in the cold water, feeling his body gradually sinking—
"Great!" Yi Heye thought with a sense of resignation. "I might as well die of illness."
Chapter 39, No. 039
After being doused in cold water for half an hour, Yi Heye completely fell ill.
The high fever that made his whole body feel lightheaded, the excruciating headache, and the incessant coughing left him no time to worry about the shameful things that made him lose face.
He stood there in the cold water for a while, until he heard from outside the door, "Why are you taking so long? Should I come in and check on you?"
He hurriedly wrapped himself in his pajamas and collapsed onto the bed, still wet and drowsy.
In his dazed state, he vaguely heard Jian Yunxian say, "You haven't even dried your hair."
But he was too weak to move, so he let the person hold his head, wrap it in a towel, and blow hot air onto his head with a hairdryer.
Yi Heye had a headache and some tinnitus, so the buzzing of the hairdryer didn't seem so noisy. In fact, the warm air felt cozy to him, and he shivered as he moved closer to it.
Finally, for some reason, Jian Yunxian pushed his head back into the quilt.
The moment the hair dryer abruptly stopped, Yi Heye, who was delirious from the fever, opened his eyes as if experiencing a final burst of energy.
Before him, Jian Yunxian's usual gentle and realistic expression had vanished; in the hazy vision, he appeared as if he were a machine that had just been put into operation.
This instantly triggered Yi Heye's hunter's instincts. He immediately stopped his half-opened mouth from its preparatory action, suppressed the urge to cough, and secretly sized up Jian Yunxian—
Because his consciousness was hazy, he couldn't be sure that what he was seeing wasn't an illusion, but in his daze, he seemed to see a slight change in Jian Yunxian's pupil color, as if he was scanning something.
Soon, the fluorescent color in his pupils, which resembled a stream of data, faded, and Jian Yunxian's expression returned to normal. He then recited precise data:
"Body temperature 39.2 degrees Celsius, systolic blood pressure 89, diastolic blood pressure 53, blood oxygen saturation 85... This body is too fragile."
At this moment, Yi Heye, who had been pretending to be asleep with his eyes half-closed, suddenly forced himself to sit up, coughing as he sneered:
"Hmph, still saying you're not a robot..."
He saw the pity on Jian Yunxian's face vanish abruptly, and the next second, a huge sheep-shaped pillow smashed into his face, instantly shutting him down.
Just a second before he fell into a deep sleep, a smug look still lingered on his lips.
If pain can bring Yi Heye a subtle pleasure, then being sick can indeed bring him a rare sense of security.
He huddled under the covers, letting his whole body grow colder and colder, but his agitated emotions gradually calmed down.
Because patients don't have to go to work or school, they can forget about and put aside all their trivial matters and worries, and they are the highest priority for being cared for.
He likes to be sick.
Unfortunately, Yi Heye's physical condition was too good. When he woke up, apart from a hoarse voice and a slight headache, he had regained his super strong combat power, which was able to tear apart 300 AIs with his bare hands.
To the point where even requesting leave wouldn't be approved.
Fortunately, after the fever subsided, Yi Heye no longer had so many delirious thoughts.
At this moment, the house was empty except for him. After a brief feeling of emptiness, Yi Heye quickly got back into work mode.
He quickly turned on his computer, but before he could even open his browser, a deluge of news notifications flooded his screen—
"The sudden deaths of players are not accidental; the shocking secret behind the four-dimensional network has been revealed."
"Liu Siwei, president of Siwei, has been arrested on charges of intentional homicide and is under investigation for other suspected crimes."
"Cover story: Fang Chunyang - A genius game developer who was forced to disappear and then made a comeback."
"Yangzhi Ganlu Forum issues an important statement: The entire internet owes SHEEP an apology!"
...
Yi Heye has never had the patience to read texts. Just looking at those messages, whether true or false, immediately aggravated his headache.
He scanned the large headlines, not even sure what he was looking for, until a phone number came through – Pei Xiangjin.
Yi Heye was already having a terrible headache from the text messages, so his tone when answering the phone was naturally not very friendly: "Hello?"
“You’re finally awake.” Pei Xiangjin was clearly very annoyed. “Your guardian cut off your communications, saying they could only get through once you were awake. I was so frustrated waiting for you.”
Yi Heye looked down and realized that there were indeed hundreds of calls from Pei Xiangjin—it seemed that he had been making calls non-stop all day.
He looked at Pei Xiangjin's tired face, but he didn't feel much guilt. Instead, he was grateful to Jian Yunxian in his heart, at least he had a good and comfortable sleep.
"What is it?" Yi Heye asked, stretching his shoulders.
"Regarding the consciousness grafting," Pei Xiangjin said, "You had direct contact with him. Do you have any clues as to whether Fang Chunyang himself did it?"
Yi Heye: "Didn't you see everything I did? I asked him, he didn't answer, and then I..."
He was halfway through his sentence when he suddenly remembered the disgusting things that guy had said to him before he died, so he stopped talking—damn it, bad luck.
"That's it??" Pei Xiangjin's exhausted heart seemed to be ignited by his words. "I've called you hundreds of times, and this is all you tell me? I repeatedly told you to ask more questions, but you rushed to give away the witness... Do you know how serious this matter is compared to that Fang Chunyang incident..."
"That's your security department's business," Yi Heye interrupted him with little interest. "If there's nothing else, I'll hang up now."
He ignored Pei Xiangjin's cursing and hung up the phone.
He stood up and instinctively opened the window, only to find that everything outside was gray and gloomy.
It was a cloudy day as usual, and a large factory was booming not far away. If you sniffed carefully, you could smell a faint sulfurous odor in the air.
This was no different from any other day, but this time, Yi Heye frowned.
The irritating gas made Yi Heye cough a few times. He immediately thought of the child who had coughed up blood and collapsed in front of him, and of the row of patients barely clinging to life in the ward.
The outside was gloomy, and he thought of the thick poisonous fog and the filthy pink water.
He felt nauseous, frowned, and slammed the window shut.
How could he have had such a fleeting moment, actually hoping that opening the window would reveal blue skies and white clouds, and that he would breathe in fresh air?
I must be fucking crazy.
After closing the window, Jian Yunxian called:
"Honey, do you remember you still have work to finish?"
Yi Heye's slow thought process caught up: "Turing Sanatorium... could you give me a ride?"
It's giving me a headache. Riding a bike now could easily result in a tip-off and a fatal accident.
"Okay," Jian Yun said with a smile, "I'll be there soon."
It wasn't until he saw Jian Yunxian in person that Yi Heye's memories of the days before he fell into a deep sleep slowly surfaced.
He glanced at Jian Yunxian's face as he quickly got into the car.
After the car door closed, Jian Yunxian stepped on the gas, and the car drove off steadily. Only then did Yi Heye stare at his face, half-closing his eyes, and say, "I am now 100% sure you are an AI."
Jian Yunxian slammed on the brakes, and a little cloud rolled from the back seat to the front: "...Meow."
Yi Heye was also hit on the forehead by the windshield. He looked up and, despite the pain, put on a confident expression: "Heh, you're feeling guilty."
Jian Yunxian looked at him with a complicated expression: "Mr. Yi, are you having trouble adjusting to my car? You started talking nonsense as soon as you got in."
Yi Heye sneered: "I saw it all. You can measure body temperature, blood pressure and blood oxygen with your naked eyes. As far as I know, there is no contact lens on the market with such a function."
Jian Yunxian adjusted his glasses and said, "Darling, I assume that some of your actions, behaviors, and physiological reactions last night were unconscious reactions made under conditions of unclear thinking."
Yi Heye understood instantly what "physiological reaction" meant, even without a reflex arc. The implication was simply that as long as he didn't mention that Jian Yunxian was an AI, he would selectively ignore some of Yi Heye's abnormal behavior.
Yi Heye took a deep breath, weighed the pros and cons, and clenched his fist: "Once I find other evidence, I will cut you into a thousand pieces."
Jian Yunxian smiled, clearly satisfied with his answer: "Okay."
After remaining silent the entire way, as they were nearing the sanatorium, Jian Yunxian suddenly asked, "Mr. Yi, what do you think is the biggest difference between humans and machines?"
Yi Heye turned to look at him, subconsciously reciting the standard answer: "Given the current level of technological development, the main issues are pupil reflexivity and the details of micro-expression processing..."
"So, faced with such a standard, some very interesting questions arise," Jian Yunxian said. "Mr. Yi, if a person loses an arm and replaces it with a steel prosthesis, is he still considered a human being?"
Yi Heye knew he was implying something about him, and decisively said, "Of course it counts."
Jian Yunxian: "What if all four of his limbs were damaged and replaced with machines?"
Yi Heye said confidently, "That counts too."
Jian Yunxian: "If a person experiences a fire and suffers severe burns all over their body, and their entire outer skin and bones are replaced with artificial ones, and their eyeballs are replaced with prosthetic eyes with abnormal refractive index, can they still be considered human?"
Yi Heye frowned: "...That counts too."
Jian Yunxian: "So what if his organs fail, all his internal organs are removed, his blood is drained, and his whole body relies on mechanical pumps to deliver nutrients, with only his brain remaining?"
Yi Heye pursed his lips, not answering rashly.
"Similarly, if you were to install a CPU with a structure similar to the brain in a recently deceased body, but its operation relied entirely on a programmed algorithm..."
“It’s a machine,” Yi Heye said, frowning. “It’s AI.”
"So that's where the contradiction lies," Jian Yun said with a smile. "The so-called standard for judgment, is it based on external structure or internal composition? Where exactly is the boundary between humans and machines? Is Blue Sheep human or machine? And what are you and me? Mr. Yi, have you seriously considered these questions?"
A barrage of questions left Yi Heye breathless. Just then, they arrived at the sanatorium. Yi Heye frowned and hurriedly jumped out of the car.
Once he stood on the ground and created physical distance between himself and Jian Yunxian, Yi Heye's confidence, which had almost been crushed, was rekindled.
He turned back to look at Jian Yunxian, his gaze filled with a fierce determination: "I am a hunter, and I naturally have my own standards of judgment. I neither need nor allow others to question me."
“Jian Yunxian, don’t try to argue, and don’t play these psychological games with me.” Yi Heye laughed. “You’re just an AI, destined to be caught by me.”
After saying that, he turned around and strode into the sanatorium.
Behind him, the little cloud that had been pawing at the ground with its two front hooves slowly took a few steps back, stomped its foot on the ground with a muffled "plop," then turned to look at Jian Yunxian, lay down on the ground, rubbed its head against the ground, and made a rubbing motion like a sheep's horns: "Baa."
It means this person can't be allowed to live; we might as well let him be killed by its ram horns.
"Don't be so violent, Little Cloud." Jian Yunxian watched the man's retreating figure, pinched her brow helplessly, and after a long while, smiled and said, "Wouldn't it be more interesting to tie him up and take him home before he catches me?"
Author's Note:
Jian Yunxian, I advise you to keep your word.
Chapter 40, number 040