Legend of the Cyber Heroes
Chapter 384 - 28 There’s still a Sudden Enlightenment Bridge Section

Chapter 384: Chapter 28 There’s still a Sudden Enlightenment Bridge Section

"Hahahaha, my friend, so there’s yet another way to see it," said the "Eighth Martial God" personality. "If the real Eighth Martial God is considered a collaborative literary work, then what am I?"

"An annual Journey to the West themed movie." Xiang Shan tried hard to roll his eyes—within the range allowed by his Prosthetic Body. The prosthetic eye that Tao Enhai had given him was too powerful, making the eye itself too large, and rendering the subtle expressions typical of a natural eye quite difficult to achieve.

In Xiang Shan’s view, "Eight" was a virtual humanoid made up of dense mosaics of color. This was a skill Xiang Shan had mastered during the second year of his isolation. He could create a mosaic in his field of vision through a program and then his brain would automatically suggest to itself to connect it with the Eighth Martial God.

Sometimes "Eight" thought this behavior was pretty sick—or maybe it was the "Native Xiang Shan" who felt this way. After all, these two personalities were actually one and the same, sharing a complete set of neurons. This was essentially "talking to oneself" and "imagining nonexistent friends."

It sounded downright autistic.

But curiously, this autistic form of self-communication was the quickest way to access brain data.

Influenced by various old-time artistic works, this was the form Xiang Shan found easiest to imagine. For him, it was a form that merged intuition with cultural experience.

Cognitive science is a field profoundly counterintuitive to human thinking. On a macro scale, from individual behaviors to group tendencies, psychologists increasingly conclude through statistical data that human actions are regular and objectively real. However, inside the brain, neuroscience researchers helplessly admit that some neural responses truly "exist if believed, non-existent if not."

Although Xiang Shan himself found the idea of "talking to oneself in this way through personality split" eerie, he accepted it for the sake of efficiency.

Just now, Mr. Babbitt offered a completely different perspective that allowed him to see this "other self" in a brand new way.

"I... no, the Eighth Martial God who died at the hands of King Aqini, was crafted from the memories of those old friends, and her life, in turn, solidified into me," Eight said. "Actually, human memory itself is just like that."

"What?"

"The weight of different memories is inherently unequal," Eight explained. "If a person does the same job day after day, and you ask him about a specific task on a specific day, he might not remember at all. To him, every day is the same. When he looks back on his years, he only sees piles of dust, meaningless. But among this dust, the rare moments of joy, the novel experiences that aren’t repetitive, outweigh the multitude of repetitive memories."

"Like Gold Sand among the dust?"

"Like Gold Sand among the dust."

In the vision of "Native Xiang Shan," "Eight" sat atop Babbitt’s van, looking down at him and at the flying dust trailing behind the trailer.

But Xiang Shan knew this was merely a comforting illusion. They shared a pair of eyes. Eight couldn’t possibly detach from his perspective to see anything.

"Language... language," Eight mused. "Was it Kanhara or Inga who said it? It’s like a Magic Spell. It binds the invisible, intangible ’demons of concept.’ Once a concept is bound by language, its ambiguity and vagueness vanish. Ba couldn’t imagine the process of a ’fictional story’ just now. But as soon as the story of the ’Golden Rose’ was told to him, he instantly grasped what he already possessed. The ’devil’ that was already in his mind, the ’Binding Demons and Commanding Ghosts’ magic of language unleashed its power completely."

"Language is an ’intensification’ of concepts. Concepts are automatically filtered and summarized by the nervous system, but metaphysical abstract ideas and complex combinations of concepts require the involvement of language. Our distant ancestors used this format to turn their mysterious, uncertain world into something easier to understand—like outlining a watercolor painting."

Xiang Shan crossed his arms. "Are you saying, they used language to demystify the world?"

"I still remember those words Inga said. She mentioned how Cang Jie created writing, then the heavens rained millet, and ghosts wept at night; this myth hides an anthropological truth. Because the things shaped by script quickly killed those primitive animistic beliefs. Stronger organizational forces then burst forth."

"And then from the language and culture born abstract concepts of new gods acquired all the mystery, sacredness, allure..." Xiang Shan looked at the slowly moving stars in the sky, "followed by those new gods also being killed off by science."

"And then science itself became mythologized," Eight sighed. "’There has to be a Lich King’... huh?"

"We can’t have another Lich King, my other self. Humanity can’t afford to repeat the same mistakes." Native Xiang Shan said. "Back to language. I can sense that you have some new thoughts."

"If you define the ’me’ in your eyes as a distinct literary experience..." Eight muttered, "perhaps we can find a way from our cultural perspective to more closely integrate the Pseudo-personality Mask with the personality native to the Biological Brain."

In the network of neurons, "Self-Consciousness" is something that exists between ’existence’ and ’non-existence.’ It resides not in any particular neuron, but in the charged ions transported by neurons, like sparks.

"Is the flame on a candle a part of the candle?"

And "culture," this intangible thing, can realistically influence this flickering candle flame—like an invisible wind.

This is also why "Inner Strength," a product combining modern computer science, was created in a traditional, fantastical form.

"Tsk tsk, isn’t this the advantage of ’knowing a lot’?" Native Xiangshan marveled. "Nowadays, anything others say can trigger our inspiration for developing New Techniques..."

"We are really quite impressive now," Eight nodded proudly, "We are not just ’Xiang Shan.’ Our memories are not just ’the memories of Xiang Shan.’ Just as Xiang Shan himself wouldn’t have so much ’Gold Sand.’"

"But speaking of which, the practical implementation of this idea still falls on Brother Ba. Ba is a true literary worker, and there are decisive differences in thinking between him and us. If we want to optimize this Inner Strength training method based on cultural experience and literary activity, we need to interact more with him."

Native Xiang Shan gently nodded with a hand supporting his chin, "I just wanted to investigate the survival condition of the Broadcasting Client group, and yet I came across these unintended gains."

Xiang Shan closed his eyes, and then he opened them.

The two Xiang Shans merged into one again.

Xiang Shan said to Babbitt, "Ba, it’s a long journey, why don’t you kill some time and tell us about the story of the Martial God, huh?"