Eight

The window in the room rattled noisily as the wind battered it from outside. The curtains were swept up and dropped again by the gusts. It was already three in the morning when Xiao Ai was awakened by the commotion at the window. Thirsty after waking, she got up to close the window securely and then headed to the living room for some water.

As she reached the main hall, she heard another faintly chaotic noise. After taking a sip of water, she assumed it was just the sound of the wind and thought of returning to bed. But as she passed the corridor, she realized the sounds were coming from the room at the very end. Could it be a rat? It didn’t sound quite right.

Xiao Ai was drawn by a powerful curiosity. She moved slowly down the corridor toward the room near the end. Darkness filled the space with a mysterious, chilling sensation. Was it a rat? Or perhaps the window in that room was also left open? No, those weren’t the sounds a rat would make. Instead, they were human voices.

She pressed her ear to the door, listening intently to the activity inside. She could vaguely hear the clatter of scattered objects falling. Intermittently, voices—a man and a woman—floated through the door, muffled yet distinct.

The woman said, “I’ve made sweet millet porridge—you love it the most. Let’s have this for dinner tonight.”

The man replied, “Wow, sweet millet porridge! I love it! Yes, let’s have that!”

After a while, there was the sound of utensils clinking, then, a little later, a heavy thud as if something substantial had fallen. After another long pause, there was another similar thud...

The woman’s voice was strangely familiar. Xiao Ai carefully opened the door a crack—it turned out the lock wasn’t broken after all. She peered through the gap, but seeing nothing, she simply pushed the door open and entered. The room was so dark she couldn’t see a thing, but the voices were definitely coming from within. She groped her way forward in the darkness, searching for a light switch on the wall. When her fingers finally found it, she flicked it on, but nothing happened—the light was broken. She pressed on, perplexed by how much larger the room seemed than she remembered. She must have walked several meters and still hadn’t reached the end, and the source of the voices seemed even farther away.

At last, she caught sight of a faint glimmer—a tiny, distant light at the far corner. Why was the room so vast? It felt over a hundred square meters, at least ten meters to the end, and even a corner to turn...

She followed the light to the corner, where a decrepit, dilapidated space appeared before her—yellowed and dim, the walls no longer a pristine white but stained gray and old, iron bars on the window rusted, the floor covered in worn tiles, a shabby dining table and faded wooden chairs.

On the table sat a pot of what seemed to be porridge—likely the sweet millet porridge she’d heard about. Xiao Ai speculated—

Two people, a man and a woman, lay collapsed on the ground. The dim light obscured their faces. Xiao Ai knelt beside the woman, gently turning her over. What she saw startled her—the woman’s mouth was foaming...

Should she call the police? An ambulance? She needed to get Xian Xiaoya to help! But as she leaned in for a closer look, she discovered—

Terror-stricken, Xiao Ai jumped to her feet and fled the ruined space. She had wanted to call for Xian Xiaoya, but...

She hurried back to the corridor, carefully closing the door behind her, her anxiety mounting. After a moment’s hesitation, unable to explain what she’d seen, she quickly made her way to Xian Xiaoya’s room. When she arrived, she found Xian Xiaoya sleeping peacefully in bed. Xiao Ai was stunned—how could this be explained? She hadn’t imagined things; she had truly seen it...

That night, Xiao Ai tossed and turned, unable to sleep. Xian Xiaoya had said that the room with the broken lock was strange, and that there was another Xian Xiaoya inside—the voice she’d heard, the woman lying on the floor. She couldn't have mistaken it! Was she dreaming? Had she only thought she’d woken up to get water? Or... perhaps none of it was real...

Near dawn, Xiao Ai finally drifted into a light sleep. Early in the morning, Xian Xiaoya called her for breakfast. Xiao Ai was still groggy when Xian Xiaoya entered her room. As she opened her eyes, the image of Xian Xiaoya before her overlapped with the figure she'd seen in that room, jolting her fully awake. Xian Xiaoya was startled by her reaction.

“What’s wrong?”

“...Nothing. I think I just woke from a nightmare.”

“As long as you’re alright. Come, breakfast is ready. Hurry!” Xian Xiaoya smiled at her.

At breakfast, Xiao Ai picked at her food, distracted. She glanced at the room at the end of the corridor, then looked again at Xian Xiaoya.

“That... the lock on that room doesn’t seem broken,” she ventured.

Xian Xiaoya paused, looking at Xiao Ai in puzzlement.

“Really, I opened it last night,” Xiao Ai insisted.

“How could that be?” Xian Xiaoya left the table and walked toward the room.

The door was shut. She tried the handle repeatedly, but it wouldn’t budge.

Xiao Ai followed and tried as well, but it wouldn’t open. She looked at Xian Xiaoya, her gaze full of confusion.

“See? It’s broken. Won’t turn,” Xian Xiaoya said.

“But I really opened it. What’s going on?” Xiao Ai muttered to herself.

“Maybe you were dreaming. Didn’t you just say you had a nightmare?” Xian Xiaoya returned to the table.

“How is this possible?” Xiao Ai murmured, watching Xian Xiaoya’s retreating back with suspicion. Was she sleepwalking?

October 25, 2020.

SNS Research Center—9:29 AM

“What’s wrong with the system?” Huo Lun demanded of the programmer.

The programmer looked troubled. The system itself had never malfunctioned, but previous tests had been rushed, and its stability was still unknown. If the doctor hadn’t insisted on linking up immediately, these data issues wouldn’t have arisen. Although the deviation was slight—one in ten thousand—the system became extremely unstable from the outset.

“Just say it. Don’t beat around the bush,” Huo Lun snapped. He had no patience for trivial issues and wouldn’t waste precious time waiting for perfect stability. Time was running out. Every second counted.

“The deviation is still minor for now, but it could cause much greater instability after connection. If a one-in-ten-thousand shift occurs during the process, they will…” The programmer had feared this would happen before launching the connection program.

“I know what you mean. It was never possible to save both—only one life could be preserved. That’s why we use the replacement program, because only one can survive,” Huo Lun said quietly. This experimental project had begun years ago, but his mentor had terminated it. Huo Lun had never let go of the research. He longed to explore this field, and now was the perfect opportunity. Even if his mentor had ended it, he could realize the dream himself—for Aiwen.

Yet the issue touched on profound ethics. They were walking the knife’s edge as they initiated the program. But if they succeeded... they would revolutionize the science of human consciousness.

“Focus on monitoring their consciousness. Leave everything else aside for now,” Huo Lun ordered.

“Understood.” The programmer reluctantly complied. In a few minutes, the data deviation would grow worse, but there was no turning back once the program had begun.