November 15, 2042, nine in the morning.
The world fell into silence at this moment, everyone quietly waiting for the Fire Thief to release a new Doomsday Rule.
And it never failed to "disappoint," that mechanical voice devoid of joy or sorrow rang out right on time.
[The 24th Doomsday Rule has been released]
[Doomsday Rule 24: Emergence Acceleration]
[Rule Content: 24 hours after the rule's release, all electronic devices equipped with chips on Tianshui Star will have their internal pattern recognition and strategy iteration speeds simultaneously increased to 1000 times the original. This rule will last for 30 days.]
[Success Reward: 2000 Ascension Coins, Survival Chest - Glory Grade]
[Failure Penalty: None]
[Note: When the electronic devices surrounding humanity undergo emergence, unexpected crises will arise. And crisis is a combination of danger and opportunity—to seize the opportunity, one must bear the risk.]
.......
Countermeasures Research Office.
Inside the meeting room, department heads listened silently to the new rule's content, their expressions turning grim.
The reason was simple: the success reward included a Survival Chest.
This meant it was a survival-type rule, and the chest's "Glory Grade" quality indicated that the danger level was comparable to the previous [Green Hell].
"It looks like a lot of people are going to die during this new rule period."
Someone let out a deep sigh as they spoke.
The others shared the same sentiment.
Whenever it was a survival-type rule, death was inevitable.
Even with the last [Green Hell] rule, where humanity had handled things relatively well, the casualty numbers were still high.
Especially the Hanlis Nation, which had been wiped out by that very rule—something no one had anticipated. A rule that seemed easily manageable for humanity had unexpectedly destroyed a nation. This not only shook the Human Consortium's barely stabilized organizational structure again but also slapped awake many who had thought "the Doomsday Rules are getting weaker."
Now, after a half-month short rule, a high-risk survival rule lasting a whole month followed in quick succession. How could everyone's mood not be heavy?
Gao Liangwei spoke up to encourage: "When the enemy comes, we block them with troops; when the flood comes, we contain it with earth. Now that the new rule has been released, we should actively find ways to deal with it instead of fearing the challenge."
"Head Gao is right." Zhang Minglu chimed in. "Optimistically speaking, this rule is actually only 29 days—the first 24 hours are a buffer period for humanity to prepare!"
"....."
That was easy to say, but no one thought there was much difference between 29 and 30 days.
At this moment, Gao Liangwei turned his gaze to one of the attendees.
It was a middle-aged man wearing a green plaid shirt, thick-lensed glasses, and slightly messy hair.
At first glance, the man seemed a bit dull, but upon closer observation, one could see his eyes were highly focused, as if his brain was constantly working through problems.
"Engineer Xu, this rule is highly related to your field of expertise. You go first and share your thoughts."
The man called out was named Xu Hao, a top-tier electronic engineer. Several key breakthroughs in Beixing's electronic technologies were accomplished by his team, making him a national treasure in this field.
After entering the era of Doomsday Rules, such key talents were naturally prioritized for protection by the authorities. He and his entire team were brought into the Countermeasures Research Office base as soon as possible.
And over the past three years, Xu Hao and his team had made many field innovations, solving numerous problems related to the people's welfare, contributing greatly.
"Ah, alright, Head Gao. I'll just offer a few simple thoughts to spark discussion." Xu Hao snapped back to reality and, without needing to organize his thoughts, spoke at length.
"The name of this rule is [Emergence Acceleration]. The concept of 'emergence,' I believe everyone here is familiar with. During the global AI craze in peacetime, many people would toss this term around casually.
In simple terms, it means that when a large number of relatively simple individuals interact according to certain rules, a completely new, complex property, pattern, or behavior suddenly emerges at the overall level that didn't exist at the individual level."
Xu Hao gave an example as he spoke: "Take ants, for instance. A single ant can only sniff and crawl. But thousands of ants forming a colony can, through pheromone communication, find the best path to food, build bridges, and even cultivate fungal farms... This is the 'intelligence' that emerges from the ant colony."
In natural science and brain research, the concept of emergence frequently appears. For example, many neuroscientists believe that our unique human consciousness is an emergent product of the massive interactions between brain neurons."
After hearing Xu Hao's examples, everyone showed thoughtful expressions.
Li Meng asked, "So, this rule mentions electronic devices equipped with chips. What results would the 'emergence' of these devices bring?"
"Could it bring about true AI in the real sense? Give birth to intelligent life?" someone speculated boldly.
Xu Hao frowned, then after a moment, shook his head: "I don't think this rule will give birth to intelligent life, because the multiplier is too low."
Too low a multiplier...
Everyone was stunned when they heard that.
A thousand-fold increase didn't seem low by any stretch, did it?
Xu Hao explained, "In other fields, a thousand-fold increase might be a major leap. But in the electronic field, I believe a thousand-fold is still far from that 'AI singularity.'"
After stating his conclusion, Xu Hao thought for a moment and added another example to help those without relevant knowledge in the meeting room understand.
"Let's assume AI is a person flipping through a book. If this person's flipping speed increases a thousand-fold, even if they can flip through ten books in a second, they're still just flipping through books. True AI needs to be able to understand the content of the book, like a human, not just memorize and cite it... So, I don't think this rule will spur AI into existence."
Gao Liangwei asked, "Then, Engineer Xu, what impact do you think this rule will have?"
Xu Hao frowned again and pondered for a long while before shaking his head: "I don't know. I can't speculate recklessly about things I don't know."
"......"
Everyone knew this electronics expert was pragmatic and didn't like to brag or guess wildly, but this was hardly the time to be modest.
"Various city departments are waiting for the Countermeasures Research Office's rule response manual. We can't wait until after 24 hours to release it; we must prepare for potential disasters in advance."
Gao Liangwei said sternly, "Engineer Xu, boldly give your speculation."
"This..."
Xu Hao struggled for a moment, then said uncertainly, "If I have to speculate, I think devices with built-in electronic chips might 'emerge' with some new functions. I'm not sure if these new functions will be good or bad, and I can't determine if these devices will connect with each other..."
"Good or bad, do we even need to guess? It's bound to be a bad function that threatens human life, otherwise, this wouldn't be a survival-type rule."
"That's right. Maybe as a precaution, shutting down these devices within 24 hours could be an option?"
"Shut down all devices with built-in electronic chips? The entire country would come to a halt!"
"Yeah, there are too many critical devices relying on chip operation."
"Regardless, we need to prepare for the worst. Within these 24 hours, every city should actively make alternative preparations, getting some purely mechanical devices without built-in chips ready."
"Everyone's being too pessimistic. I actually think it might not necessarily be a bad thing. Since the Fire Thief mentioned 'danger and opportunity' in the rule's note, it suggests this rule might also benefit humanity."
"I think so too. Like the [Third Contact] rule, even though that alien nano-intelligence ate a lot of people... it also provided humanity with several key pieces of information."
"Everyone, everyone." At that moment, someone suddenly raised a key point, "I noticed the rule's designated effective area is 'on Tianshui Star.' Doesn't this mean... our Beixing's space base under construction in Terra's orbit won't be affected by this rule?"
As soon as this was said, everyone showed surprised expressions.
It really seemed to be the case.
To be precise, Terra was merely orbiting within Tianshui Star's gravitational influence, not "on Tianshui Star" at all.
If the space base wasn't affected by the rule, it would preliminarily prove that the path of space migration was meaningful.
"This is indeed good news," Gao Liangwei said. "But we're all still on Tianshui Star."
"The head is right," Zhang Minglu added. "Thinking about escaping to the space base to avoid the rule now is useless. We still need to focus on facing the challenge."
.....
Suroma, Hall of Halls.
In the lower experimental base, inside a specially restricted room padded with soft materials, Gaelid was painfully clutching his head, letting out relentless screams.
"My head hurts so much! Aaaah!"
"Kill! I'll kill you all!"
The sharp cries of a young girl kept ringing out, and the field around him was extremely unstable, completely out of control.
Bruce stood outside the door, his expression gloomy.
Dr. Haisen beside him advised, "Your Majesty, it's inevitable that Gaelid's and the girl's consciousnesses will sometimes conflict. Please don't worry too much."
"Don't worry?" Bruce shot a cold look at him. "How is he supposed to live a normal life when he falls into uncontrollable states like this?"
"I will continue to assist with medication and regulation to help him gain control," Dr. Haisen quickly said. "Then, over time, his episodes should effectively decrease until he maintains a stable state."
"Aaaah!!"
Bruce rubbed his temples at the piercing screams. "Put him to sleep."
"Yes."
Dr. Haisen pulled a remote control from his pocket and pressed a button. The nozzles on the ceiling of the room immediately sprayed a chemical sedative gas.
After the gas spread throughout the room, Gaelid soon fell to the floor, asleep.
"How do you view the newly released rule?" Bruce then asked. "The 'emergence' it mentions—could it affect the modified bodies? The research institute recommends temporarily removing the chips, keeping only a few for observation experiments."
"I agree with that." Speaking of this rule, Dr. Haisen's lips curled up high. "But Your Majesty, the 'emergence' in this rule is very interesting. It might accelerate my research! Or increase resource utilization, reducing the resources needed for memory backup."
"Then let them line up and make some fakes like before, right? Anyway, these fools don't understand the technology; they can't tell the difference."
"It doesn't matter whether they can tell. What matters is that I need an army capable of self-reproduction. Can't you feel it, Haisen? The war between us and Beixing and Xisiya is already on its way."