"Boss——–" 922 called out.
He had quickly returned to his senses this time because he had something to tell Qin Jiu.
"You're still calling me boss?" Qin Jiu raised his brow.
922 scratched his head and smiled, "Got used to it. I'll leave it as is."
After saying this, he stored away the smile on his face and his expression turned serious, "Boss, I just dreamt of the past and that's why I hurried here. Be careful of that old man in the punishment sector."
You Huo, Qin Jiu and 154 stopped in place. They all exchanged looks, "We were just discussing him."
922 asked in surprise, "Did you also realise that something's wrong?"
"Yes, but before you woke up, we had just crossed him off the list of suspects." After 154 finished saying this, he quickly explained what had just happened including the conditions they had listed and Wu Li's denial.
922 shook his head and said, "He shouldn't be the person Doctor Wu saw if the person Doctor Wu saw was during the early years."
As You Huo tried to recall when Wu Li had met the leader, he heard 922 throw out another astonishing line, "Because that old man had died many years ago."
That line was on par to a clap of thunder.
The corridor fell deadly silent. The three listening revealed incredulous expressions.
922 said, "It may sound far-fetched, but the fact is that he is someone who is long dead."
You Huo knitted his brows, "Who?"
"The system designer." 922 paused and emphasised, "One of them."
Everyone was even more confused.
"One of them?" Qin Jiu repeated those words.
"Yes, one of them." 922 asked him, "Don't you remember, Boss? Weren't we each given some information before entering the system? It's about the system and there was a brief mention about the team."
"It was mentioned, but the content of everyone's information is different and each has its own bias." Qin Jiu said, "My mission was directly related to Invigilator A and Z, and the destruction of the system's core, so all I had was a one sentence background introduction about the team."
As he said this, he suddenly realised. His data only focused on key points and the information about the researchers were not complete. You Huo's mother wasn't amongst it so it probably only had information on the living.
922 immediately reacted and said, "My mission is to gather information. The information of the research team alone accounted for three pages and that doesn't include their photos. The old man was called Du Deng Liu, a Chinese-German mix. According to the information on the file, he only provided the initial design inspiration and prototype as well as contributing to some of the initial designs before passing away. That was about twenty years ago. Generally speaking, the head designer wouldn't refer to him since he was only involved for a short period at the beginning. In the information I received, he wasn't even considered important personnel."
"But?" Qin Jiu helped him move on.
922 continued, "Yes, but. As I collected more and more information in the system, I noticed a problem. This system isn't simply designed from the outside, but also from the inside."
"Inside?"
"Yes. I am also in charge of equipment design so I may be more sensitive in this respect compared to others. You should know that designs generally have some form of logic behind it. Different people can produce different results. Uh….that might be a little too abstract. Let's use an example. Suppose you want to design a bunker and there are two designers; one starved for three days and the other was frozen for three days. The one who had starved for three days considered the food supply issue first when designing while the one who was frozen for three days prioritised temperature regulation and heat retention. It's something like that."
922 explained roughly, "I noticed that this system had two design logics. I'm sure you also noticed it in the exam. The first set of logic is the comprehensive testing. It would target all the skill areas of an examinee and you can only leave this place once you've successfully passed all the exams. But in the situation where you're unsuccessful? There are various supplementary bits and pieces like re-examinations, make-up examinations and the like to increase the opportunity of passing. If it really didn't work out, there was also the option of abandoning the exam; giving it up. That's the most basic screening process. That isn't a problem in itself. The problem lies in the other set of logic. In that one, the outcome of an examinee being eliminated is disappearing, and the result of making a mistake in the middle of exam is either death or becoming an NPC. Especially excellent examinees would be selected and promoted to invigilators...."
He raised a finger each time he listed these out. Everything he said basically reported You Huo and the others' experiences so far.
"...Have you noticed? In this set of logic, there isn't any concept of leaving the system." 922 said solemnly, "When I was an examinee, I constantly wondered if the system had a split in personality. I only realised later that it wasn't just a split in personality, but in fact two groups of people designing it together. Theses two teams had fundamentally different logics. One team on the inside, one on the outside. The team working on the inside was responsible for the latter logic. Here in the system, food, clothing, accommodation and transport was all provided. There was no need for them to return to reality."
The three of them fell into contemplation.
"No wonder." You Huo said.
They had always assumed that the reason for the system's split in personality was because it sometimes had human traits and sometimes it didn't, but they had also felt that this explanation didn't feel enough, that it didn't explain everything.
But now they realised —– The so-called human nature part had been split away from the main body as 154 but the system still continued to exhibit these changes every now and then.
As it turned out, it wasn't because of the so-called "human nature", but because the design of the system itself was split.
922 said, "After I realised this problem, my mind was in a mess for a long time because I couldn't figure out why the designers inside would have this kind of thought process. It was too negative, too depressing. They could only die here or be imprisoned here forever. Are they a group of neurotics retaliating against society? Any normal person would want to leave the system but why weren't they?"
"At that time, I was full of complaints. Everyday I would curse at them inside. This continued until the one time I accidentally violated a rule and was brought to the Twin Towers to be punished. When I saw the old man Du Deng Liu, I suddenly understood —— The designer inside the system is indeed not a normal person, he is a dead person."
He had already died and exists in the system only with the help of its programming and design. Wherever the system is, he was there. If the system dies, he dies. His entire 'life' from then on would be tightly bound to the system. To him, the system was the world and his life. He naturally wouldn't consider leaving it.
Hearing this, You Huo was finally able to sort everything out———
This Du Deng Liu had reserved a place for himself when he designed the system. He had left behind his spirit, thoughts and ideals in the system such that when he dies in reality, the system "backup" could live in his stead. That was probably his way of continuing his life.
The rest of the team may or may not have known about this.
Even if they knew, they probably didn't think it was a bad thing at first. To the outsiders, the Du Deng Liu inside the system could be equivalent to an anti-virus software that could search and address problems internally.
What they didn't expect was that it would result in an outcome like this. The two different logics caused the system to fundamentally contradict itself. As long as this contradiction existed, one party would end up having the upper hand.
And so, one day, the internal logic prevailed and the system began to deviate from its original purpose.
This was the root of cause for the system's loss of control.
To some extent, Du Deng Liu was both a 'person' and also a part of the system.
Everything made sense now.
He had 'reported' to the system allowing it to interfere with You Huo and Qin Jiu's plans because he didn't want the system to be destroyed and he didn't want himself to disappear.
To him, he was saving himself, allowing himself to prolong his life.
154 suddenly realised, "I was just wondering why the both of you are still alive after the rebellion. Why didn't the system just let the two of you die and end it for all?"
Qin Jiu also smiled mockingly at himself, "Until just a few minutes ago, I thought it was because you helped."
"No." 154 shook his head and said, "I couldn't do that at that time and couldn't be of any help. It should be him, that Du Deng Liu. On one hand he wanted to interrupt your plans to prevent you from succeeding because he wanted to live. On the other hand, he didn't want to kill. If he is the original designer, he might have observed you or even watched you grow up——"
He looked at You Huo and said, "He probably didn't wish for you to die so he made the system remove you instead. As for boss, you——-"
154 looked at Qin Jiu, "You and A are both troublesome threats. You were already thrown out once but it didn't work so the changed the method the second time and left you behind."
After he finished saying this, he was silent for a moment. He then murmured, "You guys...Are really troublesome. More troublesome than the other."
Qin Jiu laughed and then slowly stored away his smile, "It really is like this."
In this world, very few people are born evil. No matter what they did, if you went back through their years, the reason or reasons could be found…..
But this didn't mean that it didn't exist.
Du Deng Liu may have many reasons and the most fundamental one is very easy to understand —- He didn't want to 'die', he didn't want to disappear.
Everything he didn't want to happen to himself, happened to the others.
He may also not have wanted to harm others, but he had all along been doing that.
"Alright. Once or twice is enough. It would be stupid to let him interfere with us the third time." Qin Jiu said to 154, "Your 'luring the tiger away from the mountain' tactic should be over now, and he should've almost returned to the punishment sector. Can you tie him down?"
You Huo said, "If you can't, we can go there directly to kidnap him."