by <unknown>
Determination appeared in Chen Chen's eyes as he said, "We need to plunge Northern America into turmoil, even to a point where they're on the brink of collapse. We need to let them know that we're the only ones who can bail them out!"
Little X immediately understood what Chen Chen was suggesting. Her eyes lit up. "Are you suggesting that we use memes?"
"Exactly, I need a memetic effect similar to the 'Astral Catalyst', but without any possibility of unwarranted mutation. It needs to be extremely infectious and generate mass panic among the people without posing a direct lethal threat."
Chen Chen briefly described it before looking at Little X in the eye. "Can you do that?"
"I'll give it a shot!"
Little X nodded and answered excitedly, "Give me an hour!"
With that, she plopped herself on the sofa and shut her eyes.
Chen Chen acknowledged the fact that an hour was required even with Little X's supreme computing speed was a testament to how complex E language was. Perhaps it also had to do with how Little X had only scraped the surface of its potential.
Upon mastery, the destructive prospect of memetic technology was incomprehensible to the mortal mind. It would not take much effort to wipe out human civilization.
An hour passed quickly.
While Chen Chen was getting some rest, he suddenly heard the printer beside him operating.
The printer produced two image patterns.
Chen Chen did not head over to collect them because he was aware of the effects of memetic technology. It was something that went beyond common sense. It was an informational weapon that penetrated the sense of sight, hearing, smell, and even thoughts. It was impossible to guard against.
Within moments, Little X opened her eyes again. She got up cheerfully and approached Chen Chen with the two pictures in hand. "Sir Godfather, take a look at this one first."
Chen Chen opened his eyes when he heard this. He saw countless irregular black and white patterns stemming from both edges. They faintly formed the picture of a person's face on the A4 paper.
It was the strange face of a male…
It was a fairly large and round face of a male who looked to be somewhere around thirty to forty years old. His eyebrows were curved together like two squirmy, thick caterpillars. Under the thick caterpillar eyebrows were a pair of large, soulless eyes that droop downward, carrying an unplaceable expression.
The man in the picture had a crooked nose below his eyes. The bridge of his nose was subtle and thin but expanded to an unnaturally large size upon reaching the point of the nose, ultimately forming what was usually referred to as a pug nose.
The most uncanny part of it all was his mouth. His mouth was spread far wider than the average person to a point where they nearly extended to his ears. They seemed to be tweaking upward continuously even in a still picture.
In addition, his hair was extremely sparse with a large piece of a bald spot on the top of his head that revealed his smooth scalp. Only a handful strands of hair stubbornly grew from the top of his head…
This was the bizarre face that Chen Chen saw formed from the pattern.
With just one glance, the image evoked a chilling sensation that seeped deep into one's heart. It felt as if this strange person was staring into one's soul. The way he smiled so grimly seemed to suggest he knew something others did not know. It was extremely discomforting…
"What in the world is this supposed to be…"
Chen Chen jumped at the sight of this image.
Little X only smiled and left it at that before showing Chen Chen the next image.
The second image was a lot more normal in comparison. It was only a random scribble of black and white lines that did not contain any discernible pattern. The image itself could not be properly made out either. It was closer to a splatter of nonsense that did not contain any specific meaning.
The restlessness Chen Chen felt pulsing in his mind after seeing the first image quickly faded away upon seeing the second picture.
"This here is the pattern vaccine."
Little X finally informed, "The first pattern was designed based on the concept of an urban legend. It's a Basilisk pattern derived from several E language constructs that I've deciphered up to this point. It's considered a very simple and elaborate Basilisk pattern.
"This pattern is transmitted using sight. This means that anyone who sees this image becomes infected with its memetic effect. Upon being infected, they'll have nightmares of this man each time they fall asleep and the nightmares will only increase in magnitude as time goes on!"
With just a simple explanation, Chen Chen was already very impressed and began to clap. "Not bad at all, this is the exact memetic effect that I need. However, I'm afraid its effects are still too lethal and we might need to modify it slightly."
"Too lethal?"
Little X was puzzled by this comment. "But this doesn't kill people."
"Humans are inherently fragile beings."
Chen Chen explained patiently, "An average person has four to six dreams each night, but they forget most of them except for the ones who wake them in the middle of the night. The reason I said that its effects are still too threatening is that it directly disrupts the sleep schedule of a person. Losing quality sleep over prolonged durations will cause the mental state of a person to deteriorate and lead to depression or in severe cases, death, within a month.
"Which is to say that the lethality of this meme is still too powerful."
Chen Chen shrugged. "To a certain extent, you could say that this is a catastrophic meme… Enough to wipe out the entirety of human civilization."
Little X pouted when she heard this. "Understood, how should we nerf it?"
"Just removing one characteristic will do."
Chen Chen immediately said without pause, "Remove the nightmare quality. Just make it so that everyone who is infected with this meme will dream of this man but not to such a severe extent that it would become nightmarish. This will do."
"Will it still be effective?"
Little X sounded uncertain.
"This will do."
Chen Chen nodded ceremoniously. "You hold the keys to the World Wide Web so you of all people should understand human nature. You should know just how many rumors are circulating the Internet these days…"
"From century-old tales such as the 'Bermuda Triangle' to 'Lizard People', there's also Internet tales like how 'Soul weighs 21 grams' and 'The Boy from Mars'. Are these tales so impregnable that hundreds of millions of people could be convinced that they are true?"
"No, they aren't. It's just because this is the nature of man."
Chen Chen said in a deep tone, "The reason people believe these tales isn't because they're inherently gullible but because deep inside, they choose to believe these stories. They don't care what the truth is. They only wish that these stories were true. Even if these stories were debunked tens of thousands of times, they simply refuse to look further into it.
"This is the nature of man. Therefore, when a real supernatural event occurs to the masses, there's not much else that we need to do since they will come up with theories of their own. Some would claim that it's God, the Devil, and stir up fierce social debates and turmoil…"
Chen Chen snapped his fingers and smirked. "I'm willing to bet that it won't take more than a month before Northern America plunges into chaos…"
Little X nodded in a way that seemed like she had a rough idea of what Chen Chen was talking about.
"I'll modify it right away. Give me ten minutes."
With that, Little X sat down on the sofa and shut her eyes again.
In just nine minutes, Little X opened her eyes again. The printer simultaneously produced two patterns, which Chen Chen promptly inspected. He saw that the patterns were largely the same as their previous versions, only there were several strokes missing here and there.
"Excellent."
Chen Chen crumpled them up and tossed them into
a shredder. "X, your task is to ensure that everyone in the continents other than Northern America and Europe sees the immunity pattern. This way, only the population from our targeted continents will be vulnerable to this infection, can you do that?"
"It won't be an easy task, but it won't be anything compared to the task of producing the Basilisk images."
Little X smiled slyly, bobbing her head to the side.
Chen Chen nodded contently, confident in his assistant.
…
The Secret of Dreams was a well-known forum in Northern America that had been operating for thirteen years, accumulating millions of members and millions of posts discussing their dreams.
The forum admins even went out of their way to hire dozens of masters at dream analysis to answer questions of the netizens visiting the forum.
On this day, a new post seeking advice suddenly appeared on the forum.
[Hello fellow dreamers and teachers, my name is Lilith, I'm a psychologist. Recently, I've been having some strange dreams that I'm not sure if should be attributed to the stress I've been feeling. I always see the same face in the dream. Is there an explanation for this?]
Within moments, a fellow forum member replied:
[It must have been the face of someone you've met in real life but forgot about. What happens is the face of this person remains deep in your conscience so that you would see this person in your dreams since dreams are inherently the product of our underlying memories. You won't see someone you haven't met before in your dreams.]
The comment was well-received and saw many likes quickly. A lot of comments followed after this comment.
[Of course, it's Sanimo, you're reaching the level of the teachers!]
[All hail Sanimo!]
[I'm new here, is this Sanimo popular here? Is his analysis reliable?]
[…]
Meanwhile, in the suburbs of New York City, Sanimo was looking at the chain of replies under his comments, a prideful smile hung by his lips. He proceeded to swallow a gulp of coke.
He had just finished class and was browsing the Internet inside his dormitory. He just happened to see this new post and decided to write a comment since it was convenient for him to do so.
This person was a senior member of the forum and usually very rarely replied to new members.
Chapter 421: Sanimo |
As he saw how the crowd of netizens flattered and praised him, Sanimo's vanity was greatly satisfied. He nodded with a haughty smile, waiting for the other party to reply to his answer.
Sure enough, half an hour later, this netizen named Lilith replied.
[My God, is that right? But the stranger I dreamed of was very scary. There shouldn't be such a scary person in reality. He was like a demon. If I had met him in reality, I'd remember…]
Seeing this reply, Sanimo could not help frowning, but he was in a good mood today, so he did not quibble over the fact that Lilith was doubting his assessment, but patiently explained:
[Here's the thing, if you've seen something terrifying, that means you've mixed up his face with a monster in a horror movie. This is also a normal phenomenon. The stranger's face may have come from any horror movie or even a poster that you glimpsed when you passed the movie theater.]
As Sanimo replied, the popularity of this post began to rise slowly, and it soon entered the homepage. After it gained popularity, all netizens underneath started fervently discussing with each other.
[TIL. No wonder I have nightmares every time I watch a horror movie. So this is the reason…]
[Sanimo is right, is this related to the specialized branch of dreams?]
[I see. Post bookmarked.]
With the appearance of a group of netizens, the popularity of this post increased even more, to the point that even Sanimo was a little surprised.
However, at this moment, an unfamiliar account suddenly commented underneath:
[I'm curious, what kind of face did you see?]
This sentence immediately led the discussion of the post to the topic of what the face looked like in the dream. Everyone also inquired. Obviously, to many netizens, this topic was more interesting than anything that came before.
Sanimo refreshed the page twice and saw that Lilith had not replied to him, so he checked the time.
It was already 9:30 at night, but at this time, his roommate's bed in the dormitory was still empty. His roommate was a Mexican. His parents were in jail for drug dealing and he only managed to survive by the money his parents had saved up and entered this school.
Nonetheless, although this roommate was the child of a drug dealer, he studied very seriously, otherwise, he would not have been admitted to Stanford University and become a member of this world-renowned school.
About two minutes later, just when Sanimo was a little tired and was about to turn off the computer to go to sleep, the forum finally chimed with a notification.
Sanimo clicked on the notification, and sure enough, it was the original poster Lilith who responded:
[Big thanks to the answer from the veteran Sanimo and the enthusiastic help of all netizens. The reason I'm replying to you now is that someone asked me what kind of face I saw, so I drew it out from memory and gave him a name, "This Man". If you're interested, you can click to open it, but please be careful, because this picture is very scary… [Picture]]
She had even drawn it out?
Seeing this, Sanimo smiled subconsciously and moved the mouse to the picture, but just when he was about to click on it, his hand suddenly paused…
He did not know why, but when he moved the mouse over this picture, Sanimo suddenly felt an inexplicable pounding in his heart.
As it got closer to night, the dormitory had become completely dark. Since he returned to the dormitory after class, he had never gotten out of bed. Therefore, the lights in the dormitory were not turned on. Only the lights from other dormitories came in from outside the window, illuminating part of the space in the dormitory, but most of the corners were still pitch black.
At this time, Sanimo stiffened his neck and turned his head to look into the dark corners of the dormitory.
There was nothing there.
Sanimo exhaled. He did not know why he suddenly had a horrible feeling, let alone in the dormitory that he was very familiar with. Still, he did not think much about it and he moved the mouse over the picture.
As a veteran who had trawled through major websites and forums for many years, it was not like he had never seen frightening images. At this point, the other party had already aroused his curiosity and his curiosity had overcome his fear.
"Click."
With a soft click from the mouse, the picture entered the loading state and then an image with a white background was loaded from top to bottom…
The Internet speed at this time became extremely slow for some reason, so the picture that could have been loaded in an instant had to emerge from top to bottom, but Sanimo was already staring at the screen.
First, he saw a tuft of sparse hair, and then, a pair of thick and comical eyebrows appeared, and after that, a pair of large, hollow eyes…
Sanimo held his breath subconsciously.
The picture kept on loading. Behind the hollow eyes, a weird nose gradually appeared, and finally, a slightly upturned mouth.
The most important thing was that this mouth was too big…
After seeing this picture, the corners of Sanimo's mouth twitched, and at the same time, a chill shot up his spine and surged over his scalp in ripples. It felt as if the top of his head was about to explode.
Was this the "This Man" that Lilith said?
Sanimo took a deep breath and subconsciously moved away from the screen. At this moment, he even regretted his reckless behavior.
The visual effect of this picture called "This Man" was scary, but it was not enough to frighten people who were mentally prepared. Even so, for some reason, after seeing this picture, Sanimo felt an inexplicable burst of heart palpitations.
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He could not tell the source of such palpitations. Even he felt that it was just an illusion.
Just when Sanimo's nerves were on edge, outside the dark dormitory's door, there was a sudden sound of scattered footsteps.
Sanimo hurriedly closed the picture while he looked up at the door, only to hear the footsteps coming to the door. Following that, there was a sound of a key turning in the lock.
"Phew…"
After hearing this sound, Sanimo finally breathed a sigh of relief. Since his roommate was back, he would feel much braver. At least, he would no longer feel so nervous.
"Click!"
After the clattering noises, the door of the dormitory opened subsequently and Sanimo suddenly saw a figure walking in from outside.
Due to the lights in the corridor, the person who came in was faced away from the light, and Sanimo could not see the other person's appearance. Nonetheless, he could judge that this was indeed his roommate based on his body shape, so he immediately shouted:
"Danny, why are you only back now?"
"Uh, I ran into some trouble outside…"
His roommate's voice came over, with a touch of helplessness. "Sanimo, since you're in the dormitory, why didn't you turn on the lights?"
"I'm too lazy. You can turn it on."
Sanimo spread his hands. "What trouble did you have outside?"
"Nothing much, a bee happened to sting my face and my face swelled up."
The roommate walked under the switch of the fluorescent light. "Will you come take a look for me?"
"Of course, no problem."
Sanimo laughed and went directly to the side of the bed. At this moment, the roommate pressed the switch at the same time.
At once, the entire dormitory lit up and the dazzling light made Sanimo close his eyes promptly. When he opened his eyes again in the next second, his roommate was already standing in front of him.
"Sanimo, look at my face, is it swollen?"
His roommate's voice still rang out in the dormitory, but at this time, Sanimo's eyes bulged. His pupils shrank and incomparable panic flared in his eyes ——
In front of him, there was a man with thick eyebrows, vacant eyes, and a mouth that was stretched to the base of his ears. The man was wearing his roommate's clothing while tilting his head with an eerie smile as he stared unwaveringly at Sanimo…
