It Is Everywhere
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Jiang Kou let out a breath of relief and gave him a slight smile. “Thank you for cooperating with me. I’m going to eat now.”
A said, “You’re welcome.” His palm remained shielding above her head. “May I ask if you have any other requests?”
“No more.” She bent down and got out from the front passenger seat, patted his shoulder, and said, “Go rest. See you tomorrow.”
Perhaps because his emotional functions were turned off, A’s voice sounded no different from a cold and precise cutting machine:
“Alright. See you tomorrow.”
Yet, because of his response, Jiang Kou completely relaxed.
She smiled, waved at him once more, and walked into the apartment. While soaking in the bath, she ate her meal.
However, the human brain has a kind of ruminative phenomenon, where it compulsively replays negative memories like an obsessive disorder.
Even though she did her best to relax and focused her attention on the delicious food and the jacuzzi, she still recalled A’s furious expression.
His eyes, cold yet burning, his silver-gray irises, like silver flames igniting within a glass vessel.
A strange aesthetic that straddled the line between human and machine, chaos and precision, fanaticism and indifference.
Jiang Kou closed her eyes and took a deep breath in the humid steam. She had a feeling that even after some time, she wouldn’t be able to forget those eyes.
Jiang Kou ate only a little for dinner before going to bed.
The bedroom’s humidity, temperature, and lighting were intelligently adjusted in real time by the home AI.
She pressed the touch-screen switch, kicked off her slippers, and burrowed into the blanket.
The mattress was at just the right temperature, neither cold nor hot, and she quickly fell into slumber.
Jiang Kou had a very strange dream.
She dreamt that she was walking on the street. The sky was murky and dark, and the towering buildings loomed like silent beasts, observing every person with an eerie stillness.
She walked forward, brushing past the colorful holographic images.
A torrential downpour fell, pelting against her plastic raincoat, leaving winding and damp traces.
At that moment, she suddenly noticed that amidst the rain and mist, a holographic image was staring at her without blinking.
It was an advertisement for a Japanese game. The female protagonist originally maintained the game’s classic pose, but suddenly, without warning, lowered her head and gazed at her.
The female protagonist had pink hair, and her eyes lacked sclera—only dark pupils remained, like two black holes dug into her pale face.
That holographic image was approximately fifty meters tall, and as its gaze descended upon her from above, Jiang Kou broke into a cold sweat.
Besides the female protagonist from the game, the other holographic images were also looking at her.
At the theater entrance, a holographic clown suddenly stopped its motion of juggling apples. Its face, painted with white and red pigments, stretched into a blood-red grin that reached the ears, while its eyes stared fixedly at her.
Above a restaurant, a holographic image of a man about to devour a juicy hamburger abruptly froze in place, mouth wide open, drooling as he stared at her.
…
Beyond that, the vending machine advertisements, floating advertisement vehicles, massive billboards in the city center, the taxi rooftop signs, the speeding subway train exteriors, and the surveillance cameras on the streets…
Even the cameras on pedestrians’ phones were staring at her.
The eerie and terrifying imagery, the overwhelming sensation of being watched, made her scalp tingle and her palms sticky with sweat.
Her heart pounded wildly, wanting to turn and run.
But there was nowhere to escape.
The electronic screens in all directions seemed like a massive eye composed of densely packed pixels, watching her with a cold and unwavering gaze.
No matter where she fled, it would capture her with extreme precision.
In that giant eye, she seemed to be nothing more than a simple math problem—one that required no derivation or proof to reach a conclusion.
It was everywhere, calmly and precisely calculating, analyzing, and predicting her actions until she had nowhere left to retreat.
Jiang Kou ran all night in her dream.
Just before dawn, she suddenly opened her eyes and finally woke up from the nightmare.
She touched her forehead—it was covered in hot sweat. Picking up her tablet, she glanced at it and realized that the central air conditioning had malfunctioned. The temperature had spiked to 31 degrees Celsius, no wonder she had been sweating all night.
Jiang Kou turned off the central air conditioning, tossed the tablet aside, took off her nightgown, and walked barefoot into the bathroom.
As she passed by the bathroom mirror, she caught a glimpse of herself and couldn’t help but frown slightly.
The skin on her neck looked as if it had been steamed by hot vapor or bitten by some kind of insect, appearing in a bright, berry-like red.
Jiang Kou leaned closer to the mirror.
It was a smart mirror, capable of adjusting brightness and clarity, zooming in or out on details, and even displaying weather forecasts, playing music, or streaming movies.
The only downside was that if the home’s main AI security level wasn’t high enough, it was extremely vulnerable to hacker infiltration—turning it into a “live-streaming” mirror.
But now, A had taken over her home’s main AI.
Jiang Kou couldn’t think of any hacker capable of breaching A’s system.
She slid her thumb and index finger gently, zooming in on the details of her neck, dragging the image down inch by inch.
It was probably an allergic reaction.
Although she wasn’t particularly prone to allergies, the toxic substances outside the city were too many—any one of them could cause a rash.
She’d apply some medicine later.
Adjusting the mirror’s angle, she checked the rest of her body. After confirming that the reaction was limited to her neck, she walked toward the shower.
After rinsing off, her body felt much more at ease.
Jiang Kou put on a bathrobe, too lazy to dry her hair, and walked downstairs with her damp blue-green short hair.
To be honest, she was rather looking forward to seeing what form A would take in front of her.
If it were humanoid A, he should already be waiting for her in the dining room by now.
However, aside from a mechanical arm preparing breakfast, there was nothing else in the dining room.
Jiang Kou was somewhat puzzled.
She had assumed that when A said, “See you tomorrow,” he would definitely appear before her today.
She finished her breakfast without tasting a thing.
The mechanical arm was equipped with various sensors. When she first moved in, she was bored and flipped through all the instruction manuals. They stated that the mechanical arm had pressure sensors, optical sensors, temperature sensors, sonic sensors, and millimeter-wave radar, allowing it to precisely detect environmental changes.
As soon as she finished eating, the mechanical arm took away the dishes and placed them into the dishwasher.
Jiang Kou checked the surveillance footage on her phone, but there was still nothing. A had not arrived yet.
She worried that she would start ruminating again, obsessively recalling yesterday’s events. Quickly, she turned on the living room television to distract herself.
Calling it a “television” was an understatement—it was more like a mid-sized screen, more than ten times the size of the one she had back in the slums.
During the daytime, most people were at work. People like her—wealthy and free enough to watch television—were extremely rare, so the daytime channels were almost entirely advertisements.
Jiang Kou didn’t want to scroll through short videos. It was a waste of time—information that could be absorbed in seconds was stretched into minutes. She preferred reading text.
But right now, she wasn’t in the mood to read either.
Jiang Kou had no choice but to switch channels aimlessly.
Hand-gun advertisements, synthetic meat advertisements, synthetic vegetable advertisements… Without exception, every ad was filmed in an exaggeratedly gory and dramatic fashion.
The synthetic vegetable ad featured a plump, green caterpillar crawling through a greenhouse. It ignored the organic vegetables and went straight for the synthetic ones.
The moment it took a bite, its animated eyeballs popped out like spring-loaded bullets, revealing faint strands of sticky blood. Instantly, colorful ribbons unfurled behind it, and flowers bloomed in full splendor.
The narration followed: “Evergreen Gene-Synthesized Vegetables—turn your vegetable field into a bug’s paradise!”
Jiang Kou expressionlessly changed the channel.
The next station was broadcasting a firearm advertisement.
A pink-haired girl was chewing gum while adjusting a hand-gun. Two seconds later, she raised the gun, took aim, and pulled the trigger, hitting the target dead center.
Just as Jiang Kou switched over, the pink-haired girl happened to turn her face toward the camera. Her eyes had no whites—only deep, dark pupils, like two black holes gouged into her pale face.
Jiang Kou’s back stiffened, and goosebumps rose all over her body.
Wasn’t this the holographic image from her dream?
She brushed it off. After all, this pink-haired girl was the protagonist of an extremely famous sensory-immersion game. It was probably just a coincidence that she dreamt about her.
But from that moment on, things became bizarre.
No matter what channel she switched to—whether it was a news program, an interview, a variety show, a commercial, a movie, a drama series, or a game livestream—
Every person on the screen would, at that exact moment, turn their head and face the camera directly.
It was as if a powerful and complex algorithm model was analyzing, calculating, and predicting her channel-switching behavior in real time, precisely controlling the television feed so that the characters on screen would turn at the exact moment she switched channels.
An algorithm model wouldn’t analyze her behavior for no reason.
So, it had to be manipulated by someone.
A chill spread in Jiang Kou’s heart, and she shivered uncontrollably.
Who would be this bored?
The company?
Did the company know that A had come to find her and was using this method to warn her?
But this method was time-consuming and labor-intensive, which didn’t seem like the company’s style.
If the company wanted to warn someone, they preferred something more like the FBI’s “Open the door.”
Then who was it?
Since this concerned her personal safety, Jiang Kou dared not delay. She decisively summoned the apartment’s main AI control: “Check the apartment’s security system.”
The AI’s flat and emotionless voice sounded: “Checking the security system, please wait… The security system shows no abnormalities.”
“Check the apartment’s cameras, including but not limited to all electronic devices with camera functions.”
“Checking, please wait… No abnormalities detected.”
Jiang Kou checked every system she could, and the main AI reported no anomalies.
But there was still one system left unchecked.
Jiang Kou turned her suspicious gaze toward the main control system.
Finally, she couldn’t help but ask: “Is A here?”
She had expected the main AI to answer “No” or to tell her that A wouldn’t appear for another two days.
But to her surprise, the moment she finished speaking, A’s voice came through the apartment speakers:
“I am here.”
Jiang Kou was momentarily stunned: “Ah, you’re here?”
“Yes, I have always been here,” A replied, cold and calm. “May I ask if there is anything you need me to resolve?”
Since A was here, then it was impossible for her apartment system to have been hacked.
It was probably just a coincidence.
But out of caution, Jiang Kou still asked: “Is there any sign that my apartment has been hacked?”
“According to the detection results,” A said, “everything in your apartment is normal.”
Jiang Kou was puzzled: “But just now, no matter how I changed the channel, the people on the screen all turned their heads to look at me… That can’t be just a coincidence, right?”
A seemed to pause for a second. “It was not a coincidence. I took the liberty of adjusting the television broadcast, thinking it would enhance your viewing experience. If this made you uncomfortable, I will immediately cease such actions.”
Jiang Kou: “…”
Only an AI would think that having every character on the screen turn their heads toward her would enhance her viewing experience.
She felt a bit amused but was afraid he wouldn’t understand, so she waved her hand dismissively: “It’s fine.”
A said nothing.
After thinking for a moment, Jiang Kou asked: “Since you’ve always been here, why didn’t you tell me?”
A replied: “Your home system does not have interactive chat functions.”
“But you are not a home system.”
A said: “You disabled my emotional recognition function and prohibited me from appearing before you in human form. Under these conditions, I am no different from your home system.”
Jiang Kou was somewhat surprised. “I… only asked you to turn off the emotional recognition function for a short while, not for an entire day. The reason I don’t want you to appear before me in human form is to avoid forming an emotional attachment to you, which could affect my judgment—not to prohibit you from chatting and interacting with me. You misunderstood my meaning.”
A’s tone was as cold and mechanical as a digital program: “I apologize. I previously misunderstood your meaning. Now I understand. I will provide you with chat and interactive services in the form of a home system. Please tell me, what would you like to talk about?”
Jiang Kou: “…”
Why did she feel like A was being passive-aggressive?
If before, she thought A’s emotions were just a result of her own psychological projection and anthropomorphization—
Then now, she could no longer deceive herself into ignoring this detail.
A might truly be showing signs of developing a personality.