Chapter 19: Born from Expectations
At first, because of the Nameless Technician, Joshua had held great expectations for the resisters of Siberia—that is, the group of superhumans.
On that bloodstained diary, the Nameless Technician's thoughts and conclusions over more than twenty years were recorded. From it, Joshua learned that the Siberians were a great civilization with profound research into technology, capable of creating Soul Puppets and performing precise modifications on souls. Their research into souls was even comparable to that of the Mycroft World, reaching a level that could be called art—although, admittedly, this art was applied to themselves. But what could be done about it?
Works imagining the destruction of the world by highly intelligent artificial intelligence are countless on Earth. Even on the Mycroft Continent, there are some Alchemists who call on spellcasters to be wary of the abuse of highly intelligent artificial souls. Upon his initial descent, Joshua felt that the Siberia World was exactly such a world: the Soul Puppets had overcome their creators, the Siberians, using them as materials and tools for their own reproduction—a classic civilization destroyed by its own creations.
In contrast, the beings that fought against the Soul Puppets, as recorded in the Nameless Technician's book, were, in Joshua's guess, remnants of the former Siberian civilization. They should have possessed the same technology and culture; otherwise, they wouldn't have been able to fight them for so long. In his imagination—or rather, in the Nameless Technician's imagination—the Siberian resistance group should have been a 'civilization.'
But this imagination was gradually changing, bit by bit, as Joshua deepened his understanding of this world.
The first change came with the soul scan of the children in the garden zone. Based on the fact that the children could still play instruments and sing nursery rhymes, Joshua thought that the domesticated Siberians had retained at least the most basic elements of civilization. But he soon discovered that the brains of those children contained no continuous memory fragments—they were almost completely blank. Their singing and playing were entirely like controlling puppets, just as the current warrior controlled the body of the Nameless Technician boy.
The second change occurred after leaving the garden zone and entering the farming zone. Joshua immediately realized that the environment of this world was extremely harsh, even unsuitable for life. As for why such an environment had formed, he had seen a similar cause in his memories of the Sixth Abyss. It must have been a war so brutal that it could ravage a world to such an extent, which also aligned with the guess that the Soul Puppets and the Siberians had once waged war.
But could such a harsh environment really sustain the consumption of a large civilization? Joshua had once looked down from the highest point of the world and clearly knew that the entire world only had scattered green dots—no large-scale habitable environment existed.
The third change came at the moment when, after the battle had largely ended, 'Magic Arrow' struck down countless ordinary people.
From that moment on, Joshua understood very clearly that his imagination of the remaining Siberian civilization was completely wrong.
For a civilization, population might occasionally be a burden, but it is never a disadvantage. To support a complete knowledge system and a cultural society, there must be enough people.
If the Siberian superhuman squad had behind them a civilization equally proficient in souls, then they would surely know that those dull ordinary people could be redeemed. Just like the Nameless Technician, who was not only skilled in repair technology but could even forge a soul through long-term mental work. In that case, from a long-term perspective, they would naturally not choose to destroy the resources in the enemy's hands but would try to take those resources for themselves.
This is also why Joshua said that he had thought of many reasons for their massacre but had never considered race as the cause: after all, perhaps the Siberian civilization behind the squad currently didn't need this population? But even if they didn't need it, they would never use race as an excuse, but rather reasons like war or inability to sustain them.
But the facts proved that everything aligned with another guess: that behind the Siberian superhuman squad, there was no 'civilization' as imagined by the Nameless Technician and Joshua.
Because of the Nameless Technician, Joshua had placed too many expectations on the Siberian resisters. Only just now did he finally understand that these seemingly spirited resisters were merely a gathering of fugitives who had escaped from the Soul Puppets. They were not the army or special forces of some Siberian civilization. It wasn't until 'War Chariot' personally told him his understanding of the resistance that Joshua could clearly grasp this fact and erase his mistaken imagination.
Anger? Dissatisfaction? They were all gone. Joshua now only felt disappointment, and some regret, because the main body of the Siberian civilization had most likely been completely destroyed. What remained was nothing but a group of fugitives without civilization, without history, without heritage.
They couldn't even understand the word 'history.' Even Joshua's mental resonance couldn't help, because in their language and concepts, there was no past or history... Their living conditions were too harsh, the bad environment, the encirclement by the robots, their lack of understanding of themselves... They probably truly didn't know that those ordinary people could be saved, nor that those people were human just like them... And given their conditions, even if they saved them, they wouldn't have the resources to nurture them, because they themselves needed to plunder the Soul Puppet gardens to survive.
The Siberian resistance couldn't even be called a nomadic tribe. They were just a group of homeless fugitives, without the ability or opportunity to produce anything new. Their future was bleak; they had no choice but to live this way, and could only continue down this path.
It was only now that Joshua had a relatively clear understanding of the current situation in the Siberia World. That was why he had spoken those three sentences earlier.
"You are not human." "You are not human." "None of you are human."
Whether it was the Soul Puppets, the ordinary Siberians, or the Siberian superhuman resistance, each, taken individually as a civilized entity, was incomplete. The Soul Puppets had the ability to reconstruct planting zones in the barren world, produce food, and repair the world, but they were rigid puppets, devoid of humanity and wisdom, acting according to commands and rules. Most of their technology likely came from the former Siberian civilization, with no future to speak of.
The Siberian superhuman resistance showed clear communicability and intelligence. Their actions were quite organized, and they had even learned teamwork. But as a nascent, deformed group of fugitives born from oppression, they lacked the ability to produce things and didn't even know the relationship between themselves and ordinary people. In fact, even nomadic tribes could produce; they were still a civilization, just inefficient. The resistance's existence was merely existence—let alone being a civilization, their current situation was dangerous, and they could be wiped out at any time.
As for the ordinary Siberians, they were livestock raised for slaughter, without wisdom, their abilities to think and associate blocked. They didn't even have the freedom to choose death, so how could they be called human?
These three groups were all torn, broken fragments, not complete intelligent civilized entities. Joshua's evaluation of them was an objective statement of fact. He wasn't insulting anyone, nor did he intend to express his anger. On the contrary, he had even extinguished the anger that arose from 'Magic Arrow' killing a large number of Siberians... because they truly had no other choice. For a group of fugitives at the end of their road, this was the only option.
The soil of civilized spirit no longer existed, so how could morality be demanded at such a time?
Of course, these were only temporary views.
Joshua didn't rule out that he might discover new information later that could completely overturn all impressions. Because there were still many doubts. For example, the square communication buildings in the garden zone—where were they connected to? After all, they were merely information relay stations, without a central core for thinking. If so, then who was giving orders to the Soul Puppets?
The team structure of the Siberian resistance was very complete: there were attackers, defenders, long-range and area attackers, siege and demolition specialists, transport means, and stealth support and mental unlockers. This team structure was too mature. Joshua believed that there must be a few individuals in the resistance, like the Nameless Technician, who possessed knowledge inherited from the previous generation of Siberian civilization.
"Really complicated."
Sighing, Joshua raised his head. Through the direction of the wind and clouds, and by comparing the surrounding environment from his descent from the sky, he immediately determined where he was: on the southeastern edge of the Siberia World. So, he immediately lowered his head and looked toward the northwest of the world—the direction of the spiral tower and the countless steel buildings.
The center of the world, where the spiral tower stood, was the only place in the entire Siberia World with large-scale man-made structures. If there was anywhere that might have a truly complete civilization, it would be there. If there was anywhere that might hold historical records from a thousand years ago, when the Steel Serpent Siberia was kicked out of the world, it would only be there.
Logically, he should set off now, but it wasn't time yet. Joshua looked around and saw the Siberian superhuman squad standing before him. Their expressions were tense and uneasy, looking very flustered... They hadn't actually understood what Joshua had said earlier, because their language was very incomplete. They only knew that the seemingly powerful young man before them—they thought Joshua's carbon-based puppet was his true body—seemed very dissatisfied with them.
But Joshua was no longer dissatisfied. If he had been angry because of his originally high expectations, now that he knew the tragic truth behind the resistance, he naturally had no expectations... Without expectations, there were naturally no emotions. At this moment, Joshua only felt a bit regretful. He sighed and said, "Do you want to go to the garden zone to save those children?"
"Go ahead, they're right there."
The huge metal puppet slightly turned aside, making way. Joshua casually waved his hand, and instantly, the countless Soul Puppet remains on the ground were moved to both sides, clearing a path. At this moment, under the warrior's imposing pressure, the seven people led by 'War Chariot' no longer dared to say anything about recruiting him. Instead, they swallowed their saliva and quickly ran toward the garden zone. Among them, the thin boy called 'Pegasus' had green light shining in his eyes again, and the superhuman squad's speed increased considerably.
Watching the departing backs of the superhumans, Joshua turned around and slowly walked toward the edge of the farming zone, toward the black giant wall. He walked very slowly, because with each step the warrior took, all the Soul Puppet remains on the ground trembled slightly. When he took one step forward, the remains seemed to be dragged along, moving one step forward. When Joshua took two steps forward, many pieces of metal that could no longer be used fell off from the remains. As Joshua walked forward step by step, unqualified metal materials left the dragged queue.
By the time Joshua reached the breach in the giant wall, the high-grade alloys and precious metals selected from the countless Soul Puppet remains had been reduced to a piece weighing less than half a ton. Under the transformation of some powerful force, this piece of silver-blue metal block turned into a ring, slowly floating and rotating behind Joshua's puppet body. On the metal ring, one rune after another appeared out of thin air, generating a strange power that produced immense buoyancy, lifting the extremely heavy puppet body off the ground.
Joshua's height slowly increased. He was still walking forward step by step, as if walking on an air staircase. He rose to a height of seven hundred meters in the air, gazing into the distance.
Then, he saw what he had already sensed on the ground.
The dust rising like a sky-supporting pillar at the end of the horizon... and the cold, metallic light flickering within that dust.
Requesting a Day Off
[Note: The original text contained a repetitive "Requesting a Day Off" section with multiple identical lines. This has been condensed to a single instance as it appears to be a placeholder or error in the source material.]