Losing Money to Be a Tycoon

November 23rd, Wednesday…

Lu Zhiyao returned to his hotel.

For the past few days, other than going to the film set to film, he had been holed up in the hotel, repeatedly reading the script that Director Zhu had given him, trying to understand the heart of the character Qin Yi.

Lu Zhiyao felt inexplicably frustrated because he had been cooped up in the room.

However, that was exactly what he wanted.

In the entire movie, Qin Yi had always been in the command cabin. He could not communicate with anyone else, much less go out. To a soldier who had been fighting on the front lines for a long time, this was obviously a very frustrating thing.

What’s more, Qin Yi was under immense mental pressure in the movie. His every move would determine the lives of countless soldiers and even the survival of the entire human civilization. The mental pressure would only be greater.

If he could not display such a mental state well, Lu Zhiyao’s performance would fail.

That was why Lu Zhiyao had been playing games in his room for the past few days. He wanted to better understand Qin Yi’s mental state.

However, he felt like something was missing.

After completing today’s filming, Lu Zhiyao returned to his room as usual and forced himself to sit in front of his computer.

Even though he was about to puke from playing the game and was very tired after filming for the entire day, Lu Zhiyao knew very well that his current state was the closest to Qin Yi now. He had to remember this mentality.

However, just as he sat down, he realized that there was something else in the room.

He lived in a suite, and the computer was placed on the desk in the living room. At that moment, there was a Fully-Automated Bickering Machine on the ground next to the desk. The bar-shaped sound system was connected to the computer, and the other two small surround sound systems were placed behind him on the cabinet opposite the desk.

Obviously, the staff had brought this brand new smart bickering machine in during the day.

Lu Zhiyao’s eyes lit up.

Wasn’t this the AEEIS smart speaker that he had requested before?

That’s great, his sparring partner was here now!

Before this, Lu Zhiyao’s biggest problem was that he was acting as if it was a one-man show when in actual fact, he was acting as an opponent of AEEIS. However, during filming, it was all a green screen. He had to rely on his imagination for an opponent. How was he supposed to act?

Even if he could find someone else to act with, there was still a huge gap between the lines and AEEIS’ voice.

Now that he had a physical AEEIS, he just had to record all the lines and he would be able to practice the scenes over and over again!

Lu Zhiyao looked at the Fully-Automated Intelligent Bickering Machine. From its appearance, it looked like a huge black box with an automatic bickering function at the top. The bottom half of the cell phone was the low-pitched part of the echo wall. There was also a glowing ring on the front that indicated that AEEIS was speaking.

There was a note on the Fully-Automated Bickering Machine which read: “Say ‘AEEIS, return to the initial image’ to start sparring with it.”

Lu Zhiyao remembered very clearly that this was not Qin Yi’s first line. Before this line, AEEIS had spoken to Qin Yi in a female form.

However, this line was a turning point. From then on, AEEIS became a cold electronic voice and Lu Zhiyao’s scene with it officially began.

The lines of AEEIS in all the scripts that Lu Zhiyao had received should have been recorded into the system. Once Lu Zhiyao spoke, AEEIS would automatically reply to the next line.

Lu Zhiyao: “AEEIS, return to the initial image.”

AEEIS: “Captain Qin Yi, you might be very angry now, but humans need you to continue fulfilling your mission as a soldier…”

The man and the machine began their conversation.

It was indeed interesting.

Before this, Lu Zhiyao had been rehearsing with the air. Someone else was reading the lines for AEEIS even when he was acting which gave him a different feeling. However, now that he was facing the electronic voice that AEEIS was supposed to have, he entered Qin Yi’s role swiftly.

After sparring for a few times, Lu Zhiyao decided to take a sip of water and rest for a while.

He had changed several different forms of acting during the dialogue and had also recorded the entire process of his performance with a camera. Now, he could watch all the videos and make up for his mistakes.

However, after watching the video a few times, Lu Zhiyao still felt that there was something lacking in his performance.

It was a strange feeling because Lu Zhiyao was already trying hard to express all sorts of emotions that Qin Yi might have, including relief, anger, frustration, determination, and so on. Yet, he still felt like something was missing.

What was missing?

Or was this just an illusion?

Lu Zhiyao flipped the note aimlessly and realized that there was another line on the back. “You can say ‘enter the bickering mode’ to AEEIS to relax.”

“Hm?”

“What is the bickering mode?”

He did not know exactly what it was for, the name ‘Bickering Mode’ sounded very interesting!

Lu Zhiyao immediately said, “AEEIS, enter the bickering mode.”

AEEIS: “Alright, there are always arrogant humans who want to start such boring games. Do you think you’re very smart?”

Lu Zhiyao: “?”

…

Fifteen minutes later, Lu Zhiyao quietly lit a cigarette and began to contemplate life.

What kind of experience was it to be rendered speechless by an artificial intelligence?

At first, Lu Zhiyao thought that AEEIS’s so-called bickering mode was just a gimmick. Even if it could barely compete with humans in the beginning, it would be defeated very quickly and say, “Sorry, I don’t understand what you mean.”

However, he had not expected that AEEIS would be so aggressive. Lu Zhiyao was so angry that he began to doubt his life!

AEEIS started asking aggressive questions right from the beginning. Lu Zhiyao tried his best to deny it, but no matter how hard he tried, AEEIS cleverly forced him into a corner and tortured him.

After that, Lu Zhiyao, who could not tolerate it any longer, began to argue with AEEIS. He began to attack the machine crazily. AEEIS was completely unmoved unexpectedly. It continued to attack Lu Zhiyao’s IQ in a constant, calm tone.

In such a confrontation, Lu Zhiyao was defeated very quickly. He became hopeless and began to think about many life problems and philosophical problems.

Of course, these questions included ‘how much the Bickering Machine is worth’, ‘how much do I need to compensate for it if I were to smash it’, ‘would the matter of the Bickering Machine become a scandal’, and so on.

Suddenly, Lu Zhiyao had a flash of inspiration.

“I see, I understand what I’m missing!”

“In the previous performance, I couldn’t express my emotions well enough for AEEIS!”

Lu Zhiyao suddenly realized something.

The staff matched the lines of AEEIS during the previous performances that were being shot on the green screen. Thus, Lu Zhiyao had spent most of his energy trying to figure out Qin Yi’s mentality.

Qin Yi’s character had a very complicated experience, and he had experienced a very complicated mental fluctuation in the plot. Lu Zhiyao had to take care of all aspects of the story, so he had inadvertently missed Qin Yi’s feelings for AEEIS!

In other words, even though Lu Zhiyao had already realized that this was a scene between him and AEEIS, he did not understand it well enough. He had been too engrossed in digging into the heart of Qin Yi’s character, but he had neglected AEEIS’ role in the scene.

Lu Zhiyao quickly flipped through the script and read the lines from AEEIS again.

Obviously, AEEIS’ subjective intention was something that Lu Zhiyao had neglected previously!

As an artificial intelligence, AEEIS’ emotionless electronic voice made Lu Zhiyao subconsciously treat it as a tool. However, after arguing with AEEIS, Lu Zhiyao suddenly realized that it was not a tool. It had a purpose and inclinations!

It was the same in movies.

The AEEIS in the movie actually affected Qin Yi’s thinking at many key points. For example:

When it added the realistic elements, AEEIS made Qin Yi more aware of the increase in difficulty under the simulated mode by adding specific data like ‘the morale will collapse when the previous war loss rate exceeded 5%’.

While Qin Yi was feeling depressed because of his failure, AEEIS reminded him timely that the accuracy of the data analysis had reached more than 87%. It could be used as a reference to induce objectively;

When the couple sacrificed themselves, AEEIS’ first reaction was to hide the truth and explain it as ‘unpredictable behavior and phenomena randomly generated in an intelligent system to simulate sudden situations in the real battlefield’;

After Qin Yi raised his doubts, AEEIS finally admitted that Qin Yi was commanding a real battle…

There were similarities everywhere.

Every line from AEEIS in the movie would actually have a driving effect on the plot. A large portion of the lines directly affected Qin Yi’s mentality and understanding. There were also a few lines that seemed to hide more content.

For example, when Qin Yi asked AEEIS if the couple was real, AEEIS only answered after a while.

Since it was an artificial intelligence, all reactions were calculated through a program. Logically speaking, any question should be answered immediately.

This’ period of time ‘could actually lead to many things, and Qin Yi should have reacted to it.

Even a subtle expression was more reasonable than being completely unaware.

Obviously, Lu Zhiyao’s previous performance had been very lacking in this aspect. While he knew very well that he was acting in the same scene as AEEIS, he had not really portrayed the essence of such scenes. That was why he felt that something was missing.

At that thought, Lu Zhiyao could not help but knock on the table excitedly.

“That’s right, that’s what I’m missing!”

“Previously, when I was performing, I was still too obsessed with discovering my own character. I did not really treat AEEIS as an intelligent existence.”

“Now that I’ve been rendered speechless by AEEIS, I’ve realized that this is very important!”

Now that he had found the crux of the problem, the rest was easy.

Lu Zhiyao perked up again and said to AEEIS, “AEEIS, return to the initial image!”

AEEIS: “Captain Qin Yi, you might be very angry now, but humans need you to continue fulfilling your mission as a soldier…”

The man and machine began their conversation once again.