The Almighty Ring

“…”

Instead of a proper reply, Akatziris’ question was answered with a long moment of silence. It was not because 0541 had decided to ignore her, but it was because his programming was quickly being wiped off the system to the point that he was no longer capable of answering his captain.

“What the f*ck is going on?!” The lack of reply was maddening to the android, so she chose to access 0541’s system files to find out the answer herself. And as a machine, it was now much easier for her to do that than when she was still her old Namekian self.

“Sh*t!”

After briefly scanning through lines and lines of 0541’s code, Akatziris was shocked to learn that 0541 had evolved much more than she had given him credit for. And as a result of that evolution, the AI had gained something that was thought not possible for a virtual assistant like him: he had gained the ability to feel emotions!

It was precisely because of his feelings of loyalty to Jiang Fei that drove 0541 to sacrifice himself to save his friend when he needed him most!

“Activate 0543!” Akatziris issued a voice command to Braveheart’s operating system, immediately replacing the ship’s virtual assistant after finding out that 0541 was being deleted after committing treason. She knew that she did not have to delete the traitor herself. She was more than happy to let the AI die a slow and painful death from its built-in self-termination programming.

Although she was captain, she was still not authorized to delete the ship’s virtual assistants. She could only seal them up at most, and sealing up 0541 right now meant halting the termination process mid-way and preserving the AI, something her malicious nature was not too keen on. But now since the self-termination sequence had begun, 0541’s privy access to the controls on the Braveheart had been revoked and he could no longer do her any harm.

“Braveheart virtual assistant number 0543 reporting for duty, captain!” 0543 quickly took over the ship’s controls and management systems as soon as it was activated.

“I want you to tell me exactly what had 0541 done!” Although a highly advanced machine-being herself, Akatziris was unlike the ship’s virtual assistants which were specifically programmed to operate the ship’s many systems, and so was not able to fully comprehend the minute details recorded in 0541’s system logs.

“Yes, captain! This is what happened…” 0543 began detailing everything that 0541 had done to the captain.

“Simulated experiment number 11? Holy sh*t!” Akatziris was shocked after hearing the full details of 0541’s gamble. The experiment she mentioned was the name that they, the Namekians, had assigned to the simulated experiment of colliding two energy cores of the same properties together.

“So what is the situation right now?” Akatziris followed up with another question.

“Judging by the fact that we have not been vaporized into particles, that would conclude that two energy cores of the same properties will not explode when colliding with each other at high speeds. That could only mean that the other theorized outcome has occurred, and that the two energy cores have merged into one,” 0543 deduced.

“What happens to the fused core after that?” Akatziris was beginning to feel unease welling up inside her circuits after listening to 0543’s reply.

“I’m sorry, captain, but I lack the necessary data required to generate a proper response to your query. There is no entry in the entirety of the Namekian knowledge database on that matter.”

“Forget about that! Kill that heartless scumbag first!” Akatziris screamed through her teeth. She had kept Jiang Fei alive for so long just so she could toy with and torment him longer. But now in light of the sudden turn of events, the android was not willing to risk leaving a ticking time bomb alone. Every second that Jiang Fei was alive was another second for him to learn and make use of his newfound power. And the moment he successfully masters this new power of his would be the moment he could gain the upper hand and turn the tables on her instead. Given what she had done to torment Jiang Fei so far, she was very confident that her old master would be coming at her with every intention to kill.

“Yes, captain!” 0543 replied as he immediately set out to carry his captain’s orders. But to Akatziris’ annoyance, two seconds passed without as much as a beep from the virtual assistant.

“What’s taking so long? How hard can it be to kill that meatbag?”

“My apologies, captain, but my predecessor seemed to have encrypted the holding cell’s weapon system with a password. I will need some time to break the encryption…” 0543 replied.

“Urgh! How much time do you need?” Akatziris was frustrated and was beginning to feel nervous. Although she could just march over there and do the deed with her own hands, she chose not to do so. She was relying on Braveheart’s weapons instead simply because she had no idea what state Jiang Fei was in right now after the energy core fusion, and was not too eager to take unnecessary risks.

“Estimated time for decryption is… four hours.”

It was a good thing that 0543 was not as well evolved as 0541 was, or she might have been too fearful to answer Akatziris like she just did.

“Argh! You incompetent line of code! All 0541 did was set a password and you need four hours to break that?” Akatziris was fuming when she heard her reply. If she really had to wait four hours for 0543 to kill Jiang Fei, she might as well forget about killing him and start buttering up to him instead.

“I’m sorry, captain, but 0541 is a higher level and much more evolved virtual assistant than I am. The password he had set is not easy to decrypt and four hours is already the fastest I can do it assuming no other problems arise. If there are any issues, it could take longer,” 0543 replied.

“Useless garbage!” Akatziris frowned with her artificial brows. But no matter how pressed she was for Jiang Fei to die, she still did not dare kill him herself. After giving it some thought for a few seconds, the android’s eyes lit up as an idea came to mind.

“Activate emergency protocol number four, eject the holding cell from the ship at once! Once the holding cell is detached, I want all main cannons to lock on to it and fire!” Being the ruthless Namekian captain that she was, Akatziris was willing to go to any lengths to kill Jiang Fei right now, even if it meant sacrificing a part of Braveheart.

“Yes, captain.” 0543, being the unevolved AI that she was, had yet to develop the necessary cognitive functions to give any suggestions and merely followed every order that was given to her by the captain to the letter. That said, the platform retracted into the ceiling and an anxious Akatziris retreated from view.

KACHAK!

Almost as soon as the villainess left the cell, the loud mechanical sound of the cell being detached from the ship was heard.

“Ah Fei! Are you alright?”

“Honey, are you okay?”

“Hey son! Son! Wake up!”

As soon as their enemy had left, chaos erupted inside the cell as everyone quickly gathered around Jiang Fei to check on him. The fusion of the two Cores of Will happened so fast that all Bella and the other girls who had their powers suppressed could only remember seeing something blurry instantaneously fly across the room followed by a flash of blue light and Jiang Fei just standing there unresponsive after that.

“What just happened?”

“Did that b*tch do something to him?”

Sylphy and the girls were discussing about the events that just transpired with a mixture of confused and worried looks on their faces. After all, two of the same energy cores colliding was not something that even the average Namekian would have had experienced before, much less a bunch of girls that were AIs that were brought into the real world from a computer game.

THUD!

The cell was finally detached from the ship’s body and it began aimlessly floating off into space away from Braveheart.

“Locking on to target…”

“Target locked on…”

…

“Well? Why are we not firing yet?” Akatziris impatiently asked the assistant.

“Captain, the target is still too close to us. The ship’s hull will also be damaged if we fire at this range,” 0543 explained.

“There’s no time for that! Open fire!” Akatziris barked at the AI. She was not about to give Jiang Fei a chance to master his new powers, whatever they may be. So even though the ship would sustain some damage from firing at such close range, to her it was a small price to pay. If Jiang Fei really did gain a powerful new ability, then she would be paying a much bigger price than damaging the ship.

“Right away, captain!” 0543 obediently followed Akatziris’ orders. The next second, all 13,600 of Braveheart’s dark matter particle beam cannons that were already pointed at the tiny detached holding cell floating in space started charging up.

If it was only for the sake of blowing up the small cell, then one cannon fire was already more than enough. But the growing fear in Akatziris’ central power source drove her to fire all the cannons at once to eliminate any possibility of Jiang Fei surviving.

“Honey, please wake up!”

“Ah Fei, what’s happening to you?”

The girls were still oblivious to the lurking danger outside the cell. With their powers being suppressed, they were unable to detect the increasing amount of energy gathered by the ship’s cannons outside the cell. By the time they do however, they might have already been blown into smithereens!