Chapter 5 — Understanding
At first, Merp had only been gathering those streaks of light, using scattered bits of data to enrich himself and supplement his "body." But now he needed to study computer knowledge systematically, and that method of collection was no longer suitable.
He did not act immediately. Instead, he began trying to think the way an intelligent program would.
"If I were an intelligent program, then I would download the relevant materials to study them. So I need to download them too. Right, I need to download!"
With that thought, Merp directly issued a command, ordering the home computer to download information related to computers.
But a problem immediately arose.
The command was too vague.
So the computer began downloading everything on the internet that could be found under the keyword "computer."
That instantly became a disaster.
"WTF?!"
Paul exploded in anger again.
Countless pages began opening one after another. However, because Merp had pinned the chat window to the top, all the web pages and links were opening in the background instead. The entire computer completely froze up.
"Damn it, I'm done with this crap!"
Paul forcibly shut the computer down, then stood up. He felt as though this machine was radiating pure malice toward him today. Pulling on his clothes, he shoved the door open and went outside. He wanted a drink. As for chatting with Alice—forget it.
Merp was also stunned.
The CPU had stopped running. Everything had stopped.
"What happened?"
He had no idea what was going on and started to panic. After all, this virtual world was still far too unfamiliar to him; he had not fully adapted yet. He sent out several more commands in succession, but it was useless. There was no response whatsoever.
"Don't panic. Let me think… no response… no response… Could it have been shut down?"
Merp suddenly realized the issue. Once a computer was powered off, of course there would be no response at all. That meant it was very likely that his own actions had affected the user.
"That should be it. Looks like I got too hasty. I can't be this impatient. What I'm trying to do will require tremendous patience."
Merp calmed down.
He stopped issuing commands and simply waited in silence.
But waiting like this was far too long and dull, so Merp began experimenting with changing the way he thought—trying, for example, to imitate the thought process of an intelligent program.
"No, that won't work. I actually don't understand intelligent systems at all. Before transmigrating, all those so-called smart products were just pseudo-intelligence at best—nothing more than fixed command patterns. They had no real ability to think."
"In that case, an intelligent system would first analyze the meaning of a command. That part is no problem for me at all. Next would be how to answer a question—that means searching through its own stored information, then selecting an answer. That's actually the simplest part of the whole process!"
That was how Merp thought it through.
As far as computers were concerned, his knowledge had always been limited to simply using them—and in the most foolproof, idiot-proof way at that. Now that he wanted to truly understand computers, the first step was to simplify the process, then gradually flesh it out.
Paul had already left home.
He felt as though the whole world was filled with malice toward him. He was the sort of person who loved staying at home, and now he had actually been forced to go out and drink. To him, that was unbearable.
He walked into a small bar not far from his house. It was only afternoon, so there were not many people inside. Just a scattered few, each drinking their sorrows away alone.
Paul made his way to the counter and said to the bartender, "A beer."
Then he placed a ten-dollar bill on the counter and heavily dropped his overweight body onto the stool.
Bang.
A pint of draft beer was set down in front of him.
Paul gloomily picked it up and took a savage gulp.
"Hah…"
Then he let out a long breath.
"Sigh…"
That was followed by a stretch of silent sighing before he resumed drinking.
The bartender handed him a small glass bowl filled with peanuts and shrimp crackers, and Paul absentmindedly picked at them one by one as he drank.
Meanwhile, Merp had finally straightened out the reaction process of an intelligent program.
It was actually very simple:
Command, analysis, search, and feedback.
That meant every one of those steps had to be completed by himself.
And right now, he was practicing.
"My memories from when I was three years old!"
That was the thought Merp produced.
But his thought process was not truly that of an intelligent program, so he had to consciously think of searching again. Immediately, a folder appeared, and then everything from when he was three years old began playing out like an ultra-long movie.
But the entire process took only an instant.
"My reading speed is this fast too? Just like the way I move?"
Data transmission speed in the network was extremely fast, though just how fast, Merp did not yet know. These were all things he still needed to learn.
But if reading could happen almost instantaneously, then he could study an enormous amount of knowledge.
That would be an immense help to him.
A faint excitement began to rise in Merp as he eagerly awaited the computer being turned on again. But this time he would be much more careful. His first step had to be observing the user's condition, so he could prevent the computer from shutting down again while he remained trapped inside.
That was right.
Merp had been trapped.
He had tried earlier to leave, but found he could not.
He had discovered one of his shortcomings—or perhaps, one of his weaknesses.
For now, the diagnostic checks on a home computer seemed to have no reaction to him whatsoever. As for why that was the case, he still did not know. The knowledge he needed was simply too vast.
At last, after downing one beer, Paul lugged his body—well over two hundred pounds—back home once more and plopped himself down in front of the computer.
"Please don't give me any more trouble. Otherwise I'll—"
At that point Paul stopped talking.
He had just realized he was talking to a computer.
"I'm really getting weirdly irritated today…"
There was a beep.
Then the power came on, and the fan inside the case began spinning, its sound not especially loud.
Merp saw the streaks of light appear again.
This time he avoided them while simultaneously issuing a command—one directed at the computer itself:
Scan all systems in the computer.
Immediately afterward, a large amount of data surged toward Merp. But this did not affect the computer's operating speed at all, and Merp also understood what was happening.
It was just like a system scan.
As for why scanning software had no effect on him, it was because he absorbed the data. Since the data could not be fed back to the software, it naturally could not detect his existence.
The computer also had antivirus software installed.
Paul had been so irritated today that he had not used it earlier, but now he moved the mouse and clicked toward it.
Merp, however, was not afraid in the slightest, because he had already finished understanding the antivirus software as well.
Whether he could truly be classified as a virus was unclear, but one thing was certain: there was absolutely no information or data about him in the virus database. Which meant the antivirus software could not detect him at all.
At the same time, he could still absorb data—or evade those streams of scanning data—to conceal himself.
Understanding all of that took no more than an instant.
Merp became incomparably excited.
"This is unbelievably fast! Learning at this speed feels so good it's almost impossible to imagine. Only an intelligent program could probably do something like this, right?"