Chapter 467: Chapter 455: The Algorithm of Human Nature

Within Cybertron, Jarvis’s voice rang out.

[Commander, the first round of testing for the "Flesh and Blood Great Wall" instance has concluded.]

[A total of 87,411 players participated. All were killed in action. Average survival time: 8 minutes and 13 seconds.]

[Collected 7.3TB of high-value emotional fluctuation data, including peak despair, fear, and indignation, as well as fundamental data on soul mechanics discovered through differential analysis.]

Allen gazed at the data collection curve skyrocketing on the light screen, his eyes deep and profound, like two bottomless ancient wells.

"The data quality is high," he commented calmly. "But... it’s not enough."

Fear and despair are merely the most basic colors on the spectrum of human nature.

What he wanted was something more complex, more contradictory, more magnificent.

He connected with Jarvis, inputting new commands one by one.

"For the ’Flesh and Blood Great Wall’ instance, implement a ’Heroic Sacrifice’ gameplay mechanic."

[Module construction in progress...]

"Add random missions: destroy special enemy units, protect heavily wounded allies, provide rear-guard cover."

"Next time it opens, randomly select 1% of the players entering the instance and grant them temporary squad commander authority. The Commander will receive clear tactical objectives, for example: Cover the retreat of 90% of allied forces to the second line of defense."

"Mission success: all squad members receive five times the points, the Commander receives ten times the points and a special title."

"Mission failure..." He paused. "...All squad members will receive zero points for this instance run."

[Rules implemented.]

’Let me see... when collective glory and personal gain are laid bare before them, how will these human algorithms operate?’

「Three days later.」

The "Flesh and Blood Great Wall" instance opened once again.

Cole the miner rushed in the moment it opened.

The fear from being crushed to death by a giant foot last time hadn’t fully faded, but he couldn’t stop.

He had already dropped from over 3,000th place to outside the top 10,000 on the leaderboard. He had to earn points, now!

The scene before his eyes shifted.

It was the same defensive line built from a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood, but this time, something felt different.

The public channel was no longer filled with chaotic screaming, but with a slightly tense yet exceptionally clear voice.

"First and Second Squads, suppressive fire to the front! Third Squad, with me! Our mission is to destroy the hive on the left flank that’s hatching an elite monster!"

Cole froze for a moment. He noticed a new icon in the top-left corner of his Mecha’s display: "Third Squad - Assault."

And the one giving orders was, unmistakably, their "Commander."

’Shit, are they for real?’

Beside Cole, a player with the ID "Hammer Smashes Chest" cursed, but still obediently followed the Commander’s marker and broke away from the main defensive zone.

Their squad consisted of ten grunt mecha. The mission: cross two hundred meters of territory swarming with the Beast Tide and deliver a high-energy bomb into a giant, constantly writhing nest of flesh.

It was a suicide mission.

"Commander! How are we supposed to charge? Going in is just throwing our lives away!" someone protested in the channel.

"Follow my orders!" the Commander’s voice was firm, leaving no room for argument.

"First rank, shields up! Push forward with your thrusters! Second rank, follow behind and provide covering fire! I’ll clear the way!"

Before his voice had even faded, the Commander’s mecha, painted with a red arrow, was the first to charge.

In that instant, Cole’s blood was set ablaze.

He stopped thinking about points, stopped calculating gains and losses. With a roar, he piloted his grunt mecha and followed close behind.

The battle was even more brutal than they had imagined.

The first grunt mecha was pounced on by three swift-type Heart Eaters less than fifty meters into the charge. Its Tower Shield was torn apart, and its cockpit exploded in a ball of fire.

A second one, then a third...

Like moths to a flame, they used their steel bodies to carve a bloody path through the black Beast Tide.

Alarms blared across Cole’s mecha. Its left arm was torn off, and the drive in its right leg was malfunctioning.

But he made it through.

Only three of their Mecha remained.

The Commander’s mecha was half-wrecked. He tossed the bomb, which was flashing with a red light, to Cole.

"Cole! Get it in there! We’ll cover you!"

"Roger that!" Cole’s eyes were bloodshot. He caught the bomb and clutched it tightly to his chest with his one remaining arm.

The other two grunt mecha, including the Commander’s, turned to face the surging Beast Tide behind them. With their last rounds of ammunition and their very bodies, they bought him five precious seconds.

Cole saw the final glint of fire as they were swallowed by the black wave.

He had no time for grief.

He pushed his grunt mecha’s engine to its limit, limping step by step toward the special Heart Eater unit—a great ball of flesh.

[Bomb planted. Detonating in ten seconds.]

Cole tried to retreat, but his grunt mecha was hopelessly entangled by countless newborn Heart Eaters, unable to move.

On his monitor, a crimson countdown ticked away.

5... 4... 3...

In the final moments of his life, Cole felt no fear. Through his shattered screen, he could almost see the main defensive line in the distance, holding firm because of their sacrifice.

He broke into a grin, and then he laughed.

"For Aiselan..."

2... 1...

BOOM—!!!

A blinding white light consumed everything.

...

Cole shot up in his dorm bed, his heart hammering like a war drum.

He was drenched in sweat, as if he’d just been pulled from the water. The searing pain of being consumed by flames, the impact of his soul being torn apart, still lingered at the ends of his nerves.

He had died.

But he... had succeeded.

He sat there in a daze, an unprecedented, scorching-hot emotion churning in his chest.

It wasn’t just the joy of earning points, but a sense of honor... from completing a great mission.

Just then, he felt some kind of shackle deep within his body shatter with a *CRACK*.

A warm current surged from his heart, instantly flowing through his entire body.

His body, which had been somewhat depleted from long-term labor, was suddenly filled with a new strength.

’Could it be...’

Overjoyed, he fumbled to put on his helmet and open his Spirit Realm interface.

A line of golden text slowly materialized in his personal information tab.

[Congratulations! Through extreme mental tempering, your will has touched the threshold of the extraordinary. You have completed the ’Spirit Core Metamorphosis’!]

[Spirit Core Level: Level 2!]

[Your control latency in the Spirit Realm has been reduced to 0.3 seconds.]

Cole stared at the words, stunned.

He slowly clenched his fist, feeling the very real power within him. His eyes grew hot, and scalding tears streamed down his face.

He wasn’t the only one.

On this day, in every corner of the Aiselan Kingdom—apprentices in the slums, workers in factories, farmers in the fields...

Thousands of ordinary people, after undergoing the virtual baptism of "Flesh and Blood Great Wall," completed the first leap of their lives.

Sparks can hide in the dust; legends can be born from the mundane.

On the Spiritnet, posts about "Spirit Core Metamorphosis" were popping up like mushrooms, spreading like wildfire.

Aided by Allen’s Cyber Spirit Realm, the entire kingdom was accumulating power at a terrifying rate.

「Cybertron, Main Control Room.」

Jarvis’s holographic projection materialized before Allen, a massive torrent of data cascading down like a waterfall.

[Reporting, Commander.]

[The second round of testing for "Flesh and Blood Great Wall" has concluded. A total of 91,034 players participated.]

[Detected 1,742 players who completed ’Spirit Core Metamorphosis’ within the instance.]

[Successfully collected 17 new types of composite emotional models—including honor, protection, sacrifice, and responsibility. The total volume of high-value soul fluctuation data has reached 89.6TB.]

Allen’s gaze did not linger on these astonishing numbers.

His eyes were fixed on the simulated structure in the center of the main control room, the one that represented an artificial soul.

It had once been merely a dim, spherical network composed of countless Rune Neurons.

But now, with the influx of massive amounts of high-value data, the interior of this sphere was undergoing an earth-shattering transformation.

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