Rebirth on the Doors to the Civil Affairs Bureau

61

“How can I not pay…”

“It’s really alright, I’m just happy I met you again.” The man suddenly said.

“Eh???” Ren Xinxin looked at the man in surprise. Meeting me again? And saying you’re happy, yet not smiling?

“Have we met before?” Ren Xinxin was uncertain.

The man nodded, and without a hint of joy in his voice, he said: “On April 6, 2008, at 5:31:58 p.m.”

“(⊙o⊙) Oh.” Xinxin was stunned.

“I’m Gao Feng, I’m happy to meet you again, Ren Xinxin.” The man finally showed emotion when he said this, as his calm eyes flickered.
Ren Xinxin’a brain began to run at high speed. In 2008 she gave birth to Little Bell. April was before her birth…during that time she mostly just went to work then home. Besides Xia Feng and Qin Yue, she had no contact with the opposite sex.

And at 5:00 in the afternoon, she would have already gotten off work. His name is Gao Feng, Gao Feng…

“You…you’re…the homeless man on the park bench?” Ren Xinxin asked, still not quite sure.

“You remember me.” Gao Feng’s heart seemed a little warm, is this what you call a happy feeling?

After being on earth for five years and three months, he had seen countless human emotions. But this was the first time he had experienced these feelings himself.

He’ll need to analyze this later. It seems that his body produces some kind of stimuli that affected his nerves organically. Was this the difference between human beings and robots?

For the first time, Gao Feng realized just what Main Intelligence’s mission meant.

Gao Feng’s hometown was millions of lightyears away from the Milky Way: the Kepler Planet. The civilization on this planet was highly developed, where their genes are highly optimized. They would never get sick, never age, never die, or even need to learn. This was because Main Intelligence would implant chips on their brains just after a baby is born, linking the child’s brainwaves to it so you can learn all known knowledge in an instant.

So they never had a childhood full of ignorance. Every Keplerian stayed the same, from child to adulthood. They were no different from the robots they create.

Because the planet was too powerful, there was no war. Because technology was too advanced, there was no hunger or pain. Because everyone had the same mental development due to the chips, there was no thirst for knowledge.

Day after day, the whole planet of Kepler acted like an emotionless machine, running smoothly until one day, the first suicide happened.

Everyone was puzzled, but not sad. No one thought about the suicide for too long, after all, a new child could be made. With their rigid control of the population, they would never lack people.

But that was just the beginning. Like a switch had been flipped, more and more Keplers that had lived too long wanted to experience the feelings suicide would bring. Every day, suicides would happen until this phenomenon finally attracted Main Intelligence’s attention.

Main Intelligence’s computers were overloaded for a month before it finally came to the conclusion that Keplers suffered the mythical and legendary depression.

But what was depression? The people didn’t understand.

The Main Intelligence answered: It was when you live more and more like a machine, as if you didn’t have a soul.

The people disagreed, they had consciousness and psychological drive. Robots and machines do not.

Main Intelligence said, but you have no feelings. You live day after day without experiencing happiness, sorrow, desire. You do not fear death.