“Ahem, let’s have a student answer this question. The student in the gray clothes in the left corner—yes, you, please answer.”

The students in front all turned their heads in unison, and David Clark stood up looking completely bewildered.

William Carter tried hard to hold back his laughter. Serves you right for talking nonstop—this is Introduction to Aesthetics, and the lecturer is none other than the associate dean, Professor Thompson, a name everyone knows. Every year, he fails more than a dozen male students. If you talk in his class, aren’t you just ignoring his authority?

Now look, you’re being asked to answer a question, and you didn’t even hear what the question was.

But then David Clark paused for two seconds and answered smoothly, “Aesthetics is the appreciation of beauty. It is a spiritual activity in which the subject of aesthetics freely contemplates the object of aesthetics. It is a pleasurable resonance between the subject and object, a dynamic psychological process of communication between the self and the external world. It is characterized by spirituality, freedom, and dynamism.”

Professor Thompson was stunned for two seconds, then quickly recovered: “You may sit down.”

Seeing Professor Thompson holding back his anger with nowhere to vent, William Carter was amazed. Since when did unreliable David Clark become so quick-witted, even leaving the teacher speechless?

The thing is, when William Carter flipped through the textbook, he realized this was exactly the point Professor Thompson had just covered. But David Clark had been talking to him the whole time—how could he possibly multitask, hear Professor Thompson’s question, and recite the answer word for word?

William Carter whispered, “Not bad, Little David, you pulled it off.”

David Clark looked at William Carter as if he were an idiot: “Are you stupid, brother-in-law? It’s this.”

David Clark tapped the silver ring on his right temple.

Chapter 4: The Trial of the World of Consciousness

William Carter instantly understood. It wasn’t David Clark who answered the question—it was the AI in his head answering for him.

No wonder Professor Thompson was so frustrated but didn’t say anything. He clearly realized this too.

Professor Thompson must have wanted to give a warning to this inattentive student, but David Clark just relied on artificial intelligence to answer. What could Professor Thompson do?

Tell David Clark to take off the silver ring and throw it away? Don’t be ridiculous—scientists all over the world are at a loss about this thing.

William Carter suddenly had a bad feeling. Now he understood why David Clark had repeatedly emphasized the importance of this silver ring.

William Carter’s own AI couldn’t talk, so he just went straight to sleep last night and didn’t bother to study it. But David Clark and the others had been tinkering with it until five in the morning. Clearly, they already knew how powerful this AI was.

Take this class, for example. Introduction to Aesthetics has always been a disaster zone for Chinese majors, because it’s all difficult theory and the exam is closed-book.

But this year, it’s likely that no one will fail the exam. Everyone can use the AI in their head to memorize the entire book. When the time comes, the AI says a sentence in your mind, you repeat it out loud, and everyone could get a perfect score.

If that’s really the case, then the college entrance exam—

William Carter started to feel anxious. Only now did he truly realize that the emergence of this personal AI system could be catastrophically and irreversibly disruptive to the current social structure.

It was obvious that Professor Thompson was in a bad mood; class ended at 11:50.

He used to be notorious for running overtime—sometimes lecturing enthusiastically until 12:30, so by the time everyone went to eat, there were barely any dishes left in the cafeteria.

Clearly, Professor Thompson was also worried about the ring. Today’s lecture was perfunctory, and he even ended class early.

William Carter wasn’t gloating. As associate dean, Professor Thompson always taught very seriously and was diligent and responsible. Though everyone complained, in private they actually respected him a lot.

William Carter just felt a bit regretful.

It was obvious that this silver ring would have a revolutionary impact on society, especially in the field of education.

William Carter and David Clark went to the school cafeteria, chatting as they ate.

David Clark kept emphasizing all the things the silver ring could do, including helping people memorize information, analyze problems, offer suggestions, and so on.

However, this personal AI system wasn’t omnipotent. It didn’t possess knowledge beyond the current era’s technology, and it didn’t even know how it came to Earth or got into everyone’s heads.

In other words, this thing was just an auxiliary system. It could help you memorize books, analyze simple problems, and chat, but expecting it to advance the world’s scientific research was unrealistic for now.

Some speculated that the AI’s abilities were currently restricted, which is why it said it wanted to “evolve together.”

Of course, most of this information came from online discussions. David Clark had basically read it online and then verified some of it himself.

As the two chatted, it turned noon.

Suddenly, William Carter noticed two lines of text appear in the lower left corner of his vision.

Initiating primary trial instance

Trial instance 1 has been activated

William Carter was startled. Looking across at David Clark, he saw that his eyes were vacant—clearly, he was focused on listening to the voice in his head.

“Complete the trial to become stronger.”

David Clark looked utterly shocked.