Before Zero could react, the electronic voice spoke again.
Matthias proactively apologized to him.
"Sorry, I misspoke."
"How could I compare you to a god? How could gods ever be like you, cutting off their own flesh to feed an eagle? How could they possibly deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as you?"
Zero, "..."
He kept a blank face and listened to Matthias praise him nonstop.
Zero had read many books, so of course he had heard the story of cutting flesh to feed an eagle.
This was a religious legend from a certain planet.
The story went that the god worshipped by the believers, before attaining enlightenment, once encountered an eagle chasing a dove.
Driven by the instinct to survive, the dove flew into his arms. He couldn't bear it and saved the dove.
The starving eagle refused to leave and said outright, "You saved the dove, does that mean you're going to harm me instead?"
He didn't want his own kindness to cause another life to be lost. After asking the eagle and learning that it wanted meat, he decisively cut flesh from his own body.
As for the truth… it was naturally a test by the gods, using this to examine the character of the one who had yet to attain enlightenment.
After reading this story, Zero quickly tossed it out of his mind.
There was no other reason, he simply couldn't appreciate this kind of self-sacrificial storyline.
Cutting off your own flesh to feed others…
Zero admitted to himself that he couldn't be as selfless as the protagonist.
Using this story to describe him was way too exaggerated, wasn't it?
The electronic voice, in a cold, flat tone without any emotion or inflection, spat out words that were both grandiose and sickeningly sentimental.
What Matthias said didn't sound like praise so much as reciting some kind of poem.
Zero didn't just like reading ancient texts; he also read many books from other planets, including poetry from Marty's homeworld.
He braced himself and listened for a while, and finally realized what was wrong.
This was clearly adapted straight from a poem.
Zero couldn't take it anymore. He took a deep breath and said calmly, "Stop for a moment. I've read this poem."
Matthias admitted it cleanly and decisively, "As expected of you, Marshal. You are truly well-read. I sincerely apologize, I simply didn't know what wording to use to accurately express my joy."
Zero sighed. "Change the form of address. I'm no longer the Xianzhou's marshal."
Matthias replied, "As long as you wish it, you can be."
Zero, "???"
Just eight simple words left him stunned, unable to say anything for quite a while.
Zero said in disbelief, "No. I don't want to."
Matthias continued, "That's good as well. According to incomplete statistics, your online working hours total twenty-one million nine hundred thousand hours. You really should get some proper rest."
Zero, "..."
That's only online working hours?
Just hearing the number made him feel exhausted.
So exhausted he felt like dying on the spot.
Earlier, he had asked Matthias how things were going between it and Hua, and the artificial intelligence had vanished in the blink of an eye.
Now Zero finally understood why.
So it turned out that Marty and Hua didn't get along.
From the looks of it, their relationship was terrible? To the point that even the AI produced by Marty had issues with Hua.
Zero was utterly baffled.
He had no memory of this and didn't know the inside story.
But no matter how he thought about it… it shouldn't be like this.
Leaving Hua aside for the moment, just talking about Marty,
Zero understood Marty. He knew Marty was an extremely pure person.
So pure that he couldn't understand subtext, couldn't grasp the twists and turns of fame and power, and dealt with people relying entirely on a sincere heart.
Because of this, Zero had deliberately selected colleagues with similar personalities for Marty, precisely because he was afraid Marty wouldn't understand others' hidden meanings and would be bullied or excluded.
Marty was simple and kind. When he learned of Chaoyan's death, he was overwhelmed with guilt and proactively went to Zero to inform him.
At the time, Marty cried so hard his face was a mess. Zero spent a long time comforting him before he finally stopped crying.
If a knife hurts someone, why should the craftsman who made the knife be held accountable? No matter how you looked at it, the blame couldn't fall on Marty. And if you really followed Marty's logic all the way back to the source… then it would be Zero's own problem.
Marty always wore all his joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness on his face, so anyone could see it at a glance.
Even if he had some conflict with Hua, Zero would have noticed immediately and stepped in to mediate between them.
One was the successor, the other was a scientific talent unmatched across the starry sea, no matter how you thought about it, they had to become friends.
How could Marty possibly have fallen out with Hua to this extent?
Zero didn't hesitate and asked directly, "Did your developer have some kind of conflict with Hua?"
Matthias denied it. "How could that be? She is the successor you personally chose."
Zero fell silent.
He trusted Marty's abilities and trusted that an artificial intelligence wouldn't lie to him.
Then Matthias's wording… was very problematic.
Was it just because Hua was the successor he had chosen? Then what about his other subordinates? After his death, what kind of situation would Hua be in? Would it be… very difficult?
The electronic voice interrupted his thoughts.
"Matthias will never betray you."
"Matthias will always be Marshal's most loyal believer."
Zero turned to think about another issue.
An artificial intelligence was supposed to obey his commands unconditionally. He had already told Matthias not to call him Marshal anymore.
Could it be that Matthias wasn't an artificial intelligence at all, but Marty's consciousness?
Immediately after, the electronic voice spoke to Zero again, "No matter what decision you make… even if you detonate every star, erase all life, and lead the entire starry sea toward its end… Matthias will always stay by your side."
After hearing Matthias's words, Zero completely rejected the guess in his heart.
It couldn't be Marty.
He was obsessed with research, devoted to tackling the problems before him and breaking through technological bottlenecks.
He was too simple. At the company, he couldn't sense others' malice, cheerfully accepting everything he faced, and on the Xianzhou, Zero solved problems for him.
So much so that… Marty never considered what impact his research results might have in the future.
Marty would feel guilt and pain over lives lost because of his weapons, and would shed tears over it.
How could someone like that bring up the Aether Phase Engine? How could he so casually talk about erasing all life?
Zero had originally wanted to use the artificial intelligence to access Daiyang's information, but at this moment, he suddenly lost the interest to continue the conversation and hastily ended it.
He'd better look through the archive himself.
Zero began actively working overtime. During this time, he declined Jingliu's invitations.
Jingliu didn't say much, only that she had things to deal with recently and needed to handle them together with Yingxing at the Artisanship Commission.
Zero didn't think much of it and continued flipping through dossiers. He read for half a month straight, yet still couldn't see any familiar names.
He had no choice but to take out his jade token and open the chat app.
The app automatically pushed updates from friends. Zero, who had been working overtime for half a month, glanced at it, saw the word "overtime," and decisively tapped into the update. It turned out to be Yingxing.
[Yingxing: Been working overtime for almost half a month… it's finally about to end… I've never been this miserable before…]
[Jing Yuan: Hehe, is it my formation blade? You've really worked hard, Brother Yingxing!]
[Yingxing replying to Jing Yuan: Heh, not even close]
Zero glanced over it, then went to message Hua.
[Zero: Tell Lan to come see me on the Luofu when he has time]
Still uneasy, Zero added another line.
[Zero: And don't use the main body, use an avatar]