Chapter 598 - 569: Learning AI

V was thinking about other things,

Need to figure out a way to pin something big on Lille, otherwise, it really feels like we’re going to be done paying our debts.

Even though V didn’t understand business matters, he knew Lille had too many underlings, and if they really took out that castrated version of Da Mai’s to sell... maybe they could actually make a few million off of it.

Maybe... they could really retire after solving Lille’s health issues.

Leaving Herod’s shop, Lille took another round and glanced at the arms dealer Sofia’s shop that Herod had just mentioned.

This place sold very standard genuine controlled weapons, including technical rifles from Achilles, technical sniper rifles from the raccoon dog—stuff you couldn’t find on the market but weren’t too absurd.

Lille still only bought some cheap junk with high-spec components, though it wasn’t cheap—he spent another 50,000.

With these done, they arrived at the best prosthetics doctor’s shop in EBM Stadium, arguably the best prosthetics clinic in Dog Town...

Although it was in the bathroom of the stadium.

The prosthetics doctor here was named Allen, a prosthetics doctor who looked about the same age as old V, fully equipped, with forearms full of enhanced sensory and control neural circuits. Each finger was connected with devices for excision, blood transfusion, and circuit measurement, proving he wasn’t a prosthetics doctor who relied solely on automated equipment.

Overall, apart from being in the bathroom, this clinic was actually quite decent.

Lille needed to replace the damaged prosthetic components on Jack and V and then butter up Allen to buy a set of equipment.

"...Not a brother, I can handle doing prosthetic surgery, but directly buying equipment is a bit much."

Allen shook his head while booting up the equipment.

A doctor wasn’t a medical device company, and Dog Town is only so big, you want equipment to steal my business?

If it were an ordinary person making this request, he would have directly blackened his face, you’re messing with me?

But the three from Lille’s side were clearly big-ticket clients: no need to mention Lille, the whole man looked like a cyber zombie, Jack’s uneven skin surface also proved this big guy was equipped with large areas of subdermal armor, only V looked like a normal person...

However, Allen’s prosthetics doctor nose could smell the strong, complex scent of synthetic prosthetic maintenance fluid from far away, indicating a high degree of prostheticization and serious damage.

A fat deal described those like these three: cyber heavily modified individuals with high prosthetic levels, using parts that weren’t cheap, and all injured.

Generally, such high-level prosthetics were hard to repair and mostly replaced directly.

Although it was unclear where they came from, they were indeed fat deals.

However, Lille did not intend to upgrade or replace with the prosthetics Allen had on hand.

He pretended to look at the menu, "All junk, I don’t need it."

"Me? Junk?" Allen pointed at his nose and laughed angrily, "Do you know what these things..."

"I know too well, I really don’t need them. How about this, I’ll borrow your equipment to adjust them first, I’ll pay the material fees, as for the labor fees, look at the data and then decide if you want to charge me or not."

"Wow, you’re a prosthetics doctor? But doing prosthetic surgery like this, you’ll get your two friends into a medical accident..."

Before he finished, Lille had just connected his personal link to the equipment, and Allen was surprised to find the clinic’s bottom-level permissions had already been handed over to Lille.

Words he wanted to say got stuck in his throat—

V saw his reaction and couldn’t help but tease, "Pissing your pants? Not just a prosthetics doctor, but also a hacker."

Saying this, she lay on the operating table, Jack sat on the seated operating table beside her, and the little nurse nearby took a step back in fright.

This world’s lone wolves always evoked awe, people usually chose to avoid these guys because they often entailed death and chaos.

But hackers, people were not just in awe of highly skilled hackers, but also more fearful, because in this world, not many people were zero prosthetics, and once you had prosthetics, you could be monitored, eavesdropped, controlled, or even killed silently.

People were in awe of those stronger than themselves, and more afraid of what they couldn’t understand.

Lille explained seeing this, "Just seen this kind of equipment, don’t overthink it."

Allen took a step back, "Uh... go ahead and use it."

But what happened next convinced Allen even more that this was a hacker, and not the type who only caused destruction.

Jack and V’s level of prostheticization was quite high, and they weren’t using cheap stuff, high-end materials that combined precision and reliability.

High-end meant the task of maintenance and care was quite arduous since while installation could be semi-automated, maintenance was not.

Take V’s Si Anweisitan and Krensky for instance, these advanced and precise neural implants often had automated nano robots at the ends, which, after the prosthetics doctor completed external implantation and activated the program, would automatically complete the subsequent wiring process.

But maintenance was different, to be precise, maintenance and upkeep of nano-level prosthetics was very complicated. When it came to repairs, prosthetics doctors couldn’t really do it; it usually meant removing and sending back to the factory for thorough repairs, and by the looks of these guys, they probably didn’t have warranties.

So, the risk of cyberpsychosis would increase dramatically after using high-level prosthetics for extended periods.

Lille was long used to handling the neural implants in V’s body; the only difference was, back then, his own body was in good shape, now it was weakened.

Weakness in nerves and muscles would severely lower the physical precision of his body; if he used electrical stimulation, it could cause severe damage, and the precision might not even improve.

Continued use of lizard serum to maintain a high physical state would further shorten his life, so Lille was now always maintaining a low-dose lizard serum.

Performing the surgery but couldn’t do it like before by simply using his hands.

But he had recently mastered a new skill: ever since he fully immersed himself in using the Octopus Arm, he discovered he could control precision equipment entirely like an AI.

Controlling equipment like an AI.

This was quite taxing on the brain, but overall better than injecting lizard serum, and Lille could still link another world’s brain as a backup processor.

Of course, this wasn’t just Lille’s solo achievement, Munemasa was silently observing everything in Lille’s mind, occasionally offering suggestions.

Truthfully, Munemasa was a bit puzzled and shocked: AI usually failed to understand only human emotions, while humans struggled to understand the entirety of an AI.

Now, Lille was doing what humans had always tried to do: understand an AI’s operational processes. But he was doing well, really well, surpassing any human research group on record.

And surpassing Munemasa’s cognitive model expectations, though just by a bit, it was still a leap from zero to something.

Thus Allen witnessed a terrifying scene: prosthetics doctors were a combination of doctors, programmers, and tech experts, but usually at beginner levels in various fields.

Using surgical equipment, most of the time, they operated on the system provided with the equipment, executing specific surgical procedures, occasionally fixing minor prosthetic issues.

Operating a machine didn’t mean understanding basic microelectronics, as ease of operation was a crucial consideration for consumers; the less they needed to know, the more successful the product.

So prosthetics doctors, in some sense, were advanced technicians; their job was to use equipment to operate on clients, but not to operate on the equipment.

But Lille was different; he was reprogramming all the equipment in the operating room from the ground up, recording his ideas and operations as different programs to drive these devices—

Controlling the equipment like breathing.

Allen wasn’t a hacker, but he knew that reprogramming surgical equipment and performing surgery at the nano level was extremely dangerous. Every automated surgical procedure was the result of countless R&D teams’ day-and-night work, and self-modifying during surgery could lead to unknowable consequences for the patient.

But now, all the surgical equipment was running, multifunctional probes buzzing softly, becoming Lille’s eyes; the ablative cutter opening the prosthetic skin layer, the high-precision irregular surgical knife going deep inside, extracting deformed subdermal armor, damaged Krensky, and replacing it with new prosthetic parts...

The air was thick with the smell of welding, synthetic prosthetics maintenance fluid, and blood, as surgical devices moved at high speed, hissing and flashing intertwined.

As V’s damaged prosthetic parts were either shut down or replaced, the flickering snowflake spots in her mind since the nuclear explosion began to lessen.

Si Anweisitan’s lines were restored, and Little Octopus sent the main module back to V’s prosthetic, appearing in front of her eyes.

[Little Octopus: "Big brother has evolved!"]

Little Octopus’ tentacle gave a thumbs-up to Lille, eyes turned into starry eyes.

[V: "Evolved? Feels more like he’s about to explode."]

V sneered at this, Little Octopus jumped back and stuck to V’s head.

[Little Octopus: "Hehe, Mom... V has improved a lot too; I’ll adjust the software."]