Chapter 138 - Alternative Approaches
Rupert stood tall and proud, his aura fierce, daring the whole crowd to challenge his mandate.
He's finally showing his true colors, Vern mused. A single sweat bead formed, then made its reluctant journey down the side of his forehead. He'd been expecting Rupert to suggest something insidious just like this, but now that the man had actually gone and done it, Vern was more than a little scared.
In a company of ordinary people, such a proposal would be nothing but a farcical joke. But here? In a place where some believed that humanity would be better off as machines or that society needed restarting, who was to say they wouldn't support such an absurd mandate?
No. Please. God, No! The mandate essentially anointed an omniscient overseer who had direct access to everyone's thoughts on the planet.
Vern took the idea and ran with it, simulating his future in such a world.
I'll be dead within a minute of this mandate's universalization in almost all of them.
The only method of survival would be for him to find ways to prune his memories and never think about his uniqueness ever again. He'll also have to somehow forget that Rupert was the perpetrator of fundamentalists' genocide, for there was no way such a devious man would ever let Vern live with knowledge of his wrongdoings.
The more Vern dug deeper, the more he realized how fucked up he'd be if such a reality came to pass. He'd have liked to believe that his singularity as an observer would give him immunity against Visions, but Rupert suggested he could read the minds of even 'rogue observers' to cull them before they did something he deemed 'dangerous.'
As uneasy as he was, he still couldn't help but notice this oddity. What happened to observers needing to understand their foe's viewpoint before they can use visions on them?
What factor decided that one can be envisioned by another? What was the priority order of observers?
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In this numbing silence, it didn't take him long to arrive at a couple conjectures. Hmm, it seems like this property of observation doesn't work in blacks and whites as I've assumed for a while.
Tapping the pen on the notepad repeatedly, he lampooned, Could someone of higher shades take control of others' viewpoint by brute force? So the number of shades determines the priority?
He furrowed his brows and followed that train of thought to its root. Ahh, right! That doesn't always have to be the case. There's actually a more fundamental reasoning at play here.
He nodded. It's the insights.
That's to say, if two observers decided to fight over the subjective control of an object, the one with more comprehensive insights into said object would come out on top. It was just like how he'd wrested control of the surrounding air from Lucian when the man had turned invisible.
Generally, someone with more shades in their perception would have more comprehensive insights than a lower shade observer. So brute force was still possible, but it may not work if the lower-shade competitor specialized in the particular domain.
And one would be infinitely specialized in their own viewpoint, making it very hard for higher-shade observers to envision changes directly inside one's body.
Hmm, but it isn't exactly impossible either, he mused.
After a while, he scratched his head, thinking, Wow, I am stupid. Why didn't I notice this earlier? I already had all the clues needed to figure this out.
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Soon, he gave a mental shrug. Anyways. Does that mean Rupert has comprehensive insights regarding all observers so that he can use his vision within their minds?
After only a second, a realization dawned on his face, and his expression worsened. No. It's the objectivity record that has the comprehensive insights, not Rupert. If he did, he wouldn't need the artifact at all.
Inferring from how everyone, including Lady Sylphina, talked about the artifact, he came to another realization. Objectivity record is essentially the compendium of most comprehensive insights regarding our world.
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Fuck. This is downright terrible! If someone of Rupert's caliber gets access to infinite insight, what can't he do?
With every second, the gravity of this 'consensus' sunk in like never before. Omniscience of Mandate essentially handed over full control of the planet to Rupert. He would practically be no less than a god.
What was worse was that Vern' wasn't the only one who'd lose his freedom to think in such a world—everyone would. Anyone who simply even thought of rebelling would be found out and dealt with swiftly.
That's when the heavy silence cultivated over the past couple of minutes shattered, and a cold voice emerged, "Rupert, are you listening to yourself?"
Vern extricated himself out of these thoughts and looked up. It was that lady Eterna in the rouge dress.
She rapped her fingers on the armrest and reprimanded with a dangerous tone, "You really think all humans in the world should give up their freedom and privacy and open their minds to someone like you?"
Exactly my thoughts!
"Have you considered that none of us here would like you to be inside our heads, passing judgment on everything we should and shouldn't do?" She then shook her head, "Just how narcissistic one has to be to think they are fit to decide what's right and wrong for every human on the planet?"
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Wow. Vern couldn't help but feel that he'd finally met another kindred soul in here. You tell him! he cheered.
No one in the crowd dared to agree with her loudly, but Vern's intuition for structure told him that many had similar thoughts.
Phew… He let out a sigh. Yeah. There's no way any of these selfish people would agree to such a power imbalance. Rupert had shot for the stars, only to have his ambitions mocked and shredded.
Tap.
Rupert didn't let the crowd read into her words too much and responded back in kind with a scathing tone, "Heh. Just how ignorant does one has to be to think they can sit around doing nothing with all this power as the world goes to hell? Surely, all the problems will solve themselves if we just twiddle our thumbs, right?"
Vern felt like punching something. As much as he hated this man, he had to agree with most of the points he raised. These people didn't know that Vern had already delayed the end, so they should be doing everything in their power to fix the reality.
On that note, how am I supposed to convey this information? He had no proof, after all. No one would believe him if he just stood up and told them that the former Eterna, King Keras, had raised a false alarm. Not unless he explained his encounter with Lady Sylphina, and it'd be the height of foolishness to even bring that up here.
Hah…I don't know.
Rupert continued in the same tone as hers, "Have you considered the toll it'd take on my singularity to stretch throughout the whole planet? After the critical consensus propagates the mandate of omniscience, I doubt I'll ever be myself again. You think I revel in the idea of losing my singularity and merge with an artifact?"
The lady rebutted without a pause, "Portray it as you will, Rupert, but it doesn't change the fact that you plan on controlling the denizens of the whole world like puppets on your strings. If that's what survival means, I don't want it, and I'm sure most would agree with me."
"I see." He sighed, "It's a shame you put your individual self above our civilization's continued existence." With a shake of his head, he turned back to the crowd, "My fellow Visionaries, I am sure there's more of us who believe the world can be a better place and don't think that it starts and ends with them."
The lady snorted but didn't respond.
Rupert continued, "Tell me your thoughts. If you disapprove of my mandate, give me a better proposition. Doing nothing is not an option!"
Vern frowned. What is he playing at? He found it hard to believe this man would give up on his grand plan just like this.
An impassive man in the seventh row jumped at the opportunity, "Lord omniscient one, our doom is not a matter of flesh or spirit, but of emotion. Fear, despair, rage—these are the true contagions. I propose we engineer a new kind of existence, one devoid of these destructive emotions. A society of beings that cannot feel fear cannot succumb to madness or the whispers."
It's this guy again.
Rupert didn't even turn his head and rebuked the man, "A poorly thought out idea. Emotions are a complex amalgamation of many fundamental assumptions of our reality. Removing them would mean, in part, removing those fundamentals—essentially destroying the nature of reality."
Vern's pen stopped in its tracks, and he looked back up at Rupert, his eyes wide. Did he just…mention fundamentals?
Clearly, most only processed those words at surface level, but if Vern understood this right, Rupert just claimed that Emotions were a combination of some of the eight fundamentals.
Does that mean he knows? Knows that fundamentals, observation, and subjectivity are undeniably entangled.
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Has to be, right?
A mixed feeling arose within Vern. It made sense that the leader of a coven of fundamentalists and an observer with so many shades in his perception knew about the link between those concepts.
Hahh. He sighed. It wasn't a pleasant feeling to realize he wasn't the only person to have figured it out.
I guess I'll have to find peace in the fact that fundamentals suit my viewpoint better than everyone else, and that no one here seems to understand the profound insight behind that rebuttal.
This also had its logic. All these visionaries had their own observation records that guided their path and experiences that shaped their insights. Many would laugh at and disagree with fundamentals that categorized reality into eight separate domains.
After all, Lady Sylphina had told him that even though eight fundamentals was the closest they'd come to perfection, there were other answers to abstract reality, too. This was just one of the better ones.
He had more to chew on this, but the impassive man backed down, and a dark-skinned man in the sixth row stood up in his place and bowed, "I wonder if omniscient one could grant us an opportunity to speak."
Rupert nodded, and the man began, "We at Veiled Sovereigns propose a minor adjustment to reality that may solve the problems that lord mentioned. We suggest injecting knowledge of subjectivity into the minds of everyone."
Vern listened closely, and so did others, as the proponent continued, "If everyone, including the sightless, understands the drawbacks of making deals with the devils, the terrors that await them if they lose their mind, and the consequences of their actions, we believe that the world will heal itself on its own."
That was…interesting. But it's a flawed idea.
Instead of Rupert, a woman on the far right of the row rebuked the speaker, "Hah, naive." She scoffed. "Have you considered that many would rush to enlighten themselves, even knowing the terror of the whispers? I don't know about you, but I have no wish to compete with such leeches for the world's representation."
Aha. Vern clicked his tongue. There are gatekeepers in here, too? Such people existed in all professions, and observation was no exception, it seemed.
Soon, more people chimed in. One said, "Doing so will be a terrible idea and would achieve nothing more than blowing up the already ever-increasing entropy."
"Are you stupid? Do you think the minds of sightless are ready to accept the knowledge about Elden ones? Billions more would succumb to madness or lose themselves to such knowledge in mere days."
Vern mostly agreed with their points, too. He knew better than most. Secrets were secret for a reason. Exposing them willy-nilly was careless at best and disastrous at worst.
The dark-skinned man tried to argue, but after only a bit of back and forth, Rupert interjected, "I generally respect veiled sovereign's public-minded approach, but this idea is impulsive and foolhardy. You seem to forget that spreading the knowledge of these horrors would further anchor them to our reality, strengthening their prowess. I'm sure I need not say more."
The proponent repeatedly opened his mouth to speak but eventually sighed and sat down.
That is indeed a good point. Rupert knows what the hell he's talking about.
"Next." Rupert declared, both his hands resting on the head of his cane.
A priest on the third row stood up, "Coven master, I suggest we attempt an exchange for this opportunity of critical consensus with The Eternal Keeper. As a firm believer of the Eternal One and a preacher of their faith, I assure you that the lord will listen to me and offer us far greater benefits than we could ever extricate ourselves."
To this reasonable-sounding tactic, observers sitting in higher rows looked at the priest like they were eyeing a unique specimen. Before long, most shook their head, and Rupert shouted, "Next."
A little unsure what happened there, Vern debated whether he should finally speak up and join the fray.