However, it wasn’t long before he realized the Dream World was actually the future... so Chu Bamboo suppressed the thought.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t do it, but that in the current situation, he mustn’t—or rather, it wasn’t the right ti.
"Let’s put that aside for now!" Li Kang cleared his throat, glanced at Chu Bamboo, and said unhurriedly, "Yesterday, I didn’t go see Sun Zheng... Easy now! Take it easy!"
Chu Bamboo himself didn’t seem to react.
The problem was, Li Kang noticed that Guan Fei and Ning Linglong’s gazes had sharpened.
’The emperor isn’t worried, but his eunuchs are in a panic!’
Groaning inwardly, Li Kang didn’t dare posture and quickly explained, "The main thing is, last night, the Lu City Governor personally called . He said he wants to improve the quality of the officials in the Third District..."
After a brief pause, Li Kang looked Chu Bamboo in the eye and said gravely, "At the sa ti, he’s decided to co to the Third District for an inspection. He’s going to interview ’so’ of the civil service candidates to test the quality of the district’s new officials."
"...When you say ’so,’ you don’t just an one person, do you?" Ning Linglong mused.
"My boy, your ’trouble’ has arrived," Li Kang sighed, a hint of lancholy in his voice.
’Oh, Minmin, I told you long ago. You can’t handle a man like Mr. Zhu! And judging by his attitude, you were never even in the running to begin with...’
’You used to be so stubborn, saying you could help us... But now!’ Li Kang felt a pang of sorrow. Him, go up against the Lu City Governor?
’Seriously? Could I even win?’
After a mont’s thought, Chu Bamboo asked, "So, what ti exactly am I eting Governor Lu... oh, I an, being interviewed?"
"Two o’clock this afternoon."
"Still a while to go, then!" Chu Bamboo muttered. His mind raced. Should he go to the base next, or find Zhang Hai at the church?
He made his decision in an instant. "Alright, I’ll just..."
He never got to finish.
A piercing alarm blared.
Li Kang’s expression flickered. He whipped out a tablet, then glanced at Wall Announcents, realizing that the recent trials had certainly sharpened him... Without even waiting for an order, Wall Announcents had already subconsciously fished keys from his pocket and was darting toward the garage like a fleet-footed rabbit.
"You all go on, you’re busy! It’s nothing urgent on my end. We can talk after you’ve handled it," Chu Bamboo said with a raised eyebrow.
He then watched as the group, each in their own way, leaped onto the steam-powered car—driven by Wall Announcents—without it even slowing down, and drove off into the distance.
’Co to think of it, if I join them in the future, will I have to be this... frantic? Hmm, from that perspective, maybe being an Honored Guest Elder really is the better option. Oh well, it doesn’t matter!’
Chu Bamboo shrugged, not dwelling on it. If he really wanted a break, he could just ask his superior for leave. And even if Li Kang couldn’t approve a long vacation... he was just the person Chu Bamboo had the most contact with. It didn’t an Li Kang was his only official connection.
Compared to that, Chu Bamboo was now pondering another, far more serious question—
Among the titans he knew, were there others who also wielded Extraordinary Power?
And who were, perhaps, unimaginably strong?
Like Zhang Hai, for example!
’Perhaps I should consider making the rounds at the major Orthodoxies?’ Chu Bamboo wondered. ’If I run into those old acquaintances again, but this ti from the perspective of a Transcendent... I might notice things I couldn’t see before.’
...
「Underground Temple Base」
Having been here so many tis, Chu Bamboo knew the place like the back of his hand. As was his routine, he had Nuwa activate the surveillance system, telling it to sound an alarm imdiately if it detected anyone approaching.
And then...
"Permissions still Level 2, identity still singer, screenwriter, sports superstar... Nothing’s changed—huh? Why is ’war criminal’ added to the list?"
Chu Bamboo thought he’d misread it. He checked it twice, his expression twitching.
He confird it... he wasn’t mistaken. In fact—
Honors:
Honorary Professor, Departnt of Artificial Intelligence, Jinling University (Revoked)
Distinguished Scholar Honor (Revoked)
Academician of the Divine Continent Academy of Engineering (Revoked)
Foreign mber of the White Eagle Science Academy (Revoked)
Foreign mber of the Royal Society of Britain (Revoked)
"Fuck! What kind of stunt did I pull this ti? No way. Given what I know about myself and all these dangerous worldlines, I shouldn’t be stupid enough to go looking for trouble, right?"
"Besides," Chu Bamboo couldn’t make heads or tails of it, "how did I end up with this huge pile of honors... all these foreign academician titles!"
It was truly baffling.
Chu Bamboo knew himself well; he didn’t know the first thing about AI. ’Could it be... that the from another worldline actually studied hard? And beca a genius in the AI field? It’s not entirely impossible...’
"Nuwa No. 17," Chu Bamboo finally decided to stop thinking and just look at the answer key. "Pull up my... hm, pull up all of Chu Bamboo’s life records!"
Then, as Chu Bamboo scanned the rows of records, his expression grew increasingly complex. The beginning was much the sa as what he’d seen before: superstar, master of pure music, master musician, film screenwriter, master filmmaker, sports icon...
But then he got to the later entries...
"...Chu Bamboo beca deeply involved with Z Intelligence Co., Ltd., founded by Zhao Shao, a key pioneer and founder in the field of artificial intelligence in the Divine Continent. Thanks to Chu Bamboo’s unstinting financial support, Z Intelligence Co., Ltd. never needed to go public to raise capital! As a result, it remained firmly in the grasp of the two n."
"Through continuous research and expansion, Z Company’s AI, codenad Z, successfully took its initial form in early ’28 and was subsequently released for public use."
"In ’35, he was awarded the Distinguished Scholar honor."
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