Chapter 56 - 23: "The 500 Million Year Button

Chapter 56: Chapter 23: "The 500 Million Year Button

Yu Xian stared blankly at the coffee table in front of him.

That white space, that stark red countdown, that version of himself like a broken record.

He remembered.

He remembered all of it.

The nauseating feeling of endless repetition. The despair of being in that white void, screaming to the heavens with no answer, crying to the earth with no response.

The numbness of being stripped of his senses, left with nothing but mechanical recitation.

Every detail, every emotion, every single moment.

It was all as clear as if it had just happened.

Yu Xian froze on the sofa, a chill shooting up his spine to the crown of his head.

The agreement seared into his brain had clearly stated, "99% of the content experienced by the subject within the Dream Net will be forgotten upon waking"...

TDI’s logic for "enhanced learning" in the human brain was also supposed to be "delete the training data, retain the training results"...

’Why do I remember all of this?’

’Why do I remember this hellish "training process"?’

’Why has this agony followed me back to reality?’

This definitely wasn’t a common side effect. If anyone else had gone through this, the project would have been reported and shut down long ago for its inhuman torture!

The only explanation was that everyone else forgot. Only he, only Yu Xian, had for some reason failed to forget.

Only he had returned to reality, carrying the memory of that hell with him.

He had to confirm one thing.

Was he the only one who had experienced this agonizing training?

He snatched his phone, found the chat with the TDI invitation code seller, and called him directly.

"Hey, buddy, how was it? Mind-blowingly amazing, right? The first time might feel a little weird, but after a few more tries..."

The seller’s voice was just as enthusiastic as before.

"What did you do in your first dream?"

Yu Xian cut him off.

"My first dream?" The seller chuckled.

"That was ages ago. How could I possibly remember?"

"You don’t remember reciting the TDI agreement in the dream? Over and over again, ten thousand times!"

Yu Xian couldn’t help but shout.

The other end of the line went silent for a few seconds.

"Dude, are you still half-asleep?" The seller’s tone was a bit strange.

"Let me think... I think I learned the agreement in my first dream... I must have slept for a very short time, I don’t really remember it. But when I woke up, I knew it inside and out—better than any text I ever had to memorize for school."

"You don’t remember the agony?!" Yu Xian demanded urgently.

"Being in that white space, with nothing there, forced to recite the agreement like a machine, ten thousand times! The feeling of wanting to die but being unable to—how could you not remember that?!"

The seller suddenly burst out laughing, as if he’d just heard the funniest joke in the world.

"Dude, your dreams are a little too vivid, huh? It’s a dream! You can’t take things that happen in dreams seriously."

"It was real!" Yu Xian gritted out.

"Alright, alright, let’s say what you’re saying is true." The seller’s laughter subsided a bit, his tone dismissive.

"Let’s say I really did recite it ten thousand times in my dream and suffered some kind of agony."

He paused, then said nonchalantly,

"But I’m awake now, and I don’t remember it. All I know is I feel fantastic and can’t wait to do it again. Whatever I went through in the dream, what does that have to do with the me who’s here right now?"

Yu Xian was stunned.

He stood there, completely frozen.

’What does it have to do with me?’

He was right. If you don’t remember it, did the suffering even exist?

He was suddenly reminded of a famous thought experiment, a philosophical paradox.

The "Five-Hundred-Million-Year Button."

Imagine a button in front of you. If you press it, you will instantly receive 100 million yuan.

But as a price, you will be instantly transported to an empty space with nothing in it, where you will spend the next five hundred million years.

During those five hundred million years, you cannot die, you will not feel hunger, and there is no form of entertainment—only endless solitude and nothingness.

However, the moment the five hundred million years are over, all memory of that time will be completely erased, and you will be sent back to the exact instant you pressed the button.

For the "you" in reality, it would be as if you just pressed the button, and before you could even blink, the 100 million yuan is in your account.

Would you press it?

The vast majority of people would choose to press it.

Because "erased memories" means the suffering doesn’t exist.

Even if the "me" who spent five hundred million years in that space experienced the despair of being unable to live and unable to die.

Even if I went insane and recovered, only to go insane again, contemplating every question until all meaning dissolved into nothingness.

As long as that memory disappears, it’s as if the suffering never happened.

To the "me" at the moment of pressing the button, the "me" who suffered for five hundred million years is not "me" at all.

It’s just a "consumable," a disposable asset to be exchanged for profit.

Even if that consumable went mad, broke down, and despaired over those five hundred million years, the suffering of a "consumable" is meaningless.

TDI was that button.

They sent their own subconscious minds into that white hell to be slaves for ten days, or even longer, to undergo inhuman "enhanced learning."

Then they would guiltlessly enjoy the rewards of "good habits" and a "refreshed mind" upon waking, eagerly waiting to press the button again.

"Buddy, you still there? Don’t overthink it. Dreams are just dreams, they’re not real."

The seller’s voice remained just as enthusiastic.

"If you felt uncomfortable the first time, just try it again tonight. It’ll probably be fine. Anyway, I’m at work, so I gotta go. Bye!"

The call ended.

Once again, the only sound in the room was the monotonous drumming of rain against the window.