Chapter Eight: The Ultimate Question

“Now I see why you were so eager to find a doctor. It turns out there’s such a large hole inside.”

At the familiar workbench, Shang Luo was examining the internal mechanism of the music box. He had turned on every light in the room to illuminate the workspace, which was a bit wasteful of electricity. But it didn’t matter; for now, there was no electricity meter, so no one was charging for power.

Under the bright lights, he opened the bottom of the music box. The first thing that caught his eye was the “big hole.”

It looked as though a bullet had pierced through, neatly clearing a path through the densely packed components inside the box. The gears had chunks missing, and the levers were twisted like springs.

An immaculate round cavity was hollowed out within the casing, with the surrounding parts all tangled into a chaotic mess. Yet, compared to that bullet hole, the machine itself seemed unusually abnormal.

The mechanism was almost “overly” intricate. Beyond the usual gears and levers, there were cycloidal wheels, oscillators, hairsprings, ratchets, and steel wheels of various sizes... This tiny music box contained almost every mechanical component he knew of. It was like a miniature museum of mechanisms small enough to fit in a pocket.

And none of these parts were exactly alike, just as no two leaves in the world are identical.

Shang Luo knew that his guess was confirmed. The more complicated the machine, the stronger its “consciousness” seemed to be. Simple mechanisms could only manifest a certain flow of energy, but complex machines could exhibit intricate emotions and fragmented memories. Within this incredibly complex device, the marvelous Apollonia had come into being.

“How is it? Can you fix it?”

“I need to inspect it more carefully. The construction of these parts is almost mocking me. Hmm... Let me first assess whether it’s repairable.”

Under the desk lamp, he put on his loupe.

A loupe, as the name suggests, is used to examine small objects about an inch away; typical clock mechanisms are about that size, and anything larger isn’t suitable for daily use. The brass heart of this clockwork seemed to fit within that dimension.

Yet he vaguely noticed... beyond the visible range of the loupe, there appeared to be some undiscovered mechanical structures extending beyond the size of the clockwork itself.

“Am I straining my eyes? Am I seeing things?”

He removed the loupe and looked directly with his naked eye. Things became clearer; the deep structures within the clockwork were now distinguishable.

He saw a red bullet, lodged deep inside, caught within a tiny link of the intricate mechanism.

“Alright, the problem isn’t too serious.”

He donned protective leather gloves to prevent cuts. This was necessary because the power stored in the mainspring could potentially blow the entire clock apart. Reckless handling might cause the entire spring to snap out violently. A finger cut was minor; a severed artery would be much worse.

With safety measures in place, he used a pair of fine-nosed tweezers to probe inside. The red bullet was within his line of sight. With a pinch, a twist, and a pull:

The clockwork sprang to life; the gears began to spin. At first, the small gears around the edges turned, then the larger ones started rotating visibly. Gears meshed with gears, driving levers, cycloidal wheels, and oscillators into a low, roaring hum.

Only then did Shang Luo realize that the interior of this mechanical heart was even “larger” than he had imagined, extending beyond the confines of its casing. The spiraling mechanism extended deep into the heart, seemingly infinitely far, with more and more components joining the grand concert of gears and levers.

The roar rose in pitch, gradually turning into a buzz, growing louder and louder:

Buzz—

An invisible wave shook his mind.

The world spun, and Shang Luo’s vision blanked out...

When he came to, he was still in the same spot; everything was as before. The briefcase in front of him remained open, and his hand still held the tweezers, the tip gripping the deep crimson bullet.

“You were dizzy for five seconds. Your condition isn’t serious, but my problem remains unresolved,” Apollonia’s voice whispered in his ear again.

The hole was still there. Though the mechanism had begun to turn, the hollow cavity running through the entire device persisted. Surrounding parts spun endlessly around the void, the infinite-depth mechanism making the hole seem endless, like a black hole tearing through the three-dimensional universe.

“My wound hasn’t healed. My casing was utterly shattered. I am still trapped inside this tiny music box.”

“So this is infinity...” Shang Luo realized he had underestimated her. He had thought it was merely complex, but inside there was nearly infinite space. By the logic of “the more complex, the more powerful,” Apollonia was likely overwhelmingly strong.

“Even so, can you still exert your power?”

“That’s only temporary. Like when a vein bursts—you don’t die immediately, but you won’t survive long. For me, this period is much longer, but it causes a bigger problem. Like a wolf tracking blood scent, my wound spreads the scent of my blood farther and farther. So... please, help me.”

Shang Luo set down his tools and left the music box where it was. “I need to know one thing: what exactly are you?”

Apollonia was silent for a long while.

“I must say, that’s the ultimate question. What I am... I might need a long time to understand. But you can think of it this way: I am Sun Wukong.”

“Sun Wukong? What do you mean?”

“Sun Wukong, the Naturally Born Sage nurtured by Heaven and Earth. He was born knowing everything, but he did not understand how to use his power. He wandered many wrong paths, made many mistakes. He received much help and also helped many others. Though born a 'Naturally Born Sage,' his birth did not determine everything. Sun Wukong’s future is shaped by the roads he travels. That is me—the infinite divine machine, Apollonia.”

“Where are you now, then?”

“Well... I haven’t truly walked the world yet. Comparing myself to Sun Wukong, I’m probably still outside the Water Curtain Cave.”

“So you’re a monster now?”

“That’s an apt metaphor. Because right now, I am clearly not human—at least not legally.”

“...” Shang Luo fell into thought.

As a human, he felt he should unconditionally toss this monster into the trash or, better yet, launch it into space on a rocket.

Yet Apollonia’s answer gave him pause. She did not deny being a “monster.” But she proposed the “possibility” of a monster, like Sun Wukong. Sun Wukong was a monkey demon from start to finish, yet he was also a Naturally Born Sage, the Monkey King, the Great Sage Equal to Heaven, Sun Xingzhe, and the Victorious Fighting Buddha.

“So you mean you’re not some vague, indescribable monster. You’re capable of communication?”

“Yes. Please treat repairing me as a business transaction. I will pay you a suitable reward.”

“Hmm, that may be where you differ from Sun Wukong. He wouldn’t negotiate business; he just ‘borrowed’ from his old neighbors,” Shang Luo said, looking at the music box. “Indeed, I’m no Fa Hai, and I haven’t used the ‘Great Mighty Heavenly Dragon’ move to seize your spirit. But as a transaction, what can you offer me? Let’s stop beating around the bush. Tell me what you can do. Since you show no hostility, we can communicate more efficiently.”

“Very well, let’s end the guessing game. Metaphors aren’t my strength. I’ll tell you the whole truth: I cannot foresee the future. Or rather, the one who foresaw the future before was not me, but the Akashic Records—the all-knowing cloud, the ultimate source of all things. As an infinite divine machine, I can open a gateway to the Akashic Records, assisting you in querying it. Though the Records will answer your questions, their replies may not be meaningful to you without my assistance.”

“Like tarot cards?”

“Yes, like tarot cards. I’ve made some minor ‘modifications’ to this deck so it can symbolically convey the Akashic Records directly to you. This way, the deck closes the loop itself, going straight from the Records to the individual, without consuming my energy. No middlemen profiting—energy-saving and eco-friendly, right? Whether you can understand it is another matter. Of course, if it’s you, I can do my best to assist.”

“So you’re willing to help me as much as you can?”

“Exactly. That’s the reward I’ve decided to give you. I will help you ask questions of the Akashic Records, and I will do my utmost, collaborating with you through iterative questioning to obtain the most useful results for you—because the most important thing is the question itself. Have you seen a film? The famous ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.’”

“The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,” a science fiction novel series begun by British author Douglas Adams in the 1970s, also adapted into a film in 2005.

Shang Luo recalled the movie; it did indeed have a similar plot. He had watched it in “another world,” a work unavailable in this era.

In the galaxy, super-intelligent beings—the mice—built a supercomputer called “Deep Thought,” hoping to get the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything.

The mice asked, “What is the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything?”

Deep Thought pondered for seven and a half million years and finally answered: “42.”

“I won’t ask why you know about ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’—that’s not important now. You mean the part about ‘42,’ right? The mice waited seven million years, only to get a baffling ‘42.’”

“Exactly. Where did the mice go wrong? They failed to iterate on their question. Their way of asking was flawed. ‘What is the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything’ is too vague, too chaotic. The mice should have built another ‘Apollonia’ to help them iterate the question, repeatedly, for three and a half million years, until they refined the question they truly needed. Then give ‘Deep Thought’ time to ponder, and the real answer might emerge. It certainly wouldn’t be ‘42.’”

“Wait, you mean iteration takes time too?”

“That’s what I mean by ‘the question itself is the most important.’ Because our collaborative iteration runs through questioning and answering. You provide a proposition; then I ask you questions. Yes, I ask you. Through my inquiry, we find your true needs, and finally, we formulate a practical plan to send to the Akashic Records. Only then will the result be what you truly want. The ultimate question would take at least millions of years of iteration to fit the name ‘ultimate.’ Perhaps even more after that, but at least the result would be useful.”

“So from the start, I can ask anything?”

“Of course. But don’t be too greedy. If your question is too broad, the iteration alone will take an extremely long time.”

“Then my request is— I want to cultivate immortality. I want to become a carefree immortal.”