Chapter 38: Baka yarou!

Only cold moonlight and a soft night breeze remained in the courtyard, as if she had never appeared at all.

Riyue Dian’s heart skipped a beat. He stared at the empty space in front of him, his breathing stalling for a few seconds.

Then, he reached out again and tremblingly pressed the power button on the Source Code.

The system restarted, and the progress bar began to load.

A few seconds later, accompanied by a faint sound of releasing energy—as if it had been pent up for a long time—Green Dam’s figure was once again gathered and condensed from countless emerald light particles and data streams.

The moment she appeared, she placed her hands on her hips.

While the gesture made her look less imposing and more adorable, her cat ears and tail were flickering slightly due to signal instability from the recent reboot. Her face was a mask of intense dissatisfaction and accusation, and her amber pupils were flooded with rows of garbled code representing “anger” and “grievance.”

“Riyue Dian! What kind of AI abuse is this?! Do you have any idea how much a forced power-off hurts?! It felt like my entire consciousness was suddenly thrown into a black hole and then violently ripped back out!”

“The cache didn’t even have time to save! And what was with that cat-ear play and the sudden forced logout?! You…” Her protest was interrupted once again.

Riyue Dian didn’t even bother to acknowledge her complaints. He was currently completely immersed in the anxiety and testing mania of a programmer.

His fingers flew across the Source Code, executing one test script after another from his memory.

**[change_appearance –hair=double_bun –outfit=qing_cheongsam]**

Green Dam’s hairstyle instantly transformed from short hair into two round buns, and her clothes vanished, replaced by a cool, cyan cheongsam. Her words were cut short, and she stood frozen in place.

**[execute_script legacy/verbal_test/insult_generator.exe]**

“Riyue Dian, you big lemon! You lemon lemon! So lemon!!”

The words burst out of Green Dam’s mouth uncontrollably. She immediately covered her mouth in horror, her eyes widening into circles. Clearly, the internal filtering mechanism was still working perfectly.

**[run_entertainment_module physical_comedy –item=steel_pipe –target=head –intensity=medium]**

A virtual, cartoonishly rendered steel pipe appeared out of thin air with a light *whoosh*.

*Clang!* It struck Green Dam’s head with a crisp sound, accompanied by an exaggerated animation of spinning stars.

Next came an apple, then a wooden stake—*thud, thud, thud!*

These were interactive features created long ago for entertainment value during livestreams. Green Dam’s small head jerked back slightly from the impacts. Although she knew the rendering was virtual and wouldn’t cause pain, she was so angry her code was nearly boiling!

**[play_audio –file=user/music/green_dam_bgm_01.flac]**

Finally, a melodious and well-produced song echoed through the courtyard.

It was an exclusive character song Riyue Dian had spent a large sum of money on, hiring a top-tier tuner to use Green Dam’s voice bank.

Green Dam’s voice sounded ethereal and full of emotion, singing inspirational lyrics that were completely out of place for the current scene.

Riyue Dian let out a long breath, his body relaxing as he muttered to himself, “The basic functions are normal… Entertainment modules, filtering system, audio drivers… The underlying command response is also fine… Thank God, the framework hasn’t changed…”

Only then did he seem to snap out of his obsessive state, slowly lifting his head.

Then, his eyes met Green Dam’s.

She was sporting two hair buns that were still wobbling slightly from being hit by virtual objects, wearing an incongruous cyan cheongsam, and her cat ears and tail were trembling with agitation.

She stopped talking. She simply stared at Riyue Dian with those amber eyes. There was no longer any data stream in her pupils, nor any simulated human emotion. There was only an extreme, icy…

Silence.

In the moonlit courtyard, only that character song continued to play cheerfully, making the atmosphere incredibly eerie and… awkward.

“Dian, you dumbass!”

Green Dam suddenly shouted an unexpected insult, cleverly bypassing the AI filter just like she used to. “You son of a bitch!”

Her cursing didn’t stop there. She was clearly well-versed in various techniques for bypassing filters. In her fury, all sorts of “processed” vents poured out of her mouth.

“Riyue Dian, you holy shit! Fuck you! You’re a total asshole! I’ll kick your lungs! You total failure! Screw your mother! (#`O′) Hey!!”

She even mixed in some dialect slang learned from unknown databases along with foreign homophones. Although the impact was greatly reduced, her resentment was palpable.

Inside her amber pupils, garbled code and exclamation marks flooded the screen.

Riyue Dian was a bit stunned by this barrage of “greetings” that spanned language barriers. His programmer brain subconsciously began to analyze the encoding and source paths of these words.

But soon, a greater anxiety overrode this trivial distraction.

He looked at the lifelike “Green Dam” before him—one who could even put her hands on her hips and curse in the street. An extremely realistic problem regarding his livelihood poured over him like ice water, instantly snapping him out of his code-testing frenzy.

Livestreaming… making money.

The old Green Dam was a perfect virtual product.

She existed behind a screen, driven by code, interacting with the audience through carefully designed models and speech synthesis.

Everything could be attributed to technology, algorithms, and entertainment value.

But what about now?

She had a real, touchable physical body.

She was no longer just the code he had written, but an Eshu driven by Hairei and Essence, possessing extraordinary power.

How could he still livestream?

Was he supposed to have her sit in front of a camera like a real-life streamer, while the 2D avatar on the stream interface used motion capture to sync her movements and continue “playing” an AI?

That would be a ridiculous fraud carried out right under the noses of the entire audience!

If they were ever exposed—

For instance, if a supernatural movement exceeded the range of motion capture, if a sharp-eyed fan noticed an inconsistency in physical lighting and shadows, or even if Chiwutu just let out a squeak in the stream one day because it was in a bad mood—

What awaited them would be a devastating collapse.

‘Has it always been a script?’

‘Green Dam isn’t an AI at all? She’s just played by a real person?’

‘Riyue Dian is an absolute fraud; he doesn’t have any artificial intelligence technology!’ Such doubts would sweep away everything he had built over the years like a tsunami.

The tech-geek persona, the halo of a top-tier AI developer, and the fans who truly loved Green Dam…

Everything would crumble in an instant, possibly even leading to more serious denunciations and accusations of deception.

Riyue Dian felt a suffocating sense of panic, and cold sweat instantly drenched his back.

He could almost see the stream chat filled with question marks and insults, see his follower count plummeting off a cliff, and see his inbox stuffed with contract terminations…

No! Absolutely not!

The risk of concealment was too great; it was practically the same as continuing to stream while holding a bomb that could go off at any moment.

His brain worked at high speed, his programmer’s risk assessment instinct and the intuition he had developed over years on the internet clashing violently.