Translator: Dreamscribe
8 PM, Rockefeller Center observation deck.
Seo-ha sat lightly on the windowsill.
"This is perfect. Don't move."
The photographer slowly brought his hand to the shutter of his Leica.
Click.
Brake lights filling lower Manhattan, an endless procession of headlights. Today was the day of the TIME Magazine cover shoot.
Seo-ha sat there, gazing outside.
'Incredible.'
The regularity and irregularity created by millions of vehicles.
"Quite the view, isn't it?"
The photographer pointed outside and continued.
"I shoot here pretty often, and it moves me every time I come."
"Yes, it really is an amazing night view."
But Seo-ha was seeing an entirely different landscape from what the photographer imagined.
Before his eyes, an enormous vector field opened up.
Millions of lights and dots were vectors with directionality. Points where congestion formed appeared as vortices created by vectors colliding with one another.
When energy accumulated at a specific intersection, even the smallest change could transform it into an unstable equilibrium point where the entire system spiraled out of control.
As he looked down from the window, the entire city naturally transformed into a vast topological space.
In this space, the signal system served as an operator that reshaped the terrain.
"Ah! It's similar."
"Hm? Similar to the night view of which city?"
Seo-ha didn't answer his question, simply flashing a gentle smile.
'It's similar to an energy function.'
The difference was that he could design the terrain himself.
A city is a living system.
If so, the brain had only one job: to lower the energy across every region of the space as evenly as possible.
It was a field closely connected to the theme of minimal energy that he had been researching all along.
* * *
MIT Joint Research Building.
A restricted area inaccessible without a keycard.
"Everyone looks busy?"
Rachel set down her pen, pausing from the report she was writing.
There was an unusual tension in the air around her.
Everyone was glued to their monitors, either fixing code or reviewing data.
"Oh, Rachel. It's probably going to be hectic today."
"What's going on?"
"It's the day Seo-ha does a full review of the simulation."
Rachel took another look at the researchers' faces.
Tension, anxiety, yet more than a few had the corners of their mouths slightly turned up.
"We're passing today, no matter what!"
"We're seriously confident this time, you know?"
The math team led by Theo had gathered in front of the whiteboard, analyzing the causes of their previous failures.
"The problem was always the global stability condition. If the gradient direction goes off even once here...."
"The energy surface tears apart."
"That's why we added constraints carefully this time."
The researchers, faces haggard, challenged and verified each other's theories.
The whiteboard was a tangle of dozens of equations and topological diagrams. Everyone stood before it, tense as students awaiting their exam results.
"He's coming in now!"
The research lab fell instantly silent.
An innocent-looking boy in a white hoodie.
Seo-ha walked toward the central screen of the lab with a bright, expectant smile on his face.
A small bow.
"Hello. Thank you all for your hard work."
The sincerity in his words was unmistakable.
The stiff atmosphere softened a little.
Even the researchers who had been bloodshot-eyed just moments ago found brief smiles crossing their faces.
"Don't fall for that."
Jake leaned close to Rachel's ear and whispered.
Fall for what? What does he mean?
Rachel couldn't understand what he meant.
Jake remembered it all too clearly.
On the day of the first review, Seo-ha had walked in with that same guileless face and mercilessly slaughtered every last researcher.
That day, too, he had entered the lab with a smile.
The boards had been filled with topological diagrams of traffic flow across each sector and stability analyses using Jacobians.
"The overall flow converges stably. There are no phase transitions, and we've eliminated the feedback loops."
Harry had stepped forward confidently to explain.
Seo-ha had approached the equations with the expression of someone admiring a well-prepared feast.
And then,
"The convergent flow is twisted here."
The researchers rushed over in alarm.
"Th... that can't be!"
Instead of answering, Seo-ha picked up a marker and began drawing the topological structure.
He pointed to the dots and arrows he had drawn and said,
"If the function converges like this, it actually deviates by about 0.003 radians (radian * a mathematical unit of angular measurement)."
0.003 radians (0.17 degrees). From an engineering standpoint, it was a margin of error small enough to be ignored.
The research team was stunned.
"With this level of error, the flow density at that point will triple after 100 minutes."
Seo-ha wrote an equation on the board.
Jake couldn't follow it, but as the equation progressed, the researchers' expressions grew grimmer.
What he had written was a proof that repeated micro-errors would eventually diverge.
"See what I mean? Every single person in the lab that day got demolished. The proof was so flawless they said they didn't even have the energy to argue back."
It was probably around that time.
That the researchers started quietly avoiding Seo-ha.
Seo-ha had felt regret about this, but the researchers were only human; they felt the need to protect themselves.
"Please go ahead."
Tap.
The sound of a single keystroke.
Whirr...
The massive server rack began to vibrate.
Hundreds of modules launched into high-speed computation simultaneously, and a miniature replica of the megacity New York came alive on the screen.
Seo-ha followed the flow of the algorithm and checked each of the 40 sectors one by one.
"Ah!"
Every time he pointed something out, the researchers flinched.
Seo-ha's eyes moved to the logs.
The process of tracking and comparing the algorithm's outputs to verify topological consistency.
"Please...."
Some were bouncing their legs and biting their nails, while others watched Seo-ha with hands clasped together as if in prayer.
They could barely breathe, fearing the words "error found" like before.
Seo-ha's eyes widened as he scanned the logs.
"This.... You've done a really excellent job on this."
The lab went silent.
"Ex... excuse me?"
"Really?"
"Don't mess with us. You're just going to turn around and tell us what's wrong, aren't you?"
The researchers, accustomed to repeated failures, blinked in disbelief.
Seo-ha walked closer to the monitor and enlarged the logs.
His eyes scanned across the numbers.
0.0004
0.0011
0.0009
In the past, these values would have been harbingers of topological distortion and divergence, but not now.
"There's some micro-noise here and there, so the optimization process will probably take a while, but...."
Seo-ha looked at their faces and broke into a radiant smile.
"The overall structure is perfectly solid."
Thud.
As if all the strength had drained from his body, Harry collapsed into his chair with a loud sound.
"Yes!"
"We did it!"
"We made it! We actually made it!"
"Finally.... finally!"
Cheers erupted from every corner.
Some jumped up from their seats. One researcher who had developed a bald spot from stress slumped down and wiped away tears with his sleeve.
Overcome with emotion, Harry covered his face with both hands. Then something occurred to him, and he sprang to his feet.
"Everyone, stop!"
The chatter died as all eyes turned to him.
"Freeze!
Nobody touch anything. Save first. Back it up! Save it twice!"
Clatter clatter clatter.
The sound of keyboards instantly filled the lab.
"Saved! It's saved!"
"Original backup complete!"
"Initiating redundant backup to offsite storage!"
"Don't touch the RAID server! Touch it and you die!"
Rachel felt a warmth spreading through her chest.
Even when they had grown hypersensitive to each other's mistakes, even when exhaustion and stress had worn their spirits raw, these people had never given up.
There was just one thing that worried her....
"Harry, what if you're all celebrating now and something blows up later?"
Could they really withstand the aftermath?
But Harry's expression was perfectly relaxed.
"Why would I worry about that? Seo-ha said it's fine."
His words were neither a joke nor baseless confidence.
It was a sentiment shared by everyone who worked here, an absolute premise that at some point everyone had come to believe without question.
"Seo-ha is never wrong."
Someone who heard Harry's words murmured quietly.
"If Seo-ha says it works, it works."
"And if he says it doesn't, then no matter what you try, it's a lost cause."
Having received praise from someone like that, it was only natural that everyone was over the moon.
Rachel, who had only been here a few days, found the atmosphere hard to comprehend.
"Seo-ha! Aren't you happy? Why do you look so serious?"
While everyone around him was cheering, Seo-ha stood quietly in the middle of the lab. At Harry's words, all eyes turned to him.
Seo-ha hesitated for a moment, then smiled as if embarrassed.
"You've all built the best possible framework for me, so I was trying to figure out how to design a brain that lives up to it."
"...."
The researchers' eyes reddened.
Some lowered their heads, biting their lips hard.
The best possible framework. That single phrase melted away all the hardship they had endured, like snow in sunlight.
"I thought it was already finished? That's what we'd all been told."
Seo-ha nodded.
"If we're talking about a brain that acts as a passive mediator, then yes, it's already complete. But if you ask me whether this is the best it can be, I don't think so."
"Can you explain it to us? We're not exactly nobodies ourselves! Who knows? Maybe we can help, even a little."
Harry planted both hands on his hips and spoke with confidence.
The researchers all nodded in unison.
"He's right, we're experts too."
"We studied the relevant algorithms plenty while designing the framework."
The elation of being recognized by Seo-ha, the desire to contribute to the project, the wish to lighten their leader's burden, even a little.
These feelings gave them the courage to step forward.
"Shall we, then?"
Seo-ha's face brightened instantly.
"The model I originally had in mind was...."
Before anyone noticed, the whiteboards began multiplying one by one.
Squeak, squeak squeak...
The sound of markers filled the lab.
Theo noticed that Seo-ha's mood was slightly elevated.
"So ultimately, the optimal model is...."
Unable to hide the enjoyment on his face, Seo-ha continued his explanation.
The researchers who had struggled to follow at first gradually gathered around him and joined the discussion.
One hour, two hours.
As time passed, Seo-ha's voice grew steadily louder.
"Rachel, order some pizza. From the best place in Cambridge."
An hour later, dozens of pizza boxes arrived at the lab.
"Courtesy of the Mayor of New York!"
When Jake made the big announcement, small laughs and applause broke out among the researchers.
Everyone's faces had softened.
They didn't stop their discussions even while eating.
By the time the sun set, the full explanation was complete.
The moment Seo-ha set down the marker on the final whiteboard, the lab went quiet as though time itself had stopped.
"Good lord...."
"Is... is this actually possible?"
"If it's Seo-ha, it's possible. There isn't a single gap in the theory."
"If this actually comes to fruition, New York would become a city of the future practically overnight."
Jake's jaw dropped.
He instinctively glanced around the room to check whether anyone without the proper security clearance was present.
The system Seo-ha wanted to build could cause critical problems if it leaked to the public at the wrong time.
"The problem is the cost...."
Harry still looked dazed, as if he hadn't recovered from the shock.
"That's what I've been struggling with. No matter how good the design is, it means nothing if it can't be realized. Maybe going with the initial plan would be...."
"Wait!"
As Seo-ha was about to give up, Harry stopped him.
"Everyone, gather up! Let's run the cost estimates on this."
Before Harry had even finished speaking, the researchers rose and fetched their laptops.
The lab buzzed with activity once more.
"We need to start with the power requirements!"
"No, calculating server density first makes more sense."
"Bandwidth! We need that figured out before we can even begin."
"We'll handle the initial construction cost estimates on our end!"
Specialists from each division came together to calculate the minimum cost of building Seo-ha's brain.
An hour later, a rough budget sheet was placed in Seo-ha's hands.
He shook his head.
"This won't work. There's no way the mayor would approve this amount."
Ugh...
Sigh.
Groans came from every direction.
Even Harry looked taken aback, as if the figure was larger than expected. But he quickly composed himself.
"No, let's go with this. This is without a doubt the optimal system. Now I can't even imagine settling for anything less."
"But realistically...."
"What if every one of us signs off on this? Saying that this is truly the best path for New York. Wouldn't the mayor at least reconsider?"
A heavy silence settled over the room.
"...I'll go first."
Theo stood up and wrote his name on the last page of the budget sheet.
"Me too!"
"I also believe this is the right choice."
"My name can't be missing from a historic project like this."
It was a scene reminiscent of signing a collective petition.
Civil servants who cooperated in pressuring the mayor could face repercussions down the line. Yet every one of them wrote their name on the document without much hesitation.
Seo-ha was speechless for a long time.
People volunteering to share the burden, reaching out of their own accord. For Seo-ha, it was an overwhelmingly unfamiliar kind of emotion.
They genuinely wanted to see it.
The moment the design drawn by this once-in-a-generation genius became reality.
After that day, no one had officially named it, yet everyone began calling the brain Seo-ha had designed by the same name.
'Oracle.'