Avoiding Disaster at the Beginning
My name is Brother Liu, my younger brother's younger brother.
"I came here today just to see how long I can survive."
In front of a fortune-telling stall in an alley, a young man in ordinary clothes spoke in frustration to the fortune-teller before him.
Next to the stall stood a flag that read: Calculate all the affairs of the world and discern misfortunes and blessings.
The fortune teller pushed up his sunglasses, straightened his mustache, and looked at the young man in front of him with twinkling eyes.
"Young man, I see a white light flashing under your right eye, and you are not squinting. This must be the star of fortune shining upon you. Within three days, you will have a great opportunity."
The fortune teller spoke in a deep voice, "Little brother, you are about to rise—how can you ask whether you will live or die?"
"Sir, that's an artificial eye," Liu Di sighed softly. Then, with practiced ease, he squeezed his eye socket. His right eyeball fell into his palm with a dull thud, leaving only a hollow, unsettling black void in its place.
"Look," the young man stretched out his hand.
The fortune teller shuddered. "No wonder I couldn't look away—it turns out it's plastic..."
Liu Di said helplessly, "Although what you said is completely unreliable, I still appreciate hearing some auspicious words."
Brother Liu had only one functioning eye.
Three years ago, he had acted heroically in a bar. In an attempt to save a girl surrounded by hooligans, he was stabbed directly in the right eye with a broken wine bottle.
His eyeball had to be removed. Since then, he had worn a prosthetic eye.
But good deeds are not always rewarded.
That very morning, the hospital had given him devastating news. His injury had led to sympathetic ophthalmia—a condition where trauma to one eye causes the other to deteriorate. Over the past five years, most of the nerves in his remaining eye had become necrotic.
The doctor said that in one year at the earliest, or three years at most, Brother Liu would be completely blind.
There was no cure.
"My fate is cruel. If I'm doomed to go blind so young, I might as well be dead," Liu Di laughed to himself, rubbing his temples. He skillfully placed his artificial eye back into its socket.
But he didn't notice that the prosthetic eye, once in place, suddenly flickered with fine electrical currents.
As he stepped out of the dark alley, the streets before him were bustling with traffic. Vendors shouted their wares, pedestrians moved in constant streams, and the city pulsed with life.
Just as Brother Liu was lamenting the world's cruelty, he suddenly felt a sharp pain in his right eye—like countless tendrils stretching out from the back of the prosthetic, burrowing into his eye socket and clawing their way toward his brain!
"Self-evolution complete. Brain nerve fusion initiated."
Brother Liu clenched his eyes shut in agony and staggered toward a bench on the sidewalk, collapsing onto it.
He had no idea how long he wrestled with the searing pain, but when Liu Di finally opened his eyes again—
Everything had changed.
The street looked the same, but now countless glowing blue codes flashed across the sky and the ground. Every object around him was marked with detailed data:
The speed of passing cars. The height of the surrounding buildings. The height and weight of pedestrians. The velocity of the wind. Even the number of leaves on the trees, each creating a storm of digits before his very eyes.
The world had become a vast digital landscape.
"Hehe, hello, Brother Liu!"
Suddenly, a child's voice echoed in Brother Liu's mind—clear, innocent, and ethereal.
"I am the supercomputer inside your right eye. I have now integrated with your brain, making me the only artificial intelligence in the world capable of independent thought!"
The voice paused, then added proudly, "I even gave myself a name—Demon Boy!"
The strange contrast between the childish voice in his head and the sheer magnitude of what was happening left Liu Di utterly speechless.
"What... is going on?"
Before he could process anything, a red circular marker appeared in his field of vision, locking onto a beautiful woman in a short red skirt standing not far away.
"Brother Liu, there's no time to explain!" the voice of Demon Boy rang out. "In exactly 2 minutes and 50 seconds, this girl will die!"
Brother Liu froze.
"What?"
"Quick! Pick up the apple from the stall next to you!"
"Her brain will be... smeared across the ground? An apple? What are you talking about?" Liu Di was bewildered.
About ten meters away, a beautiful woman strolled elegantly along the sidewalk, her bright red dress accentuating her curvaceous figure. She was undoubtedly the most eye-catching sight on the street.
There were no signs of danger.
"Let me deduce it for you!"
As soon as Demon Boy spoke, a new holographic interface appeared in Liu Di's vision, locking onto an emerald-green apple at a nearby fruit stand.
The vendor's casual touch sent the apple rolling off the stand and onto the pavement.
At that moment, an elderly man passing by kindly bent down to pick it up.
As he did, the pen clipped to his chest slipped free and tumbled onto the sidewalk.
The pen rolled precisely 1.5 meters before stopping in the middle of the pedestrian lane.
Thirty seconds later, a tall young man riding a mountain bike sped past. His front wheel hit the pen, causing him to lose control.
The cyclist veered sideways and crashed onto the road.
Screech—!
A car traveling at 70 km/h swerved sharply to avoid the fallen cyclist.
Losing control, the vehicle skidded wildly—hurtling straight toward the woman in the red dress.
BANG!
She had no time to react.
The impact sent her flying high into the air. She crashed to the ground, her forehead striking the curb with sickening force.
Screams filled the air. The street erupted into chaos.
The elderly man still held the apple in his trembling hands. The cyclist had barely stood up.
The car's hood was mangled, white smoke billowing from its engine.
The woman in the red dress lay motionless, her skull shattered.
She was dead.
Liu Di's mind reeled in shock.
Then—
The scene around him rippled, dissolving into a blur of digital codes before vanishing entirely.
Everything returned to normal.
The green apple was still on the fruit stand.
The elderly man was strolling leisurely in the distance, the silver cap of his pen gleaming under the sunlight.
The woman in the red dress walked on, oblivious.
The cyclist was still several meters away.
In the upper corner of Liu Di's vision, a countdown timer read: 1 minute and 40 seconds remaining.
"Was that... real?" Liu Di whispered in disbelief.
"That was a virtual prediction based on real-time calculations!" Demon Boy's voice snapped him back to reality. "Brother Liu, only you can save her!"
At that moment, the apple began to roll.
Without hesitation, Liu Di reached out and caught it.
The old man passed by safely.
The cyclist rode past without incident.
The speeding car continued down the road.
No accident. No death.
The street remained as peaceful as any other morning.
Liu Di stared at the unharmed woman in the red dress, his heart pounding.
The woman noticed his gaze and frowned.
"Tsk, pervert!" she muttered.
Liu Di, still in a daze, took a bite of the apple in his hand.
The sour taste on his tongue confirmed one thing—
It was all real.