Chapter 183: The Arrest
The biological constraints of a physical body have a profound impact on the spirit, directly capping the upper limits of one’s willpower and intellect. Even if an entity’s original spiritual magnitude was god-like, it wouldn’t matter if the host vessel was inferior.
If ’Black’ had parasitized a monkey, it would have become a monkey. It would behave like one and would never develop advanced intelligence. This is because a monkey’s cerebral cortex possesses only a fraction of the neurons of a human brain, which is biologically insufficient to support higher-level cognition.
Similarly, if Black had unfortunately parasitized a caterpillar, it would simply be a caterpillar. At that point, it would be even less capable than a monkey. How could you expect a caterpillar’s microscopic nerve cluster to ponder quantum mechanics? It’s impossible!
Currently, it had parasitized Peter. The outcome wasn’t too bad, but it wasn’t great either. To Black, this human brain was incredibly stupid, but at least it possessed basic logic and self-awareness.
The human race was vastly inferior to Black’s original species; every action they took seemed bizarre and primitive. Peter, being a human with particularly low spirit potential, was even worse. Black constantly lamented its unfortunate fate.
At least this species is capable of rational thought... That was the only way it could console itself.
Besides, it had been severely defeated during the initial psychic devouring process and had lost a massive portion of its own memories. It was actually quite remarkable that it had survived the encounter at all. With things having come to this, Black had no choice but to accept its less-than-ideal reality.
For now, it and Peter shared a single fate: if one prospered, the other prospered; if one died, the other died.
After sprinting madly down the main corridor, Black stood panting heavily. The sheer physical response of the human body triggered an unusual sense of exhilaration in its mind. However, to be perfectly honest, it had barely run 500 meters and was already utterly exhausted. This biological frame was pathetically weak.
Why do they still communicate via crude sound waves? Black grumbled inwardly as it tried to catch its breath. This method of communication is agonizingly outdated. Is the information transmission speed even 2 bits per second?
Black continued to complain, making a series of strange, gurgling noises from its throat as it tried to master the vocal cords.
Despite its arrogance, Black was deeply curious about human society. After all, curiosity was a fundamental instinct of the human brain, and Black was inadvertently adopting its host’s habits. Whether it chose to hide, lie dormant, or attempt to subtly rule... it had to understand the society it was dealing with. The more it knew, the greater its grasp on its own survival.
The corridor it had sprinted down was an old commercial promenade, but it was currently deserted. It was the middle of the working day, and everyone was busy at their assigned posts, except for the madman running aimlessly down the street.
Black wandered into a random shop. Inside, it found a few specialized automated drones and a large screen. The screen displayed options for various hairstyles, perms, hair coloring, and more.
Oh? Machines dedicated solely to grooming the fibrous growths on their heads? It seems their service industry has been fully automated. That’s at least mildly efficient!
Black studied the salon drones carefully, but was quickly disappointed. They were just basic, binary-coded machines running on simple ’0’ and ’1’ logic loops. Each drone operated entirely off a backend database and possessed zero artificial intelligence.
Looking disgusted, Black immediately lost interest and turned to leave. But as it did, it caught sight of its reflection in the large wall mirror.
Peter was tall and thin, with an exceedingly average appearance. His hair was perfectly normal by human standards, but to Black, it looked as hideous as a pile of dead weeds.
Black’s original species had been completely hairless, possessing delicate, smooth sensory tendrils. They valued sleekness and softness as the pinnacle of beauty. Now, this messy mop of human hair was simply an eyesore, a symbol of primitive backwardness. My race only had hair during our most barbaric, pre-historic era. We look like cavemen!
Since I legally possess twenty percent control over this body, theoretically, twenty percent of this hideous body hair is mine. Which means I have the right to shave it off!
Yes, that’s exactly what I’ll do! Muttering to itself, Black immediately put the plan into action. First, it stood in front of the automated scanner, letting the camera take a holographic image of Peter’s head. Then, using its finger on the touchscreen, it precisely highlighted and deleted exactly 20% of the hair...
The salon drone rolled forward and faithfully executed the programmed haircut.
A moment later, Peter was sporting a massive, perfectly rectangular bald patch right down the middle of his head, leaving the remaining 80% untouched.
It looked utterly ridiculous, but Black didn’t find it funny at all. On the contrary, it felt much more at ease. It reasoned that since its *own* hair had been removed, the remaining mess belonged strictly to Peter. Peter’s hair was none of its business!
"Hey, Pete? Are you here for a haircut? What happened to your... hair?!"
Suddenly, a clear female voice rang out from the doorway. Black spun around to look.
It recognized this female creature! She was the human female that Peter constantly dreamed about!
From Black’s alien perspective, all human females looked basically identical. But tapping into Peter’s memories, it knew this one was considered highly attractive. Peter spent almost every night fantasizing about her, engaging in... bizarre, lewd biological rituals.
This was Black’s first direct interaction with another human. It made a strange gurgling sound in its throat, completely unsure of what to say. For the first time, the ancient alien felt extremely awkward.
Peter secretly buys nutrient rations for her every day and leaves them at her workstation. Why is he so covert about it? Black thought, genuinely baffled. If he wishes to demand a mating partner, he should just state his intentions directly. Why does he waste time with all this hesitant posturing?
The beautiful woman’s name was Mei. She found Peter’s blank, silly expression rather amusing, especially since he was sporting a massive, completely inexplicable bald patch right down the middle of his skull.
Mei instantly assumed it was the result of a malfunctioning salon drone. Could it be... that the servos on these units are misaligned? They definitely need to be recalibrated.
While Mei was attractive, she was also a senior engineer responsible for maintaining the residential sector’s robots. Seeing Peter’s ridiculous haircut, she wanted to burst out laughing, but she quickly suppressed it.
After all, Peter was now a ’great scientist.’ She had to show him some respect. Yet, Mei couldn’t help but feel a little weird about it. The other great minds of the Federation like Professor Hao Yu, Roman, Felix, and Timothy were all serious, dignified figures. Peter didn’t seem to fit the mold at all. Still, he was a genius who had invented the room-temperature superconductor. He deserved her respect.
Looking closely at the absurd bald patch, Mei felt a pang of guilt. It was technically her fault; the drone she was supposed to maintain had clearly malfunctioned. She logically assumed it was a machine error, because no sane human being would ever intentionally style their hair like that.
I wonder if he’s going to be angry with me? Mei thought. Feeling embarrassed, she unconsciously stuck her tongue out slightly in a playful, apologetic grimace, unsure if she should laugh or apologize.
Black was utterly bewildered. This female creature is wriggling her facial muscles and exposing her oral muscle appendage—what is she attempting to communicate? This is completely incomprehensible! Is her brain damaged?!
Black’s original race had evolved to a highly advanced state, communicating complex thoughts instantaneously via telepathic brainwaves. They didn’t rely on crude sound waves or physical gestures. Seeing Mei’s bizarre facial contortions, Black had to frantically search through Peter’s memories to understand what was happening.
Ah, I see, Black theorized. Because communicating solely via their primitive language is far too slow, they supplement the data stream with physical gestures and facial expressions to increase the overall bandwidth of information transmitted. But what did this specific data packet mean? What did sticking out the oral appendage signify?
For some unknown reason, perhaps heavily influenced by Peter’s bizarre, suppressed subconscious desires, Black suddenly recalled a video it had watched on the internet a few days ago.
It was an old episode of an Earth nature documentary called Animal World. The video showed that dogs, as a form of affection and submission, often licked each other’s rear ends. And it wasn’t just dogs; many lower biological organisms exhibited similar behavior. Did humans do the same?
Black hadn’t actively researched human mating rituals, but it couldn’t rule out the possibility. Who could truly understand the disgusting habits of lower organisms?
Could this female creature be signaling that intent? Is she attempting to curry favor and submit to Peter?
Given that this was a scenario Peter frequently fantasized about, Black inexplicably jumped to the worst possible conclusion.
Instead of feeling victorious, Black felt slightly lost and regretful that it had wandered out of the dorm. Logically speaking, it shouldn’t interfere with Peter’s biological mating sequence; otherwise, the useless human would throw a mental tantrum, curse endlessly, and might even try to harm the host body in despair.
But... what if I successfully initiate the sequence for him? Black calculated.
Perhaps he will be so grateful that he will cede more daily control of the host body to me?
"...Reproduction?" Black managed to croak out a single, harsh word from its throat.
"What? An introduction?!" Mei asked, completely baffled by his strange, gravelly voice. She felt that Peter was acting very strangely. In fact, he was acting *extremely* strangely.
"I see," Black nodded sagely, interpreting her confusion as an affirmative answer.
With righteous, robotic efficiency, Black reached down and unbuckled its pants, fully prepared to welcome the submissive advances of the female creature...
"AHHH!!!"
Twenty minutes later, at the Federation Security Department.
The security officers, sweating profusely, had apprehended Peter on the spot. Recognizing his high-profile status, they immediately clamped down on the situation, classifying the incident and reporting it directly up the chain of command.
This was technically the first sexual harassment case in the history of the Federation. Worse, the perpetrator was one of their most prominent and newly celebrated scientists, making the situation incredibly delicate.
Because Peter was currently only a suspect and hadn’t been formally charged or tried, standard protocol required his privacy to be strictly maintained. Meanwhile, they gently escorted Mei to the Security Department to give an official statement.
Damn it! Peter, who had been violently jolted awake during the arrest, was currently sitting in a holding cell. He cursed inwardly, his face buried in his hands. He just wanted to die.
You alien piece of trash! I’m going to kill you!