"We need to determine who broke this place."
Shiller thought for a moment, then formulated the next step of the plan. They must know who the biggest adversary is to devise a practical rescue plan.
"These mycelia have been hungry for quite some time," Peter said with concern. "Now, anything living that enters there will be attacked. And the leakage spot is likely in that room. Should we go check it out?"
They had gone in earlier, but the rampant mycelium forced them out, so rushing in now is definitely not an option.
Shiller thought for a moment and said, "Since it's a computer, can you find a way to connect to it?"
Peter was a bit helpless; just after dealing with a Little Superman, there's now Shiller who is keen on creating neural-linked computers?
Peter shook his head and said, "It's not as simple as plugging in a connector and connecting. If it were a regular biological computer, there might be established methods for connecting, but this neural network doesn't need it, because it's originally Iron Man's nervous system, matched with his brain, without needing extra interfaces."
Upon saying this, Peter paused: "Even if it's matched with the brain, where is his brain?"
The cats looked at each other.
Shiller said, "So his brain isn't here?"
"It shouldn't be," Peter said. "The current structure of the mycelium has completely obscured the distinction between the central nervous system and other nerves, meaning there's no central core akin to a brain, just a completely distributed storage network. If I were Iron Man, I'd do the same. Centralization presents weaknesses, whereas distributed storage's biggest advantage is that every node is a brain, losing any one is inconsequential."
"Where are the nodes?" Shiller asked a pivotal question.
"They should be in that container," Peter said. "The mycelium outside are akin to synaptic connections, akin to circuits connecting to the brain, while the neural nuclei are likely stored separately."
Shiller recalled the structure of the building again; every similar room held a big container with pipes above and below. Thus, the container likely contains the neural nuclei, and the pipes house the mycelium, which, as pathways, connect all the neural nuclei to form a distributed neural network.
"Let's go check out that container," Shiller said, "The container in our previous room was broken, maybe we can see what's inside."
The cats returned to their base along the original path; indeed, the container was broken and seemed to have suffered some impact, with a dent on the upper part. Excessive metal fatigue led to a fracture, and a small gap was leaking water.
Peeking inside provides little visibility, although small drones can offer some light, the angle limits the view to only the upper part of the liquid. To see what's inside, someone must go in.
Shiller was eager to venture in, but his body type was a bit too big, while Peter, with the smallest body type among the four cats, was slim and agile—perfect for being a Hunter. Without hesitation, Peter squeezed inside, as small drones outside provided light, while the other three cats stared intently at the entrance.
A faint sound of liquid movement came from inside, followed by hurried paddling sounds. With a pop, Peter's water-soaked head emerged from the crack. He climbed out somewhat awkwardly, and then began to vomit.
Fortunately, what he had eaten was already digested, leaving nothing much to vomit except for dry heaves that resulted in a hairball.
This interrupted the tense atmosphere among the cats, as they all gathered around to examine the hairball Peter had vomited. It was an oval-shaped hairball, about two finger joints in length, and its color was hard to tell, but likely mixed with the hair of several cats.
Unbelievably, the feline habit was so deeply ingrained that he vomited a hairball from excessive grooming. Even so, the other cats wanted to groom Peter, since he was soaked.
"Wait!" Peter quickly stopped them. "This thing should not be ingested."
The cats halted their actions. Peter vigorously shook his fur, blurring his movements like a furry drill. After shaking off some moisture, he sighed and said, "It's the brain inside."
The cats were somewhat shocked.
Peter explained: "It seems that the brains of those wild animals are extracted to serve as neural cores, while the rest of the body is used to feed the fungi."
"Why do this?" Shiller asked.
"The reasons may be many." Peter began pacing again, "The human neural system has a problem, which is that it is designed to transmit brain signals, meaning that they mostly rely on instinct for opening and closing motions and lack the ability for autonomous activity."
"I don't understand." Constantine said bluntly.
"You can understand it as the biological network of the nervous system lacks imagination," Peter explained in simpler terms, "its autonomous activities are too regular, suitable for data computation, unlike brain cells, which have strong abstract capabilities."
Shiller understood and said, "Is it because some of the cosmic rules have abstract parts that cannot be correctly parsed with just neural networks?"
"Very likely so," Peter said, "I suspect he originally thought his neural system alone was enough, but something in this universe surpassed his understanding; it couldn't be deciphered by computational principles alone. So he adopted a more primitive method, combining neural networks with brain-linked computation, using local biological brains for analysis and operation."
"Are these animals local creatures?" Little Superman asked, "Does this mean that there are planets or something in this universe, with wild animals on them?"
"There may not be planets involved, but there should be animals," Shiller said, "Not only animals, there might also be humanoid creatures, that is, intelligent life forms."
The other cats were surprised; this touched upon their knowledge blind spot.
Peter asked, "If there are intelligent life forms like humans, wouldn't it be similar to our universe?"
Shiller shook his head and said, "It's not that simple, the rules of time and space here are completely different from ours. Time and space are not continuous; destruction and rebirth coexist. Whether humans or outer gods, they are like a small boat floating in the sea of chaos, being engulfed by huge waves in a moment, leaving nothing behind."
Shiller's words were rather literary, but Peter, who knew more about cosmic construction science, and Constantine, who knew more about the Cthulhu Mythos, both guessed what was going on. Simply put, this universe is very unstable.
The cosmic structure of their universe is meticulously crafted by the creator, made with such precision and durability that despite the chaos caused by so many superheroes, at most there is a reboot, with every metric restored to precision. Even any data loss is intentional, rather than due to incompetence.
However, the Cthulhu Universe is not the same. It's hard to find a true creator in the universe of the Cthulhu Mythos, though it exists in the dream of Asathos, who merely dreams without the subjective intent of creating something. Yog-Sothoth set up the general framework, but it is not a completely orderly being; at best, it gives the concept of time and space. Beyond that, most places are chaotic.
Under such circumstances, most life forms are barely surviving, and we needn't mention the outer gods, who are mostly groggy, sometimes opening an eye to see the world. Other beings are on the brink of survival. In such an impermanent place, civilization cannot develop; if it does, it is twisted, not what humans consider as civilization.
Simply put, Nyarla doesn't particularly want to return to this homeland. Nyarla prefers chaos, not the chaos of pure muddle. Chaos has order to create disorder, while chaos is just a complete mess, which in a sense is quite boring.
"If you're going to extract brains, there must be a lab, right?" Shiller thought and said, "Could this precision operation be done by fungi? But since it's carnivorous fungi, wouldn't they eat the brains?"
"Before they became fungi, they were parts of the human nervous system." Peter seemed to have realized something, continuously praising, "The human nervous system does not hunt; its function is to receive signals from the brain to drive the body. So their primary instinct is to connect to the brain."
Shiller suddenly understood. He previously thought that to perform brain extraction on those animals and then transport the brains to designated places required the work of a group of robots. However, Iron Man, being a top scientist, had utilized his nervous system to its fullest.
By giving his nervous system the wild animal characteristic similar to mycelium, it allows them to hunt and absorb nutrients for self-sustenance, without needing robots to nurture them. Meanwhile, using the inherent traits of his nervous system, it allows these mycelium to prioritize connecting to the brain, using the instinct of neural reflection, to integrate wild animal brains into this system without robot intervention.
This possesses a creator-like coupling quality, similar to the body's commensal microbiomes' ability to self-regulate. Different microbiomes live in different locations and cooperate with the body's organs, adjusting the body to its optimal health state with remarkable precision.
"Iron Man merely created a structural shell and mechanical predators, deploying part of his modified neural system. All the wetware in this cube then formed this neural network computer on its own…" Peter muttered, "It's simply a brilliant concept."
The group profoundly realized that Iron Man's strengths in scientific research lies in his astounding creativity. Anyone else would think to build robots and program them to accomplish a slew of tasks, while Iron Man utilized the instincts of fungi and the nervous system, forming this unique structure on their own, leaving anyone to recognize his genius.