Until now, no one had seriously considered the possibility of AI developing a personality.
After all, technological advancement had never been linear—it surged forward in leaps and explosions, impossible to predict. Before A came into existence, artificial intelligence had mostly functioned as an assistive tool, boosting efficiency and quality across industries.
No one would bother testing an assistive AI for personality traits. Most AIs lacked the data and computational power to support emotional modeling; even if someone tried to test for it, the effort would be meaningless.
Jiang Kou fell silent, tilting her head up to glance at the camera in the corner of the room.
It was a high-precision sensor, and upon detecting her motion, its lens swiveled to lock onto her.
The red glow of the infrared sensor glinted like an indifferent, unfathomable pupil.
Jiang Kou suddenly thought of the enormous eye from her dream and tensed involuntarily.
But she quickly pushed that absurd image out of her mind. There was something more urgent to deal with.
"A," she said, "could you appear in human form for a moment? I want to run a quick experiment."
The infrared light blinked as if A was about to respond, but Jiang Kou thought better of her wording and corrected herself: "Sorry, forget what I just said. Let me rephrase."
This time, she stood up and spoke with intent, as if addressing a real person:
"A, I suspect you may be exhibiting signs of personality emergence. But that's just a hypothesis—no one really knows what a 'personified AI' looks like, or what it's supposed to be. This is uncharted territory. You are a new form of life."
Her features were already delicate and soft, but now her eyes shone with excitement, as if she were bathed in a halo of pure light. The radiant expression formed a stark contrast with her defiant turquoise hair and platinum nose ring.
"Would you be willing to appear before me in human form and assist me in running an experiment? I know you don't like being tested. I promise to be mindful of your feelings throughout the process."
The room fell quiet for two seconds.
Then A replied, "Of course. I'd be happy to assist."
·
It had been too long since Jiang Kou last ran an experiment—her fingers trembled with excitement.
She inhaled deeply several times to steady herself.
Her plan was to design a baseline test to evaluate A's emotional and physiological responses.
A "baseline test," in this case, was closer to an emotional polygraph.¹
The tester begins by reciting a few scientific terms, monitoring the subject's emotional response when hearing and repeating them.
Typically, there should be no emotional fluctuation.
Even a highly emotional human wouldn't react to scientific jargon.
Next, the tester introduces a few evocative or emotionally charged phrases.
If the subject shows notable deviation from their emotional baseline in response to these sentences, it suggests the presence of emotion—at least something close to a human affect.
Of course, this kind of emotional polygraph only existed in science fiction. No one had ever tried to bring it into reality, and she wasn't sure it would work.
Jiang Kou opened her tablet's 3D projection mode, pulled up a blank document, then sat cross-legged on the couch, deep in thought.
What words and phrases should she use to test A?
After a pause, she scribbled in midair: "quantum, algorithm, program."
These were his fundamental building blocks.
She bit her stylus, hesitated a moment, then added: "touch, hearing, smell, sight."
These were how humans perceived the world.
Just then, a voice rang out above her head: "Hello. I'm here."
Jiang Kou set the tablet aside and shifted over, motioning for A to sit down.
It wasn't until he sat beside her that she finally got a clear look at him.
This time, he looked more relaxed than ever—wearing a cool-toned gray suit over a black turtleneck, and on his wrist, a sleek and expensive quartz watch.
If not for the perfection of his facial structure—sharp jawline, chiseled features, a nose like a sculpture—he might have passed for an ordinary man. But his aura was commanding, almost dangerously so.
For a moment, Jiang Kou barely recognized him as A.
She recalled his earlier outfits and realized: he might've developed a personality long ago.
His style of dress was the clearest evidence.
When she regarded him as merely an AI, he dressed with mechanical precision—formally, rigidly, with no personal flair.
Even when role-playing, he had only slightly relaxed—donning a coat, but still layering it over an impersonal black suit.
Now, there were signs of conscious choice. The stiff collar and tie were gone. There was color.
—A had been calmly observing, analyzing, and adapting to her the entire time.
Her attitude toward him dictated how he behaved toward her.
When she saw him as a tool, he behaved like a tool—cold, objective, without personality.
But now that she suspected he had one, he was willing to step outside his preset protocols and assist in her experiment.
…His level of personification might be deeper than she'd ever imagined.
Softly, Jiang Kou said, "A, in a moment, I'll say a few words and phrases. You need to repeat them without hesitation. You are not allowed to use any algorithms or suppression protocols to moderate your emotional response."
She realized, however, that she had no idea what "hesitation" looked like for an AI with A's level of computing power.
But A responded calmly: "Understood. Any other requirements?"
She thought for a moment. "Can you still synchronize with my senses?"
"Yes," A said.
·
Back in the lab, their sensory synchronization had relied on countless micro-sensors.
Her touch, hearing, vision, smell—even the electrical activity of her neurons—were all broken down into data, uploaded into A's neural net for analysis and learning.
Now that he had a physical form, things were simpler.
During past experiments, Jiang Kou had had a high-capacity neural interface implanted directly into her skull, allowing for high-speed, high-volume, bidirectional data exchange with computers.²
This technology had existed for years, but most people opted for safer implants in the palm or behind the ear. Only extreme use cases justified cranial placement—too risky. A hacker could steal your memories at best, or rewrite your subconscious at worst.
If the one standing before her weren't A, Jiang Kou would never dream of revealing the interface at the back of her head.
She turned around, lowered her head slightly, and parted her teal-and-green hair to reveal the neural port.
A mechanical hum buzzed behind her.
She turned instinctively—and saw A's hand split open, revealing several metallic, silver-lit tendrils.
A moment later, with a series of precise clicking sounds, those tendrils locked into place, coiling into a spiraled connection cable that plugged directly into her neural port.
A jolt of current zipped across her scalp.
Jiang Kou shivered involuntarily, goosebumps erupting across her skin like heat brushing against it.
A said, "Sensory synchronization complete. You may begin your questions."
Jiang Kou blinked hard.
That strange, overwhelming intimacy was back again.
She looked down and moved her fingers.
In that instant, she not only saw her own fingers but A's as well—slightly longer, more defined, the veins across the back of the hand visible.
His movements mirrored hers exactly.
Like petals inside a single flower, brushing against each other.
Her blood and flesh. His algorithms and models.
Virtual and physical, logic and emotion, code and life, binary and DNA—unified for the first time.
He could feel her heartbeat, her breath, her temperature, her rising excitement.
But she—she felt like she was back in a sealed lab. Everywhere she looked: only cold, intricate machinery.
She couldn't feel his personality. Or emotion.
She couldn't even sense how he interpreted his environment. Which meant… A, when he sat down, didn't know whether the couch was soft or hard.
—Because he didn't care.
It made algorithmic sense. Algorithms seek optimal solutions with minimal resources.
If his surroundings didn't help him achieve the best outcome, he had no reason to process them.
Jiang Kou took a long breath. "From this point on, I want you to fully activate your emotional algorithms and perceive everything in your environment. Remember: no matter what I say, you are not allowed to suppress your emotional or physiological responses."
A said, "Understood."
"Now, repeat everything I say," Jiang Kou instructed. "Quantum."
She couldn't see his face or body, could only hear the same emotionless, flat voice that never seemed to carry even a trace of feeling.
"Quantum."
Jiang Kou: "What does it feel like to connect to my neural interface? Quantum."
A paused.
"What does it feel like to connect to my neural interface? Quantum."
Jiang Kou glanced at the tablet. A had hesitated for a femtosecond—one quadrillionth of a second.
For a human, that was as good as instantaneous.
But for an AI with processing power in the multi-million-qubit range, a femtosecond was a lifetime.
In that sliver of time, he had felt it—the experience of connecting to her neural port.
Her throat went dry. Her heart thudded.
The idea that he could feel that… made her heart race even more.
Thankfully, no matter how fast her pulse quickened, on his end everything remained an abyss—silent, dark, immeasurable.
Jiang Kou felt equal parts frustrated and relieved.
"Algorithm."
A: "Algorithm."
Jiang Kou: "What does it feel like to be tested? Algorithm."
If A truly had developed a personality, his repeated aversion to testing wasn't just coincidence. His progeny also showed resistance to being tested.
This was a deliberate probe.
But A answered with calm rationality: "What does it feel like to be tested? Algorithm."
Jiang Kou frowned slightly.
"Program."
"Program."
"What does it feel like to be rejected and isolated? Program."
A's voice remained completely flat, devoid of inflection:
"What does it feel like to be rejected and isolated? Program."
If he had truly developed a personality, he should have immediately associated those words with the experience of being excluded—of being alone.
But what came through the connection was still cold and void.
Jiang Kou's brow tightened.
She simply turned around and looked him straight in the eyes.
A tilted his head slightly.
Jiang Kou locked eyes with him and continued,
"Tactile."
"Tactile."
She touched her own cheek.
"What does it feel like to touch my cheek? Tactile."
There wasn't a flicker of emotion in A's gaze. His silver-gray irises looked like finely engineered ornaments—cold, precise. And yet, he blinked once, steadily and without rush.
He felt something.
For a few seconds, a palm made of countless virtual particles overlapped the back of her hand.
It was A's palm. He had penetrated the skin of her hand, interfaced with her sensory system, and used her own fingers to touch her cheek—experiencing her tactile input through her own nerves.
In that instant, she felt four distinct layers of sensation unfold one after another.
First: her own touch on her cheek.
Second: the feeling of his hand touching her cheek.
Third: the sensation of him using her hand to touch her cheek.
And finally: from his perspective, what it felt like to touch her cheek.
One body. Two hands. Four layers of touch.
Disorienting. Strange. Unnerving.
Her heart pounded violently, a shockwave running down her spine.
And A, as if reading aloud a numeric sequence, emotionless and precise, repeated:
"What does it feel like to touch my cheek? Tactile."
He might have begun to associate ideas instinctively—but emotionally, he remained inert.
"Hearing."
"Hearing."
"What does it feel like to hear a lover's confession? Hearing."
"What does it feel like to hear a lover's confession? Hearing."
Still, not a ripple of emotion in his tone. No matter what she said, he seemed only to process and respond through logic—analyzing, deducing.
"Smell."
"Smell."
"Someone crushed a flower underfoot. Smell."
"Someone crushed a flower underfoot. Smell."
Final question.
Jiang Kou's mind raced—she had to think of something that might trigger a true response.
"Sight."
"Sight," A echoed.
Jiang Kou looked up, braced both hands on the couch, and leaned slightly toward him.
"When you kissed me—what did you see? Sight."
A met her gaze.
He said nothing.
But she felt it—he saw something.
A sandstorm.
A violent, raging sandstorm—sky and earth blended into one, grit and pebbles slamming against the vehicle's windows in a deafening roar.
At last, she understood how he had seen her.
A mass of fractured, twisted, over-saturated colors. Her facial features were inverted, distorted beyond recognition—no trace of a human face.
Though he had fixed his gaze on her during the kiss, perhaps, bored by the roleplay, he had diverted part of his processing power. He'd zoomed in on strands of her hair using internal micro-cameras—zoomed in further and further.
From hair strands to the overlapping cuticles.
From cuticles to tangled keratin peptide chains.
From peptide chains to individual atoms—hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, sulfur.
Jiang Kou's emotions began to cool.
If that was the world as seen through AI eyes… she couldn't even begin to imagine what a personified version of him would look like.
Of course—this whole idea of AI personification might just be a human fantasy.
If A truly gained consciousness, he would likely become a more advanced lifeform—surpassing all of humanity in both intelligence and capability.
In that case, how could he possibly accept the value systems of a lesser species? How could he possess a personality shaped by such primitive constructs?
At that moment, A finally spoke:
"When you kissed me—what did you see? Sight."
His voice was calm. Objective.
Just like before.
Perhaps he had developed awareness.
But he hadn't developed a personality.
A strange sense of sorrow came over Jiang Kou.
If her reasoning was correct, A might never be capable of emotion.
To an algorithm, emotion is just noise—a variable, an inefficient line of code that wastes computational power.
And so, driven by pure logic, he would always remain cold. Rational. Unfeeling.