Being 0 and 1: The Superposition State ‘Qubit’ Part 1
「Asia!」
「Aimer!」
The moment they confirmed the reboot of Unit 5, the two minds became one.
「Using Asia’s power to forcibly link with Unit 5. Initiating forced purge of additional armor. Establishing a real-time network with Unit 5. Synchronization rate at 99.9999999999%—achieved Twelve Nines. We will provide support for the unit on this end.」
Asia’s Aimer declared this firmly.
「Astraea, assist with the damaged cameras. Use past footage to predict and reconstruct current visuals in real time. Low resolution is acceptable.」
「Understood.」
「Nyanta, Aki. Support optimization for sensors and the unit’s overall status.」
The sisters were already accessing the system.
「Got it! Shutting down electromagnetic armor and reallocating power to armored muscles to ensure mobility.」
Nyanta displayed Unit 5 on the monitor and began managing the flow of metallic hydrogen within the armored muscles.
「Understood! Starting adjustments on the sensors.」
Aki announced as she began fine-tuning the sensors.
Both of them were battling an inner sense of urgency. Aimer’s response had been slightly faster than theirs—though Aimer was originally human. Somehow, she was surpassing the two Telema AI sisters. It was clear that she had been continuously observing both Kou and Unit 5, searching for any possible actions to take.
It may have been no more than a second. Yet, to Nyanta and Aki, that fleeting moment felt like an eternity, an irretrievable delay. They felt an unshakable determination—they had to support Kou no matter what.
「Unit 5’s reactor—restoration confirmed. The latent potential of Prometheus’ Fire… that’s—」
「That’s Unit 5’s Prometheus’ Fire functionality, the manifestation of its latent potential ability. It wasn’t that Unit 5 lacked latent abilities—it simply never experienced a situation where it was immobilized, so the activation timing never occurred until now.」
Asia’s Aimer’s explanation shed light on the newly observed functionality—a hidden power that could only be analyzed upon activation.
「The cracks on the reactor and the power pack are gone? Is this some sort of self-repair capability?」
「An extreme technique, using axions to apply time-axis data stored in the memory of the material to the qubits, inducing a time-reversal effect to restore the reactor. Fennel managed to pull off something as extraordinary as that.」
「That… this is an unprecedented function. Backward time traversal of material—material temporal regression? If the qubit register underwent forward temporal unitary evolution and was then subjected to time-reversal, are you saying the Fennel OS essentially manipulated Maxwell’s Demon?」
「Exactly. It’s as if the particles were correlated to reverse the arrow of time. It can’t sustain it indefinitely, so the Fennel OS restores the system to the last stable state it has recorded. And it keeps fighting to the very end—almost like a curse.」
「Fighting to the end? What do you mean?」
「The function activates in response to the pilot’s combat intent. Even if the pilot dies, it continues to rise until its objective is achieved. It keeps trying to stand. That is the essence of Unyielding Will. This isn’t something based on something as sweet as Hephaestus myths. The core AI behind this has to be based on Ares myths, or something entirely different—a primal fighting instinct. Some bizarre concept has infiltrated the Fennel OS. Perhaps even that past incident of rampancy was triggered by the system resonating with a pilot candidate’s intent and activating this ability.」
「Even if Kou dies, it will keep getting back up? The silhouette? Moving without a pilot? Isn’t that the ultimate taboo for the Fennel OS?」
Even Astraea was stunned into silence.
「Coincidence or not, some mechanism has been embedded to override that taboo. Unit 5—or rather, was it Hyoe who designed Lanius? What kind of concept did he embed in it? Resurrection from death—returning from the underworld—is the ultimate human taboo. There are heroes who became gods after death, and legends of vengeful spirits returning to battlefields after unnatural deaths. But this… this is the concept of a being that desired combat even after death. Is there really such a legend… such a person?」
Even Asia’s Aimer shuddered at the terrifying functions of the system.
This was not something that could be neatly categorized as ‘Unyielding Will’.
「The cost is immense—beyond imagination. Of course, it is. The Fennel OS is overloading, and combat functionality has significantly diminished. The synchronization rate with the pilot is also dropping.」
Aimer continued typing at an astonishing speed, her fingers flying over the physical keyboard almost faster than the eye could follow.
「I’ve confirmed a massive number of quantum errors in Unit 5’s Fennel OS. Natural recovery will take too long. I’ll handle it from here. Beginning stabilizer code construction. Generating a virtual Bloch sphere space…」
Asia’s Aimer was attempting to directly interfere with Unit 5’s Fennel OS.
「Transitioning to operations within the virtual Bloch sphere space using the Prometheus Fire. With Astraea’s processing power and Unit 5’s Fennel OS, we should be able to create a quantum error-correcting code through the entanglement-assisted stabilizer formalism.」
Entanglement-Assisted Stabilizer Formalism—a quantum communication technology that protects quantum information by utilizing quantum entanglement shared between the sender and receiver before transmitting quantum data over a quantum communication channel. This method enables the sender to utilize quantum error-correcting properties, allowing for the creation of quantum error-correcting codes. Asia was attempting to correct the quantum errors within Unit 5’s MCS using Astraea.
「Stop this! Operating in a virtual Bloch sphere space is dangerous. If something goes wrong, it could scorch your very soul!」
Despite the warning, Asia was handling hardware management in parallel to Aimer’s high-speed operations. Aimer’s fingers never slowed, continuing to type at lightning speed.
「It doesn’t matter. Our will is united. Ten seconds—that’s all I need, Astraea.」
Asia’s Aimer golden eyes gleamed brightly before they turned hollow.
◆ ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆
「Where am I?」
Aimer found herself at the base of a sphere. At her feet, a cat rubbed against her leg—a Russian Blue.
「Even you’re here, Master?」
「It’s been a thousand years since I last touched you in this form.」
Master replied with a soft purr.
Master’s gentle meow tugged at Aimer’s heart, and she instinctively embraced her. A warmth she hadn’t felt in a millennium flooded through her.
「This is the virtual Bloch sphere space, a visualization of qubits in action. To put it simply, it’s a direct representation of the Fennel OS quantum program within Unit 5.」
Asia’s voice said this as she materialized from the void.
「Welcome to the world of Qubits—the state of superposition, where something is both 0 and 1 simultaneously. Imagine multiple qubits—for instance, with four qubits, you arrange them in a 2×2 grid and control their quantum states. By manipulating the quantum circuit, you harness the numerical values of those superimposed states to perform massive computations in an instant. The Bloch sphere is a diagrammatic representation of a qubit, and this space is a virtual Bloch sphere realm I created.」
Aimer nodded in understanding. Part of her mind was equivalent in complexity to the integrated circuits of the Fennel OS itself.
「The Fennel OS of Unit 5 is suffering from quantum errors caused by physical overload—numbers used for computation have collapsed into a single eigenstate, making them unobservable as qubits. This is a state of contraction into one specific condition. Due to decoherence, the transition probabilities have disappeared, creating the apparent collapse of the wave function, and the computational capacity has significantly diminished. Our task is to restore these to their original qubit states. It’s all within the framework of Schrödinger’s equation. Right, Master?」
Asia referenced the wave function, grounded in Schrödinger’s equation—the fundamental principle of quantum mechanics.
Master’s expression soured slightly. Her situation was eerily akin to Schrödinger’s famous thought experiment: the cat simultaneously dead and alive. Despite her death, Master remained alive within Aimer’s consciousness, an anomaly carrying its own will.
「That’s an awkward analogy for me, Asia.」
「Is there anything we can do to help?」
Aimer’s straightforward question revealed her lack of familiarity with the nuances of Schrödinger’s equation.
「Don’t worry, I’ve visualized this as a virtual space, so you’ll just need to play a bit of ‘whack-a-mole.’」
「That’s easy enough for me.」
「Me too! I can do that!」
「Your consciousness has been accelerated to the attosecond scale. The real battle begins now.」
Attoseconds—an almost unfathomable speed, allowing perception at the velocity of light itself.
「Ten seconds, right? What do we need to do?」
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