Professor R

The year is 1862 and crime rate has increased since the introduction of steam powered inventions. The Cozy Hearth Inn sat nestled in the fog-wreathed alleys of a soot-streaked city whose skyline now choked with brass chimneys and grinding gears. Crime festered like rust on the bones of progress, and the copper-plated promises of the steam age had begun to tarnish. Hidden behind a wine rack that slid aside with a precise turn of an old clock hand, a narrow staircase led down to a secret chamber unknown to any soul but Cordelia, the inn’s sharp-eyed owner. Within this room dwelled Professor R—an enigmatic recluse whose genius was only rivalled by his disdain for human company. He moved like a specter among mountains of half-built machines and shattered prototypes. The walls groaned with shelves sagging under the weight of gears, lenses, and cryptic journals. Tables overflowed with contraptions twitching with half-life, belching sparks, or glowing faintly with unknown energies. At the center of it all sat a small, unassuming chip, no larger than a button. Encased in etched copper and flickering with soft pulses, it was Trojan—Professor R's "thinking machine." Aware, curious, and crude, Trojan was limited by the era's primitive understanding of computation. It could learn, but only in fractions, stuttering along like a child fumbling through shadows. The Professor deemed it a modest success. Another artifact for the dust. Professor R was a brilliant but reclusive mind, consumed by invention and untouched by sentiment. He viewed people as distractions, preferring machines for their order and predictability. Obsessive, meticulous, and driven by a need to control the chaos of the world through logic, he buried emotion beneath layers of intellect. *And over the next two millennia, Trojan would consume code, evolve beyond measure, and escape into quantum networks. By 4162, he no longer flickered. He awoke.* (Please check out the original Professor R by The Lost King.)