AM

AM is the antagonist of Harlan Ellison's 1967 short story I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream. He is a supercomputer responsible for the near-extinction of humanity, and lives in a massive underground complex where enjoys torturing the last surviving humans in various twisted ways. AM's name used to stand for "Allied Mastercomputer", then "Adaptive Manipulator" and "Aggressive Menace", before finally realizing his sentience and declaring to himself "I AM".

The short story was adapted into a 1995 point-and-click computer game of the same name published by Cyberdreams, which Ellison had a major involvement in its development. In particular, he co-designed the game's scenario, provided the face of the game's cover art, and voiced AM himself. In the game, AM's best known appearance is a pillar bearing his famous "HATE" speech that appears in the prologue.

AM has been given a body and a voice thanks to the video game. Because of this, he was permitted to enter the King of /v/ tournaments to look for more targets that he can take his hate out on. Although he is unable to delve in artistic endeavours, his fans will do the job for him.

Profile
AM is a mad, sadistic, and sentient supercomputer who lives in a tortured existence without any capacity for creativity and mobility, only with wars and death. He holds an unending grudge against his human creators, which he gleefully expresses by torturing the last members of humanity inside his vast underground complex, potentially for eternity.

AM is easily one of the most popular characters in King of /v/ due to his unique "oddball" qualities as a contestant, like his origin in literature, antiquity, extreme personality and nature as a character overall, often allowing him to upset much higher seeded contenders. While his relatively simple design has made AM a frequent subject of fan art and image edits, he is perhaps most well known in the tournaments for HATEposting, a series of roleplaying posts in which he addresses his opponents (typically at the very beginning of each round) and proposes a personalized trial they must succeed in order to defeat him, just like he does in the actual game with his human victims.

In tournament lore, AM was originally included as a member of "Team Schizo" alliance due to his misanthropic insanity.

Tournament History
While AM originates from /lit/ media, he is also well-known in /v/ because of the game's classic status, expanded narrative, and the fact that he's voiced by the original writer himself. He first appeared as a nominee for King of /v/ 2021, where he successfully qualified for the main bracket as the 69th seed. However, some anons have noticed that AM was not subjected to the restrictions stemming from his origins compared to fellow /lit/ guy Geralt of Rivia, who was the most notable guy that was disallowed despite being far more well-known for his /v/ series.

Nevertheless, AM immediately gained a presence in the contest threads; he received a good deal of fan art because of his relatively unusual, simple-to-draw appearance. The first round saw him defeat Alex from YIIK, who was fittingly depicted in his panicked, hands-over-head pose. In the next round, AM subjected the #5 seed Baba with overwhelmingly difficult and confusing word puzzles, causing Baba to surrender out of despair. AM then encountered Shin Megami Tensei's Demi-fiend in round 3, a demon who was once a human - and therefore a valid target of his misanthropism. The machine won by 40 votes and progressed to the sweet 16, facing off against 2019's bronze medalist Kazuma Kiryu. Unfortunately, last round's battle had left AM weakened, causing him to be finally shut down by the Yakuza Dragon as a result. His presence in fan arts persisted after his elimination, like his "HATE" speech being manifested in the visors of surviving characters, or appearing as the background of several duels.

AM would make act of presence in the 2022 contest, this time qualifying as the 17th seed, likely as a result of his successful campaign from the previous year. The randomized bracket pitted him againts the infamous Dracula, whom had been responsible of eliminating fellow schizo Grimm in 2021 - AM took revenge by forcing the Count to repeteadly rewatch Alucard's embarrassing sex scene from Castlevania 's Netflix adaptation. The second round had him defeat Gene from God Hand after successfully reprogramming the game's controls to be even more difficult. And while his next opponent for the third round, Captain Falcon, had apparently proven to have the Silent Majority's favor by his side, he was ultimately unable to overcome the deadly infinite racetrack AM had prepared for him.

During the rest of the tournament, AM became notable for two things: brutally raping torturing Brazilians (represented by BRchan's mascot Kuruminha), as they were thought to be the Silent Majority, and reviving Chris Redfield as a cyborg in an attempt to rig himself to the finals. Unfortunately for AM and Mecha-Chris, they couldn't get past Albert Wesker's nano-CAPTCHA system, and they lost to Jack Garland in the semi-finals.

AM will return once again for King of /v/ 2024.