in the near future we could have an artificial cortex that can think a million times accelerated. What follows?

That depends very much on what its constructors expected it to do. Maybe it will do something else, but such a thing would not come into being without its constructors having a very clear intent. This isn't just a pile of 10^14 memristors, it's 10^14 memristors deliberately connected up in imitation of a human brain. The people who make it must know quite a lot about how the human brain works, and they must know that they are making - or trying to make - a goal-directed intelligence potentially far more powerful than they are. To even be doing this implies that they expect to approve of the aims of this intelligence. Most likely, they either expect to become gods along with it or by means of its assistance, or they have some similar agenda for all humanity and not just themselves. There is essentially no prospect that the device as described will come into being and start exercising its mind-hacking powers unanticipated; the people who made it will be expecting to commune with it, follow its instructions, have it follow their instructions, or otherwise have a relationship with it. They will have some conception of what comes afterwards, some philosophy of the future which informs their technical effort. Probably the philosophy will be some variation of "someone has to win the race to achieve superintelligence, and it's going to be us, and good times will follow our victory".