dtnovels Chapter 16: Breaking Through the Barrier
Chapter 16: Breaking Through the Barrier
In less than 40 minutes, Zhou Yuan arrived near the solar collider. From a distance, the colliders looked like small black dots, orderly surrounding the sun. Each collider had a magnetic pole spin insulation system to prevent the collider from being affected by solar radiation and thus the effect of the helium-3 cryogenic refrigerant. Most importantly, the intelligent control terminal of each collider was always connected to Zhou Yuan's wrist ring.
Zhou Yuan faced the collider and pondered for a moment. Unexpectedly, he used light transmission to teleport from the spaceship to an adjacent unmanned warship. He then directed the 90 warships to be evenly distributed, with five warships facing outwards in a defensive posture at each collider. The spaceship led the other 10 warships, heading towards the moon.
April 5, 2071 AD (Earth Era).
Zhou Yuan used the spaceship to send an electromagnetic signal toward the moon, with the following message: Gaia, there's no need to wait any longer. Let's settle this now. See you at the sun.
About 20 minutes later, the warship's gravity detector detected a "massive block" flying towards the sun. When it got close, a disc-shaped flying saucer quickly decelerated and was in front of the spacecraft in an instant.
"What do you want to do?" the UFO sent the first signal to the spaceship.
"Gaia? I want to ask you a question. If a Martian civilization still existed, would they destroy the sun?"
"What? You want to destroy the sun?" The other party was startled, then fell into thought. "I don't know what my master would do, but if he feels it's necessary, I think he would."
"Oh, all right."
"You really want to destroy the sun? Then I'll destroy you first." With that, the UFO prepared to release the "orb of light."
"Please wait. If I and these warships are destroyed, then the sun will be destroyed too. You can try it if you don't believe me."
"Really? Then why don't you destroy the sun? What are you waiting for?"
"I just pity you. How about we reach an agreement that benefits both of us?"
"Hmm, you're very interesting. Tell me about it."
"What has been your duty for 600 million years?"
“Duty? Duty?” Gaia murmured to himself, then fell into deep thought. “To cultivate Earth’s civilization and avenge my master.”
"Hmm, I knew it. So, do you think you've achieved your goal?"
Gaia fell silent for a moment.
“As you have seen, humanity on Earth has enormous potential. We can reconcile and work together to achieve this goal. Besides, we humans are also descendants of your master.” Zhou Yuan paused, seemingly giving Gaia time to think.
“Only by joining forces can we defeat the enemy. Ultimately, what you lack is powerful humans, and what we lack is technology and intelligence. But our fundamental goals are the same.” Zhou Yuan seemed to see through Gaia’s thoughts again. “Don’t expect to cultivate human civilization again, because time will not wait for you.”
"What do you mean?" Gaia felt a bit absurd and flustered. "You should know that I have plenty of time."
"Heh, really? Looks like you're really short of manpower. You should know that there's a light speed barrier in this world, and the speed of light is accelerating downwards. It's estimated that this solar system will be destroyed in less than three hundred years. I'd like to know, how do you plan to cultivate a more powerful human civilization within three hundred years?"
Gaia was truly stunned this time. This was indeed her weakness; she simply relied on the existing technology of Martian civilization to transform Earth and cultivate humanity, without any manpower whatsoever. Moreover, she had no interest in exploring the unknown world or paying attention to those issues.
"A light speed barrier? A decrease in the speed of light? Wait a minute," Gaia seemed to recall something from a very long time ago, and if she were paying attention, it would be a strange unease. "Could it be them? How could that be?" Gaia thought, "They almost wiped out Master back then, and they didn't even let Master go afterward. They're so ruthless. But Master, wasn't he always decisive and efficient? Do two civilizations have to fight to the death before they're satisfied? No, no matter what, I have to fulfill Master's last wish." If Gaia were paying attention, her heart would be churning with turmoil.
How do I know if you're telling the truth or not?
"It's simple. You can send a few flying saucers out of the solar system in any direction, and you'll see the result. However, even at the speed of light, it would take 11 days."
The hovering UFO suddenly turned around and accelerated towards the moon.
Zhou Yuan let out a long sigh and smiled mysteriously.
Approximately 23 days later, Zhou Yuan received a message from the direction of the moon: "Congratulations, Earth's fifth civilization. Gaia will join forces with your human forces and gradually hand over control of the moon to humanity."
"Thank you."
"Aren't you leaving?"
"You know, I have to make sure the collider can destroy the sun!"
"Okay, goodbye then."
"Goodbye," Gaia, you must help humanity well. In this vast universe, human civilization still has a long way to go. Zhou Yuan thought to himself, feeling a mix of bitterness and anticipation.
Suddenly, the warship detected a series of gravitational oscillations, and the moon disappeared a few minutes later.
On Earth, the moon, which humans have gazed at for millions of years, suddenly emitted a bright white halo, which then disappeared in the blink of an eye, turning into a point of light in the distance before vanishing completely.
The poor Earth was immediately subjected to violent tremors. Tides ceased, volcanoes erupted, earthquakes became frequent, the Earth's magnetic field was disrupted, fierce solar winds battered the planet, numerous asteroids collided with Earth, nights became even darker, and days shortened (due to the Earth's accelerated rotation). Animals and plants on Earth died in large numbers within days, and the once vibrant planet was left scarred and devastated.
Without the moon, Earth is like a wounded child.
April 10, 2071 AD (Earth Era).
As it has for billions of years, the sun radiates boundless light and heat with its immense power.
Suddenly, the sun noticed enormous, dark creatures surrounding it, violently and rapidly sucking its blood and flesh. Thick pillars of fire were pulled into the bottomless abyss. From a distance, the sun's round body looked like it was covered in dazzling red tentacles, being violently ripped apart by the abyssal monsters. The sun roared in agony, its body swelling as if exhaling after holding its breath, its face flushed red, struggling fiercely as if trying to break free from these bloodsucking leeches. Soon, black bumps appeared all over the sun's body, indicating areas of blood deficiency. Half an hour later, the leeches seemed to have satiated their blood and disappeared. The pulled tentacles, their ends thrown out by inertia, were quickly bounced back onto the sun. One of the thrown pillars of fire crashed into Mercury, the neighboring planet, tearing it in two and causing Mercury to accelerate towards the sun, where it was swallowed up. The sun writhed in agony, frantically trying to fill the hole, shrinking circle by circle, until finally, the immense pressure within it crushed the sun. The sun exploded, suddenly emitting a silvery-white ray. This ray was invincible; wherever it touched, all celestial bodies and objects still under gravitational oscillation—Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, and others—were swept away, enveloped in light, and transformed into light itself—a world of light. The sun, freely releasing its pressure, thoroughly enjoyed itself.
April 21, 2071 AD (Earth Era).
At the edge of the dark solar system, humanity witnessed a miracle: the sky behind them suddenly began to light up, then slowly brightened, quickly dimmed, and disappeared. Meanwhile, in the darkness ahead, the stars that had been shining just moments before suddenly seemed to sweep across the sky like tiny brushes, leaving long trails as they gradually vanished.
Humanity, which had been waiting for this moment, finally took a step forward and surged forward.
Goodbye, Sun. Goodbye, Light Speed Barrier.
Far away, the moon keeps us company. Humanity is not alone.
Swept along by the torrent of time, as if dragged by inertia, human warships, space cities, and the moon seemed to be forcibly crammed into a channel of light, with the surrounding stars trailing tails as they sped past.
Suddenly, a cluster of stars appeared ahead, and a bright light, about the size of a coin, appeared. This light was moving at a certain speed.
"Commander-in-Chief, according to measurements, the speed of light in this space region is 4c0. The bright light ahead is moving at a speed of approximately 1800 km/s, and its luminosity is about 58% of that of the Sun. According to measurements such as gravity, Commander-in-Chief, this is a star similar to the Sun! Based on redshift measurements and corrections for increased speed of light, this star is currently approximately, if calculated at the speed of light from Earth, about two light-years away from us."
"Very good. Does that star have planets? What I want to ask is, does that star have an Earth suitable for our habitation? You need to know that the speed of light in this dimension is four times the speed of light on Earth, and our warships can only travel at approximately one time the speed of light on Earth. Our speed is relatively reduced, only 25% of the speed of light in this space. Before we can further increase our travel speed, we must find an Earth-like planet. By the way, according to the deductions of the civilization's academicians, the matter density in this space should be sparse. Look at this star system; the stars seem different from what we see on Earth, with a lower density than the stars in the Milky Way."
"Commander-in-Chief, the relevant observation and testing results are in. This is still the Milky Way galaxy! That coin-sized star we just saw was Aristolochia, and it does indeed have several planets! From Earth, we observe that Aristolochia is about 12 light-years away, but in reality, it's 180 light-years away. Correspondingly, the distances to all the stars observed from Earth have increased, as have the distances between them. We previously thought the Milky Way galaxy had a diameter of 10 light-years, but if we calculate at four times the speed of light (at c0), that's 3.38 million light-years!"
"Then how big must this universe be? My God, even at four times the speed of light on Earth, it would still be much, much bigger!" Eisen couldn't help but gasp.
"By the way, how's the situation on the moon?"
"Gaia has sent a message saying she will gradually hand over control of the moon to us. Commander-in-Chief, what should we do next?"
"Issue my order: activate the anti-gravity system on all warships and space cities, making the moon the 'satellite' of the moon. For now, let Gaia pilot the moon and let Aya get familiar with it. Also, send relevant scientists to the moon's interior to conduct research; we need to excavate Martian civilization technology."
"clear."
"Also, in an hour, I will be holding a conference at the Federal Academy of Sciences on Earth, Space City 1."