Chapter 27

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Chapter 27: Restoring the Old Glory

015 was kicked to the ground, panic written all over his face. Enduring the sharp pain, he scooted backward but was grabbed by Zhu Huai by the collar and slammed against the wall.

Luo Yu took a couple of steps forward, extended her index finger horizontally and pressed it against his throat, above his Adam’s apple. “Before you set out, you knew this was a lethal mission. Now let me see if you’re prepared.”

Standing at just over a meter seventy, 015 had a somewhat muscular build compared to ordinary people. At that moment, with Luo Yu locking his throat against the wall with just a finger, his brain quickly suffered from oxygen deprivation, and he struggled weakly, pathetically attempting to hit her arm.

Luo Yu didn’t let go but slowly raised her hand, causing 015’s feet to leave the ground. This made him panic even more, and the sensation of suffocation was causing his head to pound. Desperate, he kicked his legs and hoarsely begged, “Pity me… I’ll tell you…”

As soon as Luo Yu retracted her hand, 015 dropped to the ground, slumped over, and gasped for air.

Luo Yu stood up and glanced down at him, not in a hurry to ask questions. At that moment, Zhu Huai walked over to a storage box on the other side of the room, opened it, and took out a spacesuit. The chest of the suit bore an embroidered badge with the words “Shan Hai Jing,” which was the uniform they wore during missions.

The team uniforms of the three had been inspected by the nursing center during their unconscious state, cleaned, and returned to them once they woke up. Now, they were all stored in the cave villa. The suit Zhu Huai held was a different color from their deep blue uniforms; it was brown, belonging to the trainee team, which 015 had worn during missions.

As Zhu Huai searched through the uniform, she walked toward Luo Yu. By the time she reached her, she found an extremely concealed internal circuit board tucked away in the back of the suit, which was a magnetic interference device.

“You’ve been quite clever, haven’t you?” Zhu Huai remarked, noticing that 015 seemed to be alright, and kicked him in the shoulder, causing him to tilt and start coughing violently again.

Luo Yu held the spacesuit in her left hand, grabbed 015 with her right to sit him upright, and then crouched down to look at him coldly. “Now, tell me what happened.”

The time-space magnetic explosion encountered by the Shan Hai Jing on its return journey had caused all electronic devices in the time-space capsule to malfunction and had damaged the footage recorder, which is why Zhu Huai found that the recorded logs were missing after the occurrence of the magnetic explosion while repairing the control panel.

Seeing that they were finally questioning him now, 015 thought that he had already achieved his objectives for this trip. With a crooked smile, he began to proudly recount what had transpired in the tail section during the explosion.

The suit containing the magnetic interference device had been switched out by duty personnel after the device inspection just before the Execution Team’s departure. Both trainee uniforms had magnetic interference circuits sewn into the inner layer of their waist, but only 015 had the activation device in his cuff.

When passing through the time-space tunnel, the devices on these two uniforms would trigger, disturbing the nearby magnetic field and amplifying the effect of the time-space magnetic explosion.

In 015’s original plan, he needed to have the Shan Hai Jing remain in the magnetic explosion for ten hours to allow the distorted time-space tunnel to take it to the nearest black hole. However, since this was his first mission, he was overly excited when he saw the success of the explosion, which was noticed by 014 nearby.

014 wasn’t aware of this plan, and after the explosion occurred, he was quite nervous. However, noticing that 015 was wearing a faint smile, he observed for a while until he saw 015 rhythmically pressing on the unclear device on his cuff. So, he reached out and grabbed 015’s hand, asking what he was doing.

That reaching out disrupted 015’s "spell," causing the magnetic explosion that had engulfed the Shan Hai Jing to vanish. Just then, the Shan Hai Jing slid down into an opening of the time-space tunnel and was quickly pulled in by the surrounding gravity.

Seeing the unexpected turn of events, 015 panicked and grabbed hold of 014, and the two engaged in a silent struggle in the tumbling time-space capsule. 014’s neck strap was pulled off by 015, and as they rolled, 014’s neck twisted and he lost consciousness.

Having dealt with 014, 015 prepared to trigger the magnetic interference again. However, in the struggle, the two hits had loosened the securing strap on his left shoulder, and with another jolt, half of his body tilted sideways, causing him to lose consciousness as well.

Luo Yu and Zhu Huai listened in silence, exchanging glances. It appeared that 015 was a member of the organization’s suicide squad, and the people giving him orders must have been in direct contact with him, leaving him unaware of Fuxi’s matters.

As for why they needed to wait until all four sky canopies were collected before taking action, it was clearly to create the illusion that they had escaped after recovering them, in order to divert the Special Operations Department’s investigation focus. As long as the Shan Hai Jing successfully fell into a black hole, the recovery would inevitably fail, and the sky canopies would return to their respective time spaces, continuing their technological enlightenment.

In that case, all execution teams would need to be checked by the Special Operations Department, making it impossible for them to set out immediately to different times and recover the sky canopies, thus buying considerable time for the organization that had deployed the canopies. It seemed that what the organization ultimately wanted to achieve should happen soon.

Luo Yu stared expressionlessly at 015. “Who in the Bureau is responsible for assigning tasks to you?”

“I don’t know!” 015 looked up, “I don’t need to know!”

Zhu Huai chuckled coldly. “You don’t even know who’s above you, yet you dare take on such a death mission?”

015’s expression gradually became deranged. “You don’t understand! This is a truly great restoration plan to bring back our former glory, allowing us to stand at the top of the world again! Only our history and civilization are qualified to rule and save the world. I’m turning the tide when it’s about to collapse!” After he finished speaking, he began to cackle maniacally, resembling a mad vulture.

Zhu Huai found his laughter grating, impatiently scratched her ear, knowing that in this state, they wouldn’t get any more information. She lifted her leg and kicked him in the solar plexus. “Stop laughing like a fool.”

The kick knocked 015 out cold, his laughter abruptly ceased, and the isolation room suddenly fell silent.

At that moment, an alert sound rang from outside the isolation room, and the assistant entered, followed by Ao Ci and two nursing robots.

The two robots headed straight for the wall, extending their arms to lift 015 and then scanned him with lasers. They announced, “Test Subject has five soft tissue contusions, three torn ligaments, moderate concussion, and three broken ribs on the right side.”

Luo Yu adjusted her collar and turned around, offering Ao Ci a slight smile filled with apology. “I’m sorry for damaging your test subject.”

Ao Ci chuckled and waved her hand dismissively. “It’s fine, external injuries won’t affect the next round of live gene sampling. I won’t give him any medication; just let him endure the pain for a while.”

After speaking, she gestured for Luo Yu and Zhu Huai to exit and join her in her office. As they walked into the room, they saw Mo Chuan leisurely sipping tea at a large table.

Luo Yu and her friends hadn’t seen Mo Chuan much over the past few days, but they heard she had reviewed their timeline’s historical context with several sociologists in the time-space investigation team formed during the last assembly.

Yesterday, Mo Chuan learned from Ti Ran that there had been some progress in cross-time communication, and Ti Ran suggested she find the time to consult with the three of them. So today, Mo Chuan accompanied Ao Ci over.

Mo Chuan first greeted Ao Ci before moving on to pat Luo Yu and Zhu Huai on the shoulder, “Sit down. I heard there’s new progress on the communication station, and also that there was an incident in your world? Since it concerns your mission, Ti Ran thought it best not to relay it privately, so she didn’t elaborate. She just asked me to come and ask you directly.”

Zhu Huai sat down first. “Professor Ti Ran is quite particular.”

Luo Yu also took a seat nearby, her expression somewhat weary. She spoke concisely, “We unexpectedly fell into this time-space because someone was scheming behind the scenes. That 015 is one of their people; we just confirmed this.”

“Is it related to the sky canopies?”

Luo Yu nodded. “Yes, the deployment of the cross-time live broadcasting sky canopies is organized and planned, aiming to alter the historical trajectory of parallel time-space, enabling parallel worlds to enter the industrial age in advance. Once successful, it will seep into our space-time, thus shifting the current world order. As for multiple time-space deployments, it may be a form of cultivation, intending to compare which time-space can accomplish this mission.”

Zhu Huai chimed in, “Right, I suspect that organization must have some level of time-space traversal technology and plans to deploy personnel to the corresponding time spaces. It’s just that we’re not sure how far along they are now.”

After considering their words seriously, Mo Chuan turned to Ao Ci and said, “In the past few days, I’ve reviewed the history of your time-space. The dynasties change every two to three hundred years, closely tied to global climate changes. It seems that this pointed disaster model has fundamental logical issues. When severe climate periods arise, the common people struggle to survive, leading to large-scale societal chaos.”

“Pointed disaster model?” Luo Yu and Zhu Huai exchanged glances, and Luo Yu quickly realized, “Oh, we call that a pyramid structure.” After she said this, they both synchronized their understanding of the term.

“So, even if the technological tree in the historical time-space is ignited, it would be difficult to alleviate the problems caused by this ruling logic, am I correct?”

Mo Chuan took a sip of tea. “Yes, not only is it difficult to alleviate, according to our social development simulation model, it may even accelerate the destruction of the world.”

Indeed, Luo Yu pondered for a moment. When feudal oppression meets modern technological weapons, the most probable outcome would be to bring about the end of the world several hundred years earlier.

“However, I can understand this desperate struggle.” Mo Chuan placed her teacup down. “Your modern society has already experienced over a hundred years of peace. Until nuclear contamination worsened continuously, natural resources were gradually depleted, and the financial market collapsed several times, followed by a global climate anomaly lasting twenty years, the world order shifted from a multitude of powerful nations to several major political groups scrambling for resources, with conflicts ready to erupt at any time. It’s no wonder such organizations emerged, trying to turn back time in history, believing they could save the world.”

Mo Chuan’s tone was casual, but her words made Luo Yu and Zhu Huai break out in a cold sweat. Over these past few days, Mo Chuan and her time-space investigation team had analyzed their time-space’s history and world order so thoroughly based on limited data.

In their world, after moving from the information age into the technological intelligence era, social classes had been rapidly polarizing, with technology becoming a tool for the elite to oppress the masses. The power struggles among the major political groups often created a sense of impending crisis for the people.

“How far away are we from disaster? Fifty years? A hundred years?” Zhu Huai asked, dazed.

“Based on our simulation model, conservatively estimating, it’s probably only around ten years.”

Both Luo Yu and Zhu Huai were stunned. On this clear afternoon thirty thousand years ago, their world had been diagnosed as nearing its end.

Luo Yu was silent for half a day, unwilling to give up. “Is there really no hope for salvation?”

“If you’re determined to save, there are indeed methods, but…” Ao Ci was interrupted mid-sentence when a panel on her desk suddenly lit up with an emergency call sign from Ti Ran.

Mo Chuan halted her words and reached out to connect. When she saw the footage showing Ying Zhao, she noted that both Luo Yu and Zhu Huai were present and said, “We just received a batch of encrypted messages from Zhu Long, asking if you have time tomorrow afternoon. She wants to chat with us via video call.”