Chapter 4

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Chapter 4: Perfect Avoidance

When Lieutenant Ruier woke up again, he found himself lying in a white room with a single bed covered in clean and soft bedding. The only furniture was a rounded table of unidentified material with a soft cup on it, filled with a whole glass of clear water. Ruier, who was extremely thirsty, without hesitation, picked up the cup and drank it all at once.

In the monitoring room next door, whispers began, "I’m really curious about how he uses tools with those spherical palms of his. From the previous dissections, it seems like their palms lack the ability to flex and bend."

"It looks like there’s a sticky structure on the palm for sticking the cup."

"But no such structure was found on the body."

"Maybe this special protein denatured and deactivated after being baked at high temperatures. I told you those barbarians from the Air Force only know how to bomb! Now look at this mess!" The engineers exploring the wreckage, looking for potential hyperspace engines, had already been heavily criticized by the military.

Or rather, with multiple heavy 600 kg high-explosive warheads piercing and detonating inside, these warships, found to only have steel shells and wooden ribs upon analysis, were already considered mercifully treated by the military? The main reason was that they did not carry large amounts of fuel and propellant like Earth’s warships, and lacked an ammunition depot to ignite.

After drinking water, Lieutenant Ruier took a quick look at the metal door for a second before going back to bed. The soft cushion surprised him, "These natives may not be as primitive as we thought before."

Textile, as a type of light industry, shows the industrialization capability of a society besides steel. The Empire developed with steam-powered textile machines and many foreign slave weavers. Even the fine cloth offered as tribute by the royal family did not look as exquisite as the white fabrics on the bed.

"Hiss~" The metal door slid open automatically, and a possibly female native walked in. She was extremely ugly, with smooth hairless skin and only one pair of breasts. She was even less attractive than the females on the planet Nico Star, at least they had somewhat normal-looking ears instead of the bizarre fleshy masses on the sides of her head.

However, she was followed by two warriors much taller than her, each holding a short rifle that seemed to be a kind of storm gun. Knowing the frightening abilities of this weapon, Lieutenant Ruier obediently raised his tail, tensed his back and neck, and saluted this ugly female. In any civilized society, females generally signify pettiness and grudge-holding, necessary traits for survival bestowed upon them by their reproductive functions.

"Where do you come from?" The female pushed a glass plate with the Empire’s words written in standard print on it. Ruier hesitated for a moment and said, "From the Michaelis colonial settlement, about two or three jumps away from here." One jump is at most 10 Star Distances, and the calculations of Star Distances are the domain of astrologers and navigators, something Ruier had no knowledge of.

Seeing the confused expression of the female, Ruier had to slow down and repeat himself, then drew a simple diagram on the table with a bit of water. Afterward, Ruier added, "As an officer and a noble, I demand the treatment I deserve, with relevant ransom. You can negotiate with my family."

What he feared most was falling into the hands of those natives with cannibalistic habits, who cared nothing about ransom or noble rules of engagement. They would simply clean the captives and eat them in a way they liked.

"How do you move faster than light?" After waiting for a long time, a new message appeared on the glass plate, "With jumpers." Lieutenant Ruier honestly replied, "And Space Displacers."

"Do you understand their structure?"

"This is very simple…." So Ruier thought back to his experience fixing his old car at home, while drawing the structure of the Space Displacer on a glass board with a pen passed by a female.

The questions continued, about the Empire’s politics, weapons, military system, navigation during interstellar travel, and so on were raised one by one. However, some of them Ruier knew, some he did not know, and most of them he knew but couldn’t say.

However, this persistence only lasted until a weak young man entered. Amidst a large dose of wood avens extract, when Ruier woke up, he found that he had almost said all the things he knew, which suddenly frightened him.

"The so-called Space Displacer and superluminal jumper have very simple structures, but in any era in the history we have not succeeded in discovering them…"

After comparing the interrogation drawings and objects, the engineers tried to repair a Displacer. Its function is very simple, it changes the movement direction of an object. In this process, it does not perform work, but making the object move requires energy, nearly half of the mechanical energy input.

This is a circular device that gives the central object kinetic energy equal to half of the kinetic energy of the circular disk rotation. As for the principle, it’s completely unknown how it works. Just assembling these metals and wood (later changed to engineering plastics), then rapidly rotating under the drive of a military generator, the 34-ton fighter jet seemed to float up as if ignoring gravity, continuously accelerating upwards.

"Darn it, why has no one ever thought of this?"

"To be precise, we did think of it." The investigator honestly replied, "But each time, due to luck or coincidence, we missed it by a little bit. Each time the superluminal jumper was missing the same thing."

"What is it?" This question immediately attracted all the researchers to gather around.

"Safety valve…"

"What?" Everyone seemed to doubt their own ears. "Safety valve?"

"Yes, we tried removing a tiny braking component and the device reached the threshold in a short time, then the laboratory exploded. And the manuscript for this thing, I think some FBI colleagues may have seen it recently."

"Are you talking about that Serbian man?"

"Yes, and his Space Displacer made another mistake. The device he was considering was feasible, but… he firmly fixed the accelerating seat to the ground and only used a very old small generator to power it, so his action was probably like trying to move the whole Earth… Of course, maybe he succeeded, and the Earth moved by a negligible few nanometers, but that couldn’t be observed."

So all the researchers and officials’ expressions became particularly exciting. "Are you saying that at any time in our history, we could discover this phenomenon and create this… unreasonable device, but just because every inventor missed that tiny detail, so until now we have been kept on Earth?"

"Yes, statistically, this is possible. We may have conducted several experiments and speculations in our history, but each time we failed to observe this physical law and related mathematical principles due to human error or equipment error…"

"Oh my!"

"And then, after a certain number of failures and based on incorrect observations, we eventually abandoned the idea and turned to find new laws, so it forever disappeared from our scientific system…"

"But, each subject and law are related to each other…"

"But it happens to be a physical phenomenon that, apart from moving something and changing its direction, has no other application or connection. In other words, its other phenomena highly overlap with our physical phenomena – conservation of mass, conservation of momentum, conservation of energy, accumulation of kinetic energy, removal have no exceptions. The only issue is that it ‘moves’ the kinetic energy of something to another object in this way."

"So, it is a law that transfers the kinetic energy of something to another object without us ever knowing?"

"Yes, we call it the ‘Hidden Rule’ with only one specific physical phenomenon corresponding to it. If we miss this special phenomenon, we will lose it. If we compare the universe to a program, our physics is its main program, while these ‘Hidden Rules’ are patches used to patch up deficiencies and missing details of the main program."

And humanity, quite perfectly, avoids all patches and downloadable content (DLC), almost completing half of the main quest full of bugs and impossible challenges.

For instance, macroscopic quantum states, the collapse of quantum superposition from micro to macro, why do these phenomena always exist at the microscopic level? Perhaps in between, there is also one ‘Hidden Rule’ revealed by a phenomenon that is only missed by a certain human or lost a few observation opportunities for some reason. If we continue thinking along this line, it’s absolutely terrifying!

Throughout the development of human society, how many patches have we missed? How many ‘Hidden Rules’ silently hide outside the limited human vision, silently supporting the seemingly flawed reality world? And how many DLCs are in places invisible to us, filling the gaps of this cosmic physics mansion, allowing this seemingly crumbling system to operate steadily.

"How likely is this?"

"If we consider the possibility of infinite cardinality, in the universe, our situation may not even be unique. It may only not be mainstream due to the distance and small proportion."

"Do you mean that if we use this shifting technique to enter space, we may face similar failures like ours, but also develop stronger opponents in other directions?"

"Yes, and considering the number of key experiments involved, this probability is not even considered to be very small."

"Furthermore, you must consider one thing," said a serious sociologist, "Although we have not discovered this phenomenon and technology to develop advanced technical systems in other directions, it does not mean that civilizations that have discovered this phenomenon and law are necessarily weaker than us in these areas – they ventured into space earlier, developed faster. Assuming enough time, even without investing much effort in other directions, they may reach or even surpass our level."

"Even if they do not reach, the gap may be limited. As you know, the progress and advancement of modern science are inversely proportional. The more advanced we are, the more effort and time we need to move forward. Therefore, the further we go, the slower we progress, giving them a chance to catch up with us."

"After all, we humans are still too few! Compared to the universe, the 11 billion population of Earth is nothing!"

Moreover, less than 2% of the population possess higher academic abilities. The vast majority of the public may not even understand or proficiently use laws from two centuries ago. Despite forcibly promoting elite education, implanting scientific theories into citizens almost like whipping, the majority of ordinary people still believe this is brainwashing. More than half of them think that school teachers are useless because the benefits obtained from these theories seem less intuitive and useful than what they gain from social maneuvering.

Considering the population base and the current situation, it is likely that humans may temporarily be ahead of a small area of "noobs". However, expecting to continuously maintain this lead over a large scope is simply a pipe dream!

"Think about it, how many fools on Earth are taxed for their lack of intelligence. Are you still so confident? Do you still think we can roam freely in the universe?" The sociologist slammed the table and shouted, "Calm down, don’t be dominated by arrogance. Think about those foolish Kloros people, isn’t that a sufficient warning?"

"One must not harbor ill intentions, but one must not be without caution," exclaimed the Chinese leader. "It is not wrong to view this universe with the utmost suspicion. It is better than blindly rushing in, only to perish amid cheerful laughter."

"But compared to those distant problems, we need to quickly replicate all the hyperdrive and Space Displacer we have, and put them on the space station."

"Hmm, it’s time to prioritize the building of a real space defense system and fleet."

"How should we deal with the Kloros people?"

"Detain them first, we have many questions that need their cooperation."

"I mean their homeland, how should we handle a civilization that is still in the midst of an industrial revolution."

"Well…since they rudely attacked our country without declaration of war, it’s only natural…"

"Wait, since when did Central Africa become your country?" The American suddenly felt something was off, "Well, we leased the local land for 99 years, so… you know."

"…This is a challenge from an alien civilization to all of humanity, it should be discussed by the United Nations, and a correct and fair response plan should be devised…" Sly fox! Don’t show your intentions so clearly…

No matter how the disputes and interests of the top level are handled, quickly mastering the mass production of these devices and trying to make them smaller and more versatile will become the main scientific research project, and hurry to make a batch of transport ships and space stations with the materials on hand. Let’s get through the current difficulties first, otherwise, before humanity sets foot in the vast universe, we may have to fight a global war due to supply chain disruptions.