Chapter 993: Detour

Chapter 993 Detour

“…This is the Gemini. We have received orders from command to assist you in executing the ‘Final War’ plan. Please open your deflector shields, guide our landing craft to dock, and proceed with the handover of operations to our personnel.”

“This is the Orion… We have received your request and are confirming with command…”

“…Gemini received… (static)… Please respond promptly…”

“Orion received… We are unable to verify the legitimacy of the order and request that it be submitted to the Military Committee for arbitration…”

“…Request denied. This is wartime; our enemies are slaughtering our people. We have no time to wait for the Committee’s arbitration. Execute the order immediately!”

“…(static)…”

“…Calling Orion, what are you doing? My ship has detected unstable gravitational field fluctuations. Shut down your warp drive and deflector shields immediately! Repeat, shut down your warp drive and deflector shields immediately and prepare for inspection!”

“…(static)…”

“…Good night.”

Zhao Tianhe had few choices.

He was almost certain that from the moment he defied the order, the neutron torpedoes aboard the Gemini were already aimed at him and his men, and they would surely strike before he could enter the hyperspace lane.

If he chose to resign himself to fate, it would be tantamount to suicide for the entire crew of the Orion, handing over the tens of thousands of neutron torpedoes aboard to those bloodthirsty madmen.

For the constitution he swore to uphold, and for the survivors on the surface, he had no choice but to fire the neutron torpedoes from their launchers at the friendly ship while simultaneously engaging the warp drive.

This was his decision alone.

Yet it had indeed received the tacit consent of the entire crew.

They were all the same kind of people as Zhao Tianhe—traditional soldiers among the conservatives who were not so conservative.

They would rather turn their guns on themselves than on unarmed compatriots.

Under the cover of gravitational field disturbances, that torpedo successfully struck the Gemini.

The continuously accelerating torpedo could resist the repulsion of the deflector shield and, after the warhead pierced the ship’s armor, released a high-energy neutron beam.

Three thousand crew members would die in an instant, unaware of their own deaths, and the process would be painless.

At the same time, the Orion cruiser jumped into the hyperspace lane.

Everything happened in the blink of an eye, so aside from the few crew members involved in the “mutiny,” the vast majority aboard the ship were almost entirely unaware.

This was actually for their own good.

After all, regardless of the reason, the fact remained that the Orion had sunk a friendly ship.

Those were three thousand lives, not something that could be brushed aside with a simple “understandable.”

Both the one who gave the order and those who executed it would ultimately face the judgment of the law, and Zhao Tianhe had never intended to exonerate himself from his crime.

He only hoped to shoulder as much responsibility as possible alone, sparing his subordinates as much as he could, thereby reducing or exempting them from punishment.

As for now, what he had to do was to bring the truth back to the solar system as quickly as possible and stop the so-called “Final War” conspiracy among the high command of the Aerospace Force.

That was never a war for the future of civilization; it was merely a replica of the “Torch Plan”!

This was what had happened before the Orion cruiser entered the hyperspace lane.

And what happened afterward was the bizarre situation witnessed by every crew member aboard.

They were stuck in the hyperspace lane…

Zhao Tianhe candidly recounted the entire sequence of events to Luo Yi and Wu Xinghuan.

Whether or not the two could accept it emotionally, they now had no other choice.

“…I don’t expect my confession to earn your forgiveness or understanding. My wrongdoing will naturally be judged by the law, and I have no intention of evading it. But now is not the time for that. We must unite to overcome the immediate crisis.”

“You are the only known survivor, and you are the most learned scholar aboard. You two are the most likely to find a way out of this.”

Having said this, Zhao Tianhe looked at Dr. Wu and spoke earnestly.

“Especially you. I want to hear your advice… whether the method I mentioned is feasible.”

“Deceiving the observer who opens the box… There is no precedent for such a thing, nor could there be any ‘successful example’ left behind.”

Wu Xinghuan rubbed his nose and felt the tremor in his index finger.

This would be a high-stakes gamble.

But it also seemed to be the only chance of victory.

They had to actively abandon everything that was destined to be lost, which likely included not only life but also other things like honor and conviction…

The only outcome they could gain in return was to let “the part that could survive” live on.

In other words, the unobserved part, or the part whose fate was unknown.

Having served on this starship for so long, he had never felt such immense pressure.

Facing a multitude of eyes, he took a deep breath and calmly continued.

“First, we need to alter the ship’s layout, including the outer coating, markings… and send the person who opened the box away before leaving the hyperspace lane.”

“But these are actually minor details. The Orion and the Gemini are sister ships; disguising ourselves as the other won’t be difficult… The real challenge lies in two other things.”

Looking at the three who were listening intently, Wu Xinghuan raised two fingers and calmly went on.

“First, we must understand the Celestials. So far, we only know from the ‘box-opener’s’ fragmented words that they are a collective of digital lifeforms, hostile to the survivors on Earth.”

Zhao Tianhe frowned.

“Isn’t that enough?”

Wu Xinghuan shook his head.

“Of course not. First, the ‘box-opener’ is just one member of the ‘observers.’ The information he knows is neither equivalent to what all observers know nor absolutely accurate.”

“For two fragments to fit seamlessly together, every edge must align… Otherwise, we’ll face trouble at the causal level.”

Wu Mengke asked thoughtfully.

“What kind of trouble at the causal level?”

“That is unknown. Anything could happen, after all, those who encounter it can’t tell us,” Wu Xinghuan shrugged and continued. “Maybe we fall into a black hole, maybe we get hit by a meteor… Of course, those are too trivial. I’m more inclined to think we’ll be trapped in the hyperspace lane, lost forever in the gaps of time, or become quantum ghosts—some people can see us, others cannot.”

The three exchanged glances.

Such things were too bizarre; they couldn’t imagine what that state would be like.

In fact, not just them—Wu Xinghuan himself couldn’t imagine it either.

Everything he said was theoretical speculation, and the things he described with theory were, by that very theory, invisible.

Zhao Tianhe was silent for a moment, then continued.

“We can simulate a digital lifeform and hide behind it. That’s not hard… And then?”

Wu Xinghuan nodded and went on.

“Then comes the key: we must send the observer away, and as quickly as possible… Only by letting him return to his own timeline as soon as possible and reducing his observation of us can we have enough preparation time to deceive the observer, changing the future of us inside the box without altering the observer’s future.”

“In this process, the more he knows about us, the less room we have to maneuver. Of course… conversely, we must use him. The more we know through him, the higher our chances of victory.”

Wu Mengke asked seriously.

"Then the question is, how do we send him off safely?"

Wu Xinghuan said in an uncertain tone.

"If our speculation is correct, as long as we get him back to that research vessel, back into the hibernation pod... then we close the door and leave that area, it should be fine. The next time he wakes up, he should be back in his own timeline."

He paused, looking at Captain Zhao.

"The divergence point is here. What we brought into the hyperspace lane should be something else—like the landing craft sent by the Gemini? Didn't you say they dispatched a landing craft to take over our starship? That craft should have already departed."

Zhao Tianhe nodded thoughtfully.

"I see... If we close the overturned box and reopen it, we'll return to our respective timelines."

Wu Xinghuan snapped his fingers.

"Exactly."

Hearing his words, both Zhao Tianhe and Wu Mengke's expressions softened, as if they had breathed a sigh of relief, their moods no longer as heavy as before.

Especially the latter.

Pressing her temple with her index finger, she said with a bitter smile.

"Though it's a bit hard to grasp, the situation doesn't seem as dire as we imagined."

Zhao Tianhe also nodded.

"Instead, we've received a revelation about the future from a future observer..."

But just then, Luo Yi, who had been silent all along, raised his hand.

Seeing three pairs of eyes turn to him, he hesitated for a moment before slowly speaking.

"I don't really understand... but I've roughly caught the gist. So, if we want to survive, we have to become what that child calls 'the Celestials'?"

The air around the bar fell silent.

Faced with this question, the three of them fell into an unspoken silence.

Becoming Celestials...

That meant destroying the world two hundred years from now.

Yet not long ago, they had sunk the Gemini to prevent the world's destruction.

If they were to do the same thing as the Gemini, why bother sinking it in the first place, only to wait two hundred years to repeat the act?

Zhao Tianhe couldn't answer that question, so he set it aside for the moment. After a moment of silence, he spoke.

"Two hundred years from now is too distant. I still lean toward the idea that we're in different parallel worlds; our fates aren't necessarily completely intertwined."

He paused, making a decision.

"Let's first verify Dr. Wu's conclusion—find out about the Celestial organization."

"Then, send that child home."

...

Perhaps because the people of the Prosperous Era had grown up in a pampered environment, Ye Shi always felt these folks were a bit too thick-skinned.

A guy like him, who had barged into a military stronghold in a "civilian ship" and nearly injured an active-duty soldier with a combat prosthetic, not only didn't get thrown into the brig but could also roam freely around the ship.

Well, "roam freely" wasn't entirely accurate—there were places he couldn't go.

For instance, other decks and the site of the collision.

But conversely, aside from those restricted areas, he could wander anywhere on the lower decks, almost without anyone tailing him.

Beyond personal freedom, his other basic rights were also maximally protected, almost like those of the crew living on this starship.

Before fully understanding his background and history, they first acknowledged his identity as a human and treated him as such.

The management department on this starship, considering his special circumstances, even arranged a single-person dormitory for him and gave him a meal card on credit.

As the person who handed him the card put it: if he really was from the future, that debt would likely be eaten up by inflation in the distant future—meaning he wouldn't have to repay it.

If he wasn't from the future, they'd give him a bill after disembarking, and he could find a job back on Earth to pay it off slowly.

Though his education might be an issue, many research institutes would probably be very interested in him.

Every time he thought of that considerate staff member, Ye Shi, holding the meal card, couldn't help but sigh with emotion.

This was what they called conservatives?

Hell, they were even more left-wing than Ideal City!

He even couldn't help but wonder: how radical must the rebels in the colonies be to make these good-natured folks in his eyes look like conservatives?

On the other hand, the crew's attitude toward him was quite interesting.

Some thought he was full of it; others believed his story. But whether they believed or not, they all showed him great enthusiasm, eager to hear more about the future.

At the bar on the lower deck,

Ye Shi sat surrounded by a crowd. The number of people and the noisy atmosphere here were nothing like the elegant bar on the middle deck.

Listening to this self-proclaimed time traveler from the future talk about what was to come, the crew members around him stared wide-eyed, their faces full of disbelief.

"The Cloud Province actually became the most prosperous region?! That old industrial zone?! That's... incredible!"

Drinking the beer someone had bought him, Ye Shi said casually.

"After all, the Zhiyuan landed there. They had a head start from the beginning. Even I could do it in their shoes."

A busty woman crossed her arms and shook her head.

"The Vailants... Looks like the War Construction Committee wasn't any good either, bringing back slavery."

Ye Shi replied.

"You have to look at it in the context of the times... Forget it, I don't know them, and I'm not about to defend them."

Another young man stared blankly for a long time, then suddenly came to his senses and shouted.

"Wait, I wanted to ask earlier... You mean the Bahr Province is inhabited again?! Then where did the animals go?"

Ye Shi shrugged.

"Who knows? If people can't even survive, who cares about them? But thanks to your colleague, a guy named Rowell—he's a true environmentalist—it's still a zoo there, same as before."

"That's great," the young man said, visibly relieved.

Ye Shi couldn't help but roll his eyes.

What the hell is so great about that?!

In a sense, he had become a celebrity in this "town of three thousand people."

Ye Shi rather enjoyed their adulation, answering their questions without holding back, chatting from the east of the Central Continent to the west, even to the Antarctic and Arctic and the New World, places he'd never been.

Other players had been there, but nothing major had happened.

Those experiences had been written up as travelogue-style guides and posted on the official forum.

If he survived this crisis, he'd probably write about his own experiences on the forum.

He had once sat in the bar of a starship from the Union era, two hundred years ago, chatting with a bunch of ancient people about everything under the sun.

But what can you say?

His mindset was probably like keeping a dead man company to pass the time—pontificating while fishing for some intel, and nothing more beyond that, without really caring much about these people’s plight.

After all, from his standpoint, weren’t these folks living over two hundred years ago as good as dead?

Even if they hadn’t met with an accident, they’d have died of old age!

“The so-called Alliance… it’s just an alliance of survivors banding together. Actually, there was nothing mysterious about it from the start. We weren’t as noble as you think, not acting out of some savior complex—we just didn’t want to be eaten by raiders.”

The girl with the big breasts blinked curiously.

“Eaten?”

The young man with the slightly unhinged mind spoke in an uncertain tone.

“The kind of eating I’m thinking of? Or… territorial annexation in a broader sense?”

Ye Shi chuckled softly.

“Annexation? You mean the kind where you swallow it into your stomach?”

At his words, a wave of gasps spread around, and many faces showed expressions of shock.

Some with weaker mental fortitude even turned pale, making one wonder how such cowards had gotten into the unit.

“Raiders eat people…”

“Those bastards… don’t they ever think they’re human too?”

Hearing that idiotic question, Ye Shi replied offhandedly.

“You might as well hope the slime mold starts thinking of itself as human than expect raiders to get that… Ahem, but speaking of which, we actually did encounter that kind of slime mold. It mimicked so thoroughly that it eventually became our shape entirely, even more human than humans.”

The crew members gathered around exchanged glances, and a burly-looking man shook his head.

“I still can’t believe it—our children… future people could be so savage.”

Ye Shi took a sip of his cocktail and sighed leisurely.

“Human… that concept is too broad. People are different from one another, and the definition of ‘human’ changes with the times. That’s why I say the Alliance isn’t really great—it’s just relatively normal. You might be more suited to life in Utopia, but plenty of people from Utopia have joined us because they couldn’t stand it there.”

The big-breasted sister whistled and teased.

“So you won.”

Ye Shi shook his head.

“I wouldn’t dare say that, but we did get through the immediate crisis—it’s the result of a compromise among several forces.”

Humanity and Gaia couldn’t keep fighting anymore.

Neither could the survivors and the Vlandians.

Nor could the survivors among themselves.

These three conflicts had a progressive order, together forming the main thread of the Wasteland Era.

And when they were all resolved, the Wasteland Era naturally came to an end.

Ye Shi always felt a bit superfluous—the history he’d personally pushed might be far less than Brother Fang Chang’s, and together their role was more like a catalyst than the fuel itself.

But after thinking it over, that was actually normal.

Everyone plays a different role in the tide of the times; some bear a little more responsibility, some a little less, but no one is truly dispensable.

This drama couldn’t go on with just Fang Chang alone—including the Administrator, worshipped as a god by countless wastelanders.

Together with the survivors of the wasteland, they had completed this epic, worthy of being sung by future generations.

Honor belongs to every survivor.

Just as the crowd wanted to ask more questions, Luo Yi walked through the crowd.

“Sorry, everyone, I need to borrow your star for a moment.”

A burly man looked at him and whistled.

“Haven’t you two fought enough?”

Luo Yi shrugged.

“Our misunderstanding was cleared up long ago. I just need to talk to him about something—it’s important to him.”

The man put his hand on Ye Shi’s shoulder and patted it, grinning.

“If this guy gives you trouble, let me know.”

Ye Shi didn’t know this “fan’s” name, but he still said “Thanks” to him, then hopped off the barstool and followed Luo Yi out of the crowd into a room at the other end of the corridor.

After closing the door, Luo Yi looked at Ye Shi and said.

“I’ve got good news—we found a way to help you get home.”

Ye Shi felt this instance wasn’t that simple.

But to move the plot along, he crossed his arms, leaned against the table, and went along with it.

“Let’s hear it.”

Luo Yi repeated the method Dr. Wu had come up with, and the young man sitting on the table, unsurprisingly, showed a subtle expression after hearing it.

Guessing what he was thinking, Luo Yi cleared his throat lightly.

“I know you’re going to say this sounds too stupid.”

Ye Shi shrugged.

“You’ve already said it for me… but I’ll still give it a try with you—it’s no loss to me anyway.”

Surprised by his cooperation, Luo Yi gave him an odd look, paused, and continued.

“I’m glad you’re on board. Also… we want to cooperate with you.”

Ye Shi raised an eyebrow.

“Cooperate on what?”

Luo Yi laid out everything he had discussed with the captain and the executive officer.

“Our scientists in Division Five think there must be a reason you came to our timeline. That Celestial organization might be an important clue. So I want you to tell us everything you know about the Celestial organization.”

He paused and went on.

“This is crucial—maybe we can help you face that… Celestial thing together.”

Ye Shi stared at him suspiciously, feeling the guy wasn’t telling him everything, and that there might be secrets hidden behind this.

But for now, that didn’t matter.

What mattered was that he didn’t think these people could change a fate already sealed.

“You’re already dead—I should have made that clear enough, unless you can change what’s already happened.”

Luo Yi didn’t argue, just looked him in the eye and said.

“Have you heard of the Gemini?”

Ye Shi frowned.

“……What was that?”

Luo Yi said patiently.

“That’s another cruiser, built from the same set of blueprints as ours—in fact, we were completed on the same production line.”

“Wait… my head’s spinning,” Ye Shi raised a hand to stop him, staring in disbelief. “You mean… there’s another Orion?!”

Luo Yi spoke earnestly.

“To be precise, you thought you boarded the Orion, but it was actually the Gemini.”

Ye Shi cut him off without hesitation.

“Impossible. I saw the name Orion painted on its hull with my own eyes.”

Luo Yi continued.

“A few lines of paint on the hull mean nothing. They could easily pretend to be us, to do the dirty work we refused to do.”

Ye Shi frowned and asked.

“The dirty work you refused to do?”

Luo Yi didn’t hide it; he nodded and said.

“We rejected the Lagrange point’s order regarding the ‘Final War,’ and I suspect… the Celestials you speak of are connected to that ‘Final War’ plan.”

Ye Shi stared at him blankly.

“What is the Final War…”

He had never heard the term before.

But that was hardly surprising—even if he came from the future, he couldn’t know every event of the past.

Seeing Ye Shi’s utter ignorance, Luo Yi felt a strange relief.

Perhaps that drunkard’s plan might actually succeed.

History beyond the “Horizon” was malleable, and the room they had left seemed considerable.

“The command at the Lagrange point did plan a thorough cleansing of the surface—they believed it would help the shelters rebuild quickly after the war… We refused them, and launched neutron torpedoes at the Gemini.”

“That’s why others don’t believe you’re from the future, but we do… And according to you, this war never ended—it continued for two hundred years.”

Walking up to the stunned Ye Shi, Luo Yi placed a hand on his shoulder and continued in a serious tone.

“This is our war. We won’t abandon you. We will advance on our timeline, and you will return to yours.”

“We will meet again in two hundred years.”

“For that, I need you to tell me everything you know about the Celestials, holding nothing back.”

Meeting those resolute eyes, Ye Shi swallowed the words on his lips and slowly nodded.

No matter how fantastical the plan sounded, no matter how slim the odds—

For the sake of their determination, he was willing to gamble with them.

And what if it succeeded?

Not only would Jiang Xuezhou be saved, but the Alliance would gain an incredibly powerful ally!

“I accept.”