Yu Tang walked to the window.
As the night deepens, the edge of the inky black sky begins to seep into a more distant dark blue.
The lights in the main research institute were brightly lit, and Pu Ying had officially taken over the place. No one was in charge of the terminal anymore, and all wartime research efforts were fully concentrated on a mysterious nebula tens of millions of light years away.
The wind blows through the silent night, and the faint starlight cannot penetrate the clouds.
An infant cosmic civilization, spanning tens of millions of light years, declared the ultimate war on civilization - this statement is even more ridiculous than trying to stop a chariot with a mantis arm, and it makes people feel that it is just a ridiculous daydream.
The system and Yu Tang lay by the window together, trying to watch for a long time, and asked in a low voice: "Host, host, can we see this war?"
"I can't see it." Yu Tang said, "It's far away from me."
To reach here, with the current technology in this interstellar space, three cosmic jumps are required, each taking an hour.
Light takes tens of millions of years to travel.
"I usually don't fold time and space, I just go with the light."
Yu Tang pointed to the sky and said, "The star you see now, I once traveled with it. It came from the death of a galaxy 14 billion years ago."
The Milky Way at that time had just been born, and collisions and expansions were slowly continuing, leaving behind new traveling nebulae and stars to become residents of this disk.
The universe is more vast than the most expansive imagination. These rays of light have come from a long journey and are messengers who have traveled thousands of miles, passing through the vast stars and the vast universe to tell the place from which they came everything that has happened.
It takes 14 billion years for light to travel from where it originates to the cones in the human eye.
The system flashed a small red light.
It wanted to calculate how far 14 billion light years was, but just as it came up with the answer, it was overwhelmed by endless numbers.
"Compared to these numbers, life is short."
Yu Tang said: "This seems to be a kind of evolutionary inevitability. If you can live forever, remove restrictions, and do whatever you want, how many civilizations can control themselves and return to the cruel and harsh reality?"
The system thought hard for a long time: "I think it's good to live like this..."
"Every civilization that embarks on this path feels that living this way is great," said Yu Tang. "The carrier of existence is no longer 'life' but 'information', which is regulated and expressed by data."
The system asked quietly: "Isn't this okay? Why does he have to come and steal human lives?"
Yu Tang did not answer, but asked another question: "Do you know how much preparation is needed for Senior Zhan to hug me?"
The system was stunned.
After it was built into a system, it had not yet experienced what it felt like to be embodied as a human being, so it hesitated: "Adjust vital signs... give action instructions?"
"Regulate vital signs, verify target images, mobilize memory fragments, generate simulated situations, and give yourself the data command 'you should be happy now'."
Yu Tang said: "Give action instructions, hold me, decode and analyze the information data obtained by touch, and give new changes in vital signs."
…
The system was silent for a while, then it leaned close to the host and tried to explain: "Host, Zhan Sheng really wants to hug you."
"I know." Yu Tang said, "That's why some data needs to go through the bookstore."
Civilized individuals who exist in information mode do not really completely abandon emotions.
Although I am very happy, I can only call upon happy data to trigger this happiness.
Although we really want to enjoy delicious food, we can only use data calculation and analysis to find out the composition of flavor, and then call on relevant modification data to simulate the most real feeling.
I clearly want to love someone.
"What Chuanshuju sells is 'reality', a feeling that can be directly obtained without the need for data calculations."
Yu Tang said: "This is the most original motivation for Chuanshuju to create it."
But these are only temporary and self-deceptive consolations after all.
As long as he left the virtual world stored inside the Transmigration Bookstore, everything would return to the cold reality. He even felt like he was awakening, and this feeling of discomfort was even stronger than before.
Soon, even more greedy and unwillingness emerged.
He turned his attention to some real primitive civilizations. He set a trap. The bait was humans who could transform electric storms. What he wanted to capture was the electric storm that could change the nature of the time travel situation.
It is impossible to catch an electrical storm by relying on data alone, just as it is impossible to catch humans by relying on data alone. After capturing an electrical storm and turning it into a terminal, the data finally gains the long-desired ability to transform and devour.
He used the power of the lightning storm to disguise himself as a superpower card, and devoured humans through experimental body transformation and card purchase.
If they successfully devour a human, they will gain so-called "superpowers."
After the ability evolves to S-level, it will devour the parasitic human for the second time.
"The host and Pu Ying have said so!"
The system suddenly came to its senses and connected the dots: "If a human being is swallowed by the electric storm again, he will be completely assimilated by the electric pulse and become part of the storm..."
…still part of the self-aware, electric storm.
Yu Tang nodded: "After assimilation to this extent, it can already become a commodity that can be selected at will based on the data."
The system couldn't help but feel cold: "So, he has succeeded many times before? The operation logic of this door is already very mature, it doesn't seem like an experiment..."
"You can put it this way," Yu Tang said, "He has succeeded many times, but he always failed."
The system was stunned: "What?"
"Because he didn't know enough about lightning storms at that time, and he didn't know that the eyes of all lightning storms are connected."
Yu Tang said: "To put it in an analogy, we are like neighbors who live in the same courtyard and are separated by a door."
"He put the warehouse where the goods are stored in the eye of the storm." Yu Tang said, "But this location is not the home of the terminal, it is my home."
system:"… "
Particle-level civilizations are born with the ability to devour and decompose.
Some of them were swallowed up a second time and lost in the electric storm. The last remaining energy bodies were sold as commodities, but an accident occurred in the warehouse.
This incident gave the neighbor's electrical storm an independent sense of self.
"You once asked me if I was the human being that was annihilated in the lightning storm."
Yu Tang: "I really want to answer yes."
He was one of the many humans annihilated in the lightning storm.
This is an extremely weak creature that is very prone to ambition, greed and desire, but is also much more resilient than we imagine.
At the end of the devouring, these energy bodies, which only had remnants of consciousness left, voluntarily chose to annihilate.
He could never escape, could never go home again.
He chose to be completely annihilated, to leave behind a chaotic, useless mass of particles to those greedy prey, as the last protection for this interstellar world where countless humans still lived unconsciously.
In the annihilation process, these scrapped chaos particles intentionally merged into another young electric storm.
…
"I came from his annihilation."
Yu Tang smiled and raised his hand to rub his neck: "It's actually quite excessive to say this. I was also shocked when I first found out... I've never even seen him. Strictly speaking, I'm the murderer who caused his final death—"
The system was so anxious that it lit up a small red light: "Host!"
Yu Tang touched the head of the mecha model. He was about to speak when his expression suddenly changed and the aurora instantly spread from where he was standing.
The surging waterfall of light completely enveloped the terminal.
"What's going on?!" The terminal roared in panic, "What is he doing! What happened—"
"Don't talk." Yu Tang said solemnly, "I don't want to be distracted."
His eyes were calm, and countless rays of light were drawn by him at the same time, spreading out from the terminal to the origin. The light spots at the intersections were either dark or bright, weaving into a sharp and cold giant net.
… Shi Ji led people to find the Chuanshu Bookstore.
The entire space was filled with data-driven mechanical Zergs, which the ordinary Alliance army could not resist at all. The special forces' hellish emergency devil training and the Zerg combat simulation system left by Yu Tang brought out unimaginable advantages at this time.
The tiny, vulnerable human army came in like a tide, blocking the overwhelming tide of insects.
All he had to do was block.
Pin down these modified and domesticated mechanical insects, create opportunities for the new Storm Team and all members of the old Spearhead Team, and find a way to get them through the insect tide and reach the depths of the eye of the storm.
Yu Tang would use another method to meet him.
"How dare you go to the eye of the storm?"
The mechanical sound of the terminal was getting louder and louder. His data was on the verge of collapse. His voice was mixed with the sound of broken electricity: "When you get to a certain place, you will definitely be captured by them and become a new terminal."
The mechanical voice was low and gloomy, like a curse: "You will become like me, you will never escape, you will never get out..."
“This is the worst-case scenario, but also the best option.”
Yu Tang said: "If I am forced to take over the terminal, I will write Aurora as a love letter and hang it on the window of Senior Zhan's house."
The terminal froze.
"I am a human being who was annihilated in the electric storm. He gave me my self-awareness."
Yu Tang said: "His last wish is to let this galaxy continue to exist. If the price of re-establishing the rules is that I must replace you and become the new terminal of Chuanshuju, I will completely annihilate my self-consciousness."
Yu Tang: "But as long as there is a slight possibility, I want to go home with the human I raised."
"I traveled through 698 star systems and 439,713 planets before I met someone I like."
Yu Tang: "I want to hug him and kiss him, I want to take him back and marry him."
The terminal roared, seemingly losing its mind in rage, and ignored the harsh warnings and punishments from the defense program, rushing straight towards Yu Tang.
Yu Tang clenched his palms, and the web of interwoven light suddenly shrank, twisting the entire terminal into a ball. Countless data were repeatedly compressed to the extreme and turned into a dim point of light.
Yu Tang threw the light spot into his sea of consciousness: "I'd like to borrow your front door for a while."
The terminal was shocked and angry, and asked in a hoarse voice: "What—"
Yu Tang ignored him, stretched out his hand to let the system jump onto his shoulder, and walked straight towards the ever-changing aurora.