The life of a light chaser is destined to be bumpy and wandering.
In the twilight area where there is no eternal light, the light chasers must drive a huge mobile world city, follow the trajectory of the stars and absorb their light and heat. In the entire nine days, there are very few stars that can be used by the mobile city. Less, either because it is too close to the Continent of Steel, enough to turn everything into ashes, or it is too far away from the continent, and the light cannot provide enough energy to move the mobile city and maintain the inner world ecosystem.
Even if you are lucky enough to find a suitable star, due to the terrifying and changeable gravity of the Steel Continent, these blazing suns will fall off the balance line at any time due to its gravity, and then fall to the earth - and at that time, the mobile city must be fast Change direction, avoid this area, and avoid the destruction caused by the crash of the star.
Although it is said that the Continent of Steel will absorb all the kinetic energy erupted when the star collides with the earth and is destroyed, it will not cause a huge earthquake that lasts for several light hours or even several light days, and will condense the collapsed gas of the star into a new one. star, but no matter what, this means that the mobile city will lose its energy source, and they must set sail as soon as possible to the next available star.
Chasing light, chasing stars, sometimes for thousands of years, sometimes only for a few decades - the mobile city is a huge steel shell that eternally rushes on the continent, coming from the stable movement of stars, and leaving from the fall of stars. The light chasers are the insects hiding in this shell - for most ordinary light chasers, just the gravity of the Steel Continent and various radiation and pollution from the outside are enough to threaten their lives. If Ordinary people who are not in a city and are protected by artificial world barriers without extraordinary powers will die within a few minutes.
Therefore, even within the shining area, there is actually no 'stability'. Even though the endless bright light brought by dense star clusters means that all living beings in the shining area do not have to worry about energy problems, more and denser stars also mean more 'starfalls' - every year, there will be A certain mobile city accidentally encountered a 'star rain' and was destroyed by hundreds or even thousands of star clusters that fell simultaneously. This natural disaster occurred almost every day in the shining area.
Stars rise and fall, stars are born and stars fall. On this continent of steel, endless things are turning and moving, with no stability at all. And outside of the light, there are endless Chaos Familia from the end of the world. Coming, they are afraid of the light, but they shuttle through the dusk - all those who chase the light long for stability, long for eternal and peaceful light, and do not have to be tossed around in migration and escape forever.
This may sound like an inconspicuous wish, but it is a problem that has never been solved by anyone in the past 100,000 years. Countless people have devoted themselves to astral science and astronomy, or explored the distance of the stars, trying to find out the laws of the movement of stars. We want to decipher the reasons behind all this turmoil, but until now, no one has ever found the answer.
No one can even guess how this world was born or how it was created. Based on the model of stars, the basic properties of physics and extraordinary power, the smartest scholars of the Alliance of Nations have speculated on the possible birth models of countless worlds, but there has never been any model that can give birth to such a strange and weird world as the 'Three Realms and Nine Heavens' , in this regard, they can only reluctantly admit that there may really be a 'Creator' in this world, a real 'God'.
They are not gods - the gods of the age of gods, they are just 'powerful ones' who cannot even reach the 'Nine Heavens', neither the sword world nor the ax world. They are also creatures chasing light.
Therefore, everyone can only blame the cause of all this on the almighty 'Heavenly Father', the founder of this endless steel continent, the creator of all living things, and call all this suffering a 'trial' - because Other than that, they could find no other reason.
But now, Alpha Falster, an ordinary bachelor of astronomy and a well-known explorer in the past, has discovered that he may now be walking on the road to the 'truth' - in this remote aphotic zone, He saw the black giant star spinning in the center of the world, and saw countless dazzling stars sinking into it, turning into little bits of fire, like firewood adding fuel to the fire.
"... Anyway, I have no choice. They took away my Alice, my daughter and my son. I lost everything except the 'truth'."
The silver-haired middle-aged man smiled bitterly, shook his head, turned around, and looked behind him.
Instead of looking at the advanced exploration ship left by Carlisle, Alpha looked at the origin of the 'hill' beneath his feet and the ultimate goal of his trip.
He was looking at a 'mountain'.
A 'mountain' that is more than 400 million kilometers high. It takes light 24 minutes to travel straight up and down. It is extremely huge, even much larger than many stars.
However, in this infinite continent, even such a huge mountain cannot be called the highest. The 'Great God Mountain' in the shining area, the sanctuary where the gods used to live, is as high as two hours of light. But even so, such a mountain peak and the continuous mountains around it are nothing more than the wrinkles on human skin.
-The Light Chasers live in such a huge world, and they are small and struggling to struggle in this world.
It can be seen that at the top of this mountain peak, at the highest point that is completely beyond the range of ordinary people's vision, there is an extremely eye-catching tip exposed - it is a sharp prism-shaped tip that is completely made of silver, luminous crystals. The tip, and this tip is shining like a star, releasing little bits of starlight.
Alpha stared at this light, and he felt that the blood in his body was boiling, and an inexplicable feeling began to appear... What exactly does this feel like? What exactly is in his bloodline? Why do I, who have always lived in the shining area, feel 'familiar' with the crystal tip on a high mountain in this remote aphotic zone
Could it be that I am really not as ordinary as I thought? Is this why Mr. Carliss chose himself as his student? And what does the so-called 'Son of the Silver Fairy' mean
Countless questions lingered in the heart of the tired middle-aged man. However, even though he lost his wife, child, and everything he had fought for his whole life in the shining area, he had not lost his courage or curiosity—he had not yet lost his courage and curiosity. Lose the passion and impulse in your heart, and your determination to move towards 'truth'!
"let's go."
Having said that, and taking courage, Alpha once again entered his exploration ship. As the light of the jump engine started to light up, he began to head towards the top of the 'mountain'!
[—Alpha’s Exploration Log—]
[In the dark and lifeless area of the aphotic zone, I discovered something puzzling. It was a prism tip made entirely of crystal, crystal clear, and emitting blue light.
It is located on the top of an unnamed mountain, emitting a bright but cold light without any temperature. I originally took a full set of insulation measures, but it turned out to be completely in vain, but this cannot be said to be a bad thing, because this way I can leave the exploration ship. , together with other shipboard artificial intelligence, brought tools to observe it at close range and explore its situation.]
[After several days of careful investigation, I was finally able to confirm to my shock that the shining crystal prism at the top of the mountain range was actually the top of a huge crystal obelisk! The bulk of it is buried beneath the mountains, and the mountains - completely, completely! Made of the corpses of chaos monsters! Heavenly Father, it is hard to imagine that such a huge mountain range is actually made up of endless piles of corpses of chaos monsters. Over a long period of time, these chaos monsters have lost their weird and crazy toxicity and turned into nothing but... There is only a little bit of earth and stone left behind by pollution, and the obelisk is buried in it.
I am sure that there is a way to enter this obelisk. Mr. Carliss guided me here, there must be a purpose, and it is definitely not just to surprise me, and such a huge obelisk, if it is not to let me in but It would be really difficult for me to dig it out... And I don't know why, I feel that there is something inside this obelisk that is attracting me.]
[After searching for a long time - actually only two and a half hours, I found the way to enter this obelisk. The method is very simple, that is, without carrying any protective equipment, enter the silver cold light, touch the crystal with your own hands, and it will naturally suck me in... To be honest, if I didn't feel that the protective clothing is too stuffy, I would just be ready to breathe. , I will never do this. With my strength, which is just at the middle level of gold, if I encounter any accident in the aphotic zone, I will die without a burial place. But when the cold light shines on me, I feel , I don’t even need to breathe, it will naturally provide me with all the energy I need to survive.
Having no other choice anyway, I got into it. The moment I was sucked in, I felt that there was an extremely huge force, far stronger than the stars, sweeping over my whole body - this force far exceeded the supernova explosion that my teacher and I observed decades ago, and it was enough to last an instant. Destroy thousands of mobile world cities. Thinking about it, those Chaos Familia must have touched the crystal obelisk rashly, so they were destroyed. The entire obelisk was buried in it after tens of thousands of years or even longer.]
[And I found that the light in this crystal was transforming my body - I gradually no longer needed to breathe, and the feeling of hunger and thirst disappeared. I could feel that the energy around me began to gradually become closer to me, but with this At the same time, my ears began to become pointed, my skin began to look a bit like metal, and the demand for energy also increased greatly... This was supposed to be the ability to become a high-level gold, or even an ultimate level elemental and spiritual person. Appearing on... Is this a good thing or a bad thing? I didn't know clearly. In short, when I woke up from the trance, I had come to an unusually vast crystal hall with many small caves scattered around it.
In the center of the Crystal Hall, there is a staircase that is somewhat narrow for most light chasers, leading to the depths of the obelisk - it seems that this obelisk is made of a kind of body that is larger than the average light chaser. It was built by smaller creatures, but this building is far larger than many stars. It must be said that this is a shocking miracle.
Without hesitation, I chose to go deeper.]
Stopping his writing and continuing the good habit he had had for more than ten years, Alpha took a deep breath. He walked towards the central staircase of the crystal hall and continued deeper down.
The hall at the beginning was semicircular, with a radius of about fifteen kilometers. With his optimized vision, Alpha could see that the four walls of the crystal hall were filled with many large and small holes, and wind was coming from them. It seems to be leading to somewhere else. On the walls on both sides of the stairs in the center, there are countless extremely complex runes engraved on it, as well as many carvings with neat and beautiful handwriting, but it is unclear what language they are in.
Alpha felt that he could vaguely understand the meaning of this glyph. Perhaps this was some kind of rare ancient language? There happens to be translation equipment on the exploration ship. When the time comes, I will take these pictures back to the ship to try and see what they are talking about.
After walking a long distance, the glyphs gradually disappeared, and layers of murals gradually appeared. Alpha quickly took out the shooting equipment to record these layers of murals.
Unlike language, murals can be understood simply by looking at them. It can be seen that this series of murals seems to be about the life of a 'priest'. He was born in an ordinary farmer's family. He was attacked by a demonic tide (Alpha felt like a chaotic monster attack, but on the murals... (He didn't recognize any of those chaotic monsters) attacked, the priest's parents died, and he was adopted by a kind-hearted priest in the village and was able to practice extraordinary ways.
There were seven gods in total that the priest served. This was a very rare thing, because these seven gods formed an alliance of gods and shared the glory with equal status. The young priest has been concentrating on spiritual practice, traveling around the world's cities, and helping poor civilians. Until middle age, he remains unknown, and his deeds are at most praised by some ordinary people. However, after the previous generation of popes abdicated, he participated in the discussion conference witnessed by the gods, and defeated all opponents in terms of knowledge and strength, and became pope.
A very inspiring story - Alpha felt a little envious when he saw this. From an ordinary person with nothing to the Pope at the highest place in the world, this is not something that everyone can do. You have to have great courage. Only great determination, great perseverance and great wisdom are enough, and at most he only has a little courage, determination and perseverance, not to mention wisdom.
The mural is not over yet, the story continues - after becoming the pope, this priest has been trying to benefit everyone in the world. He once fought against a group of giant lizard-like monsters and killed many Chaos. Monster, he once faced off against other evil gods, and joined forces with the Seven Gods and many other powerful men to seal the black mist monster that was many times beyond the stars.
The first half of his life was unknown, and the second half of his life was spectacular. And in the end, this priest ended up side by side with a giant god standing on the galaxy, rushing towards the eternal dark chaos that seemed to be an aphotic zone. in the cluster.
"This should be the story of the last remaining gods and their churches at the end of the Age of Gods, when they fought against the chaos that swarmed from the aphotic zone, right? This is the experience of a prehistoric mobile city. It is so legendary, but I never imagined it. Never heard of it?”
Alpha has no doubt about the authenticity of this mural - who would be bored and build a huge star monument just to deceive those who come after? Compared with this, what he found strange was that the logic of this matter was a bit unclear.
Can the gods and their pope... really build this incredible monument that is twenty-four light minutes high and unparalleled in size? If it was gods, Alpha would reluctantly believe it, but what this mural tells is obviously just a pope.
And... Finally, the four-armed giant standing on the endless galaxy... Who is he? He is not one of the seven gods, nor is he any god in myths and legends. There are no rumors or descriptions similar to him.
"Strange to say, have all the defense facilities inside this obelisk failed?"
Shaking his head, Alpha put the doubts behind him for the time being - Alpha recorded all the texts and murals, and was going to use the translation system to translate them after returning to the exploration ship. Compared with these intellectual problems, what was more strange to him was that along the way, he saw a lot of crystal sentry equipment that was obviously used for defense. They were sparkling, with energy flowing in the translucent cannon body, but they didn't. I don't know why, but these sentry guns didn't move when they found him, as if they were broken.
However, as soon as the drone that Alfa brought into the obelisk was released, it would disappear instantly and be turned into ashes by the invisible beam of light... This immediately frightened Alfa to the point where his legs softened and he almost knelt down. You know, that The drone is much harder than his head. It can burn the drone instantly, and it can also burn his head at the same time.
It is so advanced that it can wipe out the gold level in an instant and severely damage the ultimate mind - and I don't know if this is the ultimate micro-weapon equipment, not even in the Alliance of Nations, or even in the mobile city ruins of the Age of Gods!
What kind of building has such high technical capabilities? On the Great Sky God Mountain in the Shining Zone, the Great Temple of the Pantheon is not one percent as spectacular as this building. Although their decorations are luxurious, they are far inferior to the sense of power. The most powerful god in the Age of Gods, the Star Sea Voyager, the God of Star Sea and Exploration, his temple is not as majestic as this ruin, not to mention that what is sung here is just that of a pope and a priest. Just deeds.
"Could it be that... this is a relic from before the age of gods, at the beginning of the birth of all living things?"
When he thought of this possibility, Alpha couldn't help but shook his head. This silver-haired middle-aged man did not look chic, but very old and tired. But because of this, his serious expression seemed so real. He murmured: "It is said that the 'Heavenly Father' created the Three Realms and Nine Heavens. He drove away the original chaos in the darkness of nothingness and created endless stars. In this initial light, the gods were born from the stars."
"However, it is too difficult to expel chaos. Even the 'Heavenly Father', after destroying most of the chaos, was so tired that he could only sleep. He handed over the world to the management of the gods, and then transformed into All things in the three realms and nine heavens - this prehistoric mythological era is the 'beginning of the birth of all things and sentient beings'."
Could it be that... this relic is the creation of the ancient era that has been lost for a hundred thousand years? And what this mural says is that the original gods and their believers fought together with the Father to fight back against the original chaos
But how is this possible!
"'Heavenly Father' is just a myth created by the Light Chasers to avoid despair... He does not exist at all, and there are no temples or ruins... Okay, the one in front of you may be considered half, but it does not prove that the Heavenly Father is existence, I would rather believe that this is the creation of seven powerful gods in prehistory... "
Almost at the end of the stairs, Alpha was taking pictures, but his thoughts drifted to the endless distance. He said to himself with a slightly bitter tone: "To put it bluntly, 'Heavenly Father' and 'Trial' are just ancient times. It is a fig leaf created by scholars to explain problems that cannot be explained for the time being. It is like passing the answer to God when encountering something that they do not understand - the existence of the Father is not important at all."
"No, you are wrong. The existence of Heavenly Father is very important."
Suddenly, a voice sounded from behind Alpha. The sound was loud and serious, like a giant tin drum being beaten, and following the sound, a series of footsteps appeared behind the middle-aged man.
Alpha turned his head in shock - he had no idea when this voice and those footsteps appeared behind him, and just after he turned around, the man saw a man wearing red and black clothes, like the embers of a flame. A white-haired man in an ordinary coat was standing on the stairs behind him. He was walking down the stairs step by step. Behind this man was a whole team of guard soldiers wearing the same 'ash uniforms'!
These people are all members of the [Ash Order]!
Facing Alpha, who was stunned and seemed to have no time to react, the leader, a white-haired old man who should be a senior member of the Ashes Order, stood firmly on the steps - he had a strong body and a majestic face. Shengfeng, except for his white hair and wrinkled face, no one can tell that he has reached the aging stage.
"Alpha Falster, don't talk nonsense about Heavenly Father and God - even if He never performs His miracles, He is extremely important to our civilization."
Ignoring the actions of Alpha who seemed to be dodging and wanting to retreat and find a chance to escape, the senior leader of the Ashes Order looked around at the murals on both sides of the stairs, then turned his head and looked at Alpha. His tone was solemn: "I know, for you guys For bachelors, neither the Heavenly Father nor the gods are as important as 'knowledge and truth'. Compared with the ancient and false glory, what you think actually exists on this continent of steel is real - but you Have you ever thought that if we lose the 'gods' and the 'Heavenly Father', we might not be able to develop the great civilization we have today?"
"this… "
Although Alpha was panicked on the surface, he was actually very calm in his heart - he understood many things in an instant, such as why the Ashes Order had captured his wife and children, but they only warned him not to come back and continued to explore the truth instead of killing himself. Catch them too. They just wanted to track themselves and find the location of this huge 'crystal obelisk'! The only thing he didn't quite understand was why the senior leader of the Ashes Order in front of him didn't ask his guards to arrest him, but instead looked at him and talked about these 'quite weird' issues
As for hatred... A rational person will not show his anger casually when he is at a huge disadvantage. After all, he is a bachelor and cannot be that stupid.
And as if he saw Alpha's disguise and the hatred hidden under the other's calm expression, the white-haired old man smiled slightly and didn't take it seriously. He started, continued to move forward, passed Alpha, and came to the end of the stairs behind him - he continued to say in that solemn tone: "Many people nowadays, especially bachelors, find it difficult to understand that at the beginning of civilization, , 'rational thinking' does not actually bring progress. Do you understand? The rationality of that ancient era was not used to explore truth and knowledge, but to think about how to defeat beasts, how to find food, and how to continue future generations. How to survive as long as possible.”
"'Rational thinking' does not allow the ancients and today's bachelors to explore the truth among the stars and the laws of the operation of all things - it is only used to summarize the knowledge that is actually used in life, such as farming and animal husbandry. , build houses, and make traps. On the contrary, it is the original 'perceptual thinking', those earliest romances, fantasies, and primitive 'imagination'. Only these things can think about why the sun rises and why it sets. , why does water flow downwards instead of upwards - In the ancient times of suffering, rational people would not waste energy thinking about these meaningless questions for survival. Only emotional and impulsive beings would do this. All unknown phenomena make up various 'stories', which are the so-called 'explanations'. Similarly, only 'gods and religions' need to explain to all living beings and their believers what is behind all these phenomena. , exactly ‘why’.”
“Only this kind of irrational thinking can think about the stories among the stars, and only the gods created by this primitive worship need to explain why fire can burn wood, why water can extinguish fire—why they flap their wings, Spraying flames can generate upward power and fly high into the sky. Why do the stars repeat the cycle of ups and downs and make us suffer so much."
With that said, the white-haired old man had already arrived in front of an arch, which was the end of the stairs. The guards of the Ashes Order also followed. They completely ignored Alpha and left him behind, seemingly not caring at all. He should run or stay - Alpha had a long battle between heaven and man in his heart, and finally gritted his teeth and decided to follow.
The old man seemed to have known for a long time that he would make such a choice, so just like that, everyone from the Alpha and Ashes Order stepped through the arch and came to a huge and unparalleled grand hall with no end in sight.
It can be seen that the hall is filled with gentle silver light, but there are seven-color spectrum lingering at the top of the hall. There are countless ups and downs, fusion and splitting of light bubbles emerging and disappearing at the highest place, and all this light , all the light bubbles surround a crystal column hanging in the center of the hall.
And in this crystal column, there is a beautiful young man with long light golden hair, curled up like a fetus, sleeping peacefully - the radiance of endless colors surrounds it, showing a dreamy and blurred holiness.
"God is the most romantic explanation of the truth behind everything in the world when it comes to intelligent life! Because we are curious about the truth behind the flames, the God of Fire appears, and because we worship the power of the sun, the God of the Sun is born. We respect water as life The most important component, so the water god appears on the throne - but all of this is far inferior to the existence of the heavenly father!"
Looking up at the young man sleeping in the crystal pillar, staring at the 'life' bred in this huge obelisk, the tone of the white-haired old man from the Ashes Order began to gradually become excited: "Belief in countless gods, in fact, it is also It is equivalent to not believing in any gods. People's curiosity will be consumed by the false 'explanations' of gods. After all, gods do not represent the truth. They only hold power and serve as the final product of 'perceptual thinking'. exist… "
"But Heavenly Father is different. He is different from God who was 'created' because 'we need'. Heavenly Father created this world, but made us suffer. This kind of 'unwillingness' or even 'hate', this kind of Emotions that have nothing to do with faith and worship make countless people have to ask religion to provide an 'explanation'. After all, a god who cannot even explain the 'why' does not exist, and no one will believe in it."
"So, in order to explain the reason why Heavenly Father created all things and to explain the laws of star movement, the original pioneers created the first mobile city. They chased the trajectory of stars and discovered 'universal gravity'. They analyzed the sun and decomposed it. Matter has discovered the 'authority to split and merge' - but this is not the end. Gravity cannot explain the existence of the Steel Continent, and the power to split and merge is not the most efficient way to use energy. At least when Heavenly Father created the world, it would not It may be that this method is used to obtain energy, so above this, there is a higher truth!"
"The existence and belief of the Heavenly Father are very important. Civilization must have a target, and it can progress through constant doubts and debates. Rational thinking must step on the bones of sensibility and pass through 'denial' The method of imagination is to spiral up bit by bit, otherwise, it will never get out of the fence of reason, and will only live for the sake of living like an intelligent insect."
"Heavenly Father is the only and supreme Creator, God of Creation. He is naturally eternally correct, but where exactly is He correct? Some people set a target and begin to explain how Heavenly Father created the world, and then another group of people will refute , point out the opponent's mistakes, and the confused and overwhelmed wisdom of mankind will progress with the 'struggle'."
"It is precisely because of this that in the endless struggle, laws and codes are discovered one by one, and the world in our cognition is getting closer and closer to reality - because of this, society gradually progresses and productivity gradually develops, so that You rational bachelors don't need to think about 'how to live', but instead raise your heads and use that wisdom to look up at the sky."
"...I don't deny that your theory is indeed interesting, but..."
Hearing this, Alpha frowned. He suppressed hatred in his heart and wanted to angrily accuse the other party of nonsense. However, regardless of the large number of people in the other party, everyone was stronger than him, even if it was just for the safety of his wife and children. , and he cannot be impulsive. So, after thinking about it, and feeling that the situation could not be worse, he couldn't help but asked: "But this old gentleman, what does all this you said have to do with the ruins we are in now? What does this have to do with the ruins we are in now?" What does it have to do with your Ash Cult kidnapping my wife and children, expelling me from the Shining Area, and following me here?"
"It has a lot to do with it. Besides, you don't need to call me Mr. Old Man. I am the Grand Inquisitor of the Order of Ashes, Groen Danis. You don't have to pretend. You can call me 'Damn Old Man' or 'A vicious kidnapper'."
Grand Inquisitor Groen turned his head. He no longer looked at the light-blond boy sleeping in the light, but looked at the silver-haired middle-aged man again. He narrowed his eyes and said in a solemn tone: "Grand Bachelor of the City of Knowledge, Alpha Falster, I say this mainly to tell you that the Light Chaser, or even any intelligent creature, can never be Purely rational creatures, they must be impulsive and emotional. They will make "wrong" choices other than "right" due to romance, impulsiveness and various reasons - and these mistakes are the ladder of our progress, so don't be fooled by God. "Father, there is no such inertia of bachelor's thinking. Only in this way can you understand the real truth."
"What's more, the 'Heavenly Father' does exist - compared to the speed of light, the laws of physics, and all the so-called 'truths' that may be changed, this alone is the 'truth' that cannot be shaken. '! And whether it's you or me, or your disappearing teacher and boss, they are all here for Him."
Another old friend shows up...guess who it is
There will be another update later in the evening, please give me a monthly pass first.
In fact, I found that the setting of this volume is too long. If I expand it, I can write a medium-length exploratory novel with a semi-science fiction style... Alas, I just summarized it a few days ago, and I made the mistake of setting it up again. On the Continent of Steel The story could be really long, but the text doesn't leave much room for him.
(End of chapter)