Deep Sea Embers

The flames seeped into the crystal, and quickly spread and flowed among the three-dimensional structures that were as thin as hair and dizzyingly complex inside the crystal. As the flames were injected, Duncan's consciousness gradually began to sink.

He felt like he had entered an empty, silent, cold and soundless place.

As if in a corner that had been forgotten for endless years, an inexplicable sense of isolation and loneliness passed along the flames almost instantly, and then, he felt a light appear in his field of vision - strong, almost An icy light whose scale cannot be discerned.

He opened his eyes and found that he was standing on a huge black stone floating in the void, while an almost terrifying golden scorching sun was burning quietly in front of his eyes. The flames on the surface of that scorching sun were surging, and the amazing prominence structure was in the sky. It rose in the void, and then fell slowly, silently.

However, this scorching sun did not produce any heat - even though the distance was so close, Duncan did not feel the terrifying high temperature that the sun should bring when it shines on his body. It just burned silently and coldly, as if it was just a scene simply being burned. Recorded...images.

Is it Black Sun? See Him again?

Duncan frowned slightly, thinking this subconsciously, but then he discovered that the golden scorching sun without heat was different from the "black sun" he had seen before - there were no weird things deep in its shell. The terrifying tentacle structure, the dying pale eyeball could not be seen, and more importantly... this "sun" did not try to call for help.

It is an image record left by a real star!

Duncan reacted quickly, and then, he finally shifted his eyes away from the cold scorching sun and began to notice the "black boulder" under his feet.

This is a massive artifact!

Its surface is smooth, and you can see the ravine marks that are obviously artificially processed. The seemingly stone-like material has a faint metallic luster. Some of the "nodes" of the ravines can also be seen with unknown purpose. The raised structure seems to be made of strange crystals.

Duncan's gaze extended outward along the edge of the boulder, and then looked toward the vast dark void surrounding the golden sun——

He saw more "monoliths" - countless huge black man-made objects like "stone tablets" floating around the golden sun, floating in the boundless darkness, arranged in a neat array like a wall, from this perspective On the top, he finally saw more details of their side facing the sun - the precisely cut crystal surface reflected sunlight on one side of the boulder, and there seemed to be sophisticated mechanical devices under the crystal, which seemed to be used to adjust the crystal. The angle of the array, the entire structure looks...as if it is designed to collect the energy released by the sun? !

Duncan stared blankly at the array of "monoliths" floating around the sun, watching them form a huge and loose spherical shell in the darkness, surrounding the star in the center, and then noticed the faint shadows between each floating device. There is a slight distortion of light, like some kind of force field, and outside this amazing "spherical shell" structure, in the depths of the boundless darkness, there seem to be more hazy shadows, but because of the distance and the Sunlight interferes with vision.

what is that?

Is it a distant planet? A residential site in space? Giant spaceship? or……

The... control center used to maintain and control this amazing Dyson sphere?

After an unknown amount of time, Duncan withdrew his gaze from the huge array of spherical shells in space. After realizing what he was seeing, it took him a long time to come back to his senses.

... What is stored in the crystal device left by the Sun's Children is not some dark and forbidden truth or the corrupted knowledge of the ancient gods, but... an ancient Dyson sphere structure.

Duncan narrowed his eyes slightly.

No, these are the dark taboo truths and the corrupted knowledge of the ancient gods - for the deep sea era, for the wreckage left by other universes, for all things established under other mathematical systems, a Dyson sphere supported and created by the parameters of different universes , which is the ultimate corruption and pollution.

After recovering from the shock, Duncan stepped towards the edge of the black "boulder" under his feet, and at the same time recalled in his mind the "New Hope" that he had seen before and crashed into this world.

Did that ship also turn into "pollution" of this world? After it fell...what did it look like?

He stood on the edge of the stellar energy gathering device and looked down.

The cliff-like mechanical shell and the boundless darkness in the distance came into view.

Duncan knew that there was actually no "up and down" here. If it had to be said, the gravity released by the star in the distance pointed to the only "down" here, but his senses still told him that the black device under his feet was Below, I stand on the shell of this device, feeling as down-to-earth as standing on the ground - I will neither fall into the endless space of the universe nor be captured or sucked away by the gravity of the sun.

This misalignment between what he knows intellectually and what he actually feels helps him remind himself all the time that this is just an illusion recorded internally by the "blasphemous prototype".

What about the deeper parts of this record? Is there something else?

Duncan felt his own flame, and he controlled the flame to spread deeper into the crystal, making his consciousness sink further.

The brilliant golden sun and the amazing Dyson sphere structure disappeared before our eyes.

Boundless darkness spread from all directions, filling his vision.

Contrary to expectations, he did not see the scene when the civilization that created the Dyson Sphere died, nor did he see another world collision - he seemed to have skipped this process directly and came to the dark chaos after the death of all things. middle.

And after staying in this dark chaos for an unknown length of time, just when Duncan was almost doubting that there really was no more information in this crystal, a glimmer of light suddenly appeared in his field of vision!

Several rays of light appeared, and there seemed to be vague shapes in the dim light, some were huge, some were weird, and some were twisted and shapeless. He couldn't see the true outlines of those dim lights at all, but he heard... "sound".

Those voices sounded directly in his mind——

"...The compatibility is seriously lower than expected, and the 'King of Dreams' also failed... We must adjust our plan..."

"It is impossible for the shelter to protect everyone...the survival conditions of some entities are too harsh, and it is too difficult to protect them while ensuring other entities..."

"...Draw up a list, outside the list..."

"Who makes this decision? How are the criteria for the list established?"

"...First determine the compatibility threshold, and then simulate...LH-01 calculated a plan to create a stable anchor that can ensure maximum protection...but still needs to give up part of it..."

This was followed by a chaotic noise, and it seemed that the corresponding records were missing. Duncan was made dizzy by the noise, but soon he heard clear information emerging from the noise——

"...The entities in this part of the list cannot bear the transformation, and the preservation costs are too high...we can only give up."

"...There is still 3% redundancy, and we can make some adjustments..."

"...They must survive in a specific stellar environment, and their sunlight is highly toxic to other entities...LH-01's plan cannot meet this requirement...Time is running out.

"...Give them up."

boom!

An illusory roar shattered all the sounds and the boundless darkness. Duncan felt that he had touched the bottom of the information - no more information emerged. Amid the roar and dizziness, his consciousness quickly changed from The crystal depths pulled away.

He opened his eyes and saw the familiar cabin in front of him. The pale golden crystal was lying in the palm of his hand and quickly turned into a pile of ashes under the burning of the green flames.

The information contained in the crystal has been drained, and this "blasphemous prototype" that should not exist in the real dimension has also lost its stability.

Duncan rubbed his hands, and the last bit of ashes in his hands immediately melted into the air.

He raised his head and met the gaze of the goat head.

"What did you see?" Goat Head asked nervously.

"...the process of their abandonment, the content recorded in the "Book of Blasphemy" has once again been confirmed."

Duncan did not hide anything. He told the goat head in front of him everything he saw and heard in the depths of the crystal.

Of course, he did not explain details such as "Dyson Sphere" in detail - this part of the content cannot be explained clearly in a short time.

After he finished speaking, the captain's cabin was quiet for a long time.

After an unknown amount of time, the goat head suddenly moved, and its tone was a bit complicated: "...it is recorded in the "Book of Blasphemy" that during the third long night, some 'clans' were exiled to in the dark……"

Duncan nodded slightly, and of course he remembered this part of the description: "It also records that the clans who were exiled to the darkness did not die - they gradually distorted during the long exile and turned into... more dangerous ones. thing."

The goat head thought for a while and suddenly asked: "What do you think of this matter? Do you think the current actions of those Sun Heirs... are excusable?"

"It is meaningless to discuss right and wrong in this matter," Duncan shook his head. "The world is not made of justice - I don't know what kind of situation the world was in after the Great Annihilation and before the Deep Sea Age began. I don't know how many plans the 'kings' who tried to build the shelter had and how many trade-offs they made. It is a stupid and short-sighted behavior to comment on the choices made by our predecessors when they paved the way from a stable era, especially with us. The current position...any form of 'sympathy' is neither justified nor necessary."

"...You are right." The goat head was silent for a moment and said softly.

Duncan said nothing more, he just nodded slightly, and then his eyes fell on the little "sun" that Vanna got from the giant.