Deep Sea Embers

An illusory roar suddenly came, and the screen in front of him fell into darkness. The next second, Zhou Ming felt that all the sounds were far away from him - the fan of the computer host quieted down, and the hum of the refrigerator not far away It also gradually subsided, and the whole room fell into a strange dead silence, and the atmosphere around... was changing.

And all this happened after he entered the words "inverse singularity" into the search box.

He blinked, pushed his chair back, and stood up from the computer desk.

The chair slid backwards silently, and his rising made no sound. A pen beside the table was knocked down and fell to the ground, making no sound when it landed.

In these brief seconds, Zhou Ming thought he had lost his hearing.

Then, he confirmed that the problem was the surrounding environment - the room was getting dark.

The light disappeared, and everything in the room was gradually covered with a layer of chaotic shadow. Everything lost its color in the darker and darker environment. The patterned curtains first turned into a gray block, and then It was his desk, chair and bed. The objects in his sight turned gray one after another, and then were gradually swallowed up by the thick and rising darkness...

It was as if each unit of a huge system was shutting down one by one. The "room" in Zhou Ming's eyes turned into a chaotic and dark space in a dozen seconds. When the surrounding walls disappeared, real darkness filled the space. His sight.

Zhou Ming stood there and looked around. In the sudden darkness, he felt an inexplicable... familiarity and a strange sense of security.

After a while, his "vision" seemed to adapt to the dim environment here. In the depths of the chaos, some vague outlines attracted his attention.

Zhou Ming hesitated for a moment, then thought of something from the position and distance of those outlines, and immediately walked towards them.

In the depths of darkness and chaos, something caught his eye - they were several lifelike "models" floating at what should have been the end of the room.

Homeless, White Oak, Plunder, Frost...

There is also the "World Tree", Silantis, which is floating in the air and spinning slowly.

They float in this endless dark space, where everything seems to have been extinguished, and they seem to be the only remaining objects in this "world".

Zhou Ming stared blankly at these "collections" floating around him, his mind racing with countless questions and conjectures.

Why? what does that mean? What is this conveying to yourself?

Silendis was spinning in the darkness like a floating potted plant, as if she had drifted in front of her inadvertently. Part of her branches slowly spread out in the void, seeming to be sensing the surrounding environment, or just growing unconsciously. As Zhou Ming looked at this small "World Tree", he hesitated and stretched out his finger towards her.

The moment he stretched out his hand, he noticed that his body had changed at some point - starlight replaced flesh and blood, dense river systems and bright nebulae filled his body like mist, and the stars It stagnated in his body, just like... the phantom of the ancient starry sky on the dome of the deep sea.

But the two seem to be different.

Zhou Ming looked at his arm in surprise, but before he had time to think more, his fingers had touched a branch extending from the World Tree.

In an instant, information that was too huge to be understood by human intelligence poured into his "brain". Among the fragments of information that came like a storm, he felt as if he had traveled through endless years and endless journeys in the blink of an eye - Original gods, original creatures, giant trees, forests, rivers, mountains, civilizations, memories...

Zhou Ming suddenly took half a step back. The information that came like a storm suddenly receded. He opened his eyes in the darkness and saw Silantis still spinning freely on the spot, and the branches extending from the edge of the canopy occasionally whipped. A lick of white oak, an occasional lash to Plunder, an occasional lash to Frost...

Zhou Ming was stunned for several seconds before he came back to his senses. He looked at the scene in front of him and muttered in a strange tone: "Silantis, don't bully your roommate."

Then he raised his head and looked at the boundless darkness in front of him.

Before the "room" disappeared, this should have been the wall where the shelves were, the end of his bachelor apartment, the barrier that trapped him here - the shell of the "cocoon".

But now the whole room was gone, and the darkness seemed endless.

Zhou Ming hesitated for a while, then slowly stood up and walked towards the darkness, raising his hand to fumble in the darkness ahead - he walked very cautiously, as if he was afraid of hitting the wall in his memory.

Fortunately he walked very carefully.

Because almost instantly, he encountered an invisible barrier - something hard and cold in the darkness was blocking him. He felt his arm hit the barrier, and then he pushed hard, The barrier was found to be motionless.

The room disappeared, but the shell of the "cocoon" still existed, and he still couldn't leave here - the seemingly endless darkness was just part of the hard shell.

Zhou Ming stopped in front of the invisible shell. After knocking on it several times in vain, he gave up and turned around to look at where he came from.

All the furnishings in the room have disappeared, including the computer. Only one door still stands quietly in the depths of darkness, which is the only "exit" to leave this space.

"Who can explain it?" After being silent for an unknown length of time, Zhou Ming suddenly spoke. He asked into the darkness. Although he knew that this "talking to himself" might be a bit silly, he still said extremely seriously, "This Is it some kind of 'answer'?"

No one in the darkness responded to his voice.

After a while, he spoke again: "Is this an explanation of the keyword 'inverse singularity'? Or is this just some kind of 'demonstration' of unknown meaning, used to help me understand my own nature or what I can do?" What happened?"

The darkness remains silent.

"Can anyone tell me in detail - what exactly is the purpose of sending a 0.002 second slice of the universe along the timeline? Where should I find my own instructions?"

"Don't you have any after-sales service? You have reached the end of time civilization and you don't even leave any user instructions? Hello? Hello -"

"Is there anyone here?"

There was no one but him in the darkness.

In the long void after the hometown universe was torn apart by the Great Annihilation, the only remaining mind was still running blankly in this hard and dark "cocoon", and the only difference from the past long years was that this mind was the first For the first time, I realized that the nothingness around "myself" was so vast.

An unknown amount of time passed, and Zhou Ming felt that he might even have stood meaninglessly in this darkness for a whole century before he finally sighed softly.

"There is nothing here..."

He muttered, somewhat mocking himself, and then sat down in the darkness, ready to rest - although his incredible body filled with starlight did not seem to feel tired.

And at this moment, just when he was about to sit down, Zhou Ming suddenly caught a glimpse of something from the corner of his eye - he saw a very thin "bright edge" that was almost ignored by the naked eye suddenly floating past. The edge of vision flashed in the darkness.

He suddenly opened his eyes slightly.

That's a fine line.

The next second, he had grasped the thin line without hesitation. The slight stagnation in his hand told him that the line was real... not an illusion!

Zhou Ming instantly raised his hand, put the thin thread in front of his eyes and observed it carefully. After a while, he began to try to find the source of the thread.

The thread comes from beyond that invisible barrier... from outside the "cocoon."

Zhou Ming slowly stood up, holding the thin line tightly in his hand. He saw that the line that was imperceptible to the naked eye seemed to pass through the "invisible barrier" that he could not break no matter what, floating lightly in the air. In the endless darkness outside, the other end of the line disappeared into the depths of nothingness. It was impossible to see where it led or what it was connected to.

Zhou Ming pulled the thin thread this way several times, feeling that the thread would never reach the end. The slight resistance from the other side made him dare not continue to exert force, for fear of breaking the only connection with the outside world. "connect".

After a while, after some hesitation and thinking, he finally made up his mind, slowly raised his finger, summoned a small group of green flames, and carefully brought the flame close to the thread.

Almost in the blink of an eye, the small cluster of flames seemed to be pulled by invisible forces, and all of them disappeared deep into the thread.

Then his connection with the flames was broken.

Zhou Ming blinked. This unprecedented situation made him a little stunned for a moment.

His connection with the flame is broken! Completely, completely, without any residue!

But before today, even though there was a dimension like the deep sea, his connection with the flame had not been completely interrupted!

Is it a problem with this wire? Or is it because of that invisible barrier?

Zhou Ming couldn't help but think about it in his mind, but he only thought about it for a few seconds before he suddenly felt that his hand was empty - the thin thread disappeared.

Then before he could react, a low buzzing sound sounded from all directions, and then all the light and color suddenly returned to his eyes - as if the units of the system that had been briefly shut down came back online, accompanied by a dazzling The light and shadow of the room, the walls, windows, roof, floor, and all the furnishings are all reappeared!

Zhou Ming was a little confused by this sudden change. He subconsciously took two steps back and held the grid of the shelf next to him with his hands - Silantes' branches hung down and rubbed against his arm.

"Don't you give me this little reminder... After all, this is my 'home'..."

Zhou Ming couldn't help muttering, shaking his head and looking around to confirm the changes in the room. Then he seemed to feel something and suddenly raised his head and looked not far away.

Almost at the same time he raised his head, a voice sounded, echoing in the quiet bachelor apartment——

"Dong dong dong..."

There's a knock on the door.