Star Empire

Almost at that moment, the alarm spread throughout the fleet.

Strong shields rose up from the center of the ground and roofs like water waves. They pushed along the walls and eventually sealed the entire ship into independent cabins. All protective gates were also completely locked. If the active "person" fails to return to his cabin within this reaction time, he may have no choice but to seek his own blessings.

The response speed of the additional protection systems within the fleet can be said to be the fastest, not to mention the communication lines. At the same time, one after another rapid response teams also began to head towards the edge of chaos.

That explosion left a fairly obvious monitoring and perception blind spot throughout the ship.

"What could it be? What could have caused such an unexpected explosion?" Facing the control systems that all reflected the state of emergency, the thousands of operators in the two control systems were all confused. The fleet was already ready In order to make jump preparations for instant long-distance emergency evacuation and enhanced wake erasure preparations, however

The system has shown that the boundary of the order field has not suffered any intrusion, and the information calculation equipment corresponding to the layers of space protection and dimensional concept partitions of the spacecraft also shows that the spacecraft has not suffered intrusive damage from the outside world.

The explosion seemed to originate directly from the interior of the ship, and even seemed to erupt instantly from the center of the explosion.

"But how is this possible?" Faced with the preliminary investigation results, all the technical managers and corresponding officials of this exile fleet were all involved in a debate.

"Countless demonstrations have been made. For safety reasons, all equipment that requires a large amount of advanced information to be directly driven are located in redundant armored cabins. Leaving aside the wrong location and wrong explosion mode, those places are generally equipped with mathematical rate isolation layers. Our equipment It is impossible to produce this form of destruction. All the information they release will be given as much directivity as possible at that moment. They should only act on the order field structure. It is impossible to produce such an explosion!"

"The current most accurate estimate of the origin of the explosion is that it is located in the civilian residential area, inside the honeycomb structure. It can be said that there are trillions of origin cabin structures arranged there. It is the area with the lowest information activity and the most stable. For safety, all Ark almost never uses a super-large-scale information activation connection system, and without related construction in the field of illusory information structure, a spontaneous explosion is impossible."

"We are monitoring the corresponding cabins of other civilians. We are sending orders to other arks that they must monitor everyone's activities. Once there is any change that deviates from the range, even if it is just a little bit, it must be reported immediately!!"

"In a trance, there seems to be a vast space in my perception."

".??"

"The system is tracking all individuals and conducting comprehensive records. This operation requires a large amount of actual storage space and must be cleared in stages."

"Explosion, it's an explosion!! Track it immediately!!"

"There are no abnormal fluctuations or attributes in residential areas. No cross-border portal reflections have been detected, there are no illusory information structures within the monitorable range, and the surrounding environment of the Explosive Origin Level is stable."

"Have you traced their conscious environment? For example, is there any underlying thinking that is rising? Or, is there any possibility that the intensity of consciousness is lower than reality, such as being in a daze or dreaming?"

"??!! How is this possible? No matter what the dream is, the dreamer is within our layer-by-layer protection system. Whether he is dreaming or awake in reality, our defense system will not have the slightest loophole in this aspect." Faced with that Even though most of the technical officials knew that the "ancient" girl's astonishing words were not impossible, they were still surprised instantly.

"The defense system can only work within the defense range that we can imagine - if these attacks are indeed targeting what we think of as dreams and imaginations, identifying signals and bypassing other defense systems, or our defense system is not How can this compare to all our target attributes?" Some dull eyes silently glanced at the technical officials on the network who were surprised by themselves, "The trace concealment system is accompanied by the expression of the story, or "narrative" "Maybe it only appeared after the research started, right?"

"Understood, let's go immediately. What to do?"

"If that's the case, perhaps an order is needed."

"Further analysis of possible targets, backtracking completed... Is this a missile?"

…

"No one is allowed to rest for a moment until the problem is solved. If their mental strength is lower than 70% of the real strength, they may have to be erased immediately. Otherwise, their dreams may become the target of those missiles."

"There is no problem just not sleeping, but in order to ensure the flexibility and sensitivity of the soul, we added some underlying code in the process of recasting the soul to constrain that it cannot operate efficiently and feverishly forever. But now, once the spirit If the intensity decreases, danger may arise.”

"If it is a few hundred years, there may not be too serious problems, but if the time begins to exceed ten thousand years, the current basic environment and our physical foundation can be sure that the kind that will cause the universe to spread out in nothingness will The phenomena that are full of twisted patterns and lead to the collapse of the universe will definitely not only be attached to the interior of the universe. It is very likely that part of the environment in the void and all the atmosphere will be contaminated by it, otherwise we would not be able to carry out such long-term wars."

"How could it be like this?"

After several tests, the identifiable attributes of those "missiles" have been roughly confirmed - in a way that is currently impossible to detect, those missiles can bypass all existing protective layers and directly use the low willpower of life as a weapon. The target is locked. They are most likely to transform into actual forms directly from dreams and "drill out" directly, which means that those missiles will not penetrate any protection at all. They can even be considered to be made by those people themselves in dreams. from

Sleep and rest are forbidden. All shipboard factories and research facilities began to continuously study corresponding countermeasures. Recast the soul's operating model, develop a life extension module to suppress and change attributes, and try to make up for the loopholes that were not noticed before.

At first, this seemed to have some effect, and even made people think that it was nothing to fear. In these short-term low-pressure environments, the ship's hull was quickly repaired, and all people took this opportunity to rest in shifts.

But soon, those golden demons will appear again. Each time they appear, they quickly become more cunning and difficult to deal with than before.

A real dream, a definite decrease in the intensity of reality consciousness and a leaping transformation of underlying thinking, a short momentary rest... these are the "targets" that were once locked.

But now, those missiles no longer follow the previous corresponding rules. Monitoring records show that the factors that may cause those missiles to penetrate the protection and appear directly inside the ship once again include intelligence transmission, language description, model simulation, speculation and imagination, and even those that have been used on the battlefield and flashed from time to time in the memory. Our own missile weapons may cause those demons to suddenly appear from a momentary trance and tear apart large pieces of the ship structure.

"Any form of rest is strictly prohibited! You must always ensure that the intensity of consciousness is higher than the corresponding threshold!"

"Always pay attention to observation and look for countermeasures!"

At the beginning, control can still prevent similar phenomena from occurring as much as possible, but as the "targets" that are most likely to have intelligent missiles that may be targeted become more and more sophisticated, more control will not only make everyone more and more vulnerable. A lot of pressure. Even later, the targets of those missiles increasingly began to correspond to "symbolic attributes" and "conceptual attributes" that covered a large number of behaviors. Not only was it difficult to clarify how to control and deal with it, but even the most basic information transmission and research were not clear at all. Unable to proceed.

"No meetings allowed! Implant the program to ensure the order is executed!"

"It is forbidden to communicate between language and actual structure! Use the network to perform chaos simulation compensation!"

"Close all research facilities! All collective research operations are prohibited!"

"Kill all doubters!! Execute all resisters!!"

…

Arks are huge in size, and in order to accommodate as many people and equipment as possible, most of the redundancy and stability of these huge arks are almost entirely used to build space expansion modules. It can be said that the Ark is even so independent that it is like a "small" world with its own system and laws. Their large size and redundancy in facilities are enough to ensure that these ships can withstand strong attacks and suffer very serious damage while still being self-sustaining.

but……

When pervasive yet untraceable attacks appear again and again in unexpected places within each ship, even under high-pressure control, loopholes cannot be avoided... No matter how hard they are repaired since their birth, How can a ship that is constantly heading towards collapse resist them under high pressure, no matter how many and fast repair measures are given?

"No intelligence transmission is allowed! Close all communication channels! Close all non-essential information conversion facilities!"

In the fleet, many ships began to fall behind. Many of them either only have a shell that is relatively intact but has rotted inside, or there are countless broken and ferocious cracks mixed with Adelora alloy and unknown crystals all over them. They dragged the unknown haze of light, distorted vision, and unknown weird phenomena toward the boundary of the order field.

What to do with them...?

Left unchecked, they will most likely become actual beacons that will shine brightly for a long time to come. The efforts of all the scholars who were left behind at the site of civilization before the fleet departed will be in vain. If the attack is carried out spontaneously, information that is too directional will inevitably expose the void spots in the order field.

Restart them?

Under ideal circumstances, it is not impossible to restart them, but as time goes by, this method is overwhelmed by the increasing number of broken ships - a large number of technicians have been executed, and without them, civilization is losing the ability to maintain these ships. The foundation of a giant ship. Long-term non-stop damage makes all repairs futile.

So... what about tow straps?

Towage sailing? What are the people who came up with this thinking now? !

The number of damaged ships is now equal to the number of normal ships, and soon there will even be no intact ships left! How does towing work?

"It is prohibited... it is strictly prohibited... it must be stopped... it must be ensured... it must be strictly eliminated..."

…

Perhaps, this was once an offensive and defensive battle in which consciousness and loopholes, reality and nothingness collided. Perhaps this was an offensive and defensive battle.

But soon, it turned into a one-sided massacre, and the sharp blade came from the negligence and fear in one's own heart, from the order field, from the nothingness outside the shield and armor, and from the story. .

Anxiety, fear, tenacity, collapse, madness, confusion, confusion...

The extreme emotions that were once integrated into the foundation and no longer have a negative impact on reality have somehow spewed out in these short tens of thousands of years, forming countless chaotic carnivals intertwined in the hearts of countless people. .

At some point, Game's heart and actions seemed to fall in an instant, shattering into fragments without structure and rules.

Not long ago, with tenacity and tenacious resistance, the peaceful years of exile could still continue. The fleet sailed further into the void, and everything was still in order, but at some point, everything changed.

The harsh environment and reality have brought about high-pressure control measures, and the loopholes that continue to emerge with the spread of control push everyone to focus all their attention with higher precision and not have any thoughts.

Then, all information can no longer be transmitted. Knowing this missile, or even just knowing a similar concept, once spoken, bombings and strikes from the void will appear out of thin air during this short exchange of information.

Later on, even if the intensity of concentration is a thousand times equivalent to the initial state of life, it cannot stop the golden light flashing from the depths of the blank dream in the brief confusion...

All the conflicts between thoughts, actions and ideas seemed to turn into a joke in an instant.

The peace that once existed disappeared quite quickly.

Rapid and terrifying thoughts began to spread. For tens of billions of years, I have witnessed the birth and death of myself, but I have not perished... But there is no guarantee that I will not perish.

The fear that seems to be engraved in the soul is like the huge rolling stones that have collapsed on the cliff. They emerge layer by layer, forming an overwhelming and unstoppable torrent - the reality distortion sword, the mechanical stars, the broken and reversed time and space and development lines, nothingness. Annihilation and will deflection... they burst out overwhelmingly from the souls of all the former exiles.

There is no reason why I cannot perish...

Tens of billions of years, even hundreds of billions of years, what does all this mean to the universe, to the world, to the endless void that surrounds the multidimensional world?

"..."

"The number has been reduced to this point."

A long white coat with a faint luster, indicating its self-consistent reaction properties, slowly floated through the hall filled with lead-gray light and traces of corrosion.

The rotating circular hall could originally accommodate thousands of operators to control the ships at the same time, but now, there are only dozens of them left. They are no longer able to calibrate the fleet's trajectory, and even so, they were not allowed to do so not long ago. Continuous killing - Due to the settings of the system, all people were placed with suicide monitoring programs during those craziest years. If there were any loopholes in their thinking or a decrease in mental strength, they would be killed immediately.

During that time, trillions of individuals died in the system, their fellow citizens, and even those programs, those devices would further kill themselves - in order to maintain operational strength, any logical structure must be in some kind of high-speed cycle , but once any problem occurs in this unstoppable cycle, the blow will come immediately.

Even so, it only slightly extends the life of the fleet.

No one has the ability to think of a solution. In other words, as the serious problem spreads to the point where it may subvert the entire fleet at any time and completely overturn them in the boundless ocean of chaos in the void, there is no way to solve it. It makes sense, not to mention...

Not to mention a solution, I can't even see the slightest possible direction of the solution.

She also has her own duties, duties that should be exercised in civilization. But now, civilization...is still there? Other exile fleets, other Ark clusters, are they still there?

Why did you ever do that? Everyone knows that not every dream, every fantasy, and every expression will lead to disaster. We are destroying ourselves——

People who say these things are often killed for their words. The meeting went from being centralized to being dispersed throughout the entire fleet, to being directly connected to the consciousness network, to being unable to be held at all and with no one attending... What exactly happened during this?

Now, it may be safe, or in other words, it may no longer have such great value and become a target worthy of being endlessly hunted across the void - civilization is over. Not long ago, there were even actual fluctuations on the edge of the order field. This I'm afraid it means that the nightmare of the past is only one step away from catching up with him.

In the distance, obscene words were rising, and several irrational voices at the regular physical level roared angrily, venting their incomparable anger and resentment, but this could not do anything.

Perhaps only now can we erect a monument to civilization.

"...Only now do I have the opportunity to think of these... Why??"

I sat in front of the old console again, but the layers of traces stacked on the console showed that everything was different from the past.

It seems that what he is facing is not the console, but the entire civilization. This is almost the layer and endless pressure formed by the entire history of the Pan-Union. Once upon a time, under the same thick layer of ground, there were cells where the prisoners lived in self-isolation, but now... why is this happening?

Everything is like a hurried historical passerby, leaving only deep or shallow traces, and these traces... soon drifted away.

…

Countless civilizations and countless intelligent creatures have tried to resist these mysterious disasters. They are not even able to distinguish all the details, and can only generalize them to phenomena.

Σ, the final glory, the chaotic fleet, the attack of the stars, the narrative structure of constant annihilation, the crazy solar wind of the void blazing sun...

They're constantly stirring up everything here. Countless lives have perished, and very few have survived through several catastrophes. How many existences can take advantage of such opportunities and make progress?

Most of them will decay more and more, until perhaps with just a look, they and their universe will be destroyed.

A long time and countless worlds can breed a large amount of life and civilization, but this does not mean that wisdom and civilization will continue to appear in large numbers. Under the madness of countless rounds of disasters, the number of intelligent life and even life will only become less and less. The worlds that were once full of rich structure and colorful vitality will become dim and empty one by one. It went down and withered, turning into simple symbols one after another, and one cold corpse after another.

This is a disaster that transcends understanding and worldview. It seems to be just one kind of super-metaphysical phenomenon after another. Being able to see is actually an extra layer of luck and pain.

The end of reality has exploded. In this universe, the source of wisdom will only continue to decrease, but even if we know the situation, what can we do?

They cannot be described at all, and preventing all living beings from resting and preventing them from having a little loophole in their thinking... that is impossible, or in other words, it is no different from killing them directly.

All we can do is rely on unconscious tacit understanding and...

Keep silent.