Voyage of the Stars

Man cannot foresee what end he will eventually achieve; his birth, growth, hopes and fears, love and faith are nothing more than the accidental combination of atoms; fire, heroism, strong thoughts or feelings are not immortal; all labor , dedication, inspiration, the brilliance of human genius, destined to disappear in the extinction of the solar system; all human achievements must be buried in the debris and ruins of the universe - all this, although far from being free from controversy, is still so close to certainty , no philosophy against them can hope to hold. Only within the framework of these facts, only on the solid foundation of utter despair, can the home of the soul be safely built.

This is a passage written by Russell in 1923. Limited by the technical constraints of his time, he already had sufficient knowledge about stellar evolution until the solar system would evolve into a red giant, and he came to this conclusion.

Indeed, without controllable nuclear fusion, Russell's words would become reality.

Extending Russell's "complete despair" of the death of the solar system to the death of the universe, we can see how desperate a civilization that knows the ending of the universe is.

Just as the rhombus crystal said at the time, the pioneers spent a billion years just to prove that they could not break through the shackles of cosmic-level civilization in the galaxy. The final Great Voyage was a desperate struggle.

The same is true for human beings now. Thousands of years of wandering, thousands of years of hard work, and thousands of years of hard research have all failed. All the ways people can think of to find the formula of a grand unified theory have failed. The only thing that can be grasped is This project took more than a thousand years to use the power of the entire civilization.

Humanity is also not sure whether it will be able to master the Grand Unification Formula after it is built, just like when the pioneers embarked on the Great Voyage, they were not sure whether they would be able to break through the shackles of a cosmic civilization after the Voyage arrived at its destination.

That was the only possible path in despair, and humankind burst out with full enthusiasm.

Except for truly fallen civilizations, every civilization in the universe is climbing to a higher level. Even if there is little hope, no civilization has given up. It's just that each civilization has different efforts and principles.

The moral standards of good and evil of human beings do not apply to all civilizations, and the same applies to the moral standards of good and evil of other civilizations. They are just concepts of good and evil formed based on their race and have nothing to do with the universe.

Some people may think that Yue Yuan's attitude toward civilizations such as the Kuntai people, the Nair people, the kobolds, and the Red Flames is evil, but from Yue Yuan's perspective, he doesn't think so. On the contrary, sometimes he even thinks that he Too kind.

He does not feel that there is anything wrong with his attitude towards these civilizations, nor does he feel that there is anything wrong with his attitude towards advanced civilizations. This is the big universe, not a world under the same racial and moral framework. Equality dialogue requires equal strength.

Or wait for the day when humans have the ability to formulate moral standards for galactic civilizations.

As time goes by, mankind's new particle collider is taking shape bit by bit like a bee building a nest. Its prototype is gradually reflected in people's minds like a miracle project in space.

At the same time, somewhere on the edge of the galaxy

The stars here are sparse and the starlight is dim. From this position, you can clearly see that the center of the galactic disk is a flat structure, with a bright center and dim lights on both sides, like fluorescent embellishments in the dark starry sky. At this moment, the Milky Way really looks like a long river of brilliant light, dividing the dark cosmic background into two, with spots of light of different spectra scattered next to it, which is really spectacular.

To observers, the dazzling galactic center is a scene 60,000 years ago, but for the photons themselves that travel from the galactic center to here, their arrival from the galactic center does not consume time, but sets out Arrive immediately.

Time is never absolute.

Obviously, this position is far away from the center of the Milky Way, but it is still within the eye area of ​​the Milky Way's center that is a thousand light-years thick. Otherwise, if you look at the Milky Way from this unknown point, it will not be a flat galaxy.

However, the shape of the Milky Way at this moment is also different from what humans usually observe. It is brighter but smaller. If you measure it, you will find that the width of the galactic disk is less than 100,000 light-years.

It's not that the galaxy has changed, it's that the perspective is different. The Milky Way is a barred spiral galaxy. Obviously, this perspective is from the far ends of the barred spiral galaxy, rather than observing among the stars of the Milky Way like humans do.

There is nothing in this star field, even the nearest stars are thousands of light years away from here, and beyond that, there is nothing in the vast void.

In normal times, no civilization would visit this place, and even the gravitational waves caused by the collision of planets in the Milky Way would be very weak here. But now, the ripples in space and time caused by warp speed are clearly appearing here. .

A dozen warp engines that didn't even have the appearance of battleships or spaceships streaked through the void, speeding here at 213 times the speed of light. After they arrived in this star field, they were like fish swimming in the water, wrapping them up. appeared in the warp bubble, and then hovered quietly in nothingness.

There are ruts when braking suddenly, and ripples when a speedboat stops suddenly. The same is true for these warp engine-like creations. They also leave traces in the space invisible to the naked eye as they speed along, and their sudden stops also create traces. gravitational waves,

For the first time, this space-time, which had been peaceful for countless years, received such an obviously unnatural gravitational wave.

"Legacy!"

After more than a dozen warp engines stopped, there was only a surge of metal, and then the original appearance of the warp engines disappeared, replaced by things of different shapes.

Some look like a certain device, some turn into a huge battleship, and some turn into a shape that looks like some kind of weapon. After these things appeared, a burst of space gravitational waves with obvious identification signals rang out in the void not far away from them.

The six-level civilizations in the Milky Way seem to know the form of signals that can be recognized by each other. This signal is exactly the same as those previously broadcast by the Galactic Center Alliance.

"The opportunity to eliminate the Reapers has arisen. An extragalactic civilization has arrived in our galaxy, the Reapers have begun to take action, and the Galactic Center Alliance has convinced a sixth-level Zerg civilization, a true Gaia consciousness, and the Immortal Community. In addition, Between you and us, we will be able to completely eliminate the Reapers this time and restore peace to the galaxy."

Gravitational wave signals travel through space and time.

Obviously, those who came here were the silicon-based consortium that had met with the Galactic Alliance at that time. There is no transformation technology like theirs in the galaxy anymore.