In Thorin’s command hall, Bertie stared blankly at the holographic projection in front of her, while her spirit spread throughout the facility. Everything that happened here, every message flowing from the communication channel escaped. But her sight.

There are hardly any obvious fluctuations in expression on the face of this mimicry avatar, but Bertila knows that his mood is not at all peaceful at the moment. Talking with a completely stranger, even a civilization living on another planet, is one An unprecedented experience. As long as she thinks about the historical process behind this conversation across the stars, she feels that every leaf of her own is trembling slightly in the treetops.

Those who follow the developments here through the remote network must be in the same mood.

"The new text has been compiled, transcoding has been completed, and it is being sent to Antavien. Antalveen sends a confirmation message that the text has been sent, waiting for the other party to respond."

There was a report from the command board in the hall, while Bertila still stood quietly in her place, watching the holographic projection in front of her calmly like a plant, and she saw a line of tiny lines appearing on the projection. Glowing text:

Star solver: "If we fail to cooperate smoothly, what will you do? Do you have some kind of...alternative plan to solve the problem of observation points four light years away? This question is purely out of our curiosity ."

After this, there was a period of blank noise that was longer than the previous waiting period. "Noy" seemed to be discussing how to answer this question. She couldn't see what was happening "opposite" after a long sea of ​​stars separated by at least four light years. , But she couldn't help but imagine, imagining the state in which those "aliens" were conducting the current conversation...

Did they gather as many expert teams as the Thorin Command Center? Will they also intensively discuss and try to guess and interpret the ethnic group that claims to be the "Lorren Alliance" across from Xinghai? Will they also feel the joy and tension like mortals on this planet?

"Noy"'s society...is it making waves because of this sudden communication? Are their leaders also paying attention to this conversation that spans time and space?

Bertila slowly raised her head, but her "eyes" penetrated the roof, wooden structure and layered leaves tens of meters above. From the perspective of a giant tree, the vast sky is as low as a giant curtain. Shrouded in her perception, but even this seemingly vast sky is actually just an inconspicuous atmosphere on the surface of the planet. Outside of this atmosphere, there is a vastness that has exceeded it. The vast starry sky of ordinary people's imagination

Four light years, this is a scale that makes all the disputes, gains and losses, and separation of life and death in the world seem small in an instant. As early as the Gondor era, the magisters were aware of the concept of the speed of light. However, until the destruction of Gondor, "light years" were still limited to a "conceptual unit of measurement." It was so desperate that people at the time It is impossible to even imagine what kind of travel method can be used to start a journey on this scale, so what is beyond understanding is eventually classified as "the power of God" like other similar things...

Now think about it, the terrible mental state of the gods on this planet today is probably due to the influence of these things that have been categorized as "miracles" indiscriminately... Mortals who were once ignorant and ignorant only know to bury their heads, but in When encountering problems that are really unclear, they always push directly to the gods irresponsibly, but what can the gods do? They don’t understand, then they can only be crazy...

If there is no theocracy, if there is no more and more revealing of the operation mechanism of the gods in recent years, this blindness may sooner or later lead to the end that is no less than the magic wave.

A slight buzzing sound suddenly interrupted Bertilalio's somewhat divergent thinking. She immediately looked at the holographic projection in the center of the hall and saw a line of text that was constantly being translated into lingua franca slowly appearing on the screen.

Noy: "Yes, we have alternatives or that your response was an accident to us. From the beginning, we formulated it on the premise that there is no other intelligent civilization within the predetermined range that can provide assistance." Self-help plan.

"Many, many years ago, we have sent out ‘observers’. The observers will go to the closest, compliant measurement point to our planet and send the magic wave readings there back to our home planet...

"To this day, observers have traveled in space for one hundred and twenty-six years, but this long four-light-year journey has not yet reached the end... It has entered a deceleration process, but there is still a certain distance from the scheduled observation point. "

The text on the holographic projection stopped beating, and the entire hall had suddenly fallen into a strange silence. Bertila realized a certain fact revealed behind the text, which made her eyes wide open.

In the next second, she heard Gawain's voice suddenly coming from the communication device: "They are able to travel in space. This civilization has passed the'Maturity Ceremony', and immediately began to inquire."

Gao Wen, who was far in the south, stood up from his chair at this time. Even Amber next to him was staring at the magic net terminal on the desk. When "Noy" said that they were before the establishment of today's communication When the "original plan" of one hundred and twenty-six years has been implemented, Gawain's most shocked is that they can carry out interstellar travel itself!

Stepping out of the planet and stepping into the universe on the planet where Loren Continent is located, this behavior means that mortal civilization completely frees itself from the shackles of gods and enters adulthood, and according to the theocracy council’s research on the laws of the gods and the Obviously, this process will not be a special case for the understanding of intelligent species every season in the history of this planet.

As long as other planets follow the same laws of the universe as Loren, as long as the thinking logic of other intelligent races does not deviate to the extent that it is completely incomprehensible to the Loren tribes, then even if it is a few light-years or hundreds of light-years away "Aliens" will certainly have this process of "primitive worship-birth of gods-two-way shackles-to adulthood", and face "disobedience failure" and "civilizational survival" at the final stage of this process. The situation of choosing one of two.

This is not a simple process. The dragons of Tarrond have used the heavy status quo to prove to the world the price of taking a wrong step in this process, but the experts of the Council of Theocracy believe that the cost is lower and easier. There is a path to realization. As long as the right path is taken in the early stage of breaking free of the shackles, it is not unimaginable to cross the rite of passage at a lower cost, but on this planet, it seems that there has never been With such an example, the countries of the alliance can only groping forward on this road.

The star solvers in the hall where Thorin controlled the hall had already begun to prepare the text for asking "Noy", while Gawain controlled the sudden excitement and sat down slowly again. He took a deep breath, feeling that his heartbeat had returned to normal a little bit, and his gaze swept across the particularly warm printed paper again. Between those short words, he exposed another one that was struggling to survive like the nations of Loren. Civilization has continued its self-help journey for thousands of years.

The interstellar broadcast that lasted for 1,400 years, the observer who has traveled in space for a hundred and twenty-six years... This ethnic group called "Noy" also looks as tough as the beings of the Loren continent, as tough as the sailors left behind. As warned by the poem, they did not indulge in this illusory and quiet long night.

As for the time scales of "four hundred years" and "126 years" mentioned in these conversation records, they are all the same as the previous "light years", and they have been determined by the star solvers and the giant tree of Thorin. The calculation node over there has performed a unit conversion. The data that Gao Wen sees here are all after they have been converted to the Loren calculation unit.

Sir Scott Planting, who interprets the "dictionary" of alien stars at the Verplanton Observatory hundreds of years ago, is a professional scholar. Star flashes are the "standard time ruler" of the reference value. At this point, the pioneers have paved the way for future generations.

There was a light click from the printing device, and then the shaft and gears began to rotate, and Amber subconsciously whispered, "Something is coming over there again!"

Gawain controlled his excitement, and after the printing paper got out of the machine, he immediately pulled it out. On it were the latest conversation records between the Star Breaker in the Thorin Control Center and the "Noi":

Star interpreter: "We have some questions that may seem presumptuous, but this will help both of us to enhance our understanding. May I ask, do you have a ‘god’ in your world?"

Noy: "Yes, of course, we have our own religion and belief system. It seems that there are gods on your side as well?"

Star interpreter: "Yes, we also have our own gods. So the second question, you... When you sent an'observer' to the universe four light years away, didn't you cause the gods to lose control?"

After this question, there seemed to be a long period of blank waiting on the "Noyman" side. In addition to the "blank waiting" mark, there was a long series of ellipsis on the printing paper. Gao Wen didn't read it until almost the end of the paper. Reply from the "Noy":

"The observers we send out are our gods."

This time, not only Gawain stood up suddenly, but Rosetta Augustus and Bersetia Morningstar, who had been quietly listening in the communication interface, stood up suddenly in consternation.

It seems that the worldview has been shattered and reshaped in an instant, and the natural laws that have been accustomed to it have been turned upside down. Even Rosetta, who always has a straight face and maintains a serious posture on weekdays, is staring at this moment, and it is even more in the lobby of the Thorin Control Center. There was no sound for a moment, and the subversive facts took away many people's words, and this strange silence was finally interrupted by Tyre, who was hanging up and listening to this day:

"Antaweien reports that the core temperature of the super-light communication array has risen sharply, and the hardware is about to reach its limit!"

Gao Wen wakes up in an instant.

The state of Antavien’s super-light communication array is not good, it can only be said to be barely usable, although the Krakens have optimized its working mode as much as possible, and adjusted the sending and receiving mode of information to a lower-load low frequency. In the communication process, a large amount of coding work was allocated to the computing center of Thorin Giant Tree, but this only delayed the burning time of the main antenna as much as possible.

In fact, it has been a miracle that the thing can persist until now, but the conversation with the "Noy" has brought so much impact information that Gawain has forgotten this matter subconsciously.

"Explain that the communication is about to be interrupted, and ask one more question at the same time!" Gao Wen said quickly, "Ask about their relationship with the gods!"

In the lobby of the Solin Control Center, the star solvers completed the compilation and conversion of the text at an unprecedented speed. The data transmission system delivered the converted code to Antavien, and after a short delay, a period of interrogation The information that travels through the star space oscillates, passing over the stars instantly at a speed far exceeding the speed of light.

Star Breaker: "Due to equipment cooling requirements, our communication system will be temporarily closed and maintained, and will be restarted in the near future. Before that, we want to know a question: What is your relationship with the gods or how you get along with them?"

Almost as soon as this question was sent out, Tyre’s voice reached everyone’s ears: “The main antenna burned out and the super-luminous communication array shut down.”

"The sensitivity of the monitoring antenna is adjusted to the highest level," Bertila standing in the control hall immediately shouted, "Notify the Ancestral Peak monitoring station to assist in capturing the signal. Don't miss the reply of the ‘Noy’!"

Although only Antavien’s superluminal communication array can send out signals, the "monitoring stations" set up in other regions can still receive communication signals. Now the main antenna has been burned out, and the alliance has temporarily lost its initiative. Communication ability, but at least...everyone still has a chance to hear the reply from "them".

Every second that follows is as long as a thousand years. Everyone, whether it is the technicians in the Thorin control center, the three empire leaders in the capitals of the three empires, or the goblin technicians in the ancestral peak, Everyone held their breath and fell into silence, as if they were afraid that their breath would interfere with the invisible signal in the starry sky. This nervous atmosphere continued until the indicator light in front of Bertila that represented the signal received by the main antenna began to flash.

"The main antenna receives the signal! The star solver is deciphering it!"

After a while, the reply of the "Noyman" finally appeared in everyone's eyes

"We have achieved coexistence with our gods, living together on the home planet."

In the study room covered with blue velvet carpet, Gawain slowly put down the paper in his hand, leaned back on the high-back chair and slowly spoke thoughtfully: "It seems...this is the answer."

"Coexistence is achieved..." Amber frowned and muttered, "They used the word'realized'... Does it mean that their previous relationship with the gods was also very dangerous? It was achieved after a lot of hard work. Is it in a better state now? And what do you think they mean by "coexistence"?"

"Except for the Noy people, any of our guesses are false guesses," Gawain shook his head slightly. "The information we have now is enough for us to think for a long time."

At this moment, Bertila's voice sounded from the Monet terminal: "We have received... the call from the Noi people again, and they seem to want to confirm whether we are offline."

The corner of Gawain’s mouth shook slightly. At this moment, he seemed to feel a faint embarrassment flooding the universe...

"Keep monitoring and recording," he sighed helplessly after a moment of silence. "We can't respond now."

While talking, he looked up at Tyre in another communication interface.

"Antawin's side..."

"It's repairing it," Tyre waved his hand without waiting for Gao Wen to finish. "The Hathaway Witch has already got into the main antenna."

"...Well, you guys come on."