Chapter 235 A New Balance

The bright light slowly faded away, and everything on the viaduct fell into an eerie silence.

In the center of the ruins, five glowing humanoid silhouettes were suspended in mid-air. They still maintained their final postures, but their bodies had become partially transparent, flowing with colors representing their respective characteristics.

Su Wanqing regained consciousness first. She lowered her head and looked at her hands, which were almost entirely made of pure golden energy. She was a little confused for a moment.

"We... succeeded?" she murmured to herself.

In my mind, the voice of the Guardian AI sounded at the right time, without any emotional ups and downs: "The pentagonal barrier was activated successfully. However, due to the unexpected intervention of the core triangle structure, the program mutated and formed a new type of barrier - a semi-permeable space-time membrane.

This was not in the original plan, but the review showed that this might be a better outcome.”

She raised her head and looked past her hands to her surroundings.

A huge translucent dome is slowly expanding at a speed visible to the naked eye. Energy lines of gold, blue, green, purple and red are flowing on the surface of the dome, like the veins of a living thing.

It is silently enveloping the entire city on the verge of collapse.

Lin Che and "Ye" were suspended on her left and right sides, and the positions of the three of them formed a stable equilateral triangle.

Half of Lin Che's body had transformed into pure blue energy. The Orion Sequence pattern on his right arm was completely integrated into it, flashing a deep light.

Even more surprising is Night. In his violent red energy form, his face has completely changed into that of Dr. Morris when he was young.

There was no longer any biting indifference in those eyes; instead there was a complex calmness mixed with a hint of relief.

He looked at his semi-energy hands and whispered, "So this is the third way... We become the living components of the barrier."

“It’s not death, nor is it a simple sacrifice…” Lin Che said. He looked at Su Wanqing and then at Morris, “…but transformation. We have become the bridge between reality and the Weaver.”

Su Wanqing thought about it and asked it in her mind: "Guardian, this is not the result of the original plan, right?"

"Yes," it responded immediately, "the original plan was to form a hard barrier that completely blocked the Weavers. But the accidental formation of the triangular core created this semi-permeable membrane, which allows limited and controllable energy to be exchanged in both directions, but does not allow any one-way plundering for the purpose of 'collection'."

Outside the triangle core, Lu Zhao and Xiao Ling also regained consciousness.

They are not as deeply energized as the three in the center, but they also form the support structure of the entire barrier.

Lu Zhao's green energy body has completely merged with the tactical equipment on his body, forming a strange form that is a mixture of technology and life.

He moved his arms and could feel that the line between metal and flesh had blurred.

Xiao Ling almost completely maintains her human form, with only the tightly closed purple third eye mark on her forehead proving that she is also part of this great structure.

She walked to the edge of the expanding dome, stretched out her hand, and seemed to be able to touch the flowing space-time barrier.

"The time collapse has stopped," she whispered, with a hint of joy in her tone, "the parts of the city that disappeared... are slowly recovering."

The Guardian AI’s explanation echoed in everyone’s heads: “The semi-permeable membrane is stabilizing the local time flow.

It allows controlled time energy to flow back from the Weaver side, and the harvested area is being reconnected and repaired with the main reality at a greatly reduced time flow rate."

Lu Zhao frowned and said to himself: "Is this symbiosis rather than confrontation? We... have created a balance?"

At this moment, the most unexpected thing happened to everyone.

The Weaver Vanguard, who had been standing quietly outside the barrier, stopped flickering the halo above its head that symbolized attack and plunder. Instead, it slowly rotated in an extremely complex pattern that seemed to represent analysis and... appreciation.

It took a step forward, came to the translucent dome, stretched out a silver palm made of liquid metal, and gently placed it on the surface of the barrier.

The five-colored energy flowed gently under its palm, but did not produce any violent rejection reaction.

After a moment, the pioneer withdrew his hand, and the mechanical synthesized voice sounded again, but the tone seemed a little less cold: "Unexpected discovery: Creative adaptation. The sample exceeded the expected parameters."

It seemed to pause, as if communicating with the Weaver main force far beyond the dimension.

After a few seconds, it continued: "This equilibrium mode is not considered in the eternal model... The semi-permeable membrane allows civilization to continue to develop while also providing a sustainable time sample... This may be a better solution."

Su Wanqing immediately became alert and asked loudly, "What does this mean?"

The Forerunner took a step back, seemingly expressing a harmless gesture. "It means re-evaluating the collection protocol. Your solution is... interesting. We will accept this balance for now and see how it lasts."

It raised its head and looked at the sky above the city, which was stable due to the barrier. "The main fleet will temporarily suspend comprehensive collection and switch to long-term observation mode. This is the first civilization to create such a balanced mode... It deserves special study."

As soon as he finished speaking, the pioneer's body turned into a stream of silver light, soared into the sky, and disappeared into the clouds.

The crisis seemed... resolved.

When the expansion of the dome completely stopped and stabilized, Su Wanqing felt a slight dizziness.

Then, countless memories that did not belong to her flooded into her mind like a tide.

She saw herself, standing on the same viaduct, but surrounded by slightly different ruins.

Once, she resolutely detonated all the cores in an attempt to die together with the Weaver, which resulted in a larger-scale time collapse.

Another time, she teamed up with Night and tried to use the power of the Core to rewrite the reality code of the entire city and hide everyone in a false time bubble, but the bubble was easily punctured by the Weaver due to its unstable structure.

The critical decisions and failed outcomes were clearly displayed before her.

She was surprised to realize, "In the first reincarnation, we tried a complete confrontation, which resulted in a complete collapse of time. The second time, we tried to use the core to rewrite reality to escape, but the result was only to accelerate the collapse of the space-time structure. Only this time... we accepted each other's existence and turned to seek a balance of coexistence, and created a sustainable solution instead."

Lin Che noticed the strange look on her face. He moved closer and asked softly, "What did you see?"

Su Wanqing smiled slightly, and this time, there was no burden in her smile, but a hint of enlightenment.

"I understand why this time is different. With each reincarnation we are accumulating invisible experience, but the key to success lies in the combination of personnel.

The first two times, we either lacked a ‘container’ like Xiaoling, or lost a ‘retrograde’ like you, and never had all five key characters at the same time. ”

She paused and turned her gaze to the energy body with Morris's face in the distance.

“And… the real turning point lies in the choice of ‘night’.

The first two times, he always chose to fight or exploit. This time, he chose to cooperate. Sometimes, the most powerful defense is not a wall, but a bridge. "

The Guardian AI's voice sounded in her mind for the last time, with an unprecedented hint of approval.

"Yes, the anchor point. This is exactly what Dr. Morris's reincarnation system ultimately wants to achieve - not to find a perfect defense solution, but to find a sustainable balance point. Congratulations, you have fulfilled his true wish."