Chen Hao threw his backpack on the ground, and before the zipper was even fully unzipped, a small amber-colored cube rolled out from the inner compartment.
It landed on the metal floor without making a sound, as if it had been glued to the ground. The blue light flickered, its frequency so steady it made you want to yawn.
“This thing is still sending signals.” Karl squatted down and poked it with his pen cap. “It’s every three seconds and seven seconds, just like the LED strip in the ruins.”
“It’s either the interference source or the key.” Susan stood in front of the control panel, her finger sliding across the screen. “The entire system is stuck on this frequency right now, and we can’t read data without dealing with it.”
Nana had already placed the three discs into the scanning slot. Her pupils narrowed to slits as the internal program began to interface with ancient coded logic.
“The original protocol is based on geological cycle modeling,” she said. “It requires a set of crustal displacement parameters as the decryption key.”
Do you have one?
"Yes. The deep-sea fault data collected yesterday matches perfectly."
The screen flickered, and the progress bar began to climb. The content of the first disc popped up—the title was "Principle of Adaptive Control of Pressure Gradient".
"This name sounds exhausting," Chen Hao said, leaning back in his chair. "Can you speak like a human being?"
“It means,” Nana looked at him, “that when you dive to 10,000 meters, the diving suit will adjust the pressure difference between the inside and outside, and won’t squeeze you into a meat patty.”
"Oh." Chen Hao nodded. "That's alright."
“You still think that’s okay?” Carl looked up at him. “This is something that could rewrite the history of human deep-sea exploration! The tattered clothes we wear now have to be supported by external scaffolding after going down to 500 meters, for fear of collapsing.”
“So we need to make new clothes.” Chen Hao stood up and walked to the furnace control panel. “Let’s make a shell first to test it out.”
The base's materials warehouse had ready-made alloy powder, but nobody knew how to smelt it. The old-fashioned furnace had crude temperature control; if it was even slightly too hot, crystallization would fail.
“Ancient technological records show,” Nana pulled out the documents, “that a segmented cooling method should be used, with a flow channel added to the inner lining to allow the heat to dissipate layer by layer.”
“Easy for you to say.” Susan frowned. “Our furnace even has a manual thermostat valve.”
“Then adjust it manually.” Chen Hao rolled up his sleeves. “You’re in charge of feeding, and I’ll control the temperature. Karl, you keep an eye on the infrared thermometer and report the numbers.”
“Wait a minute.” Karl raised his hand. “What if there’s something wrong with this material? Who knows if it will release poison gas or explode when heated?”
“Then you can record videos outside,” Chen Hao said. “Safety matters are the responsibility of the safety officers; we just need to ensure that things are done properly.”
Ten minutes later, the alloy powder was poured into the crucible. The furnace fire was lit, and the temperature slowly rose.
“Eight hundred.” Carl read the numbers aloud, “Eight hundred and twenty… eight hundred and fifty…”
"Prepare to open the cooling channels," Nana said. "The current temperature is close to the melting point."
Susan pressed a button, and several small airflow channels opened. The heat sinks on the furnace wall began to operate.
“Nine hundred degrees,” Carl’s voice tightened. “It’s still rising!”
"Turn off the main power supply valve!" Chen Hao shouted.
He rushed over and turned the handwheel. A metallic scraping sound rang out, and the flames suddenly shrank. The temperature inside the furnace stopped at 913 degrees Celsius, and remained there for a full three minutes.
“It’s done,” Nana said. “The crystal structure is intact and there are no cracks.”
They waited for half an hour before taking out the finished product. The outer shell was dark gray with a faint pattern on the surface, like water ripples.
“These patterns,” Karl said, leaning closer to examine them, “are just like the light patterns on the ruins walls.”
“They’re not the same.” Nana ran her fingertip along the lines. “They’re the same energy conduction pathway.”
She attached the casing to the test fixture and connected it to the micro-energy core. The indicator light came on, green.
"Next step," Chen Hao said, "to assemble the entire set of equipment."
They spent six hours assembling all the parts together. The helmet, chest armor, arm guards, and leg rings were all embedded with shape-memory alloy layers. Finally, they inserted the power core and connected it to the main control chip.
The self-test procedure has been initiated.
A message popped up on the screen: **Biometric verification failed.**
"What do you mean?" Chen Hao tapped on the keyboard. "It's not like I've never touched this before."
“It might not be fingerprints or irises.” Susan stared at the log records. “What it wants is some kind of… cognitive confirmation.”
“Cognition?” Carl chuckled. “You mean it needs to know that we understand its technology?”
“It’s possible,” Nana said. “The condition for the platform to be activated is ‘the knowledgeable will open it.’ Perhaps this system only responds to those who truly understand its principles.”
"Then who can prove they understand?"
“I’m in charge.” Chen Hao sat down in the control room. “I listened to your explanation of the principles the whole time, and I remembered every step.”
He opened the input interface and typed a message:
"The essence of deep-sea pressure regulation is to dynamically adjust the gas density using nanoscale pores, so that external high pressure cannot penetrate the material structure. This process relies on environmental feedback loops, and the core algorithm calculates the optimal parameters in real time."
Press Enter.
The system remains silent for three seconds.
The green light is on.
The entire diving suit vibrated slightly, and a blue light emanated from the chest plate, flowing along the patterns as if a breath had been blown into a metal vein.
"He's alive," Karl said softly.
“It’s not just alive.” Susan looked at the monitoring data. “It’s autonomously adjusting its internal microenvironment, simulating reaction patterns under deep changes.”
"Wow, this thing breathes even more than I do." Chen Hao reached out and touched the breastplate.
Nana began recording the various parameters. Susan checked the energy output curve, while Carl was busy filming the entire process.
Chen Hao stood in front of the support frame, looking at the equipment that stood quietly. The light shone on it, and the blue patterns flowed, as if it were breathing.
"Tell me," he suddenly asked, "won't it think we're stupid?"
"who?"
“This garment,” he said, “is something that the ancients made so amazingly, yet no one understood it for thousands of years. Now that we’ve finally figured it out, we have to try it out one by one, like elementary school students doing experiments.”
“It has no ideas,” Nana said. “It’s a tool.”
“But tools also know who uses them best,” Chen Hao smiled. “Just like a fishing rod knows who the angler is.”
“Then you definitely are,” Carl said. “After all, you even know how to get stuck.”
“That was tactical positioning,” Chen Hao glared at him. “To test the trap’s trigger range.”
“Yes, yes, a strategic fat man.” Karl said, taking a step back to dodge a possible flying punch.
Susan glanced at the time. "Twelve hours have passed. We need to rest."
"I'm not sleepy." Chen Hao shook his head. "Run the self-check program again to see if there are any hidden errors."
“There’s no need,” Nana said. “The system is stable, and all modules are working properly.”
“But I always feel,” Chen Hao stared at the blue light in the center of the breastplate, “that it’s not over yet.”
"What's the meaning?"
“Look at this frequency.” He pointed to the monitoring screen. “It’s a heartbeat-like rhythm, once every three and a half seconds, synchronized with that little square.”
The amber cube still lies in the corner, its blue light still shimmering.
“It’s been sending signals,” Nana said, “but now it doesn’t seem to be interference.”
"What's that?"
“It could be a wake-up command.” She walked over and picked up the cube. “Or it could be… waiting for a response.”
"What response?"
"I don't know." Nana brought it close to the main control interface of the diving suit.
The blue light suddenly intensified the moment the two came into contact.
A thin line lit up inside the helmet of the diving suit, like an eye opening.
The console screen refreshed automatically, displaying a new message:
**Secondary protocol unlock.**
Environment compatibility test start countdown: 90 seconds.
"What?" Chen Hao was stunned. "Who made it start?"
“It wasn’t us.” Susan quickly flipped through the operation log. “There was no manual input.”
“It did it itself,” Carl said, pointing to the screen. “It received the signal and then turned itself on.”
“No,” Nana stared at the cube. “It’s a response.”
"What should we respond to?"
“A question,” she said softly. “When that self-check was completed, it sent a question to the outside world.”
"What's the problem?"
The console will display the following text:
Why have you come?
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