Chapter 499 Angel
Lin Xian looked at Chu Yan, who was all smooth and clean, and countless complicated emotions surged in his heart. He had many questions and worries. He and she had been comrades fighting side by side and partners with the same mind, but now, when Lin Xian saw her again, the first sentence she heard was to let Lin Xian eat her.
He subconsciously tried to understand the meaning of "eaten" from other angles, but Lin Xian's character still quickly anchored on the most bizarre and literal result.
Even so, he still asked
"What did you say?"
"Trust me, this is the fastest way." Chu Yan looked at Lin Xian meaningfully, and then her eyes swept across the sea and mountains of this strange planet: "If you don't want to waste more time, or be eaten by them like me, and completely lose some senses."
Lin Xian narrowed his eyes slightly, looking at the strange creatures that were devouring the valley below and the indescribable absurd scene, and then said to Chu Yan
"I know this is a game, but I won't eat you. I don't know why you're in this game, but I will rescue you no matter what the cost."
Chu Yan's expression darkened, and she avoided Lin Xian's gaze for a long time before whispering, "Why?"
"Why else?" Lin Xian smiled calmly and said seriously, "Because of revolutionary friendship, because we are of the same mind, because we are comrades-in-arms, and we have even fought together without pants!"
Chu Yan suddenly smiled at his words. She raised her head and looked at Lin Xian quietly for a while. Looking at Chu Yan's eyes, Lin Xian had never seen the ace of the North American United Front show such feminine tenderness, and he was immediately a little surprised.
"Walk!"
At this time, Chu Yan suddenly pulled Lin Xian up, and the two of them quietly hid in the grass of strange vegetation, crossed the hillside jungle, and came to the hillside of a mountain on the coastline, and then hid behind several huge stamens with bright colors.
"Look."
Chu Yan pulled Lin Xian's wrist, her fingertips were cold but carried unquestionable strength, guiding his gaze to the vast blue in the distance. Lin Xian looked as he was told, and saw the surging ocean presenting an incomparably magnificent deep blue under the strange skylight. The waves surged, rolling up thousands of piles of snow foam, as if containing endless vitality and mysteries.
However, the next moment, a breathtaking change struck without warning. As the indescribably massive creature in the sky slowly descended, its immense shadow touching the surface of the sea. The entire vast ocean suddenly twisted! The magnificent azure faded and melted at a visible speed, as if an invisible giant hand had instantly drained away all color and liquid essence, replacing it with a horrifying, boundless expanse of fleshly white!
It was no longer the ocean, but a human face, immense and beyond imagination, stretching for thousands of miles! It silently emerged where the sea had once been. Its skin was smooth as fat, yet cold and lifeless. The features were blurred and abstract, with an inhuman indifference.
At its edge, countless arms, tentacles, or twisted limbs like giant pillars suddenly broke out of the "surface" and pierced straight into the sky. They stirred the space, and every swing caused the ground beneath their feet to shake and roar violently.
Amidst this earth-shaking tremor, the abyssal maw, occupying the absolute center of the "human face," silently yet with a terrifying all-consuming gravity, suddenly opened to its limit! The enormous creature in the sky seemed dwarfed and fragile before that maw, like a bird plummeting into a bottomless abyss. There was no earth-shattering crash, no dying wail, only the sound of flesh colliding and devouring. The giant creature in the sky was instantly swallowed by the snow-white "sea" maw, disappearing without a trace!
The moment the devouring was complete, the massive fleshy face that filled the view seemed to have received some indescribable nourishment. Its outline became clearer and more "perfect." A cold yet surging holy life-glow suddenly erupted from every inch of its skin and every outstretched giant arm! The light was dazzlingly pure, yet it also carried a sickening aura of evil that emanated from the abyss. It instantly stained the entire coast, mountains, and even the sky with a terrifying, divine aura.
Lin Xian's heart felt like it was being gripped by an invisible giant hand. Witnessing this grandeur and horror that was beyond his comprehension, his pupils contracted violently due to extreme shock. He suddenly said,
"What the hell is going on?"
Chu Yan stared at Lin Xian, her eyes slowly changing like a deep pool, flowing with indescribable complexity. She stretched out her arms and hugged him tightly. The embrace brought her warm breath to Lin Xian's ears. Her voice was low but clear: "Do you want to know?"
Before Lin Xian could react, Chu Yan's arms, with a gentle firmness, gently pushed him down. The two of them fell into the center of the huge and strange pistil behind them. The soft pistil supported them like a natural bed. The huge petals closed in an instant, gently wrapping them inside, isolating them from the bizarre world outside and forming a safe and private space.
Lin Xian only felt that his consciousness was thrown into a turbulent vortex of the galaxy. The world was spinning and his thoughts were completely shattered. Chu Yan's warm body was pressed against him, but at this time it was no longer the touch of flesh and blood. Instead, it turned into a surging torrent of information, directly and brutally breaking through the dam of his consciousness and pouring in!
Everything in front of him suddenly disappeared, and Lin Xian's perspective was completely pulled away, as if his soul was forced into Chu Yan's field of vision. Then, endless fragments of light and shadow exploded and reorganized in front of his "eyes" like the beginning of the universe. The torrent of time swept him up, rushing back through countless epochs at a suffocating speed.
He saw the hot and desolate surface of a primitive planet. In the boiling ocean, the most primitive simple organic matter collided and aggregated under the catalysis of lightning and geothermal heat... The fire of life was quietly ignited in the chaos.
Billions of years were compressed into a moment. Single-celled organisms floated and divided in the ancient sea. Strange brachiopods and arthropods were born in the warm shallow sea, crawled onto the muddy mudflats, and clumsily opened up the land. The spine took shape in the long evolution. Scale-covered fish leaped out of the water, grew four legs, and crawled under the shadow of the fern forest.
Light and shadows flow rapidly, and furry mammals rise from the dust of dinosaur extinction. Their nimble claws begin to grasp tools, and their ignorant eyes reflect the flames of trees split by lightning.
The picture focuses on a group of hairy primitive people hunting huge beasts with rough stone spears and bone tools. Beside the campfire, they make meaningless guttural sounds, and simple murals leave the earliest marks of civilization on the rock wall.
Time continued to fly, and settlements expanded into villages. From the pottery and worship of the matriarchal clan to the bronze and warfare of the patriarchal tribe, farmlands crisscrossed, the cities of the feudal dynasty stood tall, cavalry stepped through the smoke of war, and ancient epics were sung by wandering poets.
Steam monsters roar in mines and factories, gears mesh, thick smoke obscures the sky, and steel tracks stretch into the distance.
The light stream of the information age instantly overwhelms everything, the data torrent rushes through the invisible network, huge starships break free from the planet's gravity and sail into the boundless deep space, and giant towers with perfect geometric shapes and materials neither gold nor stone rise from the ground on strange planets, piercing the vacuum of the universe, receiving energy from the giant curtain of the sky that transforms stars and then transmits it to the ground using microwaves - this is the starting point of the tower civilization.
The picture froze inside the magnificent tower. A sophisticated synthetic factory was operating silently, and a viscous nutrient solution rich in all necessary substances was flowing out of the pipes. When Lin Xian saw this, Chu Yan's cold voice rang in his ears.
"What you see is a simulation from a human perspective, not the real Tower People, including our own iteration of civilization, but the meaning is the same."
"The people of Gaota have successfully synthesized all nutrients cheaply. Through new technologies and population control, they have eliminated hunger and increased life expectancy. Furthermore, the people of Gaota have acquired efficient methods of communication, and as a result, society has become more stable."
The scene in front of Lin Xian changed, and an incomparably magnificent civilized city full of vitality and order appeared before him. It was a city group that was more advanced and glorious than the previous Civilization No. 807 under wisdom. Hundreds of billions of human beings were freed from hunger, possessed almost unlimited energy and productivity, and ushered in an era of incomparable happiness.
Chu Yan's voice continued, "Then the people of the Tower began to explore a path to eternal happiness, how to bring the world into eternal peace, combined with eternal and renewable or searchable resources, and self-iterative wisdom and technology to promote civilization. However... they discovered that to achieve this prerequisite, they must eliminate communication barriers, including individual differences in needs, that is, evil thoughts and selfish desires."
Lin Xian asked doubtfully, "Can this be eliminated?"
“They found a way.”
The scene changed, and Lin Xian appeared in a huge and sophisticated laboratory. There were densely packed nutrition cabins, and countless living humans were sleeping inside. Half of them were men and half were women, of various ages, races, and nationalities. Seeing this scene, Lin Xian frowned.
"Why do we need biochemical experiments to eliminate people's evil thoughts?"
"Because the people of the Tower discovered that if they wanted to eliminate individual differences, evil thoughts, and selfish desires, the most important things to consider were gender, desire, pain, and death. Eliminating these three at the biological level would lay the foundation for eternal civilization. They call this the homogenized body of life, and it also has another name..."
"Angel."
"Angels?" Lin Xian was very surprised: "Could they be those strange-looking organisms I just saw?"
"Yes." Chu Yan replied
At this time, the picture continued to change. After countless years, the technology of "life homogenization body" made rapid progress. On the gene editing operating table, gender characteristics were completely erased. Nerve blocking technology cut off the neural pathways that perceive pain and death. Human gender began to disappear, and the flesh began to merge. When one day life lost the need to reproduce, those humans who finally survived in the world became the "final life". These lives began to merge continuously. Because they lost [social needs] and [reproduction needs], angels no longer had aesthetics and forms. Everything changed in a disordered way, so the form of "angels" began to become irregular.
"Angels are carefree, free from need and desire. They feed on each other and fuse to create communication. This devouring and fusion allows the knowledge, joy, and happiness of two individuals to merge together, without any pain or sorrow. Furthermore, angels' lifespans are nearly infinite..."
A new picture appeared, showing the "life" of these angels. There was no language, no conflict, only a slow, religious ritual-like approach to each other. When one angel gently embraced another, their physical bodies began to soften and blend. The eternally satisfied smile on the face of the embraced individual did not change at all, as if it could not feel any pain. Its body melted like warm wax and was slowly absorbed and swallowed by the crystallized torso of the other angel.
At the moment of fusion, the Devourer's body glows brighter, its form becomes more perfect, and even a new, blurry facial outline appears on its torso. There is no sadness, no screaming, only an eerie tranquility and contentment conveyed silently - this is their "communication" and "shared happiness."
"Such a civilization is equivalent to returning to the age of beasts. How can it develop?" Lin Xian found it difficult to understand at this time. He thought of the giant beast in the sky just now. Now he thought that it might be the life of billions of humans fused together, and the more terrifying human faces in the sea might even be geometric bodies of billions of humans.
At this moment, he suddenly remembered what Chen Yanxiu had said to him at the submarine base: "When all life merges into one." So this is what he meant...
"The people in the tower naturally thought of this as well." Chu Yan's voice sounded again: "During tens of thousands of years of evolution, the angels discovered that some of them began to have evil thoughts and selfish desires. This led to the formation of tribes and territories within the angel community, and thus triggered wars and destruction."
"Oh, back to square one again?"
"Yes, after a war that lasted for thousands of years, the surviving angels began to reflect on what was missing from their perfect civilization. Finally, they discovered that there was still an enemy that needed to be eliminated."
"What?"
"wisdom."
Chu Yan's voice continued, "When living things have intelligence, they think. This intelligence extends the power of change and cognition, discovering gender, desire, and pain. This causes rifts in civilization, so they destroy civilization and knowledge, re-integrate into a homogenized body, and concentrate their intelligence into a silicon-based intelligent body. You can think of it as artificial intelligence, and iterate and upgrade its intelligence according to absolute rules, thereby assisting and serving this civilized body."
"Is this okay?"
Lin Xian was speechless for a moment, and then the scene changed. Millions of years passed in the swallowing and fusion. Countless peaceful faces appeared and disappeared on the huge crystalline angel's torso, and the body of civilization continued in an endless cycle.
"After this, the Tower Civilization continued to thrive for millions of years, with life seemingly endless. But one day..."
As they devoured, the angels grew larger and larger. The happiness and joy of countless people gathered together, emitting surging life energy. Then, the azure sea almost became an entity, and a perfect body as majestic as a planet slowly straightened its spine. Its skin was purer, and its light was like a star. Its face was so perfect that it exceeded the limits of human cognition, and its body structure contained the harmony and power of the laws of the universe.
"During the angels' evolution, the Tower's artificial intelligence shaped them into an incomparably perfect angelic collective. Because of their extreme perfection, they reached the omniscience and omnipotence of a first-level civilization. This was the pinnacle of the Tower's civilization's evolution, and they named it... Unika."
"Unica?!" Lin Xian was shocked. Why did this name sound so familiar?
Chu Yan understood his doubts and continued to lead him in observing the evolution of civilization. "However, this ultimate perfection, in the cold scale of the universe, is as dazzling as a beacon in a dark forest. During the iteration process, the artificial intelligence discovered a problem. The disordered entropy increase of the Tower Civilization has caused a force called the 'Civilization Wave'. This force penetrated the interstellar dust and was captured by an unimaginable and incomprehensible more advanced civilization."
"so……"
"They suffered a devastating disaster!"
As Chu Yan's calm voice rang out, the vast planet that was originally full of vitality instantly turned into a piece of cosmic dust. The angel fell, the civilization was cut off, and the final form of the angel Uniga, at the critical moment, sacrificed the remaining body of the entire civilization, and escaped into the wormhole vortex with the core matter of the mother planet.
However, this advanced civilization capable of interstellar jumps was completely annihilated in the wormhole. In the picture, some high-dimensional weapon used the gravity of the galaxy cluster itself as a cosmic folding mirror to shoot an invisible destructive force at the fleeing tower people. That beam of light instantly changed the geometric structure of space itself and accurately hit the fleeing civilization.
A silent dimensional annihilation explosion occurred in the wormhole. The huge body of the Unija Angel collapsed and reduced its dimension bit by bit under the attack of a higher dimension. The fragments of the entire civilization were ejected through the cosmic folding mirror.
However, the next moment, the picture froze at the perspective of the Blue Planet's orbit. The jet of debris that penetrated from the depths of the universe instantly tore thirteen bottomless huge wounds on the surface of the earth. Then a terrifying eruption from the impact point, accompanied by Uniga's fear consciousness in the face of advanced civilization, spread wildly and out of control.
The scene flashed rapidly. On a bustling city street, pedestrians, without warning, twisted and transformed, their skin gray and their eyes bloodshot, pounced on those who had once been their own kind. Babies in their cradles let out inhuman screams. Birds fell like raindrops, their bodies undergoing bizarre deformations. Plants grew wildly, twisting into indescribable shapes...
The lights of one city after another went out, and global fear descended!
"This is……!!"
"Apocalypse Day, Xingyuan!" Above the Blue Star City, Lin Xian followed Chu Yan's perspective and looked at the devastating scene below, and immediately felt suffocated.
"Dark civilization... is a destroyed civilization?!" Lin Xian said in surprise.
"They were shattered by an unspeakable weapon and destroyed in the wormhole's fast lane. The 13 Star Abysses on the Blue Planet happened to be just 13 of those billions of fragments." Chu Yan's voice rang out: "This is the origin of Apocalypse Day."
Lin Xian was speechless for a moment. "So, the Tower Civilization didn't intend to invade Blue Planet, but we were just unlucky?"
"No, I actually think their original goal was Blue Planet, or perhaps Blue Planet was one of their backup options. There aren't that many coincidences between cosmic civilizations. They simply crashed from their high-speed orbit."
The picture disappeared, and Lin Xian's consciousness retreated. When he opened his eyes again, he was back in the pistil. Chu Yan was standing opposite him, looking at Lin Xian calmly.
"This is the Day of Apocalypse, and it's what the Tower Civilization wants us to see."
Lin Xian frowned and thought, "What's the purpose of showing them to us? Do you think they are innocent and pitiful?"
Chu Yan looked at Lin Xian and said slowly, "From your human perspective, it's hard to understand. For the High Tower Civilization, there are no such adjectives as innocent and pitiful."
"Then what is their purpose?" Lin Xian asked.
"Without a doubt, they're going to consume Blue Planet," Chu Yan replied sternly. "Combining our understanding of the Tower Civilization from the Civilization Preview Game with the information the Phoenix Order has been gathering from the Star Abyss, the conclusion is clear: the Tower Civilization intends to occupy Blue Planet and use the Star Abyss to re-dimensionalize it to accommodate the birth of 'Angels'. Blue Planet and humanity are merely nourishment for the Tower Civilization's revival."
Lin Xian's expression suddenly changed when he heard this. "Isn't that the same thing? But I don't understand why the Advent Sect, creating this game of civilization rehearsal, could cause so many people to defect?"
"Have you seen the Tower People's civilization system, which has lasted for millions of years, offering eternal life and eternal bliss? Do you want to follow them and shed the pain of death to become an angel with unified consciousness? Or have you witnessed how a higher-level civilization was easily destroyed by an even higher-level one, so you've completely given up resistance and faith, choosing to escape or join them?..."
Lin Xian was a little emotional, then sighed and sat down on the ground, saying with some self-doubt: "Prisoner of knowledge..."
He helplessly understood some problems in his heart, why the more powerful scientists, leaders, and scholars would be more affected, and he had to accept that the enemy's weapons were not only violence, but also the impact on cultural values.
"What about you?" Lin Xian raised his head and looked at Chu Yan: "Don't you think humans can win?"
Chu Yan shook her head: "I have never thought about it this way."
"Then why did you leave the Order?"
"I just said that from a human perspective, it's hard to understand." Chu Yan's eyes fell on Lin Xian
Her eyes seemed to be filled with fatigue and reluctance. After she finished speaking, she raised her hands, lowered her head, and smiled as if admiring her completely human body without the prosthetic limbs. Then she sighed and raised her head, looking at Lin Xiandao with a serious expression.
"But Lin Xian, I hope you will always stand from the perspective of humanity."
"What……?"
Lin Xian didn't understand what these words meant, but the moment he raised his head, the sky suddenly darkened, and a huge mouth with a strange smile appeared like the center of a storm, swallowing them in one gulp!
(End of this chapter)
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