Now, Duncan has two pieces of information about the red light:

First, before the great annihilation occurs, before the end of the world comes to those "old worlds", a deep red like dark blood will first appear in the sky - its "body" is reflected in the depths of the universe, but the way it propagates does not conform to the laws of optics. From any location on the planet, you can see it appearing in a specific position in the sky, and this position will not change with the rotation of the planet, as if it is directly reflected in the observer's vision or mind.

Secondly, the red light does not seem to show any direct "destructiveness". It is more like a "phenomenon" or "characteristic" produced by the universe itself during the doomsday stage. It is a manifestation of collapse rather than the collapse itself.

Third, the end of the world does not happen and end instantly. The entire destruction process will last for a certain period of time. The process of the end of the world is accompanied by an increase in various strange phenomena and the continuous distortion and mutation of the "rules" until the underlying laws of the world can no longer withstand this distortion. Therefore, the warrior and his companions have the last time to start a journey, and the spaceship named New Hope has the last time to take off.

For Duncan, this third point is particularly critical.

The end of the world did not happen in an instant, which meant that people before the end of the world had enough time to observe the appearance of the "red light" - but in his memory, he had never seen that deep red.

He was trapped in that "bachelor apartment" overnight. Before that, he had not seen any strange red light or supernatural phenomena, and he had not seen anything outside the window after that...

Bachelor apartment?

Duncan's memory suddenly got stuck, and after a moment, his brows furrowed little by little.

What exactly is my "bachelor apartment"?

He has always believed that his hometown is across the Gate of the Lost. Outside his bachelor apartment, deep in the thick fog, there are still the bustling crowds of people on Earth and their ordinary and peaceful daily lives. He is just trapped in a room, separated from his hometown by a wall. However, with the emergence of the "moon" and the gradual verification of the "world aggregation theory", this possibility has actually approached zero infinitely.

If he had had a premonition about this before, it had obviously been confirmed now - he knew that he could not go back.

But it was not until now that he suddenly thought of another question: If the place opposite the Gate of the Lost Home is not his hometown, then what is the essence of his remaining "bachelor apartment"?

Whenever I “go back”…where exactly am I “going back” to?

Duncan frowned tightly. In the faint "sunlight" spreading outside the window, the long sword and the living metal that was once a "human" suddenly appeared in his mind...

"Another part of the world fragment?" He seemed to understand something, but his expression became more complicated. "What is the nature of the world fragment?"

His mind was full of thoughts, memories and speculations rose and fell in his heart like continuous waves. Duncan paced slowly in the room, calming and organizing his thoughts in this way. Then he returned to the table, picked up a piece of paper from the side, and casually sketched a pattern on it - he didn't think about writing or drawing anything, just sketching lines and smearing patterns on it over and over again.

Then, he suddenly stopped.

He looked at what he had unconsciously drawn on the paper... a moon outlined by messy lines.

It’s like looking at a hometown that is right in front of you, but you can never return to it.

Alice once said that if the symbol of hometown appears in a place, then this place is hometown... Although she is not very smart, she can occasionally get to the core of the problem with the simplest and purest ideas. In a sense, what she said is actually right.

Hometown is here, but it is not all of it, nor is it what Duncan is familiar with. It is just a small fragment, and just like the "warrior" who has turned into living metal - it has long become something that is difficult to understand.

Duncan subconsciously stretched out his finger and touched the "moon" on the paper, as if asking someone, and whispered to himself: "Yes, what else can be left..."

The sound of flapping wings suddenly came from the side, interrupting Duncan's distraction. The fat white dove landed from the top of a nearby wardrobe, walked unsteadily to Duncan, tilted its head, then lowered its head and pecked at the moon drawn on the paper with its beak.

It pecked a hole in the "moon", raised its head and chattered: "Look up at the bright moon, look up at the bright moon, look up..."

It suddenly stopped and continued to look at Duncan with its head tilted.

Duncan also stared at it blankly, looking at this pigeon that had suddenly "mutated" from the compass for some unknown reason, looking at this silly bird that followed him for no apparent reason and was particularly obedient and intimate.

"Aiyi, Ai-yi, Ai--" The pigeon flapped its wings, making a loud and strange sound, "Aiyi--"

Duncan's eyes suddenly widened, and he reached out to grab Ai's body, but then quickly relaxed a little, as if he was afraid of accidentally crushing this tiny "creature" to death. He felt his breathing become rapid, his heart pounding, and the pigeon in his palm turned its head and looked at this side with a dull expression.

Duncan finally opened his mouth: "...Aiyi?"

The pigeon nodded: "Coo."

Duncan hesitated for a moment and changed to a more accurate pronunciation: "...IE?"

The pigeon nodded quickly: "Coo."

Duncan took a breath and said, "Internet Explorer...?"

The pigeon stretched out its wings and flapped them even harder. At this moment, it seemed more excited than ever before, and even seemed to have countless more exciting words to say.

However, after flapping its wings for a long time, it only made a loud, meaningless "cooing" sound.

Duncan gently loosened his hands and watched the fat pigeon walking around the table happily, stopping from time to time and tilting its head to observe its "master" curiously. The green bean eyes seemed to always flash with the light of network interruption and unresponsive process. After a long time, he finally sighed softly, and a complicated smile appeared on his face.

It turns out that the answer was written on the question from the beginning.

This silly bird is just another tiny remnant of his suddenly extinguished hometown.

There is no going back, really no going back.

Duncan sat quietly in the chair, like a stone statue, without any movement, expression or sound for a long time.

After an unknown amount of time had passed like this, he blinked his eyes as if he had suddenly "come alive" and began to think - or rather, forced himself to continue thinking:

If Ai Yi is really Internet Explorer, then what is its corresponding "source"? Is it the code? Is it the huge amount of accumulated data? Is it the countless hardware that once supported the operation of Internet Explorer? Or is it the abstract description behind this word?

Or...it symbolizes a brief flame in the development process of a civilization.

Perhaps the fragments of the world do not necessarily correspond to a certain "entity", it may even be a huge concept - a concept abstracted from real existence.

Does this conjecture also hold true in reverse?

Will those entities that really existed in the "old world" survive as "abstract concepts" in the deep sea era after the Great Annihilation? What were the countless abnormal phenomena in this vast sea, as well as the countless invisible objects and forbidden knowledge born around them, what were they...

And most importantly, what is the principle behind these changes? What is the nature of the Great Annihilation and the red light?

New answers brought new questions, one after another, and it seemed that he would never reach the end of the truth. Duncan felt that his thinking seemed to have reached a dead end. Before more clues appeared, he could no longer find the direction to go deeper.

At this moment, a gentle knock on the door suddenly came from behind him, interrupting his increasingly deep and difficult thinking.

Duncan quickly came back to his senses. He sensed the breath outside the door, so he breathed a sigh of relief and calmed down a little bit: "Come in, Alice."

The door opened and the puppet girl walked in, holding a large plate with the dinner that Duncan missed.

"Captain," Alice said with a hint of worry in her tone, "you haven't had dinner."

For some reason, just by seeing Alice's expression that seemed to be always pure, Duncan felt his chaotic mood calm down a lot.

He smiled: "Thank you, put it on the table."

"Oh," Alice put the plate down and added, "Don't worry, these are all normal foods, cooked according to the tastes of ordinary people - Nina said that the 'traditional food' here is not for human consumption..."

As she spoke, she looked up again and observed Duncan's expression: "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine now," Duncan breathed a sigh of relief. He sorted out the questions he had just figured out, and a smile gradually appeared on his face. "Indeed, I have gained so much... I should be happy."

"Oh," Alice didn't quite understand what he said, but she did feel that the captain's mood had really improved a lot, so she felt relieved. "They were a little worried about you, so they asked me to come up to check on you. I'm glad you're okay."

Duncan nodded slightly, but suddenly felt a little emotional in his heart.

In this big house, there are indeed many people who are always worried about his "condition", and these worries are varied. Perhaps only this silly-looking doll in front of him... has never had any impurities in his worries about him.

If I have to say, Nina might be the other one.

Feeling emotional, Duncan smiled and shook his head, then suddenly thought of another thing.

"Alice," he turned his gaze and looked into the eyes of the Gothic doll, "I need your help with something."

Alice didn't even think about it: "Ah? Okay!"

Duncan nodded, reached into his pocket, and pulled out the brass key he always carried with him.

"Alice, I need to use this key again."

"OK!"