Firewall
The glow of spacetime particles flowed through the Zhulong's repair chamber like liquid starlight. Shao Wei hovered in the center of the energy field, pale blue veins visible beneath his pale skin. Seventy-two hours had passed since the repairs began, and his vital signs were stabilizing, though he remained unconscious.
Si Qi stood before the observation window, his knuckles white from exertion. The holographic interface displayed Shao Wei's mental strength index—still far below the safe threshold. The Void Mayfly's mental contamination was more troublesome than expected, like some dimensional virus, continuously corroding Shao Wei's sea of consciousness.
"Conventional purification protocols are ineffective," the medical AI's synthesized voice stated coldly, "The target's mental structure is undergoing irreversible distortion."
Si Qi turned and walked towards the control console. His movements were filled with a kind of desperate determination - since conventional methods were ineffective, he would use unconventional methods.
"Initiate 'Consciousness Submergence' protocol."
The shipboard AI hesitated for a rare 0.3 seconds: "Warning: This protocol is still in the experimental stage. The probability of unconsciousness of the intruder is as high as 67.4%."
Si Qi had already laid down in the neural docking bay. "Execute."
The moment his consciousness left the body, a familiar sense of tearing swept over him. But unlike before, this time he broke into Shao Wei's mental world, which was on the verge of collapse.
This was once a mental vision as precise as clockwork, but now it has become a shattered nightmare. Memory fragments drifted in the void like broken film, and the area contaminated by mayflies shimmered an ominous purple-red. Si Qi saw the young Shao Wei undergoing mental power tests in the laboratory, saw the wary gaze when they first met, saw the starlight that exploded when the twin consciousnesses connected—
"Get out."
Shao Wei's voice echoed in his mental image, but with an unfamiliar sharpness. A mental shock slammed Si Qi into the gap in his memory.
"It's me." Si Qi steadied his consciousness and tried to approach the core of the image. There, suspended in a cocoon of light, entwined with purple-red tentacles, was Shao Wei's main consciousness.
"Lies." Thousands of Shao Wei's voices rang out simultaneously, and those contaminated memory fragments began to distort and reorganize, transforming into countless aggressive illusions.
Si Qi swung his sword, shattering the impending phantom. His consciousness flickered in the mental storm, each encounter draining away the dwindling time. Conventional soothing measures were ineffective; the contamination had already deeply fused with Shao Wei's subconscious.
You have to take risks.
Si Qi abandoned his defenses, allowing a mental shock to penetrate his consciousness. Amidst the excruciating pain, he detected the frequency of the source of the contamination—not only the remnants of the Void Mayfly, but also a mixture of an even more ancient, shuddering aura.
"I see..." he muttered. The mayfly was merely a carrier; the true source of the contamination came from an ancient being lurking in the interdimensional space.
This discovery made the situation even more hopeless, but it also pointed to the only direction. Si Qi condensed all his consciousness into a stream of information, crashing directly into the light cocoon:
"Shao Wei! This is not your fear!"
At the same time, he passed on to the core those memories that could not be contaminated or tampered with - the absolute trust when the twin consciousnesses were connected, the tacit understanding when fighting side by side, and the sleepless figure outside the repair cabin.
The pulsation of the light cocoon became momentarily disordered.
"Remember who you are!" Si Qi's consciousness began to dissipate, and his final cry exploded in his mental image. "You are Shao Wei! The madman who can always figure out a way out!"
Just before consciousness completely dissipated, the tentacles wrapped around the light cocoon suddenly froze. A crack spread across the surface of the cocoon, and pure blue light burst out from it.
Si Qi woke up in the neural docking pod, the medical AI's alarm blaring through his eardrums. But he immediately looked towards the repair pod.
Shao Wei opened his eyes.
Those eyes that were once filled with data were now blank, like a newborn baby. His gaze slowly focused, finally landing on Si Qi.
There was a long ten seconds of silence.
Then, a hoarse voice sounded:
"Your calculation... the error rate is 0.7% higher than last time."
Si Qi was stunned, then chuckled softly. The laughter triggered his internal injuries, causing him to cough violently, but the light in his eyes was brighter than ever.
The isolation cover of the repair chamber slowly opened. Shao Wei tried to stand, but stumbled from weakness. Si Qi stepped forward to support him. Their mental force fields spontaneously merged, and the shattered scene began to slowly reassemble.
"The source of the pollution hasn't been eliminated." Shao Wei leaned on Si Qi's shoulder, his voice weak but clear, "It's just temporarily dormant."
"I know." Si Qi stared at the boundless starry sky outside the observation window, "But we have a clue now."
The bridge's main screen automatically activated, displaying the newly planned route—the destination was a dark region not yet recorded on the star map. There, emitting energy fluctuations at the same frequency as the pollution source.
Shao Wei nodded slightly: "We need to upgrade the weapon system."
"And your firewall." Si Qi added.
After a brief silence, both hands simultaneously reached for the control console. As their fingertips touched, a pale golden glow rippled across the intersection—the twin consciousnesses were being reborn in a new form.
This time, there is no distinction between primary and secondary.
The Zhulong adjusted its course, its engines emitting a faint blue tail flame. The newly installed space-time particle generator on the hull began to work, accumulating energy for the upcoming expedition.
Behind them, the last shreds of light from the mayfly's remains vanished into the void, and ahead, darkness was writhing.
The hum of the quantum engine echoed deep within the Zhulong, like the beating heart of a starship. Si Qi stood at the main console, his fingertips tracing across the holographic star map, marking the newly acquired coordinates in scarlet. It was a void, uncharted territory, emitting strange vibrations at the same frequency as the pollution source.
"Navigation systems refuse to plan a route," the AI's synthesized voice stated coldly. "There is a severe destabilization of reality in this area."
Shao Wei sat at the secondary control station, his pale fingers weaving through the data stream. His newly reconstructed mental image was still fragile, but his computing power had returned to peak performance. "It's not attenuation, it's overriding." He called up the energy spectrum analysis, a faint blue halo reflected in his eyes. "Something is rewriting that space-time with its own rules."
Si Qi frowned. Rewriting the laws of physics—this was far beyond the technological capabilities of any known civilization. He turned to the weapons control interface. The Zhulong's newly installed spacetime particle generator was on standby. "We need to test its defense threshold."
"Reckless." Shao Wei said without looking up. "Approaching without sufficient data, the probability of survival is less than 3%."
"That's why we need bait." Si Qi activated the outer armor's mimicry system. "You stay at a safe distance and conduct scanning and analysis."
There was a brief silence. Shao Wei finally looked up from the data stream, his gaze as sharp as ever. "Your tactical proficiency remains regrettable." He called up the recalibrated twin consciousness interface. "The synchronization rate must remain above 92%, otherwise we will all die out there."
There was no further debate. When the two streams of consciousness merged once again, familiar pain was mixed with a newfound resilience. Like a ghost, the Candle Dragon slid into the hyperspace channel, heading towards the tampered starry sky.
The moment the jump ended, the alarms blared like a symphony of death. The scene outside the observation window made the most senior navigation officer gasp—the stars aligned in a way that defied common sense, the Milky Way like a thick soup stirred by an invisible giant. Even more disturbing, all the sensors were reporting conflicting data.
"Physical constants are fluctuating." Shao Wei's voice came through the consciousness link, calm and almost cruel. "The gravitational constant fluctuates 17% above and below the standard value."
Si Qi maneuvered the starship, narrowly avoiding a sudden spatial wrinkle. The fabric of spacetime here was like a waterlogged page, ready to shatter at any moment. "Locate the source of the contamination."
"Trying to locate..." Shao Wei's response suddenly stopped, replaced by a suppressed groan. Through his twin consciousness, Si Qi felt a sticky malice eroding Shao Wei's mental picture.
"Disconnect the deep link!" Si Qi ordered immediately.
"No..." Shao Wei's voice was filled with struggle, "It... is tracking in the opposite direction..."
The main screen was suddenly covered in noise, and a distorted image gradually became clear—a collection of countless eyes, each pupil reflecting a different vision of destruction. The moment its gaze met Si Qi's, an unbearable torrent of knowledge flooded into his consciousness:
They call themselves "Spellweavers." These ancient beings, who existed at the dawn of the universe, believe that the orderly laws of physics are a disease, and they are the doctors who cure it. The Reaper Fleet and the Void Mayfly are merely tools they use for "treatment."
The Zhulong's shield flickered violently under the cognitive attack. Siqi felt his consciousness being torn apart, and countless contradictory realities flooded into his mind simultaneously.
“Focus!”
Shao Wei's cry pierced the fog like an icicle. Through the remaining connection of consciousness, he constructed a temporary logical firewall. "Their attack relies on the target's perception of reality! Imagine an absolutely stable reference frame!"
Si Qi understood immediately. He focused all his mental energy on a certain, unchanging image in his memory—the path of raindrops sliding down the veins of banana leaves in a Jiangnan courtyard.
As this image solidified in his mind, the distorted space and time around him suddenly froze for a moment. Shao Wei seized the opportunity, increasing the scanning accuracy to the limit, and finally locked onto the true location of the pollution source.
Not a certain coordinate, but the entire star field itself.
"They are spaces!" Shao Wei's voice was distorted by shock. "We are inside a weaver!"
This discovery made all tactics a joke. How to kill a space? How to destroy a dimension?
The structure of the Zhulong began to disintegrate. Armor plating peeled away like dead leaves, reality attenuation erasing their existence at a molecular level.
In despair, Si Qi looked at Shao Wei. Without words, his twin consciousnesses had already conveyed the final plan—a move they had never tried before, a move that theoretically would result in mutual destruction.
"Are you sure?" Shao Wei asked. His mind was unusually calm, as if he were discussing the dinner menu.
Si Qi laughed crazily: "Anyway, the probability won't be lower."
Both of them simultaneously unleashed their full mental power. But this time, instead of attacking outward, they compressed it inward—using their own consciousness as a mold, forging the remaining particles of spacetime into entirely new laws of physics.
The process was like sculpting reality with thought. Si Qi was responsible for constructing the framework, while Shao Wei performed the precise calibration. They began by reshaping the fundamentals, the gravitational constant, then the speed of light, the strong interaction...
For the first time, the Spellweaver showed signs of "pain." The entire star field began to convulse violently, and the stars exploded like diamonds thrown into a furnace. Those eyes flickered wildly, trying to erase this "anomaly" with a more powerful reality overlay.
But it was too late.
As the new laws of physics completed their final cycle, an incredible scene unfolded: with the Zhulong at its center, the normal starry sky spread outward like a prairie fire. The stars returned to their proper orbits, the Milky Way resumed its elegant spiral arms, and the tampered physical constants stabilized.
The Weavers wailed silently. To them, this was more terrifying than death—they were forever trapped in the "disease" they were trying to "cure."
The Zhulong drifted in the tranquil starry sky, its hull as battered as a toy ravaged by a child. Inside the bridge, Si Qi and Shao Wei slumped over the control consoles, their consciousness almost completely detached.
"Next time..." Si Qi's voice was so weak that it was almost a whisper, "Try a gentler treatment method."
Shao Wei didn't respond. He was intently watching the data coming back from the sensors—something entirely new was brewing in that reshaped star field.
Not the Spellweavers, nor any known civilization.
Something...younger, full of possibilities.
He slowly raised the corners of his mouth.
"interesting."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
