Chapter 1,573 A Civilization that Disappeared Overnight

It has been three days since the second batch of deep space probes launched entered the universe. Because we don’t know what the Forge of God looks like or whether it is a conspicuous space entity, these probes are different from the first batch of probes. They are all searching the universe in low-speed mode, but even the "low-speed mode" is for Xiling Technology - three days have passed, and even the closest detector has almost reached the boundary of the galaxy we are in. It's almost 170,000 light-years away from here.

The meticulous search step by step of the low-speed detector finally bore fruit: in an unusually desolate and empty place on the edge of the Milky Way, they found traces of an artificial energy source, and the "level" of this energy source was quite high, although it was not Psionic energy, but it is definitely some kind of extraordinary power on the same level as psionic energy. If the God's Forge is really related to the blocked state of the universe, then this energy source is most likely to be the God's Forge. Anyway, we haven't found a more advanced artificial energy yet.

It seems that it will take a day or two for Celine to get permission to meet the Pope (if the heresy incident here really reaches the level that requires the Pope's personal intervention), then Sandora and I will have the opportunity to go to the border of the Galaxy to see It depends on the situation. Anyway, with teleportation technology, running around in the universe can be done in the blink of an eye.

Before I left, I made some random excuses. For example, the sandora ball accidentally dazzled my eyes when comparing the brightness with the sun yesterday. Today, I wanted to find a place where no one was around to recuperate my body and mind. I might have to be in the forest all day. It turned out that Celine had no doubts about our meritorious service in reporting heretics. She just reminded us not to spend the night in the forest, and then continued to work hard to pick up the rags returned by a group of adventurers.

We first teleported to the Imperial Admiral, mainly here to see the situation of the group of technological revivalists, and to see whether the consciousness of the two special patients had been fully restored.

This space castle, which is hundreds of kilometers long, has now ushered in the most deserted historical period since it was built. Apart from visitors, the only "residents" on the spacecraft are a lot of autonomous machines, and it is empty and quiet like a ghost town. . The technological revivalist prisoners who were captured here woke up in the prisoner of war camp and faced such a cold, silent, strange and unpopular empty world. Although they live in cells, everyone knows about the empire's space expansion technology, and we may have to put all kinds of strange species into the prison, so the imperial wardens never refuse to make the cell space wider , so even those ordinary isolation areas piled up with super alloys are almost as large as small towns. Each "guest" gets a separate room. If they are at both ends of the room, then the distance between the two people It’s almost far enough to require a semaphore (if they can see the other side through the alloy wall of the cell)... I still think that idiot Alaya didn’t have any brains when assigning rooms.

The mind was shattered by the "terrible disaster" and was taken to a strange place in a daze. After waking up, I only saw the cold alloy world in all directions. No one explained the cause and effect to me, no one could talk to and inquire, and my partners were nowhere to be found. I was trapped alone in a metal box that seemed to be built by a giant. Except for appearing at regular times every day. Apart from the food in the food trough, there are only monster-like robots (by the way, I actually think autonomous machines are quite cute) that occasionally appear in front of me, giving rough and blunt instructions on how to use the various facilities in the cell— —This experience definitely puts a lot of pressure on people. So when Sandora and I appeared in front of the "leader" again, the other party was huddled in the corner. Her frightened look made it almost impossible to tell that she was still a slightly heroic female leader a few days ago.

Seeing this sister's frightened look, I felt a little sorry. I and Sandora had been busy contacting the detector group or studying various information obtained from Celine for the past two days, and had hardly paid much attention to the empire. The situation of the general number. Although I haven't forgotten that there are still people locked up here, it's almost forgotten. This shows the disadvantages of insufficient manpower: usually the Imperial Admiral has a permanent population of tens to millions, and even the unlucky ones who are thrown into the prisoner of war camp can come into contact with others, so this kind of situation will never happen. A large pile of machines were thrown into a corner and left unattended for several days. And now the only Xiling apostles in the entire universe are me and Sandora, including a silly cat angel who is not very smart, and a little baby head who sleeps in the spiritual world all day long. The last two people together can barely account for half of it - the manpower is really too busy. Moreover, Sandora and I are not used to taking care of these minutiae matters personally: let alone my carelessness, has Her Majesty the Queen ever been personally responsible for providing humane care to prisoners?

I almost "trudged a long way" from the door of the cell to the female leader. While thinking about whether to order the redesign of this type II cell, I said hello to the other party: "Hey, we are here to see you. It looks like we are afraid. Have the sequelae of the disaster been completely eliminated?"

The female leader looked up at me and Sandora. Her first reaction was... no reaction. She blinked hard, then rubbed her eyes for a long time before finally confirming that she was not hallucinating. Then "Teng" jumped up: "Ah! A living person!"

I:"……"

Suddenly I feel that my previous apology was a waste of emotion. How can I break it? !

"Nonsense, of course it's a living person!" I didn't say anything, but Sandora spoke first, "The sequelae of the 'terrorist disaster' are not that serious. You should almost recognize our two faces by now."

The female leader pinched her arm, then quickly looked around at the cold alloy walls, and then looked at me in disbelief: "You brought me here?! Where is this place, you... who are you? !?"

Then she suddenly took half a step back and made a subconscious defensive posture: "Are you a heretic? Which ancient palace is this?"

"Sometimes I appreciate your brainstorming ability, but sometimes your brainstorming is really annoying," Sandoraball said dissatisfied, "You and your men were indeed imprisoned by us, but we and Lost It doesn’t matter about the cult. I’m not here to continue the interrogation this time. I’m just checking out the situation here to prevent you from scaring yourself. Are you okay living here?”

The female leader looked at the Shandora ball in my arms in astonishment. She may have finally recalled the terrifying moment in her mind that she didn't want to recall, and then she said something particularly desperate from the bottom of her heart while her mind was shaken. : "Is there a speaker in this light egg? Is it your communication equipment? Are you responsible for transporting the speakers? Why doesn't this woman show up in person?"

"Sandora, calm down! Impulse is the devil!" I quickly hugged my wife's ball in my arms. "If you get killed, you have to be resurrected!"

In the end, I was worried in vain. Sandora didn't seem to take it to heart at all: "I am the queen, do I need to be serious with her?"

"Uh, okay," I said to the female leader, "Congratulations on escaping. Our identity is rather complicated, and you probably can't understand it. As for this place... it can only be said to be a prison, but it's not I won’t hold you for long. I want to get some information from you. So I will hold you here for the time being. I will explain a little bit..."

Next, I probably let the other party know her own situation, because it was not necessary to mention the Xiling Empire at this time, so I just said in general that I and Sandora came from a very distant advanced civilization. Anyway, the more advanced the better, the better. The degree of advancedness and power can be infinitely improved depending on the plot. In short, this is not the point. The point is that there are countless hot-blooded battle nuns and battle monks in the Lost God Religion who are wandering around carrying particle rifles and pulse cannons. They are searching for technology all over the world. These "heretics" of the revivalists are always ready to give up first and ask questions later. If the female leader and her subordinates are handed over, it will be done without leaving a single person alive, from the leading cadres down to the rich and powerful. Therefore, from the side, staying in this prison will temporarily save many people here. One life.

I believe that the extreme conflict between the church and the technological revivalists will not last long, if I and Sandora figure out why the tree elves want to implement a technological blockade and solve this problem. Then the conflict between the technical revivalists and the church is actually gone, and all that is left are purely criminal cases that are not based on conflicts of faith. One of the reasons we go to such trouble to protect these tech revivalists is this: Their motives for reviving technology are entirely good, even if many of them are extremists. But nearly half of the remaining members are just scientists and heritage scholars. I really don't want to watch these simple and passionate guys fall down the night before the technological revival.

Oh, that statement the night before was not artistic enough. It should be said that the last night before dawn... seems even less literary?

"This is the situation," I explained the situation on the surface in a simple and clear way. "In short, you will be safer here. Most of the people in the technological revivalists have not committed any crimes. There is no need to rush to die in these last few days. Religious vendetta is a bad thing, so I have 'protected' you. Of course, you should also know that many of your subordinates are... Haha, they should just die here for a while. To be honest, you guys make me very happy. Contradictory, your revival activities make Sandora and I happy from the bottom of our hearts. This shows that a civilization is very salvageable, but why do so many of you slowly become like terrorists? "

The female leader didn't seem to be able to accept the concept of "visitors from outside the world", so she listened to me and Sandora introducing the situation in a daze, not knowing where to start until I changed the topic to technology. She showed some weird expressions about the revivalists, and seemed to have some emotion in her words: "No large-scale organization can remain pure. No matter how high the ideal is, it can't stop the corruption of individual people. And if you have been in contact with If you have experienced the Lost God Sect, you should naturally know how strict their blockade of knowledge is. In such a high-pressure environment... people will change their minds, and it is inevitable for such a large organization to have extremists. By the way, you are really from..."

"Don't worry about this. I've asked the same answer several times." I waved my hand to the other party. The female leader's face was full of doubts. Ordinary people are always full of suspicion. I It is even more impossible to dispel the barriers in the heart of such a "heroine" eldest sister in just a few words. Now I can't torture her with "terrorism" again, so I don't plan to tell her too much to challenge her three views. "In short, we intend to solve the problem of technological blockade in this world. Now that you have recovered, can you tell us what is going on with this technological blockade? You technological revivalists and the Lost God Religion have been dealing with it for so many years, and it should be Learn some of each other’s secrets.”

There is a reason why this question was postponed until today: when Shandora had just used "Terrorist Disaster" to defeat the opponent's psychological defense a few days ago, we did ask about this matter, but the mind under the attack of "Terrorist Disaster" Although he was undefended, he was trapped in an overly repressed state. This state caused the person concerned to answer questions honestly based on his own memory, and had almost no ability to use his brain to think on his own. In this way, we heard from the female leader The information received about the technical blockade is very one-sided. Now that the other party has regained consciousness, I want to hear her own guesses on this issue as an "experienced" leader of a resistance organization.

This kind of speculation may bring us closer to the truth, and we are about to come into contact with the Pope of the Lost Religion. Knowing more about the situation will also help us find a breakthrough in negotiations when the time comes. After all, neither Sandora nor I intend to use violence to force the Pope to submit.

"The teachings of the Lost God Cult are very clear. Mortals abused technology and brought about the end of the world. Therefore, the gods were angry and blocked knowledge. Now mortals need to 'atone', and the progress of the atonement is decided by the Lost God Cult, so they control it naturally. Knowledge." The female leader thought for a while and felt that this question did not involve the secrets of her organization (in fact, she had revealed a lot of secrets under the influence of "terrorism" a few days ago), so she opened up the conversation boldly, " The Lost God Sect has been controlling knowledge for tens of thousands of years. Elves are the core of this sect. They have enough lifespan to complete this long-term project. Ordinary races do not live as long as they do, so generations of people grow old, sick and die, and slowly... Taking the Lost Gods Religion as a matter of course... Tsk."

"It seems that you don't believe in the teachings of the Lost God Cult." I sat at the table opposite the female leader, and turned on the holographic projection system installed on the table, showing an overhead view of the planet, "This is your planet. In fact, this is your planet. We have conducted some 'checks' these days. The main purpose is to determine whether your planet has been destroyed by war. At first, we also believed in the legend of the Lost God Cult and thought that a high-tech war might have broken out on this planet. A war caused the survivors to block the technology, but through the scanning of two thousand three hundred detection points, we finally determined that this planet has not suffered any global-level disaster in the past two hundred thousand years. You know what that means."

The female leader looked at the projection in front of her in amazement. Her focus was completely distorted: "Ah! What is this?! Is this your display device? Is this... is it technology or magic? It's amazing! This is beautiful. The small ball is our world? Sure enough, the earth model mentioned in those ancient materials is correct, the world is a sphere. This is really... Even if there is more evidence to prove this, we have never seen the shape of our own world. The whole picture!”

This is really sad. The space station you built tens of thousands of years ago is still hanging in the sky, but people on the surface have almost forgotten that the earth is a ball.

I knocked on the table and signaled the female leader who had climbed onto the table to get down quickly, at least not to squat on the table: "I will let you slowly study the holographic projection when you have the opportunity in the future. Now let's get down to business first, okay sister?"

"Oh, oh, I'm sorry, I'm a little rude, I'm very interested in these novel things..." The female leader jumped down awkwardly, "What did you just say? Oh, by the way, you said that our world did not explode back then... disaster?"

Only then did I finally realize how much information I just said, and the female leader suddenly showed a horrified look.

Obviously, even the technological revivalists believe in the legends of ancient wars, and they have not questioned the Lost God Religion on this point, but now even this last common understanding is about to be broken.

"Yes, there are no traces of world-class man-made disasters on this planet. There is no large-scale civil war, and there are no signs of being attacked by external forces. There is not even a crater that can destroy a city," I said with a serious expression. , "In other words: Your ancient technology was not destroyed due to violence or sabotage at all, but... it disappeared out of thin air overnight for no reason, and then you began to live the life of primitive people without any doubt or reason. Life, do you understand this?”

"The Lost God Cult can't do this kind of thing!" The female leader immediately exclaimed, "They... they are also the victims of the technological blockade. Our organization has many spies who have infiltrated the high levels of the God Cult and can determine the identity of those heretics. No matter how advanced the technology is, it is only the beginning of an ancient civilization. How could they just... quietly obliterate a civilization that was so powerful back then?"

"I can't say for sure whether it was eradicated, but it is certain that the ancient people tens of thousands of years ago took the initiative to give up technology when the world was at peace." I shook my finger. "The whole world was at the same time as agreed. They all withdrew from the advanced cities, turned off the reactors, locked the gates of the base, and then began to live a life in the wilderness where men farmed and women weaved. Of course, we have not found convincing documentation, so we can only learn from some ruins. From the scanned images and geological remote sensing maps of the entire planet, we can determine the age of civilization at that time.”

We just learned about this situation yesterday, and the process of its discovery was quite dramatic: neither Sandora nor I expected that there would be other hidden secrets in the civilizational dating of this planet, but there was a newly assembled probe that was discovered before departure. A "multi-subject scan" was conducted on the planet for testing purposes, and as a result, its glance revealed this shocking secret: the entire planet's ancient ruins were abandoned at the same time, and there were no signs of war. ! (To be continued...)