144: Chapter 144: Major Events

Gao Yuan had originally thought this was just a place similar to a village.

But upon closer observation, he discovered it was filled with various equipment. Gao Yuan walked around, wanting to see more clearly.

At that moment, a young man approached him.

"Director Gao, hello! I am an academician of the Human Federation Academy of Sciences and a student of Dean Gao. My name is Lin Xiao!"

Gao Gan's student?

Gao Yuan extended his hand. "Hello, Academician Lin!"

"Does Director Gao have many doubts? I have worked in this settlement for twenty years; I built this settlement with my own hands. The Dean has built a hundred such settlements across the globe!"

"Why?"

Gao Yuan asked.

Over twenty years ago, Gao Qiu began arranging space-time nodes, and Gao Gan began setting up these settlements.

Could it be that even back then, they were already planning to burn down the Eight Great Capitals?

"Why are you telling me this?"

Gao Yuan asked.

Lin Xiao pointed toward a building ahead, which was also the only building in this settlement.

"This is Environmental Monitoring Station No. 021! However, unlike the Ecological Patrol Team of the Development General Administration, the Environmental Monitoring Stations are under the Human Federation Council! That is our monitoring station; Director Gao, please follow me inside to take a look!"

Gao Yuan found it somewhat hard to understand. If these monitoring stations were built 20 years ago, how could the Development General Administration have agreed? Moreover, they hadn't sabotaged them over all these years, nor had they even planted radiation belts around them!

Gao Yuan was full of confusion, but he still followed Lin Xiao toward the monitoring station.

The monitoring station was massive and tall! Standing below it, Gao Yuan's neck hurt from looking up.

"It is 512 meters high. If it were in Longjing, it would be a very ordinary building, but here, one can see scenes from hundreds of kilometers around!"

Lin Xiao spoke while leading Gao Yuan inside.

After entering the door, Gao Yuan saw a long corridor ahead. Both sides of the corridor were virtual scenes, playing something on a loop.

"This tells the story of the founding process of the Human Federation!"

Gao Yuan was currently looking at the scene on the left.

In 2030 AD, World War III broke out. The Western bloc pressed step by step into the Russian heartland. In the middle of the year, Russia nuked England, France...

The curtain rose on nuclear war.

At that time, China strictly adhered to peace and maintained a defensive posture. However, it was sneak-attacked by an atomic bomb from the Indians to the south, subsequently joining the fray and nuking India! The nuclear war reached its peak...

Global trade was cut off, food prices skyrocketed, and war, plague, and famine swept the world.

The war lasted for ten years. During those ten years, a total of over 3,000 nuclear warheads were detonated, and the vast majority of the Earth was shrouded in the haze of nuclear radiation.

After the war, the global population plummeted... only 2 billion people remained, 1 billion of whom were Chinese!

The Chinese government stepped forward to call for the establishment of a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind.

The following year, the Global Community with a Shared Future for Mankind Administration was established; this was the predecessor of the Human Federation.

Because the Chinese people held an absolute dominant position.

Within twenty years, Mandarin and Chinese culture had become the absolute mainstream.

At that time, humans could only huddle separately in a few places untouched by nuclear radiation, eventually forming eight metropolitan circles—these were the prototypes of the Eight Great Capitals!

Later, the Community with a Shared Future for Mankind was reorganized into the Human Federation!

At this point, humanity truly set aside their prejudices. There were no distinctions of country, ethnicity, or region, and technology entered the fast lane!

Afterward, the three-hundred-year era of the 'Technological Explosion' began!

During this period, humanity's fundamental physics and fundamental mathematics were fully developed.

Applied physics and applied chemistry changed with each passing day.

Because of the sharp reduction in arable land caused by nuclear radiation, people lived frugally and made it through the most difficult times!

Later, the appearance of Nutritional Paste and Constant Temperature Clothing allowed humanity to enter a period of population explosion.

In three hundred years, the population increased more than tenfold!

...

Looking at the historical events one by one, Gao Yuan finally understood why there were so many people in the Future World and why the people here were all Chinese...

So that was why!

Although these things were important, did they have anything to do with this current incident?

Gao Yuan looked up.

Lin Xiao was still beside him.

"Director Gao, what are your thoughts?"

"It hasn't been easy to get to this point..."

"Yes, everything was originally very beautiful... until two hundred years ago, when a rift appeared among the human upper echelons!"

"What happened two hundred years ago?"

Gao Yuan asked.

Lin Xiao shook his head. "I'm not clear on the specifics! Perhaps Dean Gao knows!"

"Academician Lin, did you have me come in just to see this?"

Gao Yuan asked.

"Of course not, let's continue further inside!"

Before them was a massive oval hall, with an area likely exceeding a thousand square meters and a height of over twenty meters...

In the middle of the hall was a giant needle!

The diameter at the base exceeded twenty meters!

"What is this?"

"A receiver!"

"Receiving what?"

"Cosmic signals from outside the Solar System. Besides these receivers, we have tens of thousands of satellite detectors throughout the Solar System. All the results from those detectors are gathered on Earth and then analyzed!"

Gao Yuan was now completely baffled.

With technology in this world being so advanced, why would they need to specially build such a large receiver to receive signals?

This wasn't scientific.

Unless...

They knew something.

For the Future World, with its advanced technology, to still need to go to such great lengths to monitor and receive signals, it was definitely a major matter.

Could the rift from two hundred years ago be because of this?

Gao Yuan looked at Lin Xiao. "You've been here for twenty years; what have you gained?"

Lin Xiao shook his head. "Nothing at all. In fact, after staying for a year at the beginning, I felt it was a waste of time and wanted to go back. At that time, Dean Gao told me that gaining nothing is the best gain. If one day our work yields results, it might mean the Solar System has reached its end!"

Gao Yuan's heart skipped a beat. It was indeed so. Why was it that even though technology was so developed, they had never launched probes outside the Solar System?

If this matter concerned the entire civilization, it was no wonder the Development General Administration wouldn't create obstacles.

"Academician Lin, how many people can this place accommodate at most?"

"With Constant Temperature Clothing, people can live directly in the woods. The only trouble is food, but over the past few years, I have stockpiled enough Nutritional Paste here to feed a billion people for half a year!"

A billion people!

That was quite a lot.

According to what Lin Xiao just said, there were a full hundred such settlements. If all the settlements were like this, it would be enough to feed a hundred billion people for half a year. The Earth currently only had a population of over forty billion, with humanity totaling fifty billion, though many were scattered across various planets in the Solar System!

Calculated this way, at least the rations for one year would be no problem. With the efficiency of the Future World, a year's time would be more than enough to build new cities.

This gave Gao Yuan some measure of comfort.

"Director Gao, perhaps I still need your support!"

"Me? Support with what?"

"Robots..."

Uh.

"Dean Gao told me that if I need robots and raw materials, I should look for you!"