179: Chapter 179 The Warning from the Stars
The disappearance of the "Ripper" was like a cold needle, piercing the thin bubble of joy left after the victory celebration.
The atmosphere inside the "Bright Dawn" base tightened again. All traces of celebration were quickly removed, replaced by denser data streams and more frequent encrypted communications. Lin Mo ordered all monitoring data from before and after the "Ripper" disappeared to be cross-referenced with the information stream characteristics captured during the "the piercer"'s final self-destruction.
The full-power operation of the "system" supercomputer caused the base's energy conduits to emit a low hum.
After forty-eight hours without sleep, a preliminary report was placed before Lin Mo.
The report was thin, only three pages. The conclusion section was written in bold:
【Preliminary assessment: The silence and withdrawal behavior of the "Ripper" conform to the preset 'observation - evaluation - transmission' logic. Its space-jump energy signature exhibits high homologous resonance with the directional encoding in the "the piercer"'s self-destruction information stream. There is an 87.3% probability that the information from both has merged and is being transmitted to the same destination via an unknown superluminal or quantum non-local channel.】
【Based on reverse analysis of the "the piercer" wreckage and combat data modeling, it is inferred that the "reaper" civilization possesses remote real-time information synchronization capabilities, and its combat units may be distributed network nodes. The destruction of a single node does not affect information integrity, but it will trigger an alert and raise the subsequent response level.】
Lin Mo closed the report, his knuckles turning slightly white from the force.
Distributed network nodes... real-time information synchronization... response level raised...
Every word was like a heavy piece of ice, crashing into his heart.
This meant that their act of destroying "the piercer" had not scared the enemy away; instead, it might have been like poking a hornet's nest, inviting more systematic, more efficient attention and retaliation. That distant civilization that had manufactured these cold killing machines might have already received the "first battle report" about the "Solar System" and about human civilization.
"Guanghan Palace" base, deep space monitoring control station.
It was quieter here than at the "Bright Dawn" base, with only countless signal receiving arrays operating silently in the vacuum, capturing electromagnetic waves, gravitational waves, neutrino streams from every direction in the universe... any possible information carrier.
Station Chief Zhao Zhe was an elderly astrophysicist with graying hair. At this moment, his bloodshot eyes were fixed on an unremarkable waveform on the main screen. This was a dedicated monitoring channel for the "Thousand-Mile Eye Plan" array pointing outside the "Kuiper Belt", the direction from which the original "beacon" signal had come.
The waveform had originally been just regular cosmic background noise, but seventeen minutes ago, it had developed a tiny, almost noise-drowned "jitter".
"Amplify! Filter! Strip away all known natural pulsar, gamma-ray burst, and interstellar medium disturbance models!" Zhao Zhe's voice was hoarse and urgent.
The technicians' fingers flew as complex algorithms were layered on top of each other. The waveform on the screen was continuously cleaned and purified. That hint of "jitter" gradually became clear—it was not random; it had nanosecond-level periodicity, and its intensity was slowly, but surely... increasing.
"Station Chief... this modulation pattern..." a young analyst's voice trembled, "matches more than 60% with a certain checksum fragment in the "the piercer" self-destruction information stream we deciphered earlier!"
Zhao Zhe's heart skipped a beat. "Connect to the "system"! Request highest priority computing power support for deep pattern recognition and cryptographic attack! Hurry!"
The vast computing power of the "system" connected instantly. Massive amounts of monitoring data and all information characteristics left behind by the "the piercer" and "Ripper" were fed into a huge simulation decryption furnace. The quantum computing unit began brute-forcing possible encoding logic, and the neural network model searched for the hidden patterns among countless possibilities.
Time ticked by. Inside the monitoring station, there was only the roar of machine cooling fans and the suppressed breathing of the people.
Suddenly!
The waveform on the main screen jumped violently! It wasn't a signal enhancement, but rather the "system" had successfully stripped away the outer disguise and encryption, revealing the information structure at the core!
It was no longer a simple waveform, but had been parsed into strings of dazzlingly complex multi-dimensional data packets. They automatically classified, decoded, and reorganized...
Finally, in the center of the screen, they condensed into three extremely short, yet chilling streams of information that made the entire monitoring station feel as if it had fallen into an ice cave:
The first segment was a repeated confirmation signal, like a cold electronic receipt:
【Unit 7 - "the piercer" - Status: Lost. Final data stream received. Combat record analysis complete. Civilization identification: Unregistered. Technical assessment: Primitive intra-stellar / primitive inter-stellar. Resistance intensity: Low (Adaptive protocol breached for the first time). Threat rating: Elevated from 'Observation' to 'Cleaning - Priority 2'.】
The second segment was a concise instruction or status synchronization:
【Unit 4 - "Ripper" - Status: Withdrawn. Observation mission complete. Supplement: Detected that primitive civilization likely possesses basic field modulation technology (Chaos Attack). Recommendation: Cleaning protocol upgraded, recommend dispatching "Purifiers" class unit. Return coordinates locked.】
The third segment was the shortest, and the most hair-raising. It did not seem to be sent specifically to any unit, but rather, like a lighthouse broadcast, it was a "beacon" update continuously sent toward some direction, or multiple directions, outside the "Solar System":
【Star region: Orion Arm - Edge Zone. Star system: GSC-4471 ("Solar System"). Civilization status: Activity confirmed, technical transition period. Cleaning protocol triggered. Harvest window estimated: Within 300-500 standard time units. Resource rating: Pending assessment. Coordinates: [Attached with a string of extremely complex multi-dimensional space-time coordinate parameters].】
【...Repeating broadcast...】
【...Repeating broadcast...】
"Boom—!!"
Zhao Zhe seemed to have been struck by an invisible heavy hammer, stumbling backward and crashing into the console. His face was pale, his lips trembling, but he could not make a sound.
Inside the monitoring station, there was a deathly silence. Everyone stared blankly at the three segments of information cycling on the screen, a chill rushing from the soles of their feet to the tops of their heads.
"Cleaning protocol"... "Priority 2"... "Purifiers class unit"... "Harvest window"...
Every word was soaked in a naked, condescending will for destruction. From the perspective of the "reaper" civilization, the "Solar System" and humanity were nothing more than an unregistered target in a "technical transition period" that needed to be "cleaned". It was just like a farmer discovering a patch of weeds growing well and deciding to send a more efficient tool to clear them out.
And that "beacon" was not some accidentally leaked signal at all! It was a "mark", a "death notice", a—hunting coordinate—that proclaimed to the universe "there is a civilization here to be harvested"!
"Immediately... immediately take all data, raise the encryption level to the highest, and send it to Consultant Lin at "Bright Dawn"! Send it to the GDC Supreme Council!" Zhao Zhe used all his strength to squeeze the sound from his throat, "Hurry!!!"
The data stream, like a desperate howl, crossed the Earth-Moon space and crashed into the "Bright Dawn" base.
When Lin Mo, Elder Chen, and the GDC core member representatives who had joined via emergency link finished reading the deciphered information, even the most composed politicians and generals lost the color in their faces instantly.
In the video conference channel, there was a heavy, deathly silence, with only heavy breathing rising and falling.
"They... they broadcasted our coordinates...?" A representative from Europa asked in a dry voice, filled with incredulous fear.
"Not just the coordinates," Lin Mo's voice rang out in the silence, cold and clear, as if it could freeze the air, "it is a 'cleaning order'. "the piercer" was our test score sheet, and the result was 'Unqualified, but possesses resistance capability'. Therefore, the next batch to arrive will not be testers, but "Purifiers"—executioners specialized in cleaning. Moreover, this 'order' may have been seen by all "reapers" or whatever else that can receive this "beacon"."
The Dark Forest law was displayed in the most cruel and direct way to human civilization, which had just been cheering for a victory.
You lit a torch and drove away a wolf, but you didn't know that the light also attracted the gaze of the predators of the entire forest.
"How much... how much time do we have?" Long Zhantian's voice came from the "soaring heavens", still steady, but one could faintly hear a tension like metal grinding.
""Harvest window estimated: 300-500 standard cycles"." Lin Mo repeated that information, ""system" is currently converting this based on the possible timekeeping benchmarks in the "the piercer" wreckage. Preliminary estimate... this 'standard cycle' is very likely close to our Earth years."
Three hundred to five hundred years?
A trace of absurd luck had just risen in many people's hearts—if it really was several hundred years, humanity still had time...
But Lin Mo's next sentence completely crushed this trace of luck:
"However, 'recommend dispatching Purifiers class unit', and it is 'Priority 2'. This means their reaction speed will not be slow. This 'window period' might be the time for the other side to mobilize resources on a large scale and plan their route. And the arrival time of the vanguard "Purifiers"..." He paused, his gaze sweeping over every pale or livid face on the screen, "might be far faster than we imagined."
"How fast?" Elder Chen asked the question on everyone's mind.
"I don't know." Lin Mo shook his head, "It depends on what their so-called "Purifiers" are, where they are, and how they travel. But based on the space-jump capability demonstrated by the "Ripper"... a few years? A dozen years? Or even... shorter."
In the conference channel, there was a sound of suppressed gasps.
A few years? A dozen years? For the development scale of an interstellar civilization, this was just like tomorrow morning!
"What should we do?" The representative from Polar Bear Country asked in a rough voice, "Hide like a tortoise? Or..."
"We can't hide." Lin Mo said decisively, "The coordinates have been lit up like a lighthouse. There is only one thing we can do—"
He stood up, and the star map behind him automatically lit up. The "Solar System" was highlighted, and that harvest coordinate from the "beacon" pointing to deep space hung over humanity's home like a scarlet arrow.
"Use the fastest, craziest speed in these '300-500 cycles' to arm ourselves!"
"Upgrade the "North Heaven Gate" project! Not a defensive circle, but a fortress! A bastion! An iron wall that will make any bastard who dares to come "harvest" break their teeth!"
"All technology obtained from reverse engineering, regardless of the cost, regardless of the price, must be converted into productivity, into weapons, into a fleet!"
"From today on, all of humanity enters a true 'War Era'! Not a civil war for territory and resources, but a life-and-death battle for the survival of the entire civilization!"
His voice was not loud, but it carried a power that pierced the soul, roaring in the ears of every attendee.
"The Star Sea has given us a warning, and it has also given us the final time—even if it might be very short."
"Whether to wait for harvest like lambs to the slaughter, or to grip our weapons and make this starry sky remember the name of humanity—"
"The choice is ours."
The meeting ended, and the orders were issued like thunder.
The global celebration atmosphere that had just subsided was quickly transformed into an unprecedented wartime mobilization atmosphere filled with tragedy and determination, under the intentional release and guidance of information from the highest levels.
The lights in the factories never went out overnight, the welding light of the shipyards was more dazzling than the stars, and the shouts on the training grounds resounded through the clouds.
And in the deepest part of the "Bright Dawn" base, Lin Mo stood alone in front of the huge star map, looking at that glaring scarlet coordinate.
The "system" interface unfolded silently before his eyes, and a line of new golden text slowly emerged:
【Civilization survival mission final stage triggered: Watchers of the Dark Forest.】
【Mission objective: Before the 'harvest window' closes, build a civilization defense system capable of resisting "Purifiers" class threats, and explore the truth behind the origin of the "reapers" and the possible cosmic laws behind them.】
【Reward: ...The possibility of continuing the spark of civilization.】
【Failure: Civilization marked as 'Cleaned'.】
Lin Mo reached out, his fingertips pointing virtually at that scarlet coordinate, as if he could feel the cold and endless malice coming from behind it.
He whispered to himself, as if declaring to the entire starry sky:
"Come."
"Let's see who the final hunter in this dark forest really is."