141: Is this the real world?

He switched to an [Anti-Gravity Polar Shuttle (Snowy Owl Model)].

This was a single-person vehicle shaped like a futuristic fighter jet; it had no wheels or treads, but instead hovered about half a meter above the ice, propelled by ion engines.

It was like a silver bolt of lightning, streaking rapidly across the vast white wilderness.

As he ventured deeper into the interior, the altitude continued to climb.

Two thousand meters, three thousand meters, four thousand meters.

This place was known as "Dome A," the highest point of the Antarctic inland ice sheet.

The ice layer here was over three thousand meters thick, which meant that the ice beneath Jiang Yuan's feet sealed away the history of Earth from the past hundreds of thousands of years.

The temperature had dropped to a despair-inducing minus seventy degrees.

Here, the breath one exhaled was no longer a white mist, but would instantly condense into tiny ice crystals, emitting a "hissing" sound known as the "sound of human breath."

...

Evening.

Or rather, the moment when the light on this polar day continent grew slightly dim.

The sun did not set completely, but lingered near the horizon, dyeing the entire ice sheet a dreamy violet.

Jiang Yuan stopped the shuttle.

This was an extremely flat ice sheet with no reference points in any direction, only the mirror-smooth blue ice beneath his feet.

"Let's stay here tonight."

Jiang Yuan stepped off the shuttle and onto the iron-hard ice.

If one were to camp in a place like this, ordinary polar tents simply could not withstand the cold winds of late night.

But Jiang Yuan did not intend to use that ready-made nano-villa this time.

Adapt to the surroundings.

Since he had come to this kingdom of ice and snow, he naturally had to stay in a palace of ice and snow.

"Zero, initiate construction mode."

"Material lock: high-density blue ice."

"Design blueprint: Crystal Palace."

Jiang Yuan extended his right hand, palm facing down, aiming at the ice surface beneath his feet.

Hum—

A visible blue ripple of energy spread outward, centered on his palm.

That was the [Molecular Manipulation Force Field].

A miracle was once again unfolding in this uninhabited region.

The originally flat ice surface began to bulge, flow, and reorganize.

Under the influence of the force field, the hard ice became as soft and obedient as modeling clay.

Countless ice crystals danced in the air, automatically arranging themselves.

No steel bars, no cement, not a single nail.

A structure made entirely of pure ice blocks was rising from the ground.

It was not one of those crude Eskimo igloos, but a piece of modernist architecture full of geometric beauty and artistic flair.

The walls were transparent, polished at a molecular level, resembling a single massive piece of crystal.

The roof was a streamlined dome, designed to prevent snow accumulation and withstand the wind.

In just ten minutes.

A "Crystal Palace of Ice" covering about one hundred square meters stood quietly atop the Antarctic.

Illuminated by the afterglow of the setting sun, it refracted brilliant light throughout its body, as if it were a diamond dropped into the mortal world by the gods.

...

Jiang Yuan walked into the house.

All the furniture here was made of ice.

Ice sofas, ice coffee tables, an ice bar, and even a massive ice bed floating in mid-air.

"Zero, activate the interior environment force field."

"Temperature lock: 22 degrees Celsius."

"Activate 'material lock' mode to prevent the ice from melting."

As the command was issued, an invisible film covered all the ice furniture.

This force field not only isolated the ice from human body heat to prevent melting but also provided a soft tactile sensation.

When you sat on this seemingly hard and cold ice sofa, it felt like sitting on the softest cloud, and it was warm.

This was the power of technology—making the laws of physics serve comfort.

The night deepened.

Although it was the polar day season, today was a special day—the peak period of solar activity.

A geomagnetic storm was brewing.

Jiang Yuan lay on that massive transparent ice bed.

The bed faced the dome directly.

Through that layer of high-purity ice, which was even more transparent than glass, he could look directly up at the heart-stoppingly deep firmament above.

There was not a trace of light pollution here.

Even the moon had not yet risen.

There were only the Prosperous Stars filling the sky, densely packed, so many that they could trigger trypophobia.

The Milky Way looked like a milky white river spanning the entire horizon, as if one could reach out and pluck it.

"It's here."

Jiang Yuan looked at the sky, his pupils slightly constricting.

As a powerhouse who had unlocked the Third-Order Gene Lock, he could sense the violent stream of solar wind particles outside the atmosphere, frantically bombarding Earth's magnetic defense line.

The next second.

The sky lit up.

The originally deep blue night sky suddenly looked as if a bucket of glowing paint had been splashed onto it.

A green band of light rose from the horizon without warning, like a massive green ribbon, winding and dancing across the starry sky.

That was the Aurora Australis.

Immediately after, there were purple, pink, red...

Colorful lights erupted instantly, occupying his entire field of vision.

They were no longer static but flowing and leaping wildly.

It was as if they were playing a silent, grand symphony, or as if the skirts of countless gods were brushing across the sky.

The bands of light hung down, as if they were just a few hundred meters above his head.

That shock was enough to make any language pale in comparison.

The entire ice house was illuminated in a riot of colors.

Jiang Yuan lay on the bed, feeling as if he were floating in the center of the universe, enveloped by this miracle in the sky.

"It's so beautiful..."

Jiang Yuan exclaimed sincerely.

In his hand, he held a glass of freshly mixed "Aurora Cocktail," the liquid changing colors under the light.

He quietly admired the scene.

Watching the green band of light pour down like a waterfall, watching the purple halo diffuse like smoke.

This masterpiece of nature was indeed incomparable to any special effects.

However.

Just as Jiang Yuan was immersed in this ultimate beauty.

His brow suddenly furrowed, ever so slightly.

Something was wrong.

His eyes, this pair of genetically enhanced eyes capable of tracking the trajectory of a bullet, had caught a trace of... discord.

Just a moment ago.

When that most spectacular green aurora band performed a complex dynamic movement similar to a "spiral flip."

Its flow seemed to...

Stutter for a moment.

That stutter was extremely subtle.

Probably only a few milliseconds, or even shorter.

It was like playing a AAA masterpiece on a high-end computer, with the frame rate maintaining a perfectly smooth 144 FPS, but suddenly, due to the graphics card overheating or a data read error, the frame rate instantly dropped to 143 FPS.

For ordinary people, this was impossible to detect.

The naked eye would automatically fill in this tiny stutter as a smooth image.

But in Jiang Yuan's eyes, at that moment, a trace of extremely fleeting, mosaic-like blur appeared at the edge of that light band.

Although it returned to normal the very next instant, still smooth and silky.

But Jiang Yuan was certain he hadn't seen it wrong.

"Zero."

Jiang Yuan's voice became somewhat low, and the relaxed feeling of admiring the scenery vanished.

"I am here."

"Did you record the aurora from just now?"

"Recording throughout, Master."

"Playback the last second. Slow it down a thousand times."

"Processing..."

A holographic projection unfolded in the middle of the ice house.

It was the footage of the aurora flipping just now.

After being slowed down a thousand times, every frame of the image was clearly visible.

The flow of light particles, the ionization reaction of the atmosphere...

Everything looked perfect, conforming to the laws of physics.

"No abnormalities, Master. According to spectral analysis, this is a normal luminescence phenomenon caused by solar wind particles striking the upper atmosphere," Zero concluded.

Jiang Yuan looked at the holographic image and fell silent.

Could it be an illusion?

Was it visual nerve fatigue caused by the continuous high-intensity travel over the past few days, combined with high-altitude hypoxia (even though he didn't need oxygen)?

No.

Jiang Yuan shook his head.

At his level of existence, his control over his own body was one hundred percent.

It was absolutely impossible for him to make such a low-level mistake as "seeing things."

That feeling just a moment ago was too eerie.

That "stutter" did not feel like a physical phenomenon of the natural world.

It felt more like...

A pre-set program, when running to an extremely complex computational node, experiencing a slight delay due to insufficient computing power.

Jiang Yuan sat up and put down his glass.

He no longer lay down, but stared intently through the transparent ice wall at the gorgeous curtain of light still dancing wildly above.

The aurora was still stunningly beautiful, still unpredictable.

As if the sense of discord from that moment had never existed.

But a seed of doubt had already been planted in the depths of Jiang Yuan's heart.

"This world..."

Jiang Yuan reached out, pressing his hand against the air through the ice wall, towards the sky.

His fingers tapped lightly on the ice surface.

"Is it really this perfect?"

The night wind howled, and the aurora filled the sky.

In this stunning, fairytale-like Crystal Palace, Jiang Yuan felt for the first time a chill that was even more bone-piercing than the Antarctic wind.

That chill came from questioning reality.

If even this miracle in the sky was just some kind of "rendered" image.

Then, the ice beneath his feet, the air he breathed, and even... himself.

Were they real?

Jiang Yuan closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and forcibly suppressed those unsettling thoughts.

"Maybe I'm overthinking it."

He lay back down on the bed, but he no longer had the mood to purely enjoy the scenery as before.

His deep eyes, under the colorful light and shadow, flickered with a cold light of investigation and vigilance.

"No matter what it is..."

"As long as I reach the end, everything will have an answer."

Outside the ice house, the aurora continued to dance tirelessly, as if trying hard to cover up something.