39: Tower of Babel

When Elon returned to the United States on his private jet in a daze, the brilliant California sunshine outside the window seemed somewhat unreal to him.

The trip to Tianqiong City felt like a bizarre dream.

He had met the legendary StarRiver—a young man who was much younger and looked far more ordinary than he had imagined.

He had toured the future factory hidden deep underground, composed entirely of AI and robots, a place that would make any industrial designer bow down in worship.

He had learned the earth-shattering secret about the approaching alien fleet, a secret that would make all of Human Civilization tremble.

Finally, he had even been invited by that young man, in a tone bordering on an "appointment," to run for the most powerful position on this planet.

The amount of information in all of this was simply too much.

It was so much that even his brain, which prided itself on genius, divergent thinking, and the ability to handle multiple complex projects simultaneously, felt somewhat overloaded.

The plane landed at the private airport in Palo Alto.

Elon did not go home, nor did he go to the company.

He had his driver take him to one of his villas by the sea.

For the next three full days, he declined all visitors and meetings, locking himself alone in the house that overlooked the entire coastline.

He needed time.

He needed time to digest the news that was simply too shocking for him.

He needed time to re-examine the world he thought he had already seen through.

Sometimes he walked aimlessly on the beach, letting the cold sea breeze blow across his face, which was etched with both exhaustion and excitement.

At other times, he shut himself in his study with a blank sheet of paper in front of him.

He tried to use logic and reason to analyze the olive branch that Lei Wen had thrown his way—an olive branch filled with both temptation and danger.

Become president?

This thought had also flashed through his mind among the countless crazy dreams of his youth.

But he knew very well that he was not a qualified politician.

He did not like compromise, was not good at giving speeches, and detested those hypocritical political games.

He was an engineer, a dreamer, a tech fanatic who only wanted to advance technology.

But now, Lei Wen was telling him.

Everything he dreamed of had to be premised on him sitting in that position he disdained the most.

This was a paradox, a paradox filled with dark humor.

How should he choose?

Should he continue to be a "king" who wielded great power in the business and technology worlds?

Or should he challenge that "divine position" which he was completely unsuited for, yet which concerned the future of all Human Civilization?

Three days later, when the first rays of morning sunlight illuminated his messy study again, Elon finally made a decision.

He picked up his mobile phone.

It was the same phone that had previously been hacked by white flower.

He just looked at the screen, doing nothing.

One minute later, the Paradox Technology logo appeared on the screen again.

"It seems you have made your decision, Mr. Elon."

...

Just as Elon made up his mind and prepared to throw himself into an impending political storm, Lei Wen had already shifted his attention to another, grander domain.

He knew that for Elon to successfully ascend to the pinnacle of power during the coming turmoil, conspiracy and force alone were not enough.

He needed an open strategy that could fundamentally tip the scales of public opinion.

He wanted everyone to clearly see what concrete benefits the technological path represented by Paradox Technology could bring to this world.

Thus, in the autumn of 2028.

Paradox Technology, with its usual high-profile attitude, launched another revolutionary product to the world.

[Optical Quantum Supercomputer]

This was not humanity's first encounter with the concept of "quantum computing."

Before this, tech giants like Google and IBM had long since created prototypes with dozens or even hundreds of qubits in their respective laboratories.

But those machines required harsh environments near absolute zero to operate; they were merely toys in a laboratory.

All they could do was demonstrate theoretical advantages over traditional computers in certain specific algorithms.

But the optical quantum supercomputer launched by Paradox Technology, named [Apocalypse], was an entirely different species.

It was a mature product capable of stable operation under normal temperature and pressure.

Its core was a perfect photonic crystal provided by Paradox Technology, manufactured using [Micro-Material Science] technology.

Hundreds of millions of photons entangled and superimposed within it in an incredible way, enabling its parallel computing capability to reach a level previously unimaginable to humanity.

When the first Apocalypse Type-I computer was delivered to the dome project supercomputing center and successfully started, all the scientists present witnessed a miracle.

Complex cosmic evolution simulations that previously required the [Tianhe] and [Summit]—the world's top two supercomputers—to run jointly for several weeks.

In front of [Apocalypse], took less than 3 seconds.

Its terrifying computing power was like a smartphone descending into the era of the abacus, instantly making all traditional computing methods pale in comparison.

The advent of [Apocalypse] was like a golden key, instantly unlocking countless bottlenecks in the field of basic human science that had been locked due to a lack of computing power.

In the field of biology, scientists could finally simulate every folding process of proteins, and the R&D cycle for new drugs was shortened from years to weeks.

In the field of materials science, the physical properties of countless new materials could be perfectly simulated on a computer, greatly reducing expensive and time-consuming physical experiments.

And in the fields of meteorology and fluid mechanics, the contribution of [Apocalypse] was nothing short of revolutionary.

In the past, the most accurate weather forecasts could only predict the general weather conditions for the next few days.

But now, [Apocalypse] could theoretically calculate global climate changes for months or even years to come by simulating the trajectory of every atmospheric molecule on the planet.

It could even theoretically simulate every subtle change in the planet's air currents and ocean currents.

What did this mean?

It meant that the path of typhoons could be accurately predicted months in advance.

The occurrence of droughts and floods could be warned about years in advance.

Flight routes could be optimized to the extreme, avoiding any unstable air currents and thus saving a large amount of fuel.

The birth of the optical quantum supercomputer gave humanity, for the first time, an ability that was almost omniscient regarding this planet.

We began to be able to truly understand the complex and chaotic operating laws of the planet we live on.

The basic science of Earth's civilization had taken another big step forward because of the appearance of this machine.

While the Apocalypse supercomputer was bringing a paradigm shift to Earth's basic science, five [jinglei-class] short-range transport ships had, over the past six months, been like the most diligent worker bees, completing dozens of round-trip transport missions between the Earth and the Moon.

They had continuously transported hundreds of thousands of tons of materials—refined metals, industrial robots, and prefabricated modules for the voyager starship—from Earth to the Guanghan Palace Base located on the Moon.

Their performance was nothing short of perfect.

The powerful energy provided by fusion reactors and the stable thrust brought by Hall thrusters made every one of their voyages precise and efficient.

And the recyclable design, combined with the ultra-long lifespan brought by [el-3 composite target material], had reduced the cost of Earth-Moon transport to an unprecedented level.

But Lei Wen was not satisfied.

His gaze would not stop merely at the Moon.

He knew that although the Moon was an excellent shipbuilding base, it was ultimately not a qualified space starport.

Although its gravity was much lower than Earth's, for those future giant starships that could easily be several kilometers long, every takeoff and landing would still consume a huge amount of energy.

Moreover, its distance of 380,000 kilometers from Earth meant that there was always an unshortenable time cost for the transit of personnel and materials.

Humanity needed a closer, more convenient "space terminal" that could serve as an eternal springboard for the civilization's expansion outward.

He told his idea to white flower.

"white flower," he said in the command room, addressing the empty room, "how high do you think the feasibility is of building a space elevator in geostationary orbit with the technology we currently possess?"

white flower's massive database immediately began to run at high speed.

Countless physical models, materials science data, and engineering plans were colliding and being screened within its core.

A moment later, her voice echoed in Lei Wen's mind.

"The feasibility is zero, Father."

This answer was somewhat unexpected for Lei Wen.

"Why?"

"According to model simulations, even if we use the top-tier [el-3 composite target material] currently available to manufacture the cable, its strength would be far from enough to withstand its own weight over 36,000 kilometers, as well as the tearing force of Earth's gravity," white flower explained calmly.

"The concept of a space elevator is theoretically feasible, but its requirement for the strength of the cable material exceeds the energy limit that chemical bonds can provide. It requires a metamaterial that utilizes strong interaction forces to connect at the atomic nucleus level, and such a material cannot be realized with our current [Atomic-Level Matter Synthesizer]."

Lei Wen nodded.

He knew he had been a bit presumptuous.

"Then let's take a step back," he changed his line of thinking.

"What if it's not a space elevator, but a super-large space station in geostationary orbit that has artificial gravity and can dock dozens of starships at the same time?"

"Feasibility analysis in progress..." white flower fell into calculation again.

This time, she was silent for a longer period.

Because the factors she needed to consider were more complex—orbital dynamics, structural mechanics, energy supply, logistics support, ecological circulation...

This was almost equivalent to building a self-sufficient city from scratch in space.

Finally, her voice sounded again.

"Feasibility... 79.4%."

"There are huge engineering challenges and resource consumption, but it is theoretically feasible."

"There are three core difficulties."

"First, how to efficiently transport millions or even tens of millions of tons of building materials from the Moon or Earth to geostationary orbit."

"Second, how to solve the problem of the space station resisting cosmic radiation and solar storms without the protection of a planetary magnetic field."

"Third, how to build a giant ring structure in a zero-gravity environment that can rotate stably and generate centrifugal gravity."

white flower placed the three huge problems in front of Lei Wen.

Lei Wen looked at the three technical bottlenecks highlighted in red, and instead of feeling discouraged, a more intense light burned in his eyes.

This was the challenge that truly belonged to him.

And it was the next leg of the journey he had planned for this civilization.

"Very good."

He stood up and walked to the huge holographic Star Map.

His finger gently drew a circle around the Earth.

"Then, let's name it—"

"The 'Babel Tower' project."