79: Gaia

Just as Lei Wen was immersed in the immense excitement brought about by the leap in his own life level, the voice of "white flower" sounded in his mind again.

"Father, we have made another astonishing discovery regarding the blood orchid. This discovery may overturn our existing understanding of the origin of life on Earth."

"What discovery?" Lei Wen asked curiously while exercising his new body, which was filled with explosive power, feeling the vigorous strength transmitted through every extension of his muscle fibers.

This sense of power was so real, so fascinating, but the shock of knowledge moved him far more than pure physical strength.

"It is about its soil." "white flower" pulled up a projection of a complex geological composition analysis report.

Countless data streams and three-dimensional molecular structure models slowly rotated in front of Lei Wen, each point of light representing a secret waiting to be deciphered.

"After I conducted the deepest material composition analysis on that associated rock layer your parents sent back, I found its composition to be very strange, one might even say contradictory."

"Its main constituent materials, such as the isotope ratios of silicon dioxide, aluminum oxide, and iron oxide, are extremely similar to the lunar rock samples we collected on the moon, with a similarity as high as 99.2%. From this point of view, it is almost certain that the rock is not a native product of Earth, but a meteorite that splashed from the moon to Earth during some distant geological age."

"A lunar meteorite?" Lei Wen paused. Although this conclusion was astonishing, it was not entirely unacceptable.

"This isn't strange, is it? The Earth and the Moon were one at the beginning of their birth. The Earth-Moon system must have had material exchange throughout its long evolutionary history. There should have been many lunar rocks in Earth's history that were splashed out by impacts from other celestial bodies and eventually fell back to Earth."

"Yes, Father, this in itself is not strange." "white flower" affirmed, then changed the subject, "But what is strange is that in this lunar rock, I also detected some unknown stable superheavy elements that do not exist on Earth at all, and have never even been discovered in the material composition database of all celestial bodies in the Solar System we currently know. Their atomic numbers far exceed uranium, yet they exhibit incredible stability, which violates our existing nuclear physics models."

"Furthermore," she zoomed the report in on an intricate genetic map, "we also used high-energy particle collisions and genetic tracing to determine that the seeds of the blood orchid did indeed come from extraterrestrial sources. Its life form is completely different from Earth's life, but the blood orchid plant itself presents a genome very similar to Earth's organisms. Or rather, the blood orchid is like a biological gene bank; one can find genetic fragments of any ancient organism on Earth within it."

"What does this mean?" Lei Wen frowned.

"Simply put, Father," "white flower" explained with a more intuitive metaphor, "the blood orchid is like a living celestial book that records the epic history of Earth's life evolution."

"Its genetic sequence contains core genetic fragments of almost all representative species that have appeared on Earth with milestone significance, from the trilobites of the Cambrian explosion to the dinosaurs that ruled the Earth in the Jurassic, and then to the mammoths of the Cenozoic Ice Age... all archived in its vast DNA chain."

"It is like a super life form that does not belong to Earth but contains genetic fragments of all Earth's creatures—an alien archivist that has faithfully recorded the life changes of this planet for billions of years."

This conclusion instantly hit a blind spot in Lei Wen's thinking.

A plant that came from extraterrestrial space but carried the entire history of Earth's life?

This was no longer a simple biological problem; it was almost challenging the cornerstone of modern biology: "Evolutionary Theory."

There must be a huge secret hidden within it about Earth itself, and perhaps even about the past of the entire Solar System.

Lei Wen immediately informed his parents, who were far away in the South American rainforest, of this astonishing discovery by "white flower".

When Li Wen and Lei Jun learned of this news, their reaction was even more excited than Lei Wen's.

As scholars standing at the pinnacle of human geology and botany, they immediately realized the significance behind this discovery, which was enough to overturn the entire scientific community.

"A meteorite suspected to be from the moon but containing unknown elements... a plant that carries the entire history of Earth's life..." On the other end of the phone, his father Lei Jun's voice was no longer as steady as usual, and the background noise was mixed with rapid breathing and the beeping of various instruments.

"Xiao Wen! Do you know what this means? This means that the evolution of life on Earth may not be a completely closed and random process! It might even... might have some kind of profound connection we have never imagined with the moon and those unknown elements! This might explain why there have been several unreasonable 'leaps' in the evolution of life on Earth!"

"We must go back! We must return to that cliff immediately!" Mother Li Wen's voice was equally full of excitement. She was shouting instructions to the team members on the other end, "We need more samples! We need to conduct the most thorough exploration of the entire geological environment, magnetic field distribution, and radiation levels there! This may be the closest our generation has ever been to the ultimate answer to the origin of life!"

Lei Wen knew that for his parents, who had dedicated their entire lives to scientific exploration, nothing was more attractive than solving such an ultimate mystery concerning the foundation of human existence.

He immediately used all the power of Paradox Technology to provide top-tier logistical support for his parents' "return to the forbidden zone" operation.

An elite security team composed of retired special forces soldiers, a batch of drones equipped with the most advanced LiDAR and material detection equipment, and he even had the knowledge manager send an Osprey transport aircraft capable of vertical takeoff and landing directly in the rainforest.

Lei Wen's parents also immediately used their connections in the global academic community.

Soon, a dream scientific research team composed of the world's top geologists, paleontologists, botanists, and even a few astrophysicists gathered in that forbidden zone of the Amazon rainforest.

Their goal was only one—to dig out the shocking secret about Earth's past hidden behind the blood orchid.

...

Just as his parents set off again to solve the mystery of the blood orchid, Lei Wen's thoughts drifted to another equally mysterious problem.

He remembered the mysterious tablet that guided the Faleim People to the Solar System—the civilization guidance stele.

The secret of the blood orchid seemed related to Earth itself and appeared to have nothing to do with the civilization guidance stele.

But would these two seemingly parallel clues intersect at some point?

He immediately contacted the Chief Scientist Zeral, who was far away on the Falem Homeworld, through Grey Wind's communication channel.

"Zeral," he asked straightforwardly, "Have you had any new discoveries regarding that tablet later on? Especially regarding why it guided you here."

"Great Guide!" As soon as Zeral's holographic projection appeared, he immediately performed a respectful chest-touching salute. He seemed to have just finished an intense research project, his eyes still bloodshot, but his spirit was exceptionally excited.

He zoomed in a research report to a key comparison chart. On one side of the chart was the planet model depicted on the tablet, and on the other was the Earth data scanned by the Far Star Fleet. "It is the information it depicts about the planet you are on; there is a huge deviation between the two."

"The tablet clearly shows that this should be a perfect Gaia planet."

Gaia planet.

Lei Wen had seen this term countless times in the "stellar universe" game; it was the ultimate habitable planet that all players dreamed of.

But in reality, what did this actually mean?

"Zeral, can you explain to me in detail what a true Gaia planet looks like in your definition?" Lei Wen asked.

"Of course, the guide." Zeral answered immediately, seemingly happy to have the opportunity to show his knowledge to the guide.

"Gaia planet is our highest designation for an extremely rare living planet with planet-level self-awareness. It is not just an ordinary habitable planet with an environment suitable for life to survive; it is itself a living super life form with a unified cluster consciousness."

"Its entire ecosystem—from atmospheric circulation to crustal movement, from ocean currents to the evolution of the biosphere—is under the precise control of that unified planetary consciousness. It is like a huge organism with countless cells, and every life on the surface is a part of its body."

Zeral's voice was full of awe for this cosmic miracle.

"On a Gaia planet, you will never see devastating natural disasters. Because the planetary consciousness will act like the most brilliant gardener, releasing the energy of all earthquakes, volcanoes, and typhoons in the most gentle way in advance. It will guide the plates to drift at an extremely slow speed and will actively create rainfall in the atmosphere to regulate drought."

"Its environment is capable of ultra-high-speed self-repair. Even if it encounters an asteroid impact or the baptism of nuclear weapons, it can restore the destroyed ecosystem to its original state within just a few decades, and even evolve more resistant species. We once discovered a Gaia planet that had been thoroughly purged by neutron extinction weapons in the ruins of an ancient civilization, and in just three thousand years, it became full of vitality again."

"The most magical thing is that it can perfectly simulate the best survival environment that any creature yearns for at the genetic level, and actively guide and accelerate the evolution of life! It will tailor a habitat most suitable for their reproduction for every species, and will even 'push' them by changing the environment or inducing benign genetic mutations when a species is about to walk into an evolutionary dead end."

"For any civilization that longs for reproduction and evolution, a Gaia planet is the most perfect paradise in the universe!"

Zeral's description caused huge waves in Lei Wen's heart.

A living planet with self-awareness that can actively repair the environment and even accelerate the evolution of life? This sounded like the planet Pandora in the movie, or even more magical than that!

But a cruel reality lay before him.

"But..." Lei Wen said in a low voice, "The current Earth does not match a Gaia planet at all."

That's right.

Although the current Earth is still beautiful, it is full of scars and fragility.

Earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions... various natural disasters are still happening frequently.

Environmental pollution, species extinction, climate change... human beings' own actions are also constantly bringing new traumas to this planet.

Although it possesses an incredibly complex ecosystem, this system is clearly chaotic and disordered, full of various contradictions and conflicts.

It is definitely not a living body with a unified self-awareness.

So what caused such a huge discrepancy between the information on the civilization guidance stele and reality?

"We have also been thinking about this question, the guide." Zeral's face also showed deep confusion.

"We have proposed several possibilities."

"The first possibility is that the information on the tablet is wrong or we have misinterpreted it, but considering the mysterious origin of the tablet, this possibility is extremely low."

"The second possibility is that what the tablet shows is not the present of Earth, but its past or future. Perhaps in the distant ancient times, Earth was once a Gaia planet, but lost its consciousness for some unknown reason; or perhaps in the distant future, it will reawaken."

"And the third possibility..." Zeral's voice paused, as if weighing his words, "is also the one we think has the highest probability: Earth's Gaia consciousness has not disappeared, but... is sick, or rather, asleep."

Asleep? This word made Lei Wen's heart jump.

He suddenly thought of something, and some clues were connected in his mind.

""white flower"!" He called out immediately.

"Here, Father."

"Record this explanation about Gaia planet, and then perform the deepest correlation comparative analysis of the entire genetic sequence of the blood orchid and all the material component data of that associated lunar rock with all the biological and geological data of Earth we currently know! Especially those genetic fragments of ancient organisms!"

"Instruction received, establishing correlation model..."

"Correlation target: origin of Earth life, geological evolution history, Gaia planet theory."

The terrifying computing power of the "Apocalypse" optical quantum supercomputer cluster was driven to the limit at this moment.

Countless seemingly unrelated data chains were colliding and reorganizing crazily in its core.

The blood orchid's genetic fragments, which were as complex as a vast sea of stars, the mysterious superheavy elements in the lunar rock, the history of Earth's billions of years of geological evolution, and the Faleim Civilization's theory about Gaia planet...

Everything was looking for a common intersection, an ultimate answer that could perfectly connect all the mysteries.

Lei Wen waited quietly.

He had a strong premonition.

A secret concerning the oldest and most core part of Earth was about to be completely revealed before him.

And the answer to this secret might be hidden in that enchanting red flower from hundreds of millions of years ago.