章節 104: Chapter 104: The Silk Road's Tentacles, The Final Chapter Begins After 5300 Years
After the Olive Branch Civilization's battleships depart, the internal conflict within /Star City continues, albeit at a slightly reduced pace. Nuclear explosions, which previously occurred every few days, now happen once a month.
However, the nuclear explosions are getting closer to Yan Xia, with the most recent one occurring within the Civilized Federation's region, resulting in casualties among their soldiers.
Yan Xia suspects that the 'Changers' are growing increasingly dissatisfied with him due to his support for Chu. These 'Changers' are unaware that their actions are part of Yan Xia's plan, and they view him as an enemy.
Yan Xia lodges a complaint, accusing the 'Changers' of trying to disrupt the stability of the Olive Branch Civilization and the Civilized Federation.
He only puts on a show of anger.
Yan Xia wants to see the conflict within the Olive Branch Civilization intensify.
The more chaotic the Olive Branch Civilization becomes, the more advantageous it is for him. The recent attacks on them provide an opportunity to exacerbate the conflict further.
Yan Xia continues to fuel the flames, binding himself closely to Chu and playing the role of a villain, making himself and Chu unpopular among the Olive Branch Civilization lifeforms.
After approximately 1600 years, when the number of 'Changers' exceeds 100 billion, Yan Xia begins to exert his influence.
He supports a leader within the 'Changers', one who will replace Chu's position, but this leader is not permanent like Chu, instead changing every year.
The 'Changers' promote the idea of "anyone can be a leader," which gains widespread support, increasing their numbers from 10 billion to 48 billion within a decade.
A plague!
Yan Xia feels like he has cast a source of infection within the Olive Branch Civilization. He even begins to wonder if Chu is capable of dealing with the current situation.
Meanwhile, Yan Xia receives another piece of news that eases his mind—the construction of the Interstellar Silk Road is complete, and merchants are already active within it.
These "merchants" are not actually merchants but soldiers sent by Ella.
They are not living beings but liquid metal robots created by Ella, true warriors without fear, far stronger than biological lifeforms.
Ella, understanding that the Olive Branch Civilization is a mechanical civilization, has upgraded the robots with a firewall, but this is not an accurate description of the current technology. The robots' crystal cores contain information that is a jumble of random code, making it impossible for intruders to find any pattern.
This mode of operation is more akin to the way living beings think, as life forms tend to subconsciously ponder any situation they encounter. Even if someone possesses mind-reading abilities, they would not be able to gain any meaningful information.
For example, if mind-reading abilities were used on teenage boys and girls during their puberty, the reader would likely encounter a lot of thoughts about "something blue" and "something small."
This simulation of thought processes increases the reliability of the robots.
In fact, biological lifeforms are also like this, and with the help of the quark robots within Yan Xia's body, he cannot be directly controlled by the Olive Branch Civilization. If he were to be controlled, the internal quark robots would kill him before that could happen. The robots are there to assist Yan Xia, and they can survive in space, transforming into a ball of iron asteroids that gradually approach /Star City when their power is turned off.
If something were to happen to Yan Xia, the robots would quickly arrive to help, reducing the response time from thousands of years to just a few.
Despite receiving this reassuring news, Yan Xia does not relax his guard, as accidents can always happen.
This game is still in the mutual probing stage.
...
After the first 2000 years of the joint military campaign, Yan Xia observes the destruction of a star along the Olive Branch Civilization's path.
This destruction is not a result of war but an intentional act by the Olive Branch Civilization.
They are destroying stars.
Why would they do such a thing?
Yan Xia recalls Ella's previous explanation that /Star City is powered by gravity.
The Olive Branch Civilization's battleships are separated from /Star City, and once they are no longer connected, they cannot generate enough gravity to produce a gravity drive. Therefore, they must use another form of propulsion.
Yan Xia suspects that the battleships do not use conventional or dark matter for propulsion, nor do they have the ability to generate nuclear fusion or fission as an energy source. Instead, they rely on stored energy.
This explains why the Olive Branch Civilization's battleships are destroying stars.
Because they need to extract the star's energy, and Yan Xia estimates that in order to store enough energy for the upcoming battle with the Silk Civilization, they will need to destroy more than one star.
"Based on our observations, the energy of the stars has not been significantly absorbed by them. The destruction of the stars is due to the Olive Branch Civilization's attempt to forcibly extract the star's energy, which causes the star to become unstable and collapse."
This destruction is more accurately described as "downgrading," transforming a main-sequence star into a red dwarf. Unlike main-sequence stars, red dwarfs do not collapse, as they are already too weak. The Olive Branch Civilization's battleships will find these red dwarfs and absorb some of their energy, but they will not stay for long, as absorbing energy from red dwarfs is too slow compared to main-sequence stars.
It's like they're just messing around.
Observations over the next few centuries confirm Yan Xia's suspicions.
The battleships, like locusts, leave a trail of destruction along the star road, storing approximately 0.5% to 1% of the energy of a sun.
Based on their absorption rate, they will need to destroy more than 100 stars.
Yan Xia believes that this strategy has strategic significance.
The speed of light is faster than that of the battleships, which means that the information about the destruction of the stars will be observed by the Silk Civilization first.
When the Silk Civilization sees this, they will likely feel immense pressure, as this is an extraordinary display of power.
After so many years of judgment, Yan Xia believes that the Civilized Federation is currently between a 2.1-tier and a 2.2-tier civilization, while the Silk Civilization is between a 2.2-tier and a 2.3-tier civilization, and the Olive Branch Civilization is between a 2.4-tier and a 2.5-tier civilization.
In fact, for the Silk Civilization, which is stronger than the Civilized Federation, the Olive Branch Civilization is still a formidable opponent.
It's like the situation in the Eastern Han Dynasty, before the Three Kingdoms were established.
The Olive Branch Civilization is like Cao Cao, the Silk Civilization is like Sun Quan, who is just beginning to take control of Jiangdong, and the Civilized Federation is like Liu Bei, who is still following behind these powerful figures.
And just like Liu Bei, the Civilized Federation has joined forces with Cao Cao, but both parties understand that Liu Bei is not truly loyal, and Cao Cao will not keep a treacherous vassal by his side.
After another 3400 years of silence.
Chu sends a message to Yan Xia, informing him that they are now engaged in mutual attacks with the Olive Branch Civilization, separated by over 600 light-years.
Yan Xia can only marvel at how quickly time has passed, and he turns his attention to /Star City, where more than a quarter of its lifeforms have now become 'Changers'.
This is an extremely alarming number, and Chu's control over /Star City is becoming increasingly precarious.
"It's time to put an end to this."
If the internal conflict were to escalate into a full-scale civil war at this point, it would deal a fatal blow to the Olive Branch Civilization.
However, Yan Xia still feels some hesitation internally.
Everything has progressed too smoothly.
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