Clues

The secrets surrounding the residents of Shelter 404 were hardly secrets anymore. Throughout the Alliance, ministerial officials and even the grassroots staff of certain specialized departments had long grown accustomed to the bizarre abilities the "players" displayed. These included telepathic communication, revival from death, and much more. Although such rumors had never become common knowledge among the general public—buried as they were under a deluge of far more absurd, inaccurate urban legends—most wastelanders who had dealt with the players for any length of time felt it in their bones: These blue coats, who seemed so utterly out of place on the wasteland, were perhaps alien to more than just the wasteland itself. It was as if they did not belong to this world at all. Carrying this perception, the vast majority of Alliance leadership and relevant grassroots personnel harbored complex feelings toward the identity of "Shelter 404 resident." Respect was a certainty. Even if they could revive after dying, it did not diminish the valor of Shelter 404's residents throwing themselves onto the front lines. Yet fear of the unknown was inevitable; after all, no one understood why they did what they did. Rather than respect, "awe" was perhaps the more fitting word. Yin Fang was not the first person to voice his confusion; Heya had raised similar questions in the past. Perhaps it was due to their differing fields of expertise, but compared to revival from death—which could just barely be rationalized through "science"—Yin Fang was far more stunned by the players' ability to exchange information across any communication barrier. In particular, once he discovered that this information exchange could span a distance of five light-years, "shocked" didn't begin to cover it. His entire understanding of reality had been shattered. "...To be honest, I don't really know how to explain it either," Chu Guang sighed softly. "I think I've mentioned before that I'm not the only manager this shelter has had. There should have been several before me, but I have no information about them." "My authority was granted directly by the first-generation manager. When he handed the shelter over to me, the only clues he left were a few recordings and scraps of paper." Yin Fang stared at Chu Guang, dumbfounded, struggling for a long moment before finally squeezing out a sentence. "He just... handed the shelter over to you like that?" "That's right. Sounds completely reckless, doesn't it?" Chu Guang said in a joking tone. "Honestly, I thought he should have found someone more professional to manage this facility, too. But sometimes I can't help thinking that maybe this was the best arrangement after all." Chu Guang had actually seen quite a few professional shelter managers by now. Some he had met face-to-face; others he had encountered in manager logs. Some were first-generation managers, while others had inherited their posts from predecessors just like him. Though each faced their own unique challenges, they all shared one thing in common. Alienation. Whether passively or actively, they had almost inevitably alienated themselves into a kind of existence elevated above all living beings. This didn't mean they had transformed into another biological species, but rather that they had lost the capacity for empathy with fellow humans. Chu Guang had encountered the exact same issue himself. In fact, due to physiological mutations, that sensation was extraordinarily pronounced. If not for his deliberate self-restraint, he wouldn't even need to speak; a single glance from him could make people cheer or fall to their knees. Yet that was something he refused to do. "...Well, I don't really care that much about those matters. I don't doubt that your first-generation manager made the best arrangement," Yin Fang said with a sigh after a moment of silence. "I just want to know how information can be transmitted across spatial distances... or even across time." Chu Guang smiled. "To tell you the truth, I'm just as curious as you are. How about we set up a project in the Scientific Expedition to look into it?" Yin Fang froze for a second. "Would... would that be all right?" Chu Guang answered casually, "I never said this was an off-limits subject. Besides, it'll help us understand ourselves." Previously, he had always waited for the first-generation manager to come forward and reveal the secrets he didn't know. Yet ever since that man had handed over Floor B7 and a slate of administrative permissions, he hadn't made a peep. Perhaps Chu Guang needed to unearth the shelter's secrets on his own, rather than just waiting. Let alone Yin Fang, he himself was full of curiosity regarding this mode of communication that ignored time and space. Never expecting Chu Guang to agree so readily, Yin Fang's face lit up with ecstatic excitement. "Thank you for your support! You might not believe me, but I have a strong intuition... we might just discover brand-new physics!" Looking at the overly thrilled "Alliance Chief Scientist," Chu Guang couldn't help teasing, "Don't get your hopes up too high. Since we're already using the technology, someone must have discovered it long ago." Yin Fang smiled and said, "That doesn't matter. Rediscovering forgotten knowledge still counts as a discovery." "Haha, I'm glad you think so." Seeing Yin Fang's renewed spirit, Chu Guang smiled. "Let me think about what information I can offer you..." Closing his eyes in thought for a moment, an idea suddenly struck Chu Guang, and he opened his eyes. "Ah, right." Looking at Yin Fang, who had leaned in to listen intently, Chu Guang voiced a concept he had heard from a certain recording long, long ago. "As for the project's name, let's call it the 'morphogenetic field.'" ... Deep in a forest on planet Gaia, Ye Shi woke inside his power armor after donning his gaming helmet, only to be stunned by the scene before him. Kneeling beside his resting pallet was a group of graceful young women. They wore garments woven from dried grasses and carried clay vessels filled with water, seemingly intending to attend to his morning wash and bath. Their youthful faces resembled freshly picked green apples in the morning, their tranquil, dignified bearing entirely distinct from other primitives. It made Ye Shi's heart skip a beat. While the aesthetics of primitives were generally nothing to write home about, these little green people hadn't descended from the trees; more likely, they had "fallen from the sky and climbed back up." Consequently, even by human aesthetic standards, they were by no means unattractive. There was even a trace of wild, rustic beauty to them. As for the emerald-green skin, unusual though it was, it was actually quite pleasant on the eyes once he got used to it. Especially their chests. It was hard to believe such petite, slender branches could support such bountiful fruit. Ye Shi suddenly realized that he wasn't really any nobler than a primitive himself. He actually shared their primitive worship of certain physical attributes?! Right then, a cold chuckle sounded through the comm channel: "Heh." A chill ran down Ye Shi's spine. Suddenly remembering that the action recorder on his power armor was still connected to the network, he scrambled to sit up straight on the bed. "What are you doing? Ge-get up, quickly!" The young women couldn't understand what he was saying and merely looked at each other in confusion. An older girl among them seemed to catch a few words. Leading the others to their feet, she stammered in Human Alliance language far more broken than any player's: "Priest... ordered... us... bathe." She probably meant they were ordered to help him bathe. Ye Shi hurriedly refused. "No need for that." The girl blinked. "But in heaven... always like this." Ye Shi nearly choked on his own saliva. He could tell with half a brain that the chieftains and priests of these primitives had smuggled their own self-serving perks into the legends of the Progenitor. In the name of righteousness, he declared sternly, "Have you ever been to heaven?" The girls exchanged bewildered glances, unsure whether to signal that they hadn't or simply unable to understand. Ye Shi continued, "Heaven believes in equality. We don't do things like that back home... well, generally speaking, at least." He had sounded absolute at first, but remembering that fellow Indebted Big Eye, his tone wavered. Truth be told, lecturing a primitive tribe about equality was foolish, but the words weren't meant for them anyway—they were intended to appease a certain someone floating in the sky. The girl who could understand him nodded half-comprehendingly, but then, somehow, stumbled out a question that caught Ye Shi completely off guard: "You... want... help us? Wash?" "Pfft—" Ye Shi nearly spat a mouthful of blood through his nostrils. He frantically waved his hands to clarify, "No, that's not what I meant!" *Damn it, you really can understand me!* *Wait, no—* Looking at the girl's puzzled expression, Ye Shi suddenly snapped back to his senses. In his fluster, he had just spoken Chinese, and the final word the girl uttered—"wash"—was also in Chinese... The problem was, he hadn't used that word anywhere in his sentence. Ye Shi was completely baffled, utterly unable to figure out what was going on. Seeing his reaction, the girl grew apprehensive, looking as if she had done something wrong and was begging for forgiveness. While Ye Shi stood there bewildered, Jiang Xuezhou's voice came through the comm channel again. "Ye Shi..." Her raspy voice carried a slight tremor. Hearing it, Ye Shi panicked immediately. "Xuezhou, let me explain—" "No, listen to me first!" The tremor in her voice wasn't from anger, but excitement. Jiang Xuezhou took a deep breath, fighting down her shock before speaking slowly. "I just realized... they don't know the Human Alliance language at all." "What do you mean—" The moment Ye Shi asked, he realized something as well, his face slackening into astonishment. As if confirming his suspicion, Jiang Xuezhou continued at a measured pace, "Think back carefully. When you first met them, when did that priest named Saqui say his very first word of the Human Alliance language to you...?" *How the hell am I supposed to remember—* *No, wait!* A spark of inspiration flashed in Ye Shi's mind, and he blurted out almost instinctively, "After I said the first sentence to them?!" When the old man first saw him, he had fallen to his knees with a thud and jabbered a whole string of gibberish, not a single word of which Ye Shi understood. Only after Ye Shi told them to stand up had that old man managed to sputter out a recognizable phrase. "Exactly. After you spoke your first sentence—or rather, after you expressed a desire to communicate—they immediately understood your words and acquired your language..." Having confirmed it, Jiang Xuezhou continued her analysis in a calm voice. "The priest named Saqui before, that leader named Tunnan, and now the girl in front of you... what they mastered wasn't the Human Alliance language, but *your* language. They don't know a single word of Human Alliance speech; every word they know was read directly from you!" A chilling creep of dread crawled up Ye Shi's spine. Looking into the innocent eyes before him, he suddenly felt as though the metal bucket on his head were made of paper. Not in a physical sense. In a mental sense. Those gazes seemed capable of piercing through his armor, through his face, and touching his soul directly. Swallowing hard, Ye Shi still found this bizarre ability hard to believe, even though he possessed a perception that others considered miraculous. "...But I never told them I was the 'Progenitor.' They were the ones who told me that word." Jiang Xuezhou's voice remained calm. "Yet you understood precisely what the word meant, didn't you? I know what you're trying to say—they pulled words from you that you hadn't spoken aloud, right? That's what astonishes me the most. What they're displaying isn't merely a talent for languages, but another ability entirely... Telepathy? Resonance? Brainwave modulation and demodulation? Or some unknown higher-dimensional energy field? Whatever the case, the result is that they read certain thoughts from your mind and utilized them." Cold sweat broke out across Ye Shi's back. "...What the hell is this? Mind reading? Holy shit?" Jiang Xuezhou took a deep breath. "I don't know. I've never seen anything like this on the wasteland... But as things stand, I can tell you with certainty that she pulled the word 'wash' out of thin air. I can testify that you didn't say it once—after all, even I don't know what that sound means." Seeming worried that she might frighten Ye Shi too much, Jiang Xuezhou paused for a moment before adding: "You don't need to be so terrified, though... My impression is that they don't fully comprehend their own ability. And judging by the results, this abstract ability hasn't given them any significant advantage in combat strength or productivity. Otherwise, they wouldn't still be living such a primitive lifestyle." "Then could they already know that I'm actually..." Ye Shi was about to say "putting on an act," but stopped halfway, not daring to let the thought finish, terrified that the girl with the big, watery eyes would read his mind. Jiang Xuezhou said patiently, "I doubt it. What they can read is likely only the information you intend to convey. You don't need to worry too much about them seeing through your inner thoughts unless it's something you explicitly try to express..." Pausing, she added, "Even so, my advice is to err on the side of caution... especially whenever you intend to express something." *In other words, avoid saying one thing while thinking another, and keep my mind aligned with my words?* Thinking back to how the girl had misunderstood him earlier, Ye Shi felt his face grow hot. Clearing his throat, he said, "Understood." Whether she was still annoyed or not, once business was concluded, Jiang Xuezhou dropped a final "heh" into the comm channel and went silent. Not knowing how to coax her out of her mood, Ye Shi had no choice but to focus on the task at hand. Turning back to the girls he had left waiting for half an eternity, he cleared his throat and spoke in a solemn tone: "From now on, no one is permitted to enter my room without my permission... and that means no one." As if confirming Jiang Xuezhou's theory, the slightly older girl with the suspected high perception understood his words immediately and replied with deference: "Understood." She turned and gave a few instructions to the other girls, and the group gathered their things, preparing to leave the room. Something occurred to Ye Shi, and he called out to them: "Wait. You stay." The slightly older girl blinked and pointed a finger at herself. Seeing Ye Shi nod, she handed her things to the other girls and obediently remained in the room. Only the two of them were left. Looking at the curious girl, Ye Shi organized his thoughts for a moment before speaking slowly: "I have only just returned to this land. The changes here surprise me; so many things are different from before, as if we had never been here at all." "I want you to tell me everything you know—about what happened after 'we' left, and about 'you.'"