Could It Really Be a Game Made by Aliens?!

"Have you met that Administrator?" "Yes." On the wasteland north of Xizhou City, the faint howling of wolves echoed in the distance. Standing beside a makeshift tent, Xavier held the handset with both hands, his expression brimming with reverence. The man on the other end of the line was none other than Sigma, the uncrowned king of the Free State of Bugra and the president and chairman of the Flint Group. After a few brief inquiries regarding the Administrator, Sigma moved on to the matter he cared about most. "What about Dillon?" Xavier spoke in a heavy voice. "Dillon... is dead." The communication channel fell silent for a moment. Sigma asked slowly, "How did he die?" Xavier answered truthfully. "The New Alliance claims he died on the battlefield and was buried on the spot in a trench near the pine forest..." As he spoke these words, Xavier's heart was filled with nervous tension. Although the Great Ravine was the suzerain of the Free State of Bugra, the Legion was the Flint Group's primary trading partner. He didn't know what agreement his boss had struck with the Legion, but his intuition told him Dillon's identity was far from ordinary. Fortunately, his boss was a reasonable man and did not vent his anger on him. Taking a moment to compose himself, the voice on the other end continued, "...What about the trade agreement?" Xavier said shamefacedly, "We couldn't reach a deal... They only agreed to grant us certain tariff concessions, and strictly on non-military goods. As for prospecting and mining rights, they refused to discuss them altogether." "How is their strength?" A sharp edge crept into the voice, keen as an unsheathed blade. Xavier's heart quivered slightly. Instinctively lowering his voice, he replied with caution. "They have roughly two millenaries. Their numbers aren't large, but their individual combat ability is very formidable. Another factor is their weapons; while their gear can't be called advanced, it's plentiful and singularly well-designed... The Fang Clan didn't lose undeservedly." The line went quiet for a spell. The boss seemed lost in thought. After a long pause, he said slowly, "Understood. Head back for now. I have another assignment for you." Relief washed over Xavier, and he answered respectfully, "Right away, sir." ... Three days had passed since the auction concluded. The real world. In a laboratory at the CAS Institute of Material Technology and Engineering, overtime work was in full swing. "...H-how... was this even done?" Staring at the image on his computer monitor, Academician Liu Yiping wore an expression of sheer disbelief. A pliable artificial SEI film, less than one hundred nanometers thick, stood like a barrier woven of pure magic. Yes. That host of miraculous properties was practically magical. Its mechanical strength was extraordinary, complemented by high stability and single-ion transport channels. The high electronegativity at open metal sites within the coordination polymer channels significantly improved the Li+ transference number and the conductivity of individual ion channels within the composite membrane. Moreover, this exquisite architecture effectively suppressed side reactions, regulated the deposition behavior of Li+ on the anode, and restrained the growth of lithium dendrites, thereby preserving stability across both battery electrodes. It was nothing short of miraculous! "...Professor, the data analysis from the charge-discharge cycling group is in." A bespectacled researcher walked over, his dark-ringed eyes wide with the same ghost-stricken expression. Tearing his eyes from the screen, Professor Liu Yiping looked at his student and immediately said, "Bring it here, let me see!" "Right here..." The researcher handed over a USB flash drive. Three days were certainly not enough for the entire research team to comb through all the documents. However, it was more than enough time for them to use the most cutting-edge equipment in the lab to reproduce that "No. 404 Artificial SEI Film" according to the methodology outlined in the files. Once the film was fabricated, performance testing followed. The overworked lab hands on the project team swiftly assembled a simple lithium battery test cell using lithium foil as the anode. Sourcing the materials was effortless; the one thing this electrochemistry lab never lacked was battery components. After disassembling the cycled pouch cells and transferring them under inert atmosphere via an in-situ transfer vessel to the observation stage, they quickly obtained 3D surface images under a scanning electron microscope and 2D projections under a transmission electron microscope. Everything was done to extract as much information about the film as possible. While such procedures sounded straightforward enough, in practice they consumed an enormous amount of time. Over these three days, his research team had done nothing else, pouring every ounce of energy into those ten gigabytes of data. In fact, after obtaining these results, there was no longer any need to continue the project they had been working on before... Plugging the flash drive into his computer and looking at the images on the monitor, Academician Liu Yiping suddenly broke into a wry smile. Pinching the bridge of his aching nose, he sat in his office chair, muttering the same words over and over. "...How on earth did they do it?" The researcher standing beside him remained silent, though it was obvious he wanted to ask the exact same thing. Three days ago, when they first received the documents, everyone on the project team had thought it was a joke. An unresolved problem that had confounded academia for decades. At the most recent academic conference, they had still been debating feasible directions and whether the path of lithium metal batteries was even worth pursuing further. Yet now, someone had suddenly come along claiming to have found the definitive answer. And on top of that, via a direction no one had ever explored. No matter how one looked at it, something this incredible sounded like an April Fool's prank. It was not even a question of whether it was possible; it was logically implausible. If someone designed a product to meet specific needs using existing technology—be it a weapon or a water cup—keeping it secret was not difficult. Frontier scientific research, however, was an entirely different beast. It was not merely a matter of whether things were kept public or private; it simply could not be conducted behind closed doors. Ever since the twentieth century, scientific research had evolved into an interconnected system. An individual's role within that system was less like a central processing unit and more like a wafer fabricated for it. Aside from the occasional genius in mathematics who could produce revolutionary breakthroughs in total isolation, research in most disciplines had long become a campaign of massive armies. Although research groups might sit on phased milestones to drop a bombshell paper all at once and claim first place in their niche, it was virtually impossible to conceal what everyone in the field was working on. "...On page twenty-seven of Document No. 13, there's a detailed description of the reaction mechanism, but we haven't observed it on our equipment." "Is it unobservable, or simply unobserved?" the elder academician asked with rigorous precision. The researcher hesitated before answering slowly. "Strictly speaking... the former. Our instruments can observe the deposition process of lithium dendrites in the control group, but as for how the Li+ ions pass through that film... we can't track their path. We might need to design a brand-new experimental protocol tailored specifically to this membrane material." "If it's just up to us, that could take ages... unless we can track down the research team behind these findings." "Still, it's bizarre. I just looked through the proceedings from the last two academic conferences, and there wasn't a single discussion on this line of inquiry. The few that sounded remotely similar... turned out to be worlds apart upon closer inspection." Just then, a researcher at an adjacent desk remarked with a sigh, "I wonder which heavyweight dropped this nuke out of nowhere." "Is there even anyone that insane in materials science?" "I counted on my fingers through every big name, and I honestly can't think of a single person..." "So what do we do next? Are we still sticking with our old project?" "We'll probably have to pivot... It'll take industry quite a while just to digest this, let alone pose new questions." "Sigh... Three years down the drain. Thank God I finished my dissertation a few years back." "It wasn't entirely in vain; some of the milestone findings were still quite interesting. But as for SEI films... there's truly no ground left to break." Listening to his students' chatter, Professor Liu Yiping said nothing, lost in his own train of thought. At that moment, the phone on the desk rang. He picked it up and stepped outside. The moment the call connected, an urgent voice came through from the other end. "Old Liu, what are the results?" Liu Yiping answered, "We've synthesized the film." Hearing this, the voice on the other end grew audibly excited. "Does it work well?" Liu Yiping remarked with deep feeling, "Calling it 'well' is an understatement... I was completely blown away." Strictly speaking, even the lithium-ion batteries ubiquitous on the market today stood to benefit from this technology. And if an entirely new battery was designed specifically for a pure lithium anode, it would not pose much technical difficulty either. The supply chains for electrolytes, cathode materials, and separators were already well-established. All it would take was modifying the existing battery manufacturing line to add an extra coating process, and the technology could be put to work immediately. He could already picture the wild expressions that would appear on the faces of his colleagues in the industry once they learned of this breakthrough. It was bound to be quite a sight. The elder on the phone pressed on, "What about the costs? How hard is it to industrialize?" Liu Yiping promptly answered, "Exact costs are an industrial matter; lab-scale synthesis and industrial manufacturing are two different things. But I looked over the process flows outlined in the documentation, and based on my knowledge of the industry, manufacturing it shouldn't be very difficult." "Fantastic! Hahaha, thank you so much for your hard work!" The voice on the phone brimmed with unmistakable joy. "You're welcome, it's my duty." Pausing for a beat, Academician Liu suddenly spoke up, "By the way... I have a request, though I'm not sure if it's appropriate to ask." The elder on the other end responded without hesitation, "Please, go ahead! If I can help, I certainly will!" "If possible, I'd like to meet the team that produced this data, or at least speak with the person in charge." Pausing to gloss over the intricate technical details, Academician Liu continued, "There are many things I would like to learn from them." Industry cared about the film itself, but he cared about how the film was created, and what train of thought had led to its inception. To know what was true was one thing, but one had to know why it was true. Copying someone's homework didn't take long, but understanding the homework and grasping the problem-solving logic was another matter entirely. To a scientist pursuing the truth, the result, the methodology, and the underlying rationale were all indispensable. In three days, they had only managed to comprehend half of the documentation. The remaining half might take three months, or even three years, to digest fully. Academic progress was not merely an accumulation of results; it was the refinement of tools and methods forged along the way. He wanted to sit down and have a proper talk with the one who had bested them. In scholarship, the accomplished were masters; he was certain he would benefit immensely. Silence lingered on the other end of the line. "Old Liu... If it were anything else, I wouldn't hesitate, but I'm afraid I can't help you with this." Academician Liu hesitated, his tone turning solemn. "Could you give me a reason?" A sigh came across the line. "...After going through that data, how did you feel?" Academician Liu replied bluntly, "Incredible." The elder pressed, "Incredible to what degree?" Liu Yiping fell silent for a few seconds, then gave a soft cough. "...Don't laugh if I say it." The elder chuckled. "Go ahead. Your perspective is very important to us." After a moment's hesitation, Academician Liu finally voiced the thought closest to his heart, albeit in a joking tone. "...It's almost as if aliens made it." The phone fell quiet again. Academician Liu felt a subtle twinge of embarrassment. Just as he was about to say something to break the awkwardness, a soft sigh came from the receiver. "...It's hard to explain over the phone. I was planning to head over to your side anyway. Wait for me." With that, dial tone buzzed in his ear. Holding the phone, Academician Liu froze, his expression turning increasingly strange. Could it really be aliens? No way it's that absurd, right...? ... "...Looks like we aren't the only ones who think so! Academician Liu's side also feels this technology doesn't look like something developed by a research team on Earth." "Speaking of which, Academician Gao, whom we consulted last time, seemed to say something similar." "It appears our initial hypothesis was correct." "Who would've thought a Close Encounter of the Third Kind would unfold like this? It's unbelievable!" Somewhere in an office, a lively discussion was underway. The task force's team leader had just taken Academician Liu's call and was currently en route to the Chinese Academy of Sciences. According to the old leader, the "reverse engineering" of that film material was proceeding very smoothly, with costs well within an acceptable range, and commercial prototypes wouldn't be long in coming. Hearing this news, everyone on the task force was delighted; it proved their efforts had borne fruit. "By the way, any word from Academician Gao?" a colleague suddenly asked. The coworker next to him chimed in, "Academician Gao? You mean the mining expert we consulted before?" "Yeah. Didn't Old Li send him the website link? I wonder if he checked it out." "I didn't ask. It's not the easiest thing to ask about, after all." At this point, a staff member spoke up. "I still think our strategy is too conservative. We ought to recommend to higher-ups that we bring the players under direct control." This was indeed an option on the table. However, his proposal found little support in the room. Someone quickly objected, "I'm against it. What about the risks? Have you considered them?" "If we do our job thoroughly, what risk could there be?" the man countered. "And don't you think it'd be far more efficient?" "I don't think so at all. What you call efficiency is merely what you assume it to be. Besides, the people trust their organization, and the organization trusts its people. What do you mean by controlling them? Do you distrust the organization, or do you distrust the people? That kind of mindset is deeply problematic!" More than problematic—it bordered on reactionary! Still, considering this comrade had good intentions and had merely spoken out of impatience, the dissenting colleague didn't push the censure too harshly. Seeing that the office was on the verge of rehashing an old debate, the square-faced man gave a light cough, cutting short the dispute. "...All right. Don't reopen topics we've already settled. The directive from above is to remain cautious and maintain the status quo. The team leader and I share that view." "Meddling rashly in the game's progression not only commits the blunder of laymen directing experts and interventionism, but it's also prone to producing uncontrollable fallout." "Since the current rules work in our favor, what we must do now is not change the rules or flip our own table, but uphold the rules and preserve our advantage." Scanning his colleagues around the room, the square-faced man continued, "Let's talk about practical matters. This 'technology acquisition' actually exposed our lack of preparation." "The foreign exchange platform had been open for a long time. The other side actually gave us plenty of prep time, but nobody took it seriously enough back then. In the end, we rushed to buy on the final day, only to get stuck unable to execute orders, allowing early speculators to turn a quick profit." Originally, this acquisition was meant to be handled by state-owned central enterprises so that technology transfer could begin the moment the tech was acquired. However, time was far too tight. There was no time to coordinate with specific enterprises on such short notice. They had to adapt to circumstances, buying the technology first and then deciding how to deploy it and which units and directors would take charge. The ramifications involved were far too complex. The bespectacled man nodded. "Indeed... We can't keep cramming at the eleventh hour. Especially with this precedent set, the next time news breaks, the speculators active on the exchange will definitely bid prices up." The staffer who had proposed controlling the players sighed. "If it were just high prices, so be it; any problem money can solve isn't really a problem. The real worry is another emergency trading halt like last time, where even all the money in the world won't let you buy." The trader who had handled the account nodded in agreement. "Exactly. And with that kind of rushed, aggressive accumulation, even a blind man could see who was buying. If I were a speculator, even I wouldn't resist moving in for a harvest." If accumulation had been gradual, nobody would have known who was buying. But with yesterday's brute-force approach, one didn't even need a pen and paper to calculate how many cards they held in their hand. "...Our current silver coin reserves sit at around two million. That's still far too low. I propose establishing a 'Technology Acquisition Fund,' drawing a few professional traders from the financial sector to build a steady, long-term position." "So basically setting up a foreign exchange reserve?" a colleague at a nearby desk joked. The trader smiled. "Why not? Even if we don't know what they want, they possess the technology we need. If you view the players as labor exports, we should also be compensating the workers who earn that 'foreign exchange' for us." The square-faced man's eyes lit up. "Makes sense. That's a good suggestion; I'll include it in the report to higher leadership!" Seeing his idea taken seriously, the trader warmed to the topic and continued. "...Let's take it a step further. Beyond establishing a regular currency exchange mechanism, we also need to clarify how foreign exchange is funded. For instance, the money for tech imports can't always come out of state coffers. We should encourage enterprises benefiting from the technology to allocate part of their profits to purchase it, establishing a virtuous cycle." On the surface, the money used to buy silver coins went to players, but in reality, it subsidized the enterprises receiving the technology. Doing that once or twice was fine, but relying on it long-term was bound to cause friction. Excessive micro-management would inevitably provoke grievances from above and below alike. As everyone chimed in with ideas, the square-faced man took meticulous notes. Before long, several pages were filled, his pen practically smoking. The specifics of this "Extraterrestrial Technology Acquisition Fund" would still require detailed coordination with other departments, but the general direction was set. Looking at the densely packed notebook, amid his reflections, a curious thought suddenly popped into the square-faced man's head. Did Ah Guang work like this on a regular basis? Keeping one eye on the forum, taking notes with the other hand, and developing the game all at once. If that was truly the case, being the developer of Wasteland OL was definitely no easy job... ... While the relevant authorities of various nations were meeting to hammer out countermeasures, the official Wasteland OL forum was buzzing with activity. "Wuu wuu, Brother Guang, when is your Silver Exchange opening up again?" "Damn it! It's been locked for three days! Network fluctuations don't last this long!" "Crying so hard! If trading doesn't reopen, my family won't have food on the table! QAQ" "Lmao, I almost believed you!" On the day the expansion ended, any player holding silver coins—provided they weren't too greedy to sell, or reckless fools itching to time the market with swing trades—had basically made a killing off that surge. No food on the table? Not a chance. Even newcomers who had only joined recently and possessed a few hundred silver coins had cashed in for ten or twenty thousand yuan during the price spike. Though it meant having to get back to hard labor in the game, it was all worth it! With the war over and countless undertakings waiting to be rebuilt, now was the time to work hard, boost production, and consolidate the fruits of victory. How could anyone squander money on frivolous pleasures? For the Alliance! Let's get it! Browsing the official forum, Chu Guang was gratified to see that his little players, fresh from the front lines, had rushed straight to the construction sites without missing a beat. They even showed off their labor experiences on the forum. It truly was something to brag about. In the past, closed beta slots hadn't been worth much; now, a single gaming helmet was worth at least a million at the low end, and practically priceless at the high end. Of course, "going to the construction site" was merely a figure of speech. There were plenty of ways to earn money in Wasteland OL. While plenty of Strength-type players hauled bricks on construction sites, even more players loaded up on spoils of war and ran trade routes to nearby survivor settlements like Red River Town. To keep his little players occupied, Chu Guang had also overridden all objections, approving an infrastructure project with a budget of two hundred million silver coins under the bewildered stares of logistics officials like Old Charlie and Luka! This plan covered the New Alliance's railway and the construction of Daybreak City. Relevant resources would be funneled preferentially toward player-run businesses, and only secondarily toward NPC-run enterprises. He was sure his little players would be deeply grateful for his generosity! As for the silver coin trading platform suspended due to "network fluctuations," Chu Guang was in no rush to reopen it. On one hand, players currently had no spare cash on hand; those active in the market right now were all speculators. On the other hand, the big institutional players in the real world were still formulating their strategy for the next phase, and it would take time for fresh capital to enter. Reopening trading now would serve no purpose other than letting speculators fleece retail traders. Both cloud players and active players needed time. Furthermore, Chu Guang was awaiting an opportune moment. He was waiting for the in-game technology to project into reality, waiting for the seed he had sown to sprout its first green shoot. It shouldn't take very long. After all, that was technology he had personally handpicked based on real-world needs. Not to mention, his counterpart in this cooperation hailed from the very same place as those wonderful little players of his...