Although Natural History also had its own internal logic and connections between knowledge points, those connections were not absolute. It was a subject that emphasized the accumulation of knowledge and experience. Even without starting from the very beginning, as long as one could read and understand the words, one could still acquire the knowledge that came later.
These knowledge points did not necessarily have to come from secret manuals. Ordinary life experience, reading books and newspapers—all of it could improve one's Natural History cultivation. So even though Shi Tiexin was terrible at every other subject, Natural History alone stood out like a solitary branch, reaching Good.
Today, Shi Tiexin intended to search the history and geography textbooks for the answers he wanted.
He first opened the history and geography textbook. Shi Tiexin scanned ten lines at a glance, searching for the information he sought.
Nothing...
Nothing...
Nothing...
With a rustle, he flipped through the entire book. There was absolutely nothing!
This geography textbook recorded nothing but the geographical and topographical conditions of Donghua Nation. At most, it included some hydrological and climatic characteristics of the Pacific Ocean, but it did not contain even the slightest description of the other planets in the Solar System.
That would have been impossible in Shi Tiexin's world!
How could one study geography without studying Saturn's geography? How could it fail to mention Saturn Ring and Saturn's moons? This geography textbook described Earth's geography in great detail, precise and meticulous, yet it kept utterly silent about the other planets of the Solar System. There were only two possible explanations.
Either this world—this place, this region of Fengming First High School in Southern Zhili—had isolated and suppressed geographical information about the other planets in the Solar System, simply forbidding ordinary students from accessing it.
Or this world's exploration of the other planets in the Solar System was not advanced to begin with. Even if they knew something, they would not make that knowledge public—or at least, they would not include it in a high school geography textbook, in a secret manual at the level of "Basic Natural History Third Layer."
In Shi Tiexin's view, the latter possibility was more likely.
And if the latter possibility was true, it likewise meant that humanity here probably had not yet left Earth. The place where he currently was was nowhere else at all—it was Earth, the Central Star at the heart of humanity's territory!
So that white jade disk he had seen last night had actually been the legendary moon?
It was said that sights like those were breathtaking vistas only the great figures of Central Star could enjoy.
Central Star...
The lifelong yearning of countless people!
For a moment, Shi Tiexin's heart surged with emotion. He sat there blankly, not knowing how long he had been lost in thought.
"Brother Shi, your, um, homework, could you..." Zhao Qingmiao's voice sounded beside him. Shi Tiexin came back to his senses and realized morning reading was about to begin. As usual, Zhao Qingmiao had come to collect homework.
As usual, Shi Tiexin replied, "Didn't do it."
"Oh, oh, all right, um... I won't disturb you." Without another word, Zhao Qingmiao withdrew. He did not resemble a class monitor dealing with a delinquent student who had failed to do homework in the slightest.
Recalled to his senses by Zhao Qingmiao, Shi Tiexin finally set aside those swirling thoughts for the moment. He collected himself and reopened the history textbook. Central Star was Central Star; the fact that he was on Central Star shocked him greatly, but of all the things he had seen and heard last night, it was not what had left him most stunned, most unable to accept.
What had truly left him dumbfounded were those stars.
Shi Tiexin rustled through the book, scanning ten lines at a glance as he searched without pause.
Ming history—not it.
Qing history—not it.
The late Qing, modern history—yes, here!
Shi Tiexin carefully examined the historical records from after the late Qing. He read them forward once. Nothing. He read them backward once. Nothing. Meticulously and earnestly, he turned the history of the early twentieth century inside out, picking over every word again and again. He studied until his Natural History cultivation progress had risen several marks, yet he still had not found what he was looking for.
There really was nothing!
Shi Tiexin sat stunned for a long while, then rustled farther back through the pages. After modern history came the founding of Donghua Nation, then the revival of the Hua people, written in a sweeping flow of words—yet there was still absolutely no record of what Shi Tiexin sought.
In the end, Shi Tiexin snapped the book shut.
Combining what he had seen and heard these past two days, the records in the books, and the scattered information that had come when the other consciousness in his spiritual domain dissolved, Shi Tiexin was now basically certain that this world must have countless threads linking it to his own.
Looking across the two worlds, their astronomical conditions and historical records were almost completely identical. Shi Tiexin had once thought he had crossed into another world, or perhaps some colonial planet, but in the end he discovered that the place he had come to was Earth.
Although the histories recorded in the books differed in detail and emphasis, they were no different from the history he knew. The same Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors, the same Spring and Autumn and Warring States Period, the same Tang, Song, Yuan, and Ming, the same Opium War—they were all exactly the same.
Their languages, writing, culture, customs, even their food, all shared considerable consistency. If both worlds had not had buns, how could Shi Tiexin possibly have called out the name of those big steamed buns the moment he entered the cafeteria?
And then there was himself.
This body he currently inhabited was also named Shi Tiexin. Not only did they share the same name, they even had the same appearance. He was a little shorter, much lighter, and far weaker physically, but those were acquired factors caused by nutrition, development, training, and the like—not innate problems.
He was already almost certain that the body he had descended into likewise had an extremely close connection with his self from the other world.
It could be said that, for a very long period of history, this world and his original world had no differences that Shi Tiexin could discern. With the knowledge he possessed, the two worlds were almost completely identical.
But!
From a certain point in time onward, the two worlds developed an enormous divergence.
That point in time was 1919 CE.
Shi Tiexin pinched the bridge of his nose, closed his eyes, and began carefully recalling the knowledge recorded in the Natural History secret manual.
January 21, 1919 CE, was a day that would go down in history. That day was also known as Mist Eve. On that day, the former United States across the Pacific discovered an astronomical phenomenon that shocked all humanity. It was—
Ahead of Earth, there appeared an incomprehensible, enormous mist.
More precisely, Earth and the other planets of the Solar System traveled through the vastness of space along with the Sun. Ordinary people found it difficult to notice this movement, but the Solar System truly had been charging forward at an unimaginable speed. Since humanity began keeping historical records, there had never been a single moment of exception, nor a single moment of accident.
But on January 21, 1919 CE, astronomers discovered that along the Solar System's path of travel lay a colossal region of mist, so vast it could not be measured, imagined, or understood.
Humanity saw it, yet could do nothing. Humanity knew, yet could not resist.
At around five o'clock on January 22, 1919 CE, Central Star Eastern Eighth Time Zone, as though it were fate, as though decreed by Heaven, the entire Solar System plunged into the mist region with an utterly irreversible momentum.
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