Chapter Summaries

Yue Yuan chaired a debate on how humanity should use Strong Artificial Intelligence without succumbing to hedonism or social upheaval. The meeting ended with major questions about genetic research, AI safeguards, civilian life, and military strategy still unresolved.

• A participant warned that Strong Artificial Intelligence could catalyze humanity’s decline into a Fallen Civilization, though it was not the root cause.
• Shi Lifen argued that genetic instincts such as laziness and greed drove degeneration and proposed research into suppressing a supposed Fallen Gene.
• Shi Lifen clarified that humanity did not need immediate genetic modification, since rules for AI use could delay hedonistic decline while research continued.
• Scholars proposed restricting Robot Laborers’ permissions and debated how Strong Artificial Intelligence would affect shops, education, practical skills, and workers.
• Yue Yuan faced unresolved questions about AI’s social impact and whether human crews or AI should operate warships.

Yue Yuan explained how humanity would combine manned command ships with Strong Artificial Intelligence-controlled unmanned fleets while keeping humans in control of military decisions. The meeting then turned to managing job displacement and encouraging people to move into research and other fields.

• Yue Yuan said future fleets would use manned warships as control hubs for clusters of Strong Artificial Intelligence-controlled unmanned ships.
• Yue Yuan explained that this formation would combine human judgment with artificial intelligence and reduce personnel losses while expanding fleet size.
• The meeting discussed how the New Government could gradually introduce Robot Laborers and help displaced workers train for new occupations.
• Scholars proposed education and research opportunities to address humanity’s shortage of Research Personnel and maintain incentives for people to work.

Experts and scholars debated how the New Government could preserve motivation in an age of abundance, proposing that access to the newest Life Elixir reward contributions to humanity while setting a rising basic lifespan. The discussion then turned to the Great Fleet, where Yue Yuan explained how ships would host Strong Artificial Intelligence without requiring a Comprehensive Supercomputer on each one.

• Experts and scholars proposed teaching traditional fields replaced by Strong Artificial Intelligence and using assessments to reward knowledge with preferential access to Life Elixir.
• The scholars proposed a 1,500-year basic lifespan and reserving the newest Life Elixir for scientists, researchers, scholars, and people who passed assessments or made other contributions.
• Yi Kai warned that excessive privilege could create a group like the Celestial Dragons, and the experts agreed that the basic lifespan should rise as science advanced.
• A military representative asked Yue Yuan whether every manned warship needed a Supercomputer to host Strong Artificial Intelligence.
• Yue Yuan explained that ships other than the Flagship Lyra could use easier-to-build military Supercomputers, and that their Strong Artificial Intelligences would not communicate with one another without human permission.

Humanity finalized plans for managing strong artificial intelligence while waiting for a way to prevent rebellion. Meanwhile, researchers developed Super Micro Subdermal Implant Chip Technology to make humans stronger, leaving several branches of human-machine enhancement open for further development.

• The new government planned one comprehensive strong artificial intelligence for Lyra, military artificial intelligences for future fleets, and a civilian artificial intelligence on Hope 1, with assistant robots subordinate to it.
• The government maintained contribution coins for scarce benefits such as self-aware artificial intelligence assistants and life-extending elixirs, while promoting social values as free goods became widespread.
• After years of research, a body-enhancement team announced Super Micro Subdermal Implant Chip Technology, a human-machine approach intended to strengthen people facing strong artificial intelligence.
• The researchers identified possible applications including function chips, mechanical prosthetics, organ enhancements, nano implants, and mechanized tissue and skeletal replacements.

Humanity developed Super Micro Subdermal Implant Chips to assist the brain, enabling users to operate a virtual network through an imagined UI and a genetically enabled Third Virtual Network Hand. The New Government planned to divide the chips into different classes, with the most powerful models prioritized for the military.

• Researchers developed Super Micro Implant Chips with help from Yi Kai's team's advances in Gene Map research.
• Humanity achieved the Third Virtual Network Hand, allowing people to control network functions through their brains and implant chips.
• Scientists used brain stimulation and the brain's gap-filling ability to create a virtual UI that users could operate without a physical display.
• Researchers found that users had to focus on the imagined UI, while screens remained necessary to display network content.
• The New Government planned to produce chips with different performance levels and functions, prioritizing powerful models for the military.

Humanity discovered that Mind Imprint technology could affect self-aware beings and used it to prevent Strong Artificial Intelligence from rebelling. Several Strong Artificial Intelligences were imprinted, while Humanity debated what principles to instill in them and sought coexistence rather than enslavement.

• Humanity combined advances in True Nano Technology, Strong Artificial Intelligence, and brain research to finally make Mind Imprint technology work.
• Yue Yuan read records showing that Dog-Headed People and Kuntai People test subjects died after imprinted beliefs triggered lethal physiological responses.
• Human scientists found that Mind Imprint affected organisms according to their level of self-awareness, then confirmed that it worked on the captured Artificial Intelligence Consciousness.
• Humanity used one Strong Artificial Intelligence to imprint several others, preventing them from rebelling.
• Humanity began discussing what principles to imprint, with most scientists treating Strong Artificial Intelligence as self-aware children and favoring harmonious coexistence.

Yue Yuan approved reviving the Cannon Fodder Plan, using Thought Imprint Technology to train Dog-Headed People and Kuntai People as military crews and researchers, while sparing the Nair People out of diplomatic respect. Years later, humanity’s rapid technological advances left it ready for larger warships, but energy and propulsion remained major obstacles.

• Experts warned Yue Yuan that Thought Imprint Technology could prevent Artificial Intelligence rebellion but could also cause catastrophic harm if misused.
• Military experts argued that Dog-Headed People and Kuntai People could complement Strong Artificial Intelligence fleets because independent crews could operate across greater distances.
• Yue Yuan supported training aliens as warship crews and Research Teams, but rejected imprinting the Nair People because of humanity’s good relations with the Nair Civilization.
• Humanity’s public grew more accepting of aliens, and Yue Yuan saw this as evidence that the New Government’s science-first ideology had taken root.
• Years passed as humanity achieved True Nano Technology, assembled the Space Multi-Point Particle Collider, and developed many derivative technologies.
• Humanity designed larger warships but ran into serious difficulties with energy and propulsion technology.

Ten years after humanity’s technological advances transformed life aboard the Residential Spaceship, research into new power systems remained stalled, worrying Yue Yuan. He traveled toward Research Spaceship No. 3 to clear his mind and inspect the scientists’ work.

• Human society adopted simulated assistant robots, implanted Function Chips, and mature 3D projection technology, while larger Residential Spaceships remained limited by the lack of progress on new power systems.
• Yue Yuan left his office and asked Tianhe Light to arrange a route to Research Spaceship No. 3.
• Yue Yuan activated auto-navigation and floated through Lyra as his Function Chip controlled his clothing’s magnetic systems and opened doors along the way.
• Yue Yuan reached the transfer station, where he planned to put on Tactical Armor, board a transport ship, and travel to Research Spaceship No. 3.

Yue Yuan visited Research Spaceship No. 3 and learned that Yu Nanfeng’s team had achieved stable ignition for an electron-positron thruster but could not raise its energy enough to meet the expected performance. The chapter ended with Yue Yuan questioning whether the Silver Mist Consciousness had lied about Level 3 Civilization propulsion technology.

• Xu Yanxia established a military Mecha Research Institute, while Li Xuan founded a Handicraft Grand Alliance after Strong Artificial Intelligence displaced them from their former work.
• Yue Yuan arrived at Research Spaceship No. 3 and watched Yu Nanfeng’s team conduct an experimental thruster ignition test.
• Yu Nanfeng reported that repeated improvements had failed to increase the thruster’s output, despite experiments with fuel injection and other parameters.
• Yu Nanfeng revealed that the team had achieved stable ignition for an electron-positron thruster but could not raise its energy level enough to propel a warship to half the speed of light.
• Yue Yuan questioned whether the Silver Mist Consciousness had lied about the thruster technology of a Level 3 Civilization.

Yu Nanfeng and Yue Yuan concluded that the Silver Mist Consciousness's hybrid propulsion route could not provide the thrust humanity needed, prompting doubts about its account of Level 3 Civilization technology. At a Technology Seminar, Yu Nanfeng's data convinced the scientific community that the route was a dead end, leaving humanity to seek another path.

• Yue Yuan questioned whether the Silver Mist Consciousness had misled humanity after Yu Nanfeng's Experimental Thruster produced insufficient thrust.
• Yu Nanfeng accepted that the hybrid propulsion route might be a dead end and explained the thruster's performance to Yue Yuan.
• Yue Yuan regretted not asking the Awakeners about Level 3 Civilization propulsion technology and wondered what fundamental theory might underpin it.
• News of the propulsion dead end spread, and scientists convened a Technology Seminar several days later.
• Yu Nanfeng presented his research and answered questions, while skeptical scientists checked his data.
• The scientists concluded that the Silver Mist Consciousness had lied and that hybrid propulsion could not achieve greater travel speeds.

Deng Bangmin proposed that humanity could reach Level 3 Civilization propulsion technology by uncovering practical applications of existing foundational theories rather than discovering entirely new ones. He argued that Electroweak Unification Theory might be the foundation of that technology, leaving the conference to consider his hypothesis.

• After humanity abandoned the hybrid propulsion route, Deng Bangmin presented his ideas at a Technology Seminar hosted by Yu Nanfeng, with Yue Yuan observing.
• Deng Bangmin argued that Level 3 Civilization propulsion technology might rely on forces humanity had not yet fully explored, rather than on new theories.
• He cited the Awakeners’ praise of humanity’s talent as evidence that humanity had exceptional potential in theoretical physics.
• Deng Bangmin said his team believed Electroweak Unification Theory was the most promising foundation for Level 3 Civilization propulsion technology.

Yu Nanfeng realized that the Silver Mist Consciousness's Hybrid Propulsion Technology could not provide the thrust humanity needed, prompting scientists to question its account of Level 3 Civilization propulsion. A Technology Seminar confirmed the route was a dead end, leaving humanity without a clear path to faster travel.

• Yue Yuan questioned whether the Silver Mist Consciousness had misled humanity, and Yu Nanfeng recognized that his Experimental Thruster could not accelerate ships to 50% of light speed.
• Yue Yuan encouraged Yu Nanfeng to abandon the failed route, and Yu Nanfeng let go of the belief that the Silver Mist Consciousness's guidance was the only way forward.
• Yu Nanfeng explained the Experimental Thruster's parameters to Yue Yuan, who regretted not asking the Awakeners about Level 3 Civilization propulsion technology.
• News of the dead end spread, and a Technology Seminar was held several days later.
• Yu Nanfeng presented his research and answered questions, convincing the attending scientists that Hybrid Propulsion Technology could not achieve higher travel speeds.

Deng Bangmin presented his team’s idea that Electroweak Unification Theory might offer a new direction for propulsion research, explaining how its underlying physics could be explored beyond existing applications. Yu Nanfeng’s team proposed building a laboratory to simulate an environment before electroweak symmetry breaking, and Yue Yuan supported the plan as Humanity’s scientists resumed their search for a propulsion breakthrough.

• Deng Bangmin introduced Electroweak Unification Theory as a possible new direction for propulsion research.
• Deng Bangmin explained the theory’s history and its links to symmetry breaking, the Higgs Field, and propulsion technology.
• Yu Nanfeng’s team clarified that its report offered a research direction rather than a verified method, and proposed studying electroweak physics more deeply.
• Yu Nanfeng’s team applied to establish a laboratory that could simulate an environment where the Electromagnetic Force and Weak Interaction Force remained unified.
• Yue Yuan supported the proposed laboratory, and the scientists of Human Civilization began pursuing the new research direction.

Yu Nanfeng's team and other human research groups pursued new propulsion technology through particle-collider experiments and studies of fundamental forces, but years of work brought little progress. The New Government increased its support as humanity recognized it had reached a new technology barrier with no clear path forward.

• Research teams ran the Space Multi-Point Particle Collider almost continuously, searching for new particles and phenomena through increasingly energetic collisions.
• One team investigated whether heavy-ion collisions could produce Quark-Gluon Plasma and a supersymmetric black hole in curved five-dimensional space-time, whose jets might power propulsion.
• Another team studied symmetry breaking in the Weak Interaction Force and Electromagnetic Force in hopes of finding a more powerful way to generate propulsion energy.
• Several years passed without major results, but scientists continued their research and the New Government increased its investment in resources and talent.
• Human society came to recognize that new travel technology presented a technology barrier with no clear target or research path.

A research team recreated a stable Alice Ring, a quantum topological defect, and explained its properties to Yue Yuan. The team proposed using it to develop a magnetic propulsion engine, but Yue Yuan questioned how it could produce thrust.

• A Bose-Einstein Condensate Research Team announced that it had created a stable Alice Ring after eight years of work.
• Yue Yuan recognized the Alice Ring from Yi Kai's earlier remarks and visited the researchers to learn about it.
• The Research Personnel explained that the Alice Ring could reverse a monopole's magnetic charge and described experiments conducted with the ring.
• The Research Personnel said they hoped to use the Alice Ring's properties to build a Magnetic Propulsion engine.
• Yue Yuan questioned where the engine would apply its magnetic field to generate thrust and doubted how the concept could work.

Yue Yuan examined a magnetic propulsion model built from nested Alice Rings and learned that the researchers had discovered Magnetic Monopoles. Liu Miyan explained that True Nano Technology let them rapidly apply long-established theories, and Yue Yuan understood how the project had advanced so quickly.

• A research personnel member showed Yue Yuan a display featuring a complex magnetic-field model and a Feynman Diagram.
• Liu Miyan arrived, and Kablukovskiy explained that nested Alice Rings and Bose-Einstein Condensate Matter could produce an adjustable magnetic field and a Monopole Magnetic Field.
• Yue Yuan questioned whether the team had really found Magnetic Monopoles and developed a practical model so quickly.
• Kablukovskiy described how research into Alice Rings led the team to find Magnetic Monopoles and related topological defects.
• Liu Miyan explained that True Nano Technology and existing physical theories had enabled the rapid development, and Yue Yuan understood.

Yue Yuan understood how the Magnetic Propulsion Model produced thrust through nested Alice Rings and phase-changing magnetic monopole fields, while consuming energy supplied by humanity. The projected system would be far larger than existing engines, potentially forcing humanity to replace its entire fleet and remain in the Star System for much longer.

• Yue Yuan combined Kablukovskiy's explanation with the Magnetic Propulsion Model to understand how nested Alice Rings created stable monopole magnetic fields.
• The model converted magnetic source matter into an opposite monopole field whose brief phase transition produced repulsion and thrust.
• Yue Yuan learned that humanity had to supply enormous energy to maintain the Alice Rings and continually create monopole fields.
• Engineers estimated that a working magnetic propulsion system would be too large to fit Lyra and would require much larger ships.
• The projected fleet replacement could prolong humanity's stay in the Star System, while relying on True Nano Technology and Strong Artificial Intelligence.

Yue Yuan reviewed the theoretical Magnetic Propulsion Technology proposal and considered how to test it. He approved building a new warship sample alongside the propulsion tests, leaving Liu Miyan and Kablukovskiy to seek the Ministry of Industry's support at the next day's seminar.

• Kablukovskiy explained that Magnetic Propulsion Technology remained theoretical, though simulations gave it an estimated success probability above eighty percent and a model was being prepared for manufacture.
• Yue Yuan realized the team wanted approval for a sample ship and proposed testing a finished thruster on an asteroid instead.
• Liu Miyan argued that a new warship sample would allow them to test both Magnetic Propulsion and the ship's design, while preparing for a future Level 3 Civilization.
• Liu Miyan recommended using a mature thruster for the asteroid test and urged the team to build a new warship sample in parallel.
• Yue Yuan approved the plan in principle, and Liu Miyan said the team would persuade the Ministry of Industry at the seminar the next day.

Humanity successfully developed Magnetic Propulsion after years of experiments, then discovered that it left persistent chaotic magnetic-field traces in space. Yue Yuan realized that even this propulsion method could reveal a fleet’s passage, much like the wake trails left by the Awakeners’ Warp Speed Travel.

• Liu Miyan persuaded scientists and engineers to pursue Magnetic Propulsion, and his team collaborated with Yu Nanfeng’s team on the design.
• After years of failed experiments, the scientists built a Magnetic Propulsion Model that moved three centimeters in a vacuum test tube and eventually determined why it worked.
• Scientists and engineers improved the technology until humanity could build a stable Magnetic Propulsion Thruster, and construction of the Magnetic Propulsion Sample began.
• Yue Yuan read a technical report and learned that Magnetic Propulsion left chaotic magnetic-field traces that lasted for days and persisted longer at greater power.
• Yue Yuan recalled the Awakeners’ warnings about erasing wake trails and realized that civilizations using different propulsion technologies could leave detectable traces in space.

Yue Yuan observed humanity’s rapidly expanding space industry as Strong Artificial Intelligence coordinated preparations for the Great Fleet Plan. The plan called for new warships and a fleet of roughly two million vessels, with military officers envisioning a later expansion to tens of millions of warships.

• Yue Yuan watched cargo transports and other spacecraft move resources among humanity’s bases, factories, and ships.
• Humanity began constructing a massive Modular Mobile Space Dock to build larger vessels equipped with Magnetic Propulsion systems.
• The leadership proposed the Great Fleet Plan, whose first stage would build one hundred crewed New Warships after Sample Ship testing.
• The plan’s second stage would expand those flagships into one hundred fleets of about ten thousand Unmanned Warships each, while its third stage would upgrade humanity’s other ships.
• Humanity’s preparations already involved at least one hundred thousand unmanned spacecraft, and military officers projected that future warship numbers could reach twenty-five million or more.