Earth's Tech Tree Had Already Been Led Astray (4,000 Words, Please Recommend, Please Vote, Please Follow)

Wang Lei saw how agitated Du Kao was and merely sneered, shaking his head. He continued unhurriedly.

"Is that so? Then can you explain why De Nuo deliberately led Earth's tech tree astray?"

Du Kao did not react at first, but then flew into a rage. His temper had improved considerably over the past few decades, but that did not mean he would tolerate slander. He slammed the table and rose to his feet. "What? You're saying we led Earth's tech tree astray? Don't spout nonsense. Do you know what the highest technology in the universe is? We've shared every bit of God-Making technology we know with the government. We even established laboratories to study genes."

Wang Lei did not stand, but he showed no courtesy in the face of Du Kao's glare, staring right back at him before speaking righteously. "That's precisely the problem with gene technology. Let me ask you: how many stages must a known-universe civilization pass through before reaching the level of a God-Making Civilization?"

Du Kao instantly sensed a trap in Wang Lei's words through sheer political instinct, but he could not yet tell where the trap lay, so he did not answer directly.

Seeing Du Kao remain silent, Wang Lei continued with the classification of civilizations in the Super God Universe. "Hmph, not talking? Then I'll explain. The advanced civilizations of the known universe broadly divide all intelligent civilizations into five tiers: Primitive Civilization—Pre-Nuclear Civilization—Spacefaring Civilization—God-Making Civilization—Super God Civilization."

After Wang Lei listed the five tiers of civilization, Du Kao sat back down, seemingly listening carefully to his analysis. Everyone else, including Huang Lao, had already taken out paper and pens to start taking notes.

Wang Lei thought, had Du Kao and the others really failed to pass on even such basic information? He could only continue explaining.

"There's no need to say much about Primitive Civilizations. They are civilizations that have yet to grasp the concept of a planet, and have not even widely adopted thermal weapons."

"Pre-Nuclear Civilizations are where Earth currently stands. However, Earth has already reached the final stage of a Pre-Nuclear Civilization. It has discovered nuclear energy and can manufacture primitive nuclear weapons."

"Spacefaring Civilizations are actually divided into local-system spacefaring civilizations and star-domain spacefaring civilizations. A local-system spacefaring civilization can effectively utilize nuclear energy and build spacecraft capable of traveling through its own star system. A star-domain spacefaring civilization, meanwhile, has developed antimatter engines or warp engines and can travel across star domains. The Taotie are at the star-domain spacefaring level. Without that giant wormhole near Pluto, they normally would not have been able to reach the Solar System."

"A God-Making Civilization is one where people realize that with shipborne space travel alone, neither speed nor fragile lifeforms can guarantee survival while flying from one star system to another. That is why gene technology and the God-Making Project began. Of course, that was merely the original purpose of creating gods. By now, every God-Making Civilization has tossed that notion into some forgotten trash bin. Gods have become a general term for the top Combat Strength of each civilization."

"As for Super God Civilizations, both the Angels and Styx have actually reached that standard. Blazing Sun and the Demons have fallen behind in this regard. However, the Angels have explicitly banned the admission ticket to becoming a Super God Civilization: the void. It is one of Galaxy Power's abilities. To be fair, the legacy left behind by the Super God Academy was truly immense. Not only did it elevate De Nuo, but even after De Nuo's destruction, the three major God-Making Projects remained at the pinnacle of the known universe. No wonder the great civilizations all coveted Earth's Super Gene warriors."

"Oh, right. Death God Karl also defined the next generation of civilization beyond a Super God Civilization, naming it Void Civilization. But even he only had a partial understanding of it, so the civilizations of the known universe never acknowledged it."

Wang Lei's mouth had gone dry from all that talking, yet no one had even offered him a drink. He could only exchange a bottle of Linyuan Ice Spring from the system to quench his thirst.

Huang Lao rubbed his temples, apparently struggling to digest so much information, but he still asked, "Xiao Wang, the civilization rankings you've provided are indeed a little more detailed than what Old Du and the others gave us. But doesn't that instead prove they haven't withheld anything?"

Wang Lei shook his head and continued staring fixedly at Du Kao.

"The logic is very simple. Earth is at the final stage of a Pre-Nuclear Civilization, while De Nuo's God-Making Project was at the final stage of a God-Making Civilization, perhaps even with one foot in the door of a Super God Civilization. There are almost two entire civilization tiers between them. De Nuo directly giving Earth gene technology is no different from asking an elementary school student who has just learned addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division to research antimatter engines. Even if Earth poured all its global resources into it, it could only establish a few rudimentary gene research institutes—ones without any actual development capabilities. Every process could only imitate the De Nuo Civilization by rote, and not even properly. After all, De Nuo no longer had the ability to create new God-Making genes."

Du Kao was rendered speechless. He wanted to say that was not what he had intended. It was simply that there was truly nothing around Earth, and the De Nuo Civilization no longer had the ability to gather resources across star systems. Even the Super Soldier Company they had now had only been activated thanks to aid from the Blazing Sun Civilization. Even darksteel had to be supplied by Blazing Sun.

Moreover, Du Kao had become accustomed to wars between Super God Civilizations. Therefore, when a threat emerged, the first thing he thought of was Super Soldiers. He had completely ignored the possibility of strengthening Earth's foundations to resist invasion. In his eyes, no matter how hard a Pre-Nuclear Civilization like Earth tried, it could never defeat the Taotie Civilization, which had nearly reached the end of the Spacefaring Civilization stage, on its own. Only Super Soldiers could break the deadlock.

It could not exactly be said that Du Kao's judgment was wrong. If Earth had not possessed these Super Soldiers, then under the circumstances of the original story, Earth truly would have had no hope of turning things around. But making Earth stubbornly tackle gene technology directly was simply leading it astray.

At that moment, Lianfeng, who had just hurried out, had completed the preliminary assessment of the Energy Battery and rushed back with the data.

However, the moment she entered the office, she found Du Kao's face livid, looking as though he wanted to say something but could not get the words out. Jess had his head lowered, desperately trying to make himself invisible.

Huang Lao and his assistant were looking at Du Kao critically, as though waiting for an explanation.

As for Wang Lei, he was staring at Du Kao with a deeply serious expression. His face practically said, "Let's see how you explain this."

Lianfeng's arrival temporarily saved Du Kao and broke the awkward silence in the meeting room.

Seeing that Du Kao was unable to defend himself, Huang Lao had already developed some misgivings about the De Nuo Civilization. Still, he helped his old friend out of the situation.

"Lianfeng, what were the results of the battery analysis?"

Lianfeng had no idea what had happened while she was gone, so she could only report according to her duties.

"The battery Wang Lei provided uses an unknown energy compression method. It can directly compress and store energy itself. It is somewhat like compressing carbon dioxide into dry ice. They directly compressed an unknown form of energy into liquid form. Judging by its energy output efficiency, with only minor compatibility adjustments, this battery could sustain a First Generation Super Soldier at maximum operational capacity for over five hours. Its storage efficiency already surpasses all of our energy devices."

Huang Lao nodded and continued asking, "Then if we convert it into the electrical energy we use daily, approximately how much would that be?"

"Roughly the amount of electricity generated by the Three Gorges power generators operating at full power for half a month. But in reality, we have no way of compressing electrical storage equipment to such a small size."

Huang Lao's face immediately filled with worry. Clearly, he had wanted to buy equipment from Wang Lei. The equipment Wang Lei had worn when he first appeared had been quite good, but Wang Lei obviously could not haul around mountain-sized, low-efficiency energy storage equipment to trade with others.

In truth, Wang Lei had never expected the Hua Xia government to be able to help him right now. If he wanted the Hua Xia government to supply him with energy, they would at least need to unlock controlled nuclear fusion on their tech tree first. So he said directly, "Forget it. The De Nuo Civilization doesn't have much legacy left anyway. Don't rack your brains over batteries. By the way, General Du Kao, do you have anything to refute about what I just said?"

Du Kao had no idea how to refute him. He was not a scientist. Fortunately, Jess briefly explained what had happened to Lianfeng, and Lianfeng stated that, as a technology researcher, she had something to say.

Naturally, Wang Lei would not stop Lianfeng from speaking. After receiving Huang Lao's permission, she said, "Wang Lei, I believe your judgment is flawed. In the long run, having Earth leapfrog into researching gene technology is indeed unwise. But the Taotie are already at our doorstep. Only Super Genes can break the deadlock, so we no longer have the luxury of choosing. Even if the government cannot possibly fully understand Super Genes right now, even if it cannot even manage repair and maintenance work, it must still understand what they are and how to provide logistical support. Otherwise, Super Soldiers alone cannot win this war."

Wang Lei nodded. Du Kao was not a professional in scientific matters, but Lianfeng was far more qualified. She would not be so easily cornered by his questions. So he said, "So you had the government completely abandon military technological advancement and study genes alongside you? Knowing how to provide supplies does not require so much manpower, does it? In principle, you aren't even the ones providing supplies right now. Judging from the records of Deno No. 3, Earth's only achievement in gene technology so far is that lump of high-energy compressed meat. Its only purpose is to keep the Super Soldier Company's Super Soldiers from starving to death when they lack sufficient energy replenishment."

Wang Lei was not making that up. The Super Soldier Company had been able to fight across the country after the Demons destroyed Juxia largely because their energy replenishment agreement with Leina had not been interrupted. Even though Leina was captured by the Taotie for a time and her Gene Engine shut down in a self-protective manner, she had not left Earth's vicinity. Therefore, the Super Soldier Company did not need to worry about energy replenishment.

Just look at Ge Xiaolun's miserable state in Fereze after he exhausted all his energy, when even his Invincible Body could not activate. If Yan had not used her last bit of energy to activate Ge Xiaolun's Wings of Time and Space and send him back to Earth, he might truly have fallen on Fereze.

It was not until Zhi Xin arrived later and used Divine Code to help Ge Xiaolun establish a stellar energy supply channel that he escaped his dependence on Blazing Sun.

Under these circumstances, Lianfeng had no way to deny that Earth's current gene research was truly of little help to Super Soldiers. Seeing this, Wang Lei continued.

"So you could clearly have walked on two legs. With De Nuo Civilization's basic database, you could have helped Earth avoid countless detours in technology. You could have had one group study gene technology that Earth would not be able to figure out even after several centuries, while the rest hurried to climb the basic tech tree. Earth is not that far from becoming a local-system Spacefaring Civilization. The fact that you can secretly build spacecraft already proves it, even if they were built using resources extorted from Blazing Sun. Yet you completely ignored Earth's own potential. Is this the arrogance of an advanced civilization?"

Lianfeng's expression froze. Mount Mangdang was among the most classified secrets, and it was not even recorded in Deno No. 3. How did Wang Lei know about it? Wang Lei kindly answered Lianfeng's unspoken question.

"Don't look so suspicious. I work with quantum technology—electronic information, in other words. Even the Angels and Styx might not be better than me at it. Do you know Laplace's Demon? In theory, if many harsh conditions are met, I can become an inferior version of that Laplace's Demon. Of course, I'm still far from that level right now. But it's enough to detect De Nuo's little schemes."

"Think about it carefully. If Earth could now meet the minimum standard of a Spacefaring Civilization, then Earth's light weapons would no longer be incapable of even piercing Taotie armor. How much pressure would that take off the Super Soldier Company? That is why your De Nuo definitely harbors malicious intentions. You want to use war to reduce the population of Hua Xia and its military forces."

The moment Du Kao heard that, he grew anxious. This time, however, he did not slam the table, because he no longer had the confidence to do so. Instead, he sighed and said, "Wang Lei, I admit that my judgment was mistaken. I will voluntarily submit a self-criticism to my superiors and remove this uniform while awaiting judgment from a military court. But the Super Soldier Company is Earth's hope. I hope you can take my place and train them from now on."

Huang Lao now understood why Wang Lei had said the De Nuo Remnants had led Earth's tech tree astray. In truth, Super Soldiers were simply too tempting. As long as one could fully understand them, one could rise in a single step to become a top civilization in the universe. No civilization could resist such a temptation. So this matter could not be blamed on one side alone; one was willing to offer, and the other was willing to accept. Therefore, he said nothing.

Wang Lei had to admit that Du Kao had played this retreat-to-advance move beautifully. But it was an open scheme. If he took over the Super Soldier Company, he would most likely have to support them afterward as well. That bunch of worthless trash... he might as well go to the Star Rail World and look for a super energy source. Then he could trade for a mechanical army and steamroll the Taotie outright. So he refused directly, "Cut it out, Du Kao. You want me to clean up the Super Soldier Company's mess for you? Dream on. The Angels, Demons, and Blazing Sun are all eyeing the Super Soldier Company's Super Soldiers, but I'm not. Oh, no, Qi Lin and Mengmeng are exceptions—I do care about them. If you want me to protect those two, we can talk. As for everyone else... I couldn't care less. Your Black Great Wall Project has been underway for so long already. Just fleece Blazing Sun again when the time comes."

Huang Lao spoke up as well, offering Du Kao some comfort. He knew that Earth still needed Super Soldiers right now. But just as Wang Lei had said, they could not place all their bets on Super Soldiers. Only strength in their own hands was true strength. How had he forgotten the words of their ancestors?

Wang Lei knew that it was impossible to bring down Du Kao with a single meeting. In any case, Du Kao would be taken out of the picture later on—and according to the later plot, he truly was. And if Wang Lei did not intervene, Rose would still defect to Morgana just like in the original work. That would be the time for him to make his move. For now, he should first leave a good impression on the Hua Xia government.

So Wang Lei exchanged for an electronic document through the system. He put it onto a USB drive, took it out, and handed it to Huang Lao, saying, "Huang Lao, while there isn't much I can help the government with right now, to be honest, the government can't offer me much help either. Still, consider this document a token of goodwill. It contains the formula and manufacturing process for a Room-Temperature Superconducting Material. I specifically chose one whose materials can all be easily gathered on Earth. It is very easy to make; an ordinary university laboratory can produce it. But the material itself isn't very strong, and in the universe, it's the sort of thing nobody wants. Still, it's enough to let Hua Xia rapidly unlock controlled nuclear fusion and Electromagnetic Weapons. It can also be used for near-Earth spacecraft."