The cruel reality had already broken Irene.
Hawking, however, was unusually calm. He said evenly, "The excitement only lasted a short while, didn't it? When America abandoned its subsequent space programs, and its spending on space exploration fell below its military expenditure for the Gulf War, that hyped-up story fell apart."
Huang Ji said, "Yes. Your ignorance wasted the time you had left for that final sprint."
"Other than primitive-civilization enthusiasts like me, most members found it uninteresting and stopped paying attention."
Hawking said calmly, "It wasn't just ignorance, was it?"
"For a very long time, advances in space technology wouldn't bring any economic returns, so most nations didn't focus their efforts on space exploration. They left it to future generations."
"But that was only one reason. The criminals preying on humanity probably didn't want humans to overcome nature's trials, either."
Without a doubt, the reason secretly harming humanity like this carried no serious consequences at present was that humanity had been judged incapable of ever reaching the stars.
But once humanity reached the stars and became one of them, the repercussions would be endless.
The criminals only wanted a source of goods destined to perish. They didn't want that source to one day stand beside them.
Hawking said, "So behind the abrupt collapse of the space programs, and the major powers' sudden loss of interest in developing space technology, there must have been interference from these 'Earth suppliers,' correct?"
"Are the insiders you mentioned a nation or an organization?"
Huang Ji said, "As far as I know, they're called the Illuminati."
Hawking felt a pang of melancholy. He knew of this organization, but hadn't known they were involved with aliens. He had thought they were merely a secret society formed by a group of wealthy people.
Not long ago,