Kelvin, deputy director of security at the New Jade Gate branch of the Zixin Hui Group and deputy general manager of Grandpa Wang's Agricultural Reclamation Company, had just turned thirty-five. As he gazed at the solemn, mysterious scene before him, his mind was in complete disarray.
He had never imagined that something no big-budget movie could recreate would appear in his own life.
He was now inside an underground cave at the southern foothills of the Qililuo Mountains, along with Taina Morn, a reporter for the Alliance; Yaxiu, an Alliance ranger and an "old acquaintance"; and Mr. Summers of the Engineers' Guild.
Judging by the distance they had traveled, Kelvin estimated that they were already hundreds of meters underground.
Yet somewhere beneath the mountain, at an unknown depth, there was a vast cavern. At its far end stood a remarkably smooth, polished wall, though he couldn't identify what it was made of. It looked like an enormous mirror. Its surface was pitch-black, yet it could serve perfectly well as one.
But within that dark, unknown mirror seemed to lie countless gorgeous specks of light. Hazy starlight shimmered inside the wall, though he couldn't see where it came from. A profound, mysterious glow spilled from its surface into the cavern, forming a thin mist of light.
Kelvin felt as though he were standing in that mist, surrounded by the universe, with no idea what time or age he was in.
In truth, he had never really seen the magnificent sweep of the stars and galaxies.
He had traveled aboard a starship, but his only interstellar voyage had been spent in a cramped, cheap cabin on the lower deck, with twenty people to a room. He had endured two months in a stuffy, claustrophobic personal space, surrounded by the racket of people