A beam of Primordial Law-Extinguishing Light streaked through the starry expanse between the Galactic Center Black Hole and the Solar System.
That beam traveled faster than light!
In theory, nothing in the universe could ever exceed the speed of light. According to special relativity, as an object approached that speed, its mass grew without bound, and the energy required approached infinity.
Yet at that moment, an object truly was traveling faster than light!
Defying common sense and everything people knew, this superluminal existence had appeared in the vast starry reaches of the Milky Way.
Was it the creation of a civilization beyond the third level?
No one knew. Perhaps no civilization could observe it, for the beam did not radiate in every direction. It remained concentrated at a single point, moving toward a fixed destination.
At superluminal speed, all things in heaven and earth slowed down.
Jiang Ding soared through the universe, silently taking in the scene before him.
Light, the movement of stars, the movement of galaxies, the movement of asteroid belts... Every moving thing had slowed to a crawl.
Could he say that time itself had slowed?
After all, time was something revealed through the movement of matter.
When everything moving in the universe slowed, and no other frame of reference for time remained, had time itself slowed as well?
Yes.
Time had slowed!
Jiang Ding was certain of it.
"I should be able to reach the Solar System within a thousand years..."
Jiang Ding calculated silently.
The beam traveled through the universe for decades. Then, at a certain moment, it suddenly flared bright and began to flicker. Its light dimmed rapidly as it dropped out of superluminal travel, its speed plunging toward and then below the speed of light.
"This is bad!"
Jiang Ding's expression changed.
At