The Doctoral Researcher's dejection spread through everyone present like a virus. Even Pan Long could not help feeling down.
He had expected that abandoning Psionic Power as an energy source would cause the people of this world plenty of trouble. But he had never imagined the trouble would be this great—so great that even the leaders of the Tower of Babel were at their wits' end.
These were people who could summon the courage to face war and even death. There could not be many people in the world braver or stronger than they were.
If even they were this disheartened, the gravity of the situation was obvious!
"Is there really no way to phase out the use of Psionic Power?" he pressed. "Even a partial phaseout would be something!"
The Doctoral Researcher gave a bitter smile. "There's no doing this 'partially.' Psionic Power is this world's most important energy source. From running mobile cities to powering a lamp on the wall... most production and daily life in civilized society depend on it. Only isolated, backward villages might still have ways of life that don't involve Psionic Power."
"But that isn't even the most critical problem!" His voice rose a little. "The most important use of Psionic Power in this world is military!"
"Military?"
"That's right, military. Take two armies with equal numbers and equally trained soldiers. If one can use Psionic Power freely and the other can't, the first can crush the second at very little cost." The Doctoral Researcher sighed deeply. "If it were only household or even industrial use, we could still think of something, try to persuade people. But military use... we'd be embarrassed even to bring it up!"
Pan Long had no words. He could only smile bitterly.
The Doctoral Researcher was right. Other uses