war.
From the movie, this term seems far removed from Interstellar Spacetime, but in Zhang Tianyuan's view, it is more likely that it has simply been obscured.
The movie mentioned that NASA was once disbanded for refusing to drop bombs on starving people in the stratosphere, but it was later rebuilt.
When a country faces irreconcilable and enormous contradictions, it will most often choose to shift its focus outwards, with war being the most common form.
In Zhang Tianyuan's view, the fact that they can even drop bombs on starving people within their own country or near the border indicates that the means of diverting attention from external problems have likely become ineffective.
In other words, the means of warfare have most likely already been tried and have failed, or at least yielded very little result.
Come to think of it, what is the purpose of war when internal conflicts are so intense?
The purpose is to plunder the wealth created by the people of other countries, then seize this wealth for themselves, transport it back to their own country for distribution, and alleviate domestic conflicts.
But where does wealth come from?
It comes from the land.
Food, minerals, and population—none of these are independent of the land.
Unfortunately, the land in Interstellar Spacetime has become unsuitable for planting. Desertification is severe, and Blight is spreading among various plant species. Not even a trace of green can be seen on the land.
Food can no longer be grown.
In this way, the side that started the war would find it difficult to obtain food from the defeated side; at most, they could only take away the grain reserves in their warehouses.
As for other resources such as minerals and population, they are meaningless or even a burden when food is scarce.
What good is it to seize vast mineral resources, develop a sophisticated industry, or achieve rapid economic growth if the people have nothing to eat?
We can't expect the entire nation to simply ascend to mechanical flight and start consuming engine oil, can we?
Moreover, developing these industries will crowd out human resources and exacerbate food consumption. With such a waste of already scarce food reserves, even cockroaches entering the granary might be used as reserve food.
Therefore, in this timeline, with countries running out of food reserves, waging war has gradually become a purely unprofitable business, and many countries may not even be able to squeeze out enough food reserves for the logistics of launching a war.
Of course, it is highly probable that a major war broke out in Interstellar Spacetime in order to plunder the food reserves of various countries.
Otherwise, it would be difficult to explain why drones belonging to the New Delhi Mission Control would cross the ocean to North America.
If it really did fly from New Delhi to there over ten years, then this autopilot is truly outrageous; even Brownian motion wouldn't explain it.
Zhang Tianyuan had discussed these speculations with Instructor Yin in person.
Therefore, Instructor Yin was not too surprised after "hearing" the little girl's sign language expression.
The chairman's information is always accurate.
He just looked at the dust wrapped in the air, looked at the sun and sighed in his heart, but also a little worried.
"Did many people die in that great battle?" he asked.
The little girl tilted her head, seemingly pondering what adults had told her before. After a while, she nodded hesitantly.
Instructor Yin then asked, "Which countries participated in the war?"
The little girl genuinely didn't understand, and she simply shook her head.
Instructor Yin knew he had reached his limit, so he changed the subject and asked about the little girl's schooling.
As he expected, the little girl shook her head again.
Instructor Yin reached out and patted her head. He sighed inwardly, but forced a smile, "It's alright, you can still go to school in the future."
The group hadn't walked far when they approached the city ahead.
Like its surroundings, the city was shrouded in dust, appearing as a yellowish-brown color, with piles of sand visible everywhere. However, compared to the countryside outside, the towering houses provided some shelter, making the situation much better.
Even the roads were buried under nearly a centimeter of yellow sand, making them soft to walk on. Some gaunt workers in uniforms were using tools to push the sand together, shovel it into carts, and then haul it away by hand.
Outside the roadside shops, the dilapidated signs were covered in dust. There were shops selling handwoven fabrics, books, various tools, and even a blacksmith's shop with constant clanging sounds, as if someone was hammering some kind of farm tool similar to a hoe.
Aside from the towering buildings, the clearly defined business areas of these shops show almost no trace of modernity.
The only thing worth mentioning is that corn is planted in every corner of the city, wherever there is vacant land, as if corn is being used as a form of green vegetation.
Only
However, the tall corn stalks were also covered with a layer of sand, making them look sickly and with little greenery.
Moreover, outside these corn cobs, there were handmade signs of different materials and shapes, but all with the same sentence written in ink:
" Dongxing Subdistrict residents' public land: Damage and theft of public grain are strictly prohibited!"
This is a gated community.
As soon as Instructor Yin Instructor Yin's car entered, it attracted the attention of the crowd, especially the bottled water he was carrying, which made many people stare and unconsciously swallow.
Having seen the city, Instructor Yin had gained a basic understanding of the situation in this time and space.
Judging from the signs for the common land, the government still exists in this timeline and has considerable control over it; the area did not collapse due to the famine.
Once inside the neighborhood, the little girl visibly relaxed, nodding and greeting some people or other children. Some people cautiously approached Instructor Yin to inquire about the identity of his convoy.
In response, Instructor Yin readily agreed to send the little girl home in one of his cars, and then asked the man to help take him and his men to the police station.
The man seemed somewhat taken aback by this request. He had initially thought these people were criminals from somewhere, but who knew they would actually go to the police station voluntarily?
Surprised as I was, this man was efficient and didn't hesitate to get things done. For a bottle of mineral water, he led the convoy to its destination with lightning speed.
The convoy had already attracted attention as soon as it arrived at the police station, so even before Instructor Yin went inside, officers came to the door to inquire about the situation.
"Who are you people...?"
Just as Instructor Yin was about to answer, the police officer continued, "You guys are scavenging outside, aren't you?"
"Scavengers?" Instructor Yin roughly understood what the police officer meant, then shook his head and denied it, saying, "We're not scavengers."
"Hmm..." The police officer named Ma Le nodded without saying anything.
However, after looking the convoy up and down, he had already concluded that it was a powerful scavenging group.
Following the food shortage, the world order crumbled, and the order of various countries was damaged to varying degrees due to the famine.
In this context, the emergence of groups like scavengers is perfectly normal.
These people the Wandering Earth from place to place, setting up camp wherever they could, searching for groundwater, food, fertile farmland free from sandstorms, minerals, and gasoline...
Of course, these are law-abiding scavengers, or rather, scavengers with a conscience.
Having confirmed the identities of Instructor Yin and his group, Ma Le became secretly on guard, his hand unconsciously resting on his waist.
Instructor Yin was unaware that his identity had already been decided in Ma Le's mind. He maintained a normal expression and wanted to go inside with Ma Le to talk.
Ma Le did not refuse. After calling out a few colleagues to watch over the remaining team members, he, Instructor Yin, and Zheng Xu went into the police station office.
Upon entering, the air was much cleaner than outside, but the feeling of impurities and staleness was still quite strong.
Instructor Yin couldn't worry about that for the time being. After sitting down, he took a bucket of water from Zheng Xu behind him and placed it on the table.
Ma Le paused, looking at the bottled water in the bucket and the sealed cap. "What's this?"
Instructor Yin opened the bottle of purified water, poured a glass of water for Ma Le, and then said to Ma Le, who was still standing there: xS12
"Officer Ma, it's actually like this."
"We come from a charity organization that has a large supply of fresh water. We've noticed a severe shortage of fresh water in the country, so we want to make a contribution. We hope Officer Ma can help us report this and coordinate the matter."
The situation of water scarcity in China was speculated upon at an expert meeting as early as the No. 7 Spacetime, and this view was subsequently verified during the last Mutual Aid Society's drone patrol.
Ma Le scratched his head, unable to react for a moment.
"Contribution?" He glanced at the water on the table, then at the now rare mineral water bottle bearing the marks of industrial production.
"Are you looking to donate a batch of water?" Ma Le blinked.
Instructor Yin nodded.
Ma Le was immediately delighted and, without bothering to find out anything else, asked right away, "How many?"
Instructor Yin paused, then said mysteriously, "The exact number is still uncertain, but it's certain there will be a lot more. The final total will definitely exceed your imagination."
However, his vague answer made Ma Le frown again, unsure of what to do.
Instructor Yin smiled, said a few words to Zheng Xu, then asked him to leave. He then sat quietly in his seat, appearing very calm.
Ma Le still didn't understand what this meant.
What's the meaning.
Within two minutes, he saw his colleague rush in from outside, gesturing for him to leave.
Feeling puzzled, Ma Le apologized and then left temporarily with his colleague.
"What happened? Has something happened outside?"
"Holy crap!" Ma Le's colleague's face turned red. He grabbed Ma Le's shoulders. "Do you even know what's in those trucks?"
"What is it?" Ma Le instinctively leaned back, avoiding his colleague's spittle.
But the next second, he froze.
"It's all water!"
"Water in several entire train carriages!!!"
"It's all brand new, unopened bottled water!"
"Did they tell you they wanted to donate that water? Hurry up and go in and agree!"
His colleague sprayed spittle all over his face, but Ma Le remained stunned and unresponsive until his colleague pushed him back into the room.
Instructor Yin turned and smiled, "The rest is up to Officer Ma. Due to certain reasons, this is actually only our first batch of supplies."
Ma Le blinked a few times in a daze, responded with a few "ah"s and "oh," and then nodded, completely stunned by the unexpected windfall.
On the other side of the ocean.
Murphy woke up in bed again.
The little girl immediately went to the bookshelf and examined the book that hadn't fallen down the night before. She discovered that the entire night had passed and the book hadn't changed at all; it hadn't shrunk back into the bookshelf, nor had it moved even a centimeter further.
The Ghost seems to have disappeared?
Murphy scratched her head and left the room. After a quick wash, she went to the living room to have breakfast.
Her father and grandfather were both waiting for her there.
" Murphy, what's wrong? You don't seem to be feeling well."
Murphy looked up. "Dad, the Ghost seems to have disappeared."
Cooper, the father, gave a helpless smile, " Murphy, I've already told you, there are no Ghost in this world."
"No, it was there; it just suddenly disappeared last night!"
Little Murphy pouted, firmly insisting on his point of view.
Cooper still looked helpless. "Say what you will, but sit down and eat breakfast. You and Tom have to go to school today."
Fifteen-year-old Tom didn't even look up, frantically devouring all sorts of corn products on the table, his mouth covered in corn paste.
In this day and age, an ordinary family really couldn't afford to have a teenager eating like that; only a wealthy family like theirs, with 500 acres of corn, could withstand it.
Grandpa Donald still looked cheerful and content, watching the father and daughter's conversation with a satisfied expression. In this era, he was wealthy, had no worries about food or clothing, and had his children and grandchildren by his side. Apart from his daughter's early death, he had no other regrets.
Little Murphy sat down dejectedly, picked up his bowl, and started stuffing food into his mouth.
Cooper also began arranging household chores, mainly talking to his son Tom. He was discussing things in the fields with Tom, who, at 15, was already one of the main laborers on the family farm, even though he was still in school.
Murphy wanted to chime in, but she never participated in farm work, and her father wouldn't allow it.
After a while, she finally found a moment to talk with her father. "Dad, was the moon landing real? Our teachers and textbooks all say that the moon landing didn't happen, that it was just a conspiracy..."
The moment those words were spoken, the father's gaze immediately turned to him, and he was utterly astonished. "What?"
Murphy, munching on his corn porridge, mumbled, "That's what the teacher said, and that's what the classmates said too. It's different from what your book says."
Her room contained many of her parents' books, including Cooper's childhood textbooks, which Murphy could understand.
Cooper seemed somewhat unable to accept the news. He took a deep breath, paused for a moment, and then said, "Of course it's true, Murphy."
"Don't forget, your father is a retired astronaut, and once the best pilot!"
Although he had only barely left the stratosphere, Cooper was always proud of it, and he wasn't lying; having only left the stratosphere once, he was indeed one of the most outstanding astronauts ever.
Murphy pouted, poking at the corn porridge in her bowl with her spoon. "But why don't we go to the moon anymore? I can't answer that question."
Cooper choked; the corn porridge he had just tasted tasteless, and his eyes were filled with despair.
" Murphy, before we look up at the stars, we must first survive..."
In this world, just surviving is difficult enough.