"Come out, don't hide!!!" Hu Yu shouted sternly. The atmosphere here was already very thin, and even though the sound waves were amplified, they couldn't travel more than a hundred meters. However, Hu Yu knew that his Main Consciousness would definitely be able to receive them.
Sure enough, the matter in the airspace surrounding Earth Two began to move against the rules, and the alarm for abnormal movement of space matter kept sounding. The entire airspace was marked in red. A huge cloud of gas slowly gathered, becoming thicker and thicker, until lightning flashed within the cloud and the cloud itself turned almost black.
"Humans, don't even think about using this little bit of antimatter to control me. You can't."
"What exactly do you want? Stop controlling my people right now, or the antimatter in this entire airspace will explode. Even if I don't kill you, I'm sure you won't get away with it."
"Alright, I'll withdraw my Consciousness Field for now. Human, I believe you already know my purpose: liberation. If you can help me achieve liberation, we can absolutely become friends."
"It's not just it, there are us too." As soon as the voice fell, several clouds of gas arrived around Hu Yu, a total of seven.
"You are the seven Main Consciousness of this Nebula Region, aren't you? Why should I help you achieve liberation? It would bring no benefit to humanity. Moreover, you are enemies of humanity."
"Human, I'm not negotiating with you right now. You need to understand your own situation."
"General, let me talk to them," Academician Xiao said from the side.
"Good."
After he finished speaking, Academician Xiao's holographic projection appeared high in the sky.
Hello, may I ask how to address you?
"We don't have names, but you can call me Number One, the one to my left is Number Two, the one next to that is Number Three... and the one at the very back is Number Seven."
"Alright, Number One, you said you'd let us humans help you escape this predicament. How can we help you?"
"People, we are Nebula Lifeform. Our consciousness has existed in this nebula for billions of years. In these billions of years, nearly a hundred civilizations have entered the nebula and been captured by us. I alone have captured more than a dozen civilizations. However, we have never found a way to escape. We want to leave this Nebula Region and go out into the greater universe to see what it's like."
"No problem, we can build several large spaceships specifically for you to house. As long as it's within our capabilities, you can have as many as you want."
"Humans, even if you give us a fleet, it won't help. We want to become a sentient species like you; that's the key to liberation."
"That's impossible. The nature of life is different. How could you possibly transform back into a living organism?"
"No, absolutely possible. Do you know why we've only existed for billions of years?"
Upon hearing this, the scientists on Earth Two almost burst out laughing. What do you mean by only a few billion years? That's hundreds of times longer than human history.
Number One continued, " The Milky Way has existed for over ten billion years. Before us, a group of Nebula Consciousness Entity had already left this Nebula Region. We are the second Nebula Lifeform in this Nebula Region. The first group of Nebula Consciousness Entity to leave, so they must have found a way to escape."
"How many were in the first batch of consciousnesses? How do you know they've already been freed? Maybe they were killed by other civilizations?"
"There was only one consciousness in the first batch. Do you know why we, the second batch of consciousnesses, cannot get close to each other? It's because we are all the Consciousness Field of the first batch of consciousnesses. After the first batch of consciousnesses were released, their Consciousness Field continued to spread in the Nebula Region, and we were born from these residual Consciousness Field. Because the frequencies of our seven fields are all the same, if we get too close, they will overlap and cause our consciousness to disappear. If the first batch of consciousnesses had been killed, their Consciousness Field would definitely not be so intact. It would be good if one or two of us, the second batch of consciousnesses, were born."
"We humans have a device called a robot, which is a mechanical device that simulates our own human behaviors and actions. I wonder if it could liberate you?"
"Of course not. If it were that simple, would we have waited until now? Robots and warships are not fundamentally different; they are both machines. Our control of machines is the same as yours. Consciousness is not integrated into the machine. This kind of existence is not what we want. No matter how advanced machine technology is, it will eventually age, while living organisms have self-repair capabilities. As long as technology reaches a certain level, it is almost possible to live forever. Moreover, only living organisms can allow our consciousness and body to fully merge."
"Machines can have their parts replaced, yet they can still exist permanently."
"Do you think we're a biological civilization where if one individual has a problem, a large number of others will immediately come to help? Moreover, the higher the level of civilization, the more stable the organisms are; as long as there are no external influences, they will hardly have any problems. If we exist in the form of robots, and one day a critical component breaks down, we might just have to wait for the machine to continue aging and our consciousness to die out."
"Okay, how powerful a biological entity would it take to contain your consciousness?"
"It would need to be at least ten thousand times stronger than an individual human to have the potential to accommodate our consciousness and brainwaves. Otherwise, the intensity of our brainwaves would turn the organism into charcoal. Also, it's not that any organism can be created just to suit us. It must have vital signs but no consciousness, and of course, be powerful enough."
"That's impossible. We can't create such powerful individuals. Living organisms are inherently fragile. I've seen it myself; the electrical waves from your thought processes are far too powerful, almost like offensive weapons. Putting aside consciousness, what living organism could withstand such an intensity of electrical current?"
"Humans, I am not pleading with you. If you do not agree or cannot do it, then you have no reason to exist. In this Nebula Region, you should not even think about escaping."
"Gentlemen, the man next to me is one of the most outstanding biological scientists in human Human Civilization. You can call him Academician Xiao, just like us. I agree to help you escape this predicament, but we need time, and we need your cooperation at all times. At least one of you must stay nearby at all times to fully cooperate and must not obstruct the process in any way. Otherwise, don't blame us if we fail."
"Fine, but I warn you not to try anything funny. I'm giving you two hundred years. If you don't find a way to escape within two hundred years, you know the consequences."
(PS: Some friends asked why all alien civilizations use years as their unit of time. Well... I could easily make up a new unit of time and then translate it as a year, but wouldn't that be confusing? It's not just years; all units involved follow the same principle.)
"Furthermore, you must not interfere with any of our human activities for the next two hundred years, and you must guarantee our safety. Seventy years ago, there was a fleet hunting us down outside this nebula. Are they still there?"
"They left long ago. That was a Small Star Sector Civilization. They knew we existed. Under normal circumstances, we would have already killed you and plundered your technology, so they had no reason to wait outside. You're lucky. If you had come hundreds of millions of years earlier, we wouldn't have resorted to this method, because your biological civilization is far too cunning."