"By the way, Academician Zeng, we don't have any other urgent matters right now. When we get back, you and Academician Liu can discuss how to find the location of the Treant Civilization. Zhang Yuanshan and Ninety-Seven have been asleep for thousands of years. Ninety-Seven is alright, but Zhang Yuanshan's wife... I've met her a few times, and her eyes are always red."
"Sigh, I've spent a lot of time studying Zhang Yuanshan's case over the years, but his brainwaves are abnormally weak right now. I don't dare to try unless I'm 100% sure," Academician Xiao interjected.
"It is indeed time to deal with Zhang Yuanshan and Ninety-Seven. They are both heroes of our civilization. Now that we have the capability and time, we cannot let heroes remain asleep forever. General, rest assured, I will go back and immediately discuss with Academician Liu a method to find the Treant Civilization."
As Ninety-Seven once said, his home planet was special; it wasn't in the normal universe. For safety, those elder trees that had lived for billions of years had folded the entire planetary system, and the folded space wouldn't move with the black hole at the center of the Milky Way.
To avoid the influence of stars orbiting the central black hole of the Milky Way on the folded space, the Elder Tree frequently adjusts the position of the folded space. After 2 million years of adjustments, even Ninety-Seven cannot know the exact location of his home star system, or even its approximate location. He only knows that they are currently on this side of the Milky Way, presumably to avoid harassment from the swarm of insects.
It's difficult to determine the level of the Treant Civilization because they haven't developed technology, but they're not technologically illiterate either. Their understanding of space has surpassed Hu Yu's fleet, and they're probably at least at the advanced stage of Small Star Region. It's just unknown whether they have space attack capabilities. If you say they don't, almost no one would believe it, because folding the space of an entire planetary system is a feat that not every civilization can accomplish.
Since Ninety-Seven, some academicians in the Department of Space Science have been conducting special research on space folding. This space technology is far more difficult to understand and control than space attack. Although folding space is simple, it is just an advancement of bending space. Almost every massive celestial body has the prototype of folding space. However, as soon as the celestial body leaves its original place, space immediately returns to its original state. How to create a stable space that does not rely on mass to fold has always been a headache for the academicians.
Another issue is that, according to the academicians' understanding, even if space is folded, it should move along with the space of the Milky Way. It is impossible for the folded space to stop on its own. This is hard to explain. It's like a piece of paper that is folded; the folded part is still part of the paper and will move along with the paper.
If the folded space moves along with the Milky Way, the Treant Civilization would not have needed to adjust its spatial position over the past 2 million years. However, because it does not move, they need to adjust their position occasionally to avoid large celestial bodies passing by affecting the folded space. The folded space must be in a state of equilibrium.
Although everyone knows what folded space is, there is no relevant theoretical support. Now, Academician Zeng is discussing with everyone how to find this folded space.
" Academician Zeng, I have an idea?" Academician Liu Bo said.
What are your thoughts?
"Regarding the fact that space doesn't move along with the river system after being folded, there are two possibilities. The first is that Ninety-Seven was just saying it casually at the time, or perhaps he himself didn't quite understand it. It's very likely that it's not folded space, but another spatial method. If the spatial flow of the river system is like a river, it won't stop flowing unless we isolate a certain section of the water with bricks and stones."
"Based on our research on space, that is indeed the case."
" Ninety-Seven also said that he didn't actually know what space folding was. Only those elder trees that have lived for hundreds of millions of years are qualified to know about this method. So I suspect that they didn't fold space at all, but rather cut space. Just like what I said earlier, building a fence with bricks and stones in the water will stop the river water from flowing. The celestial bodies that pass through the cut space are like boulders and dead wood in the river. In order to prevent the fence from being broken, the position of the fence needs to be adjusted frequently."
That does make sense.
After several days and nights of discussion, several feasible solutions were proposed under the current conditions.
The first option is to launch a sufficient number of miniature probes, placing one every light-year across half of the galaxy, and then patiently wait for the Treant Civilization to adjust its spatial position next time. However, doing so would greatly increase the likelihood of exposing humanity's existence. Although humanity's strength has now barely entered the ranks of the strong, the Milky Way is so vast that it's best to keep a low profile.
The second method, similar to the first, involves using a large number of spaceships to traverse the Milky Way. If space is folded in a certain area, the spaceships may experience fluctuations when traveling through the warp drive. The disadvantage is the same as the first method, and it may not even be effective.
The last method uses time travel, taking a panoramic photo of the entire Milky Way from above, 10,000 light-years away. A photo taken 10,000 light-years away shows the Milky Way Milky Way it was 10,000 years ago; a photo taken 100,000 light-years away Milky Way as it was 100,000 light-years away. By comparing photos from different time periods, if two stars were originally 100 light-years apart, and suddenly at some point the distance closes by tens or hundreds of astronomical units, it's very likely that a portion of the space between them has been folded.
However, the last method is the safest but also the most difficult due to energy issues (many readers wonder why not leave the Milky Way; let me elaborate a bit...).
Each warship has a limited energy capacity, meaning it cannot travel to infinite distances, especially faster-than-light travel, which consumes energy at an alarming rate. Most civilizations use matter-antimatter annihilation to obtain energy efficiently, limiting their travel distance to around 10,000 to 20,000 light-years.
The larger the spaceship, the faster it consumes energy. This is why all civilizations can only stay in the Milky Way. If we compare the Milky Way to Earth and the Andromeda Galaxy to Proxima Centauri, the closest Proxima Centauri to Earth, or we don't need to be that far away, we only need to be in Neptune's orbit.
No matter how much gasoline a car carries, it can't possibly reach Neptune's orbit. In fact, the more fuel a car carries, the more fuel it consumes. It's like a warship transporting a star; although it has enough energy, the consumption is also much greater. While it might travel a little further, this amount of energy is woefully inadequate for a distance of 2.5 million light-years.
Even if we could glide across at near-light speed, it would still require energy. We would need to contend with the gravity of the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way, and the various systems of the spaceship would also require energy to maintain during the journey. Although this amount of energy is small, it is still considerable when combined with the endless time required for near-light speed. No civilization would dare to attempt this.
The academicians have calculated that a warship like the Grim Slayer would need to consume at least 50 times its own mass to reach the Andromeda Galaxy. Even if the Grim Slayer uses pure energy to greatly reduce the mass, the long journey still requires real matter from countless people, and leaving the Milky Way is a problem that plagues all civilizations.
Getting back to the main point, if we want to capture a clear, complete view of the Milky Way, we need to go at least 100,000 light-years away from the galactic disk, and the farther the better. The academicians believe that each time the Tree Elders adjust the position of the folded space, they will definitely choose a location with the longest period of quiet. Perhaps they will not move for 100,000 years. Therefore, the longer the time, the more likely they are to find any possible anomalies.
However, the pure energy supply of the Grim Slayer can only allow it to travel about 30,000 light-years. If it wants to escape the Milky Way and fight against the central black hole, it will need even more energy, and it is estimated that it will be able to travel 25,000 light-years at best.
" Academician Zeng, you make the decision."