" Old Gao, any progress?" Luo Zhigao asked Academician Gao Zhengyang Luo Zhigao. He had asked this question so many times that he had lost count.
"I suspect that the three-dimensional space here has been twisted into a circle from the fourth dimension."
"What's with all this 3D and 4D circles, Old Gao? I don't understand any of that. Keep it simple."
Look at this.
Gao Zhengyang picked up five small balls and arranged them in a pentagonal shape on the table.
"Minister, you see, we are currently in the middle of these five small spheres. When we sail outwards, it's like we've circled one of the spheres and returned to the center. Of course, this analogy isn't very vivid, and I can't give a clear demonstration. We are in space, so it's difficult to understand changes in space."
"Alright, I won't understand even if you explain it to me. I just want to know if there's any way to leave this place. We've been trapped here for nearly ten thousand years. We can't build a fleet anymore, and the planets are almost depleted. If we endure another tens of thousands of years, we'll become numb."
"If my suspicions are correct, I think the key lies with these two stars."
"A star? We can just crash into it and leave?"
"Minister, this is the convergence point of all distorted dimensions. Although it appears normal, it likely hides some secrets."
"This is getting more and more absurd. Just tell me what to do, don't give me these complicated theories."
"I plan to move the other two stars here as well, then detonate all four stars simultaneously, concentrating their energy to penetrate the fourth dimension or break through the current state of space."
"What? Old Gao, have you thought about this? If we lose our star and can't get out, we'll disappear into this space because we don't have enough energy."
"Minister, do you think we can hold out for a long time if we don't detonate the star?"
"Isn't that right? It should take at least several hundred million years, no problem."
"Of course not. I tested the entropy of this space from the beginning, and it's hundreds of times higher than the outside space. In the past ten thousand years, the entropy has more than doubled. If we don't leave here soon, we'll be heat-dead here. The heat inside this space can't get out, but the heat from the outside can get in. The entropy will only increase faster and faster. We might be doomed in a few tens of thousands of years."
"There's such a saying?"
"Putting everything else aside, the temperature in this space has already risen to minus 120 degrees Celsius. In tens of thousands of years, the warships will be boiling over."
"Are we confident we can escape after detonating a star?"
"We don't have absolute certainty. We've tried all the methods we could, but we'll conduct rigorous testing again. This is essentially a desperate gamble."
Twenty thousand years have passed since we entered this space. The temperature inside has plummeted to near zero degrees Celsius. The warship can only sail using conventional power engines. The warp drive has been firmly fixed in place by the increased spatial density, and no matter how hard we try, we cannot move the space even a fraction. The space has transformed from a pot of clear water into a pot of thick paste.
Academician Gao Zhengyang had anticipated the significant increase in space density and had moved the four stars together beforehand; now it was time for the experiment to proceed naturally.
Four stars, one astronomical unit apart, form a square. They were previously held firmly in place by a warship, but now that the warship's warp drive is not working, the four stars are attracting each other under the influence of gravity. Although the density of space has increased, the large stars can still bend space and generate gravity.
Their speed gradually increased from a few centimeters per second to hundreds of kilometers per second. As time went on, the gravitational pull between them grew stronger and stronger, and their speed increased until finally, the four stars collided violently with each other.
An earth-shattering burst of energy erupted from four points in less than 0.001 seconds. Four of these energies traveled the radius of a star, then violently converged and collided with the empty area at the center of the four spheres. The impact of these four energies was several times stronger than the explosion of a single star. With the continuous influx of energy from the star's explosion, this area had become a forbidden zone where no object could exist.
Gao Zhengyang originally wanted to concentrate all the energy together, but with the increase in spatial density and the scarcity of matter, the fleet was no longer able to prevent the energy from leaking out of the exploding stars. Therefore, they could only manipulate four stars to collide simultaneously in a plane so that the central region of the stars could receive the maximum energy impact.
The fleet was anchored three million kilometers from the explosion's epicenter. Earth Three and the other planets were no longer able to move, and after transferring all supplies, they had no choice but to reluctantly abandon them.
" Old Gao, are you confident?"
Before Gao Zhengyang could answer, the warships were forced to retreat by the surging, violent energy and particle stream. If the engines hadn't been activated in advance to stabilize their attitude, the fleet would have been scattered to pieces.
"Go!" Gao Zhengyang shouted.
The fleet, now in a stable position, increased its speed and sped towards the coordinates of the exploding star.
" Old Gao, come and see what this is?"
The light from the explosion had already reached us, and a huge void appeared in our vision—yes, a void, or more accurately, an empty area. The energy and matter from the stellar explosion were still churning violently in the air, but the very center of the explosion remained remarkably calm.
It's like an ancient well suddenly appearing on a turbulent sea. Although it's all water, the water in the well is completely still, except that the diameter of this ancient well is tens of thousands of kilometers.
"It's a passage, hurry up, it won't be long before it closes," Gao Zhengyang said anxiously.
Sure enough, the calm airspace was shrinking rapidly at a visible speed. Luo Zhigao knew this was his last chance; if he couldn't escape this time, there would be no hope left.
"Faster, faster!"
"Minister, the engine is already operating at overcapacity."
"Never mind that, activate all backup engines, and start the warp drive too. Do it even if it only increases the speed by one meter."
"Yes."
When the first warship approached the void, it had already shrunk from tens of thousands of kilometers to less than five thousand kilometers, and this shrinking rate was constantly accelerating.
Regardless of whether the path ahead led to an exit, Luo Zhigao had no time to think. Less than two minutes had passed since the explosion.
Finally, after the last warship passed, the hole was only a little over two hundred meters in diameter. Luo Zhigao wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, counted the warships and civilians, and Luo Zhigao breathe a sigh of relief.