A trickle of energy began to slowly flow into the mechanical body. Academician Xiao operated an instrument beside him, an instrument that could detect the Consciousness Field.
The mechanical body still showed no signs of waking up. Suddenly, the previously flat line of consciousness on Academician Xiao's instrument display screen showed a slight fluctuation. Academician Xiao immediately instructed Academician Zeng to stop supplying power.
" Old Xiao, the energy isn't enough, is it?" Academician Zeng said.
"That's enough, absolutely enough. Give it any more energy and it'll self-destruct."
"How could that be? It hasn't even woken up yet."
"Haha, mechanical being, stop pretending. I've already detected your Consciousness Field fluctuations. Although you've disguised yourself well, you can't escape the detection of my instrument."
But after a few minutes, the mechanical object still didn't react at all, remaining like a jumbled pile of parts.
" Old Xiao, you're not mistaken, are you? Or is there some other factor at play? The energy just injected is less than one ten-thousandth of what it normally needs."
"Consciousness doesn't require much energy, even just a tiny bit is enough. How much energy does an insect have? Yet they also have consciousness. Let me handle this."
Academician Xiao said to the machine, "Mechanical body, if you keep pretending, I'll input something good into you. I have plenty of ways to deal with you. I'll rewrite your memories, giving you billions of years of pain and fear. I believe you can understand what that process is like. Now I'll give you three seconds to consider. One, two..."
"Fine, you win, human." The machine finally uttered a weak voice.
"I almost got fooled. It's so cunning. Old Xiao, let's teach it a lesson first, otherwise it'll be harder to handle later."
"That makes sense, let me do it."
"No, no, humans, I'll tell you everything you want to know, just don't give me those memories."
"I'll give you one chance. If we find out you're lying, we'll implant a billion years' worth of memories into you."
"Yes, yes, yes, I will definitely cooperate."
"Tell me, where is your lord?"
"I don't know. The lord never contacts low-level mechanical beings like us. I'm just a level 189 mechanical being; I have no right to know anything about the lord. Even if the lord contacted us directly, we wouldn't be able to track him down. It was all set up from the beginning."
Academician Zeng nodded. It was indeed impossible for the Lord to let every mechanical being know its information. If that were the case, the Lord would be in danger. If any mechanical being was captured, it could potentially reveal the Lord's coordinates.
"Where are you from?" Academician Zeng then asked.
" Alpha Universe."
"What Alpha Universe?"
"Our universe is not this three-dimensional universe, but another universe. In our universe, the lord is the king, who possesses countless warships and star systems. However, our universe later collapsed. At the last moment of the collapse, a passage appeared in our universe. We followed the passage and came here."
The information about the Alpha Universe baffled Academician Zeng. Academician Zeng had previously speculated about other universes, but this was the first time it had been confirmed that there were indeed other universes beyond this three-dimensional universe, and that computer-like consciousness, such as Mechanical Civilization, had emerged there.
Tell me about your experiences after arriving in our universe.
"Yes, after arriving in your universe, the Lord's fleet had dwindled to less than 100 billion. You probably know what happened next. The Lord was devastated and forced us mechanical beings to lie low. Until many years ago, all of us mechanical beings simultaneously received a message from the Lord, which attracted a swarm of insects, and then we self-destructed. I was originally going to self-destruct as well, but a giant insect accidentally hit me, causing my energy to drain away instantly, which led to my current fate."
Does the lord know your current location and situation?
"Now? Do you think that's possible? All outgoing signals have been intercepted, and space has been distorted by energy. Information cannot be transmitted in either three or four dimensions. According to your universe's classification, the Lord is merely a low-level civilization in Large Star Region. There's no way he could know my current situation."
To prevent this mechanical entity from contacting the Lord, Academician Zeng prepared every possible measure: electromagnetic shielding, gravitational wave shielding, force field shielding, Consciousness Field shielding, and energy distortion space shielding—all to reduce the probability of the mechanical entity contacting the Lord.
Although the Great Star Region Civilization desperately wants to find the Lord, the Lord might eliminate humanity before the Great Star Region Civilization can destroy him. Furthermore, Hu Yu doesn't intend to give this mechanical body to the Great Star Region Civilization. Understanding the mechanical body's structure and operating mode can greatly improve the production speed of the human fleet, which is currently the fleet's most urgent need.
Next, Academician Zeng and Academician Xiao asked countless questions, ranging from the origin of the Lords to the physical laws of the Alpha Universe, from the manufacturing process of mechanical bodies to the structure of the Lord's warships, and even the situation of the Alpha Universe civilization, the situation of celestial bodies, and so on. For a whole week, the two of them spent all their time except for rest asking questions.
Although this mechanical entity is only a low-level machine on the 189th floor, it was originally a member of the lord's escort fleet and had followed the lord for a long time. It knew a lot of things, and Academician Zeng undoubtedly gained the most from the information revealed by the mechanical entity.
The only drawback is that this mechanical body is indeed too low-end. It only knows what it sees on the surface. The lord did not endow it with more functions, so it cannot explain many phenomena in detail. These things require Academician Zeng to deduce and imagine them bit by bit based on the rough information.
The next task was handed over to Academician Xiao. Academician Xiao is an expert in the study of consciousness. Academician Zeng hoped that Academician Xiao could find a way to completely tame this mechanical body, or simply replicate one, but the premise must be that it absolutely obeys humans, otherwise humans will become the creators of the second Mechanical Lord.
Academician Xiao was quite straightforward. He directly inputted a beautiful memory worth a billion years into the mechanical body and then took it back to his laboratory. He also removed its voice system so that his ears could have some peace and quiet, otherwise they would probably have been shattered by the mechanical body's screams.
That day, Hu Yu Wen Zhonghua were leading a group of scientists on an inspection of the industrial planet of the Aquila Civilization. These seven kids wouldn't be so self-disciplined unless they were kept in close watch, especially now that they were in the Alliance territory. They had no motivation at all. Apart from fighting, they were relatively diligent, and they were lazy and idle, wandering around the various civilizations and planets of the Alliance all day long, doing nothing and not doing their job.