Chapter 346: Chapter 345 Persuasion and Comfort

The soldiers had gone through a great ordeal to retrieve the Black Box, which contained a substantial amount of data. Beyond ordinary content, there were also encrypted sections.

Deciphering these encrypted files proved extremely challenging and entailed certain defensive measures. Basically, if the incorrect password was entered too often, the data inside would be completely formatted. This was the challenging aspect that baffled many scientists; after all, it was an encryption method from a higher civilization, and circumventing these restrictions was quite vexing.

Professor Yamamoto’s extracted memories, without a doubt, improved the success rate of the decryption.

Professor Yamamoto continued, “Captain, this is all we’ve managed to achieve so far, and it might not be entirely accurate. I have sent the password to the information research institute, and I’m planning to rest for a while… I’m really quite exhausted.”

“No problem, take some rest. By the way…” Zhang Yuan asked one last question, “Regarding the technology of the Badeit Civilization, we will surely grasp it thoroughly; it’s just a matter of time. Do you have any particular views on how we should handle the Badeit people?”

Professor Yamamoto pondered for a while before responding, “Captain, I have a suggestion. Specimens of extraterrestrial intelligent species are still quite rare for us. If we can avoid killing them, let’s try not to kill them, even if it’s just for experiments in the Virtual World. Also, we should give these scientists trying to commit suicide some hope to cling to for survival.”

“Their civilization’s philosophy of survival is different from ours; they are a species extremely greedy for pleasure. Give them a bit of freedom…”

“I understand, what a strange species indeed.”

Zhang Yuan sighed lightly. Despite feeling just as much resentment towards these alien lives as the general public did, from a civilizational perspective, allowing them to live well in the Virtual World would bring greater benefits.

“Also, Captain, regarding the bodies of these Badeit people, especially their brains, I would like to request some for experimental purposes.”

“Just submit a written report first… Generally speaking, it’s not permitted within five years.”

After hanging up, Zhang Yuan shook his head with a rueful smile and then called the information research institute to inquire about the work of Li Zhendong on password decryption.

However, the call was answered not by Li Zhendong himself, but by a female doctoral student in the institute.

Zhang Yuan knew this unfortunate young woman whose husband had just been a brave soldier who had died in the war – in the permanent sense.

When Lingzi saw Zhang Yuan’s call, she forced a smile and replied, “Captain, Professor Li is still resting, so I am temporarily in charge of this decryption work. The passwords provided by Professor Yamamoto are indeed effective. But the data that has been deciphered hasn’t been translated yet, I apologize…”

“That’s alright, thank you…”

Zhang Yuan glanced at the data on the computer screen, then noticed the barely visible tear stains in her eyes and her forced smile, and he couldn’t help but sigh, “You should rest early, don’t push yourself.”

“People aren’t robots; when we’re tired, we need to rest, and when we’re sad, we need to cry. How can anyone keep working all the time? Humans are very fragile creatures.”

Lingzi was taken aback for a moment; her sorrow seemed to explode suddenly.

Zhang Yuan continued, “When you’re feeling down, either eat something or have a good cry. It’s better than keeping it all inside. Your siblings wouldn’t want you to continue like this.”

Unfortunately, these words made Lingzi’s emotions overflow, and she began to cry “woo-woo” as she laid her head on the table.

It took her about ten minutes to get her emotions under control. She then lifted her head, wiping her tears and said, “I’m really sorry, Grandpa Captain… for embarrassing you like this.”

Zhang Yuan gently shook his head, all the generations that followed were still children, having never experienced such painful separations in life and death.

Humans, as a species, tend to appear somewhat childish when they experience less suffering. To put it nicely, they are full of ideals; to put it bluntly, they are somewhat naive. Everyone lives carefree like children, with the government acting like a big nanny. The generations that followed, even eating was done in cafeterias, with very few people who knew how to cook for themselves–how could you not call them big kids?

But with more suffering experienced, a person always seems to become more sophisticated and less endearing–there’s a saying that difficult environments breed cunning people, and that’s the essence of it.

Zhang Yuan sighed deeply, this feeling… it was probably like the time during hibernation when one first wakes up and realizes that all their friends and family have passed away…

One must rely on their own strength to overcome such a threshold; comfort from others doesn’t do much good.

Zhang Yuan said, “When I was 19 years old, my father died, you know, in our era, we were raised by our parents, mom and dad were the closest relatives… When I graduated from the university, I left our human Mother Star, Earth, and embarked on an interstellar voyage.”

“And during that journey, when I woke up, I discovered that all the friends and family on Earth had already died, including Professor Wang who often took care of me, and my aunt’s family. Back then, people could only live to 150, thanks to Earth Civilization, we can now live to 300.”

“… One time after waking up from hibernation, I found that the first captain of the Earth Era had died, then the second, the third; another time I woke up from hibernation to find that my teacher had died. Later on, my senior brother died of old age, and now, some of the younger people younger than me have died in battle. In fact, everyone has their time to live and their time to die, it’s the same for everyone.”

“I still don’t know what the meaning of life really is? I love everything about Kunlun Mountain, seeing the progress of human civilization, that’s probably the meaning of my existence. But maybe not, I’m just living for my own happiness… everyone lives for themselves, who knows?”

Lingzi raised her head and wiped her eyes.

After chatting idly with this girl for half an hour and seeing her mood slightly improve, she agreed to go rest, and then Zhang Yuan hung up the call.

He couldn’t help but lament that he was already “Grandpa Captain” in the eyes of the younger generations, just a kind and reliable, erudite old man.

He was happy to accept this nickname and didn’t feel anything wrong with it.

Humans have their joys and sorrows, separations and reunions; the moon has its phases; after experiencing so many deaths, he felt somewhat numb, considering more from the perspective of the civilization’s interests than being personally affected at first.

This is… the change brought by time!

The thoughts of one’s youth contrast vastly with those of one’s old age.

“Everything, everything has changed from what it once was.”

“… Perhaps in a thousand years, two thousand years, human civilization might undergo even greater changes.”

He then continued to review the various documents on his desk, following up with the review and correction of various matters, each document was so heavy, whether it was spaceship repairs, public suggestions about the Virtual World, or something else… so heavy.

Zhang Yuan sighed in his heart…

“I hope we can walk the right path.”

Humans, hurry up and become stronger.

…