Chapter 311: Song of the Leviathan
Regarding the Mainframe's concerns, the players seemed quite optimistic.
"I don't think it's a big problem! Think about it, even if thousands or tens of thousands of years pass, a human smile should still represent friendliness to other humans."
"Right. And body language. Raising both hands will always signify no hostility."
"It seems the handshake became a greeting ritual precisely to show one had no weapons."
"And toasting was for exchanging drinks in cups, to dispel the guest's fear of the host poisoning them."
"And this!"
One player raised his middle finger.
"That will always be a universal gesture in the cosmos!"
Hmm...
Lu Yuan thought for a moment.
"Then let's try it. Have the warships broadcast."
A moment later, the Mainframe sent a 15-second very-low-frequency radio signal.
"We come with good intentions."
The fleet had intended to loop the broadcast, but in fact, after playing it once, they received a melodious radio frequency from the swarm leader.
There was a response!
The fact that the other party didn't attack directly meant the plan was already half-successful.
Lu Yuan quickly sent the signal back to Emerald Star, asking the Mainframe to help translate.
About two minutes later, the Mainframe sent a communication:
"Our language structure is far more stable than humanity's, but it has still changed significantly over the past billion years. Now, I can only determine the meaning of some key informational particles."
"No problem, being able to translate words is enough."
The message sent by the Zerg fleet appeared before all players.
"Goodwill. Denial. Ship. Weapons."
Oh no...
Was this expressing that adventurers who had come to this star system in the past had fired upon them?
Lu Yuan guessed that the first to do so was likely that Imperial heavy cruiser 120 years ago.
Truly courting death, they were probably scared senseless at the time.
Another melody came through.
Translated, the meaning was: "You. Ships. Weapons. Many."
This couldn't be denied; they had a point!
These five Taibai ships were all proper warships, armed to the teeth.
Their threat level was definitely higher than that of ordinary adventurer vessels.
It seemed the Zerg had a way to see through armor and scan the interior of human ships.
Coming to someone's doorstep with five warships and trying to explain that they had no ill intentions was indeed a bit tricky!
What to do?
How to explain clearly? How to gain their trust?
The players looked at each other, unable to come up with a good solution for a while.
"Do we need to disarm on the spot, dismantling all our weapons in front of the Zerg?"
This suggestion was not accepted.
Not to mention whether they could bear the consequences, it would be impossible without a shipyard.
Just then, the swarm leader seemed to lose its patience for observation and communication. It stopped circling and stared directly at the space station.
On its massive head, layers of fine biological armor folded back, revealing a huge, pure, flawless, and terrifying golden-yellow eyeball beneath.
"That's not an eye," the Mage said, his voice trembling, "It's an ultra-large-caliber biological laser cannon!"
The power of a laser cannon is generally proportional to the diameter of its lens.
And the eyeball tissue used as a lens on this Zerg bio-warship was at least 300 meters in diameter, even exceeding the length of a Taibai warship!
Such a colossal scale, even if it only fired the weakest infrared laser, would have immense power. And if it fired X-ray or even gamma-ray lasers, its effective range could be over 10,000 light-seconds, or at least 3 billion kilometers.
This is equivalent to the distance from Uranus to the Sun in reality, far exceeding the radar detection range between Star Alliance stealth warships, making it a true over-the-horizon strike capability!
Lu Yuan estimated that for such an ultra-long range to truly be meaningful, the Zerg should have faster-than-light detection capabilities.
Otherwise, the farthest targets they "saw" would only be images from 10,000 seconds ago. If the target maintained maneuverability, a laser beam fired would have a 20,000-second delay, hitting nothing at all.
But now was not the time to ponder these academic questions.
The other party was staring at them, ready to fire at any moment!
Neither the space station nor the fleet could withstand a main laser cannon of this magnitude!
"Wow~ Look! It's a giant space monster!!"
In the Taibai's restaurant, the rescued children gathered in front of the holographic display simulating a porthole, intently watching the strange sight outside, unaware of the impending danger.
For them, who had just lost their loved ones, this was the first time since embarking on a new journey that they had temporarily cast aside their sorrow and were very happy.
"Hello~~ Big monster~~~"
The children waved excitedly.
Just then, the swarm leader seemed to sense something. The biological armor actually folded back, covering the eye that was about to fire the laser.
What's going on!?
Inside the space station, all the players were stunned.
Did it change its mind? Or was that just a threat, just to scare us?
No—it's not that simple.
Lu Yuan immediately entrusted the Mainframe with a translation and broadcast a Zerg phrase.
"What's wrong?"
The other party quickly replied.
"Human. Young. Cute."
What??
The players could hardly believe their eyes.
The brats came through!
"Young? Cute!?"
"Is it referring to those little rascals we rescued from Red Dust Star?"
"Must be right, ha! We were saved by those kids!"
"But for humanity's great enemy to find human young cute, is that reasonable? Did they only attack planets without children before? That seems impossible."
"Perhaps the belligerent and aggressive nature towards humans is just a psionic code transmitted to them by a decision-making Mainframe, a military command," Lu Yuan said.
"These individuals don't include a Mainframe and have been isolated for at least 300 years. Perhaps they've long shed their aggressive and fierce nature, returning to a relatively docile state of wild beasts in nature."
"Very possible!"
A player who was an animal lover agreed.
"In nature, the stronger an animal is, and the fewer natural enemies it has, the more stable its temperament becomes when not hunting or fighting for territory. For example, Siberian tigers and killer whales in the sea!"
"Hmm—it does seem to be that way." Fang Xue Hou Tian Tai Jian nodded. "And speaking of which, whales and dolphins also have a strong liking for human young; this isn't uncommon in nature."
At this point, the swarm leader emitted a slightly longer melody.
"Young. Cared for. Good condition. Peace. Consideration."
Phew...
Peace!
Peace is good!
Finally gaining the other party's recognition, the Executive Officer and the players all breathed a huge sigh of relief.
Evidently, in the Zerg's universal values and cultural traditions, the ability to care for the young was a strong guarantee of character.
This was also very consistent with their racial characteristics.
No, on this matter, perhaps there should no longer be a distinction between "us" and "them."
Even with racial differences as vast as between humans and Gaia Zerg, both could still reach a consensus on protecting the young.
From this perspective, the adventurers who came here before didn't have brats on board. But who could have foreseen such a thing?
What a dramatic development. In any case, the danger was temporarily averted, and the players now felt a wave of lingering fear.
"If Prairie hadn't kept his promise to Connor and hadn't gone to rescue the children in the colony, the consequences would be unimaginable."
"So this is the so-called sense of redemption? I can finally understand it a little now—"
"Yeah! This is where Infinite Deep Space truly far surpasses other games! Not the graphics, not the full immersion, but something I can't quite put my finger on! In any case, being chosen as a closed beta player is truly too lucky!"
Today, a moral choice brought moral forgiveness.
At this moment, on the five Taibai warships, the children were still curiously looking outside, unaware of the "feat" they had just accomplished.
After establishing initial trust, the players began to attempt more complex communication with the Zerg, but unfortunately, the effect was not very good.
Due to the difficulty of language communication, it was hard for the two sides to make further progress.
All the players could sense that the other party possessed intelligence no less than humanity's, but it was difficult for two intelligent species to conduct truly intelligent negotiations.
The other party had only initially lowered its guard. The seven bio-warships gathered near the fleet, huddled together, curiously observing.
Lu Yuan couldn't maintain a relaxed state for long, because soon, the returning First Air Squadron sent a message.
"Executive Officer, this is Chang Kong. We have entered the K063 star system and are expected to return in 12 hours."
"We just conducted a review and found that the signals previously classified as cosmic background noise by the computer might be ultra-high-power anti-stealth detection in the OTH band. Our whereabouts may have been exposed."
"When was the signal received?" Lu Yuan asked.
"12 hours ago. The signal source distance at that time was 2.7 billion kilometers."
Twelve hours!
The Empire's warp speed was one-third faster than Taibai's, meaning the other party could already be very close to K063 and could appear at any time if they truly intended to.
At this distance, whether the aviation team was detected by anti-stealth or not made little difference.
Because even if the other party conducted a carpet search, they would eventually find this place, in as little as one day, or as long as two or three days.
Xian Yu, who remained on the flagship, immediately began calculations and concluded that if the Imperial fleet followed the shortest route, they might be right behind the First Air Squadron, expected to arrive at K063 in another five hours.
"I recommend immediate withdrawal!" Xian Yu said.
"No." Lu Yuan disagreed. "The other party's anti-stealth methods are more sophisticated than we anticipated. OTH band radar would find it easier to track warships than fighter jets."
"And our armor isn't repaired, and our radar profile is poor. Once our approximate position is determined by anti-stealth radar en route, it will be easy to be precisely locked by millimeter-wave phased arrays later."
"That's correct." The radar operator on the Taibai said.
He also had some radar professional background in reality.
Lu Yuan looked back at the large psionic equipment in the space station.
"I plan to repair it, persuade the Zerg to join the upcoming positional battle, and destroy the Imperial fleet."
The Mage came to stand before him.
"You need to consider carefully! From the development logs here, Infinite Deep Space, even with alien assistance, was unable to complete this research in the end. The mural we saw before was likely just their final hopeful wish."
Lu Yuan shook his head gently.
"I said 'persuade,' not 'control,' which is inherently less difficult than Infinite Deep Space's research. These Zerg organisms are not stupid; they understand advantages and disadvantages, so I intend to communicate with them deeply and then negotiate."
"Furthermore, Infinite Deep Space back then didn't have a Mainframe like we do now. It might be able to help us."
"I've seen the scanned blueprints you uploaded; this is possible." Nan Guo de Xue sent a communication.
"As long as through a specific interface, psionic signals can be inter-translated with electromagnetic waves, and this interface is the equipment behind you."
"Electromagnetic waves can be transmitted to the Mainframe without delay, so even if it cannot directly establish a psionic connection with the Zerg fleet, it can still help us modulate psionic signals and optimize the equipment's operational status."
Excellent!
"I agree with this plan." Prairie said.
"I agree too." Xian Yu said.
"I agree too!" The players all expressed their approval.
It's come to this, let's give it a shot!
Mage: "Alright! Next is discussing the concrete feasibility. We still need a psionicist."
Sister Xue: "No, according to the blueprints you provided, a psionicist isn't necessarily required. The equipment operator only needs to be able to stably convert their brainwaves into electrical signals."
"On Emerald Star's side, Sasha has already developed a trial version of a brain-computer interface; its performance is stable enough. I'll send you the blueprints now."
"Afterward, based on the scanned Infinite Deep Space blueprints, we need to create a signal bridge between Taibai and Infinite Deep Space."
"After printing all these devices, the final step is to select a negotiator and perform surgery on him to implant the brain-computer interface."
"Doesn't sound too complicated~"
The players quickly understood.
"It's like making a data cable port for the brain, and then making an adapter cable between two different manufacturers."
Prairie: "Roughly how long will it take?"
Sister Xue: "Making the equipment won't take more than two hours. The subsequent surgery depends on the situation; it could be quick or take a lot of time. I will teleport over then."
"The key is to select the surgical personnel and the negotiator in advance. The negotiator operating the equipment should ideally have sufficiently high intelligence and spiritual attributes, which helps maintain mental stability. However, considering the risks of mental communication with the Zerg, I still don't recommend performing surgery on the Executive Officer..."
That leaves the Mage and Xian Yu, a choice between two.
The Mage had high intelligence, Xian Yu had high spirit, and as for the sum of both attributes, Xian Yu, who had entered the game earlier, was 16 points higher.
"I'll do it!" Xian Yu volunteered.
Lu Yuan nodded in agreement.
"Is anyone here a surgeon in reality?"
Prairie initiated a broadcast to the entire expedition force.
As it turned out, there really were. Among the nearly 400 players who could be teleported to the expedition fleet, 3 were professional doctors with surgical experience.
One of them was even capable of performing neurosurgery and brain surgery!
"Excellent, let's start the plan!"
