Rebirth of the Super Battleship-Chapter 760: Red Life

The so-called Solar System bubble, the heliosphere, was the great gaseous bubble blown out by the sun into interstellar space, and the heliopause was its outer edge. All of the major planets humanity had once discovered lay within this heliosphere. The sun generously sheltered her children, using her radiation to carve out a region in the endless universe that belonged to her alone.

In the past, this had been humanity’s safe harbor. Without the heliosphere, the terrifying radiation bursts and energy eruptions of the universe would have left not a single blade of grass on Earth, and no life could have survived.

Now, this safe harbor belonged to Xiao Yu.

After stepping into the heliosphere, Xiao Yu exited curvature flight and continued forward using conventional propulsion. Here, he once again saw the traces he had left behind one hundred thousand years ago.

“Grave of seven billion humans, erected by Xiao Yu.”

This tombstone still orbited the sun along its own trajectory, quietly circling. The low-power ‘candle,’ which used nuclear energy as its power source, still emitted a faint glow, illuminating the carved inscription. Its designed lifespan had not been this long, but just like the Curiosity rover that humanity had once sent to Mars in the Earth era, this candle had far exceeded its intended service life.

Curiosity’s designed lifespan had been only a few months, but it had worked for years. When Earth was destroyed, it had still been roaming the Martian surface. If not for the great event of the Jupiter-Moon Collision, it might have continued working even longer.

“I have returned to the place that raised me, to the graveyard of humankind.” Xiao Yu thought quietly. After pausing here for a while, the Hope spaceship moved on.

Xiao Yu first visited Neptune. Uranus and Pluto were currently on the other side of the sun, so he did not see them for the time being. Looking at Neptune, blue and ocean-like, distant memories slowly opened up.

Xiao Yu did not linger, nor did he carefully observe Saturn and Jupiter, even though one of his main goals was the base he had built on Titan. He quickly passed through these regions and through the asteroid belt, which was as sparse as ordinary interstellar space, and arrived at Mars.

Mars looked exactly as it had when he left. One hundred thousand years had brought no obvious changes. Aside from a greater number of impact craters, Mars was still the same as ever. Amid the yellow dust that filled the sky, the same cold, dead, desolate aura lingered.

In fact, every planet Xiao Yu had passed showed more impact scars. Even gas giants like Neptune had not been spared; Xiao Yu still found many dark red impact marks on its atmosphere.

Extremely energetic explosions and high temperatures would alter the local elemental composition, and different temperatures would cause similar effects. This meant color changes, and these color changes recorded what had happened, in another form.

By analyzing the size of those dark red patches and the elemental makeup of those regions, Xiao Yu could even infer the approximate size of the asteroids that had struck them.

Without a doubt, all these asteroids had come from Earth’s orbit. Earth’s explosion had impacted the entire Solar System in deep and all-encompassing ways. The frequent asteroid bombardment would continue for at least several hundred million years. It would be during this period that the Solar System would settle into a new equilibrium.

Xiao Yu stayed much longer in Martian orbit. He hoped to find signs of life on Mars, even primitive life.

This was entirely possible. Earth’s explosion had certainly been a disaster, but in certain respects it might also have had positive effects. Earth had been filled with life, whether in the vast oceans, in the sky, in the mountains, in the forests, in caves or in deserts. The whole planet was blanketed in living things.

After the explosion, not all of that life would necessarily be killed. It was quite possible that some tough, resilient species had survived. In that case, Earth would have become an enormous seed scatterer. Carrying fragments of Earth’s life, it would launch into a long interstellar journey, like dandelion seeds drifting on the wind. Titan, Ganymede, Triton, Venus, Mars, all of these worlds might have become second homelands for Earth’s life.

But Xiao Yu was disappointed.

Over these hundred thousand years, Mars had undoubtedly suffered billions of impacts from fragments of Earth. Yet there was still no sign of life on Mars. It appeared that the seeds from Earth had failed to take root here. The result left Xiao Yu a little disheartened.

Passing Mars’ orbit, ahead lay the former orbit of Earth.

Earth, of course, was gone. In its place was a ring-shaped cluster of asteroids. Evaporation of gases still continued. Many asteroids trailed long tails behind them.

For example, after Earth exploded, its oceans could condense into ice-rich asteroids. When these were shielded from sunlight by other fragments, they remained solid, but once their orbits shifted and sunlight struck them directly, the ice would rapidly evaporate. Under the combined effect of light pressure and high-energy particles, the vapor would stream backward, forming a tail.

This was a comet.

The tails of countless comets completely veiled this region. Even the sun looked dimmed when seen from here. But Xiao Yu knew this spectacle would not last.

On astronomical timescales, it would only exist for a very short period. After all, the total amount of volatile material was limited. Once the sun had boiled all of it away, this region would become an ordinary asteroid belt, just somewhat denser than most, and nothing more.

The Hope spaceship threaded its way through the dense asteroid swarm. Many asteroids still bore traces of the Earth era, special limestone structures from the ruins of human architecture, and distinctive calcium phosphate formations from the bones of large Earth creatures.

A strange emotion rose in Xiao Yu’s heart. 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

As he drifted through the swarm, Xiao Yu noticed something unusual. On some water-bearing asteroids, there were patches of a peculiar red color. These red patches appeared and vanished according to a certain pattern.

Specifically, when the regions were bathed in sunlight and water vapor began to billow out in large quantities, the red would quickly appear. When other asteroids moved between them and the sun, blocking the light so the areas no longer received sunshine, the red would rapidly disappear.

The phenomenon piqued Xiao Yu’s curiosity.

He drew the Hope spaceship closer to one asteroid and began observing the red patches at close range. He maneuvered the ship to push away a few asteroids blocking the light so that this region could receive direct sunlight. Almost immediately, great amounts of water vapor steamed up from the asteroid’s surface, and the red that had been hidden swiftly appeared.

Xiao Yu then used the Hope spaceship to block part of the sunlight shining there. The red in the shadowed areas began to vanish at once, while the red in the regions still basking in sunlight grew more abundant.

It was as if the red substance that had originally been in the shadow had moved to the sunlit areas.

“This is a lifeform.” Xiao Yu thought. “It has a strong tendency to move toward light and heat. When there is sunshine, it becomes lively. Without sunshine, it quickly enters a kind of hibernation-like state to withstand the cold of space.”

As the Hope spaceship drew nearer, Xiao Yu was able to observe more and more details. He found that this was a kind of organism similar to algae. It seemed like a plant, yet it also possessed the rapid reaction mechanisms of animals.

Xiao Yu stayed there, silently watching and learning everything about the organism, seeing it move from dormancy to activity and then back again.

Chasing sunlight was its only mission.

Where there was sunlight, there was energy. Sunlight melted the water ice, releasing the rich nutrients locked inside it so they could mix into the water vapor. Once vapor appeared, food had arrived.

“The amount of ice on a single asteroid is limited. When the ice is used up, how do they survive? They do not seem to have any ability to migrate between asteroids.” Xiao Yu pondered. “And under these conditions, a species that cannot move between asteroids has no right to continue existing.”

They were not true animals. They had no legs and could not walk from one asteroid to another. Even if they had legs, the distances between asteroids were far beyond their ability to cross. Most importantly, these organisms depended on ice to live. Without ice, they would die immediately, and there was no ice in the vacuum of space.

Xiao Yu watched as another asteroid suddenly flew into view and smashed into the asteroid he was observing. The collision sent a great spray of debris flying outward. There were rocks among the debris, chunks of ice, and of course, many of the red algae-like organisms that dwelled within the ice.

Those fragments flew in all directions, some striking other asteroids, some sailing on through space. But Xiao Yu knew that, given the density of matter in the present asteroid belt, they were unlikely to escape this region.

In the end, they would fall upon other asteroids.

Watching the rocks and ice chunks scatter like heavenly maidens casting flowers, Xiao Yu suddenly understood.

“So that is how it is. I see now.”