Volume 2: The Undersea City Chapter 78 Projection
At first, Ke Lan planned to calculate how far he could drift in eight hours, but it didn't take him long to realize that it was completely meaningless - he didn't drift here in a normal way. If he calculated it in a normal way, he shouldn't be standing on this beach, but should be crushed into a meat patty thousands of meters deep on the seabed.
It wasn't just the underwater city that had problems; the entire sea area itself was wrong. Ke Lan even suspected that she had accidentally entered a miniature wormhole with short-distance teleportation capabilities, which led her to enter this area. However, this kind of artificial wormhole technology had never appeared in humans, let alone in the ruins of the Alpha civilization.
Although humans were forced to make a space jump during the 900-year voyage of Noah's Ark, that jump was made with the help of a natural wormhole that had existed in the universe for billions of years. Moreover, after the jump was completed, less than one-tenth of the people survived and the entire Ark was severely damaged. It took nearly a hundred years to recover.
Theoretically, artificial wormholes are far less stable than natural ones. Ke Lan once read several related papers out of boredom. The authors of the papers believed that even if humans possessed this technology in the future, the wormholes they created could only exist for a very short time. In the words of the original author, it would be about ten to twenty femtoseconds, and one femtosecond is only one quadrillionth of a second.
The reason why it can only exist for such a short time is that the energy required to maintain an artificial wormhole is an extremely terrifying number. Assuming that there is an artificial wormhole created by the Alpha civilization in the ocean, not to mention how long the Alpha civilization has disappeared, even if it is only one year, the energy used to maintain this artificial wormhole in this year is enough to drain the entire star system where Alpha Star is located...
Even that might not be enough.
"...Apart from wormholes, there seems to be no other means for a living person like me to be instantly transferred to another place without any consciousness, right?" Ke Lan thought hard for several minutes and finally gave up... Even professionals cannot explain this kind of question clearly, let alone an amateur like him.
If this was a plot in a science fiction novel, perhaps he could use excuses like "when in doubt, use quantum mechanics", but the problem is that this really happened to him. He can fool others, but he can't fool himself, right?
"At least I'm still alive...it's better than being dead." Ke Lan comforted herself.
It took Ke Lan nearly twenty minutes to take off this deep-diving suit that was as good as armor. However, as soon as he came into contact with the outside environment, his skin felt a tingling sensation.
This was not good news: the radiation concentration in this area was very high, which was fatal to Ke Lan who did not have spare protective clothing.
"Fortunately, there is anti-radiation medicine in the emergency backpack..." Ke Lan found a small bottle labeled "Anti-Radiation Ning" , poured out two small tablets from it, tilted his head back and swallowed them.
This is the smallest medicine bottle, which contains only thirty-six pills. If he takes two pills every four hours, and then increases the dose by two pills every four hours , this amount is not enough for him to take for twenty-four hours...
"We need to figure out where this place is, and we also need to find a way to get in touch with the Pioneer." Ke Lan glanced around and then walked towards the bedrock of the coast not far away.
This rock belt is more than ten kilometers long and almost surrounds the entire coast. The top of the bedrock is about one hundred meters above sea level.
Ke Lan found a gentle slope and climbed up using his hands and feet - there was no soil or vegetation on it , just bare stones.
Although it looks desolate and there is no sign of any biological activity, this also means safety - on Alpha, the indigenous creatures themselves are synonymous with danger and threats.
As long as the problems of heat and radiation can be solved, Ke Lan's life will not be in danger for the time being.
Standing on the top of the bedrock and looking towards the sea, the mirage in the distance presented a completely different scene from before - I saw tall towers shaking violently, flames burning everywhere, a strange black mist covering the entire city, and aircraft in the sky falling like dumplings... After a while, those tall towers began to sink one by one, the originally prosperous city was shattered, the transportation network built in the air was torn apart, and the scope of the black fog was constantly expanding on the sea...
"This mirage... could it be the ruins of the underwater city?" Ke Lan was very shocked - the ruins of the underwater city he was referring to were not the complex of buildings built on the underwater plateau, but the original target point of the Pioneer - "Ruins No. A-094".
"Is this a visual record of the city sinking to the bottom of the sea..." Ke Lan took out a camera from his backpack, pressed the power button with the mentality of giving it a try, and with a burst of pixel snowflakes flashing across the screen, the camera actually started up.
"Is it because we left that sea area?" Ke Lan glanced at the locator and communication device on his body, but unfortunately, these electronic equipment were still in a faulty state, and he did not have the corresponding maintenance tools at hand.
"Well, at least let's take a picture of this mirage first. This footage should be able to sell for an astronomical amount of money." Ke Lan pointed the camera at the sea, but to his surprise, there was no image of a mirage on the camera screen.
There was only a calm sea, no black fog, no flames, and no tall tower sinking into the sea.
"What's going on?!" He glanced through the optical viewfinder - black fog, flames, a destroyed city... But when he moved his eyes to the screen, there was nothing!
He stood there for a few seconds, then turned around woodenly, took out a mirror, and pointed it at the sea behind him.
The sea surface in the mirror was empty, just like the screen of the camera.
In other words... this mirage can only be seen by Ke Lan's eyes.
No, to be precise, it wasn't that he was the only one who could see the mirage, but that these scenes were originally recorded in his mind. Only when he cast his gaze toward the sea would these scenes appear before his eyes...
This is not a mirage at all. If I have to use a word to describe it, "retinal projection" would be more appropriate.
"First there were texts and audios... now even images and videos are coming out..." Ke Lan stretched out his hand and rubbed his temple vigorously, "That damn stone tablet... what on earth did it stuff into my brain..."
