Sword of Dawnbreaker

Chapter 1229: Chapter 1228: Beyond Light Years

The sea demons arrived on this planet aboard their starship...

Upon hearing the last half sentence murmured by Tiel, images immediately flashed in Gawain’s mind of that interstellar ship still stranded in the depths of the Endless Sea, supposedly larger in scale than the Gondor imperial capital in its day. Frankly, even though advanced civilizations like Talronde’s cyberpunk-like society have emerged on this planet, the sea demons’ ship still stands out as the most incongruous thing here in Gawain’s view—a ship! A ship capable of interstellar colonization!

It’s amazing how I came out of the grave thinking this was a world of swords and magic...

Gawain shook his head, casting out those irrelevant associations, while looking curiously at the sea caterpillar lazing around with its upper body resting on the bench, its tail extending a few meters out: ”How’s the repair on your ship coming along? I recall not long ago you mentioned that your engineers had made unprecedented progress on the Power Core or some core...”

”It’s the Core Fusion Tower, you know, the big structure used to harness energy from negative space tides to power the Transition Engine—it shut down ever since we crash-landed on this planet, and the deep water technicians have tried everything but still can’t rekindle its primary Drive Furnace,” Tiel wiggled her tail-tip, speaking with an air of understanding, ”But now we’ve finally figured out what Magic Power actually is and calculated the ’deviation’ range encountered by the Core Fusion Tower during initiation.”

She paused, seemingly deep in thought about how to explain next, and then began again: ”Apparently, the deep water technicians have given up on restoring it to its original state—the environmental difference between this world and our home planet is too great, and the key structures of the Core Fusion Tower cannot adapt to the new environment, so they’ve decided to remove its core section and use a Rainbow Light Device instead, reallocating energy flow using the field coils and Phase Transition Diverter surrounding the fusion tower. In fact, they’ve tried replacing a small part already... and the effects seem positive.”

”Rainbow Light... you directly put that into the ship’s Power Core?!” Gawain was instantly dumbfounded. He wasn’t surprised the sea demons were seeking inspiration from the Cecil Clan’s Rainbow Light Generator for repairing the ship’s energy modules, but he didn’t expect the daring deep-sea creatures to directly stuff the Rainbow Light Device into the Power Core, and it sounds like they didn’t just fit one or two—they’ve installed a matrix!

That thing is usually used as a Giant Cannon for siege warfare! It has terrifyingly high output power! Are the fish folks burning nuclear warheads in the boiler?

Tiel felt Gawain’s reaction was baffling. She lazily lifted her head and glanced over, as if she could fall asleep at any moment: ”What’s the big fuss? Our deep water technicians have always had innovative ideas—of course, there are still some issues, mainly that the energy output of the Rainbow Light Device is insufficient, even though the technical personnel have maximized the matrix’s power density, it only allows the fusion tower to operate barely at its lowest power, and for ordinary energy needs, the Antawen Vessel still relies on burning squid... but given the years of stagnation we’ve faced, this progress is quite remarkable.”

Listening to Tiel’s casual rambling, Gawain’s initial shock gradually turned to a wooden expression. He looked blankly at the sea caterpillar lying on the bench, thinking this race truly deserves admiration as a former interstellar civilization—aside from generally having waterlogged brains, this species on this planet is truly awe-inspiring...

Tiel was unaware of Gawain’s thoughts. She merely yawned and recalled recent contacts with her home, then uncertainly continued: ”Oh, there has been another result in our side’s repair efforts lately... you may be interested.”

”Something I’m interested in?” Gawain queried with surprise, ”What is it?”

”The Antawen Vessel’s Superluminal Communication Array,” Tiel stretched intensely and curled up beside the chair, ”which is essentially the antenna system.”

”Superluminal Communication Array...” Gawain blinked, finally remembering, ”I recall you mentioning it... wait, have you repaired it?!”

”We wouldn’t say repaired exactly; the resonance crystal of the sending unit is too severely damaged, and we haven’t found an adequate substitute, but we’ve managed to repair part of its receiving module,” Tiel stated, with a sudden hint of emotion, ”We haven’t received messages from other immigrant starships, but we’ve picked up the kind of signals you’ve been receiving in the listening stations... and successfully pinpointed their locations.”

This news was so sudden that Gawain couldn’t react immediately. He blinked a few times and the relevant information emerged in his mind: he knew the sea demons were attempting to repair the ship’s antenna array, and that there wasn’t just the Antawen Vessel among the immigrant starships launched from their home planet—supposedly several ships set sail from their mother star, yet now all have been lost in the vast Star Sea.

Despite all the years that have passed, Tiel’s kin seem to still believe the kin aboard those ships are alive, hoping to repair the ship’s communication system to reconnect with those comrades lost in contact for millions of years.

On the other hand, Gawain was aware of what Tiel meant by ”signals.” These were mysterious messages detected previously at Sorin Hub, Northern Nexus, and Ancestor’s Peak Nexus from the vast universe, transmitting basic mathematical knowledge in unrecognized languages, as if displaying their presence and sending greetings to other civilizations—and from what he learned from the Dragon God, those signals originated from intelligent beings on other planets. However, due to technical limitations, even the most advanced Magic Web Nexus in Cecil can only occasionally receive these signals one-way, unable to pinpoint the exact emission source or decode the technology behind them.

As for decrypting those mysterious ”alien texts”... the Cecil Clan and Typhon Empire had long ago organized massive teams of cryptographers and language experts, even extending it to the public for brainstorming, and yet the progress remains minimal after all this time.

He never anticipated the sudden breakthrough would originate from the sea demons, who maintain an ambivalent relationship with the alliance.

”The location direction of those signals aligns closely with your previous estimates,” Tiel noticed the change in Gawain’s expression and didn’t beat around the bush, ”Indeed, they come from the direction of the Frost Throne Constellation. At its base, there’s a dim star—possibly some small celestial bodies too, but our observation equipment is damaged, so we can’t confirm for now. Based on precise tracking from the Antawen Vessel’s star orbit instrument, the signals emanate from near that star.”

”Does that star have a name?” Gawain instinctively asked.

”We call it SK-32-A, but in your human world, mages and astrologers seem to have given it a rather pleasant name, ’Cang Xing,’” Tiel shrugged, ”Confirming this wasn’t easy, I rummaged through a heap of your messy, inaccurate astronomical tables before finally confirming with the Antawen Vessel’s astronomers multiple times that our SK-32-A and your human ’Cang Xing’ are indeed one and the same...”

Before she finished speaking, Gawain interrupted: ”Starting tomorrow, the salt in your pool will be replaced with refined sea salt.”

”Alright!” Tiel nodded instantly and then continued with the main topic, ”Let’s go back to ’Cang Xing’—we measured the distance between it and the star beneath our feet, approximately 6.12 light-years. It should have at least one massive gaseous planet and two solid planets orbiting it, but we still can’t confirm which star’s vicinity the signal was sent from...

”Also, our antenna system has tracked the signal for quite some time and confirmed that the signal is sent in cycles of approximately 3.35 days, lasting 16 hours from appearance to disappearance each time. Currently, it’s not clear whether this cycle is intentional by the sender or influenced by the cosmic environment along the way...”

Gawain’s expression was more serious than ever, carefully memorizing every word Tiel said, and softly repeated that special name: ”...Cang Xing...”

Tiel glanced at Gawain, appearing somewhat hesitant. After contemplating for several seconds, she continued, ”There’s one more thing...”

”Go ahead,” Gawain said immediately, his urgency even surprising himself.

”...Most humans probably cannot understand what this means, but according to my knowledge, you should be able to comprehend the concept I’m about to describe,” Tiel lightly flicked her tailtip, her expression becoming very solemn, ”Upon analyzing the communication array, we discovered something—that signal... is transmitted at superluminal speeds.”

Gawain instantly frowned: Tiel’s words were brief, yet the information conveyed was remarkable.

”Superluminal...” he couldn’t help but mutter softly, ”which means...”

”Even beyond the distance of 6.12 light-years, those signals aren’t ’outdated messages’ sent six years ago. We received real-time communication from Cang Xing, and this signal transmission technology is very high-end—it can be captured by our superluminal communication array and enter the Magic Web Nexus, indicating that from its initial modulation it was intended to convey information to as many ’targets’ as possible,” Tiel nodded, ”And if we had equal sending technology, we might now achieve real-time communication with ’Cang Xing’—over 6.12 light-years, establish communication with intelligent beings on another planet.”

Gawain was struck by this sudden news, and subconsciously asked, ”Your superluminal communication array can’t...”

”It can’t,” Tiel shook her head, ”I just mentioned we only repaired the array’s receiving module, and only a part of it. The entire system’s resonance crystal is broken, and we haven’t found a replacement yet.”

Gawain realized he was too excited and immediately forced himself to calm down, thoughtfully and softly said, ”Regardless, ’Cang Xing’ is evidently a civilization more advanced than ours...”

”They at least possess more advanced communication technology than us—but this might not be certain once the Antawen Vessel is repaired,” Tiel said and immediately frowned, showing a slightly perplexed expression, ”But speaking of this ’communication technology’... one of my sisters working in the communications group mentioned a suspicious aspect to me last time.”

Gawain frowned: ”A suspicious aspect?”

”Compared to ’superluminal communication’ with such cutting-edge transmission technology, the signal from Cang Xing appears too simple and outdated in terms of encoding and modulation format,” Tiel slowly explained—she rarely spoke to people here about this knowledge, as what she knew was often too profound and difficult for humans to understand, but she knew the incredible ’human’ before her could understand what she was saying, ”With the same channel width, they could pack in more effective information and clearer graphics and text, but they chose the most primitive and inefficient ’code table’...

”Can you understand the contradiction here? For a metaphor understandable to land dwellers, it’s like they have an extremely precise and advanced magical device from the Gondor Empire, which is still usable today, yet they’ve tied a stick to it to crack walnuts—as if the ultimate goal is achieved, but the process...”

Tiel spread her hands, and Gawain quickly grasped the implication in her words. He thought of the information previously intercepted by the Sorin Hub; at the time, it didn’t seem unusual to him. However, now he knew that the signal was transmitted superluminally, and the sense of discordance in the matter indeed surged into his mind.

This is akin to two individuals using the most advanced computers and the highest-speed fiber optic networks in the fiber era... to exchange telegrams.

”Perhaps it’s just to make decoding easier for ’low-level civilizations’ like ours,” Gawain, after some thought, considered a possibility, ”More complex encoding might be more efficient, but evidently, the difficulty in decoding would also be greater...”

”We have considered this possibility, but there is an issue,” Tiel shook her head, ”If it was to accommodate ’low-level recipients,’ they could completely transmit multiple sets of different codes simultaneously, employing different levels of encoding technology—thus, regardless of the level of ’receiver,’ they’d have a chance to receive and decode those signals. If ’Cang Xing’ truly is an advanced civilization mastering superluminal communication, this kind of thing should be a breeze for them.”

Gawain, having thoroughly calmed down, his mind quickly analyzing Tiel’s questions, evidently worth further thinking: ”Perhaps... their signal was only meant to be sent to ’low-level civilizations’? Maybe the sender from ’Cang Xing’ simply doesn’t care about the efficiency of information transmission and only needs to send those basic ’greetings’ throughout the entire star area, while the most primitive and simple encoding ensures these messages are reliably sent to every civilization capable of ’listening to space’...”

”This is also a possibility,” Tiel nodded, ”But what’s the significance of doing so?”

”...I don’t know,” Gawain hesitated briefly and slightly nodded, ”Ultimately, we know too little about that distant ’sender.’