Voyage of the Stars.

Chapter 1440 Put yourself to death and survive

As for the fact that the formula for the zero-point energy of vacuum was not recorded in the rhombic crystal, no one dwelled on it, nor did they blame the War Immortal Civilization for not leaving the answer like ungrateful wretches.

On the contrary, we should be grateful—grateful to the War Immortal Civilization, and even more so to the Pioneer Civilization. Because the inscription on this rhombus-shaped tombstone clearly states that if the Pioneers hadn't had the habit of leaving something behind for later civilizations, the War Immortal Civilization wouldn't have even left this information; at most, they would have erected a monument to commemorate the Pioneers.

Everyone already knew this, so on the long voyage, they were looking for the traces of the pioneers, not the War Immortal Civilization.

Of course, this doesn't mean that the War Immortal civilization was ruthless and merciless. After all, they came from the Andromeda Galaxy and were neighbors with the Milky Way.

Given the current state of the Galactic Great Voyage Organization, if they have the chance to meet again, they will most likely be able to get along amicably. After all, they have the connection of being pioneers, even though the pioneers never knew that there was such a civilization that had been pursuing them until their demise.

Regardless of the circumstances, the Galactic Great Voyage Organization recognizes pioneers and will not deny that it is now standing on the shoulders of its predecessors to continue moving forward.

anyway.

After further interaction with the rhombus-shaped crystal and confirming that it indeed had nothing for them, the civilizations prepared to leave.

The reason is simple: this place is no longer suitable for research.

The Star Guardian remained here, and the other civilizations didn't say anything. Anyway, it didn't need to do any research, so it was fine for it to continue its contact with the rhombus crystal.

"Now that we know the reason, the next question is where to conduct our research. Chief of Staff, these are the possible routes we and other civilizations that started their research earlier might have taken, all marked on the star map."

On the Lyra, a staff officer tossed a star map onto the holographic screen and pointed to the intertwined flight paths on the star map. Red areas were marked around the flight paths. He continued, "According to the information provided by the War Immortal Civilization, and considering the current distance between the disaster zone and us, it is no longer realistic for us to stay put and wait for the dark matter's influence to dissipate. So there is only one way, and that is to leave this place."

The Dragon Star Brigade, appearing as a projection, continued, "We must leave, but not like this. We need to dismantle all the dark matter production lines and replace the dark matter engines, otherwise it will be the same no matter where we go."

Another staff officer shook his head thoughtfully and said, "It is indeed necessary to dismantle and replace it, but the problem is who should dismantle it first. You know, if we replace the dark matter engine, our warp speed will drop back to 101.59 times the speed of light. Moreover, without dark matter and dark antimatter to provide energy, our Lyra will also lose its ability to jump between microscopic and higher dimensions."

Upon hearing this, Long Xinglv solemnly stated, "It's not just us; all teleportation-related technologies are rendered unusable. I even doubt whether the Divine Matrix civilization's neutron war star can still be activated. This is only a reduction in combat power. Considering the need to eliminate the influence of dark matter, all civilizations must abandon all dark matter technologies, and anything that uses dark matter must be discarded."

"In other words, the deeper the research into dark matter-related technologies, the higher the prevalence of dark matter technology within a civilization, and the more difficult it becomes to completely escape the influence of dark matter."

Long Xinglv is right. The hallmark of a Level 6 civilization is mastery of dark matter-related technologies. Therefore, the deeper their research in dark matter technology, the more powerful this Level 6 civilization will be—that's beyond doubt.

It can be said that the progress of a normal Level 6 civilization is a process of embracing dark matter, only it has not reached the level of complete integration seen in the second type of boundary breakers.

After so many years of voyages, which civilization present wasn't an ancient level-six civilization?
However, the older the civilization, and the more advanced its mastery of dark matter technology, the more difficult it is now, because it has to discard more things, and the impact is greater.

For example, the Falcon Civilization, upon receiving this news, immediately convened an emergency meeting; they were in a real hurry. Their signature technologies were all related to dark matter, and various devices on their ships also reflected dark matter technology. Now, all of these things had to be eliminated, which was incredibly difficult for them.

But there was no use in agonizing over it; they knew this was the only way.

The two expeditionary organizations are about to hold their plenary meetings. Now all civilizations know that anyone who dares to oppose self-degradation will become the target of everyone's criticism, and might even be wiped out.

After all, everyone is going to abandon dark matter-related technologies and all related creations. What do you mean by keeping them? Do you want everyone to be downgraded so that your civilization can use dark matter technology to wipe out all other civilizations?
Abandoning dark matter technology and related creations sounds simple, but it's actually very difficult; it's a matter of going through a do-or-die situation.

The reason why the various civilizations did not hold a general meeting to discuss this matter immediately after receiving the news, but instead discussed it internally first, was to formulate feasible plans and discuss together how to downgrade, who should downgrade first and who should downgrade later, and how the civilizations should supervise each other's downgrade operations.

Abandoning dark matter-related technologies is not as simple as changing energy sources; it also involves the question of whether existing ships can be propelled by the energy of a Level 5 civilization.

It's important to understand that every civilization's ships are built according to the industrial standards of a Level 6 civilization. Take the Void Shield, for example. A shield that can cover an entire civilization-level warship requires dark matter and dark antimatter as its energy source; otherwise, the energy level is insufficient to activate it.

Eliminating dark matter-related technologies not only means reduced travel speed, but also means that everyone will lose various attack and defense methods of a Level 6 civilization.

Neutron Star, Falcon, Galaxy, Daya, Lyra—all the flagships of distinctive technological civilizations will lose their powerful combat capabilities. Their various methods will be rendered useless without the energy levels generated by the annihilation of dark matter and dark antimatter.

One civilization is an exception: the Awakener Civilization!
The third-person driving mode of the Awakener civilization is unaffected, and the same applies to human civilization.

Therefore, after some discussion, human civilization agreed that this decision, which was essentially a matter of life and death and starting all over again, should be implemented immediately. It would be best for everyone to upgrade their ships to Level 5 civilization ships, and the more thorough the upgrade, the better.

The Tianqin can be dismantled.

We can build another star-class Lyra to use for now.

With human civilization setting an example, other civilizations, even if heartbroken, have no objections. Everyone must downgrade so that they can leave this place with their existing matter as quickly as possible and go to a region free from the influence of dark matter.

This self-degradation requires a high level of trust among the 84 civilizations.

Moreover, there are not only 84 civilizations at the center of the Boötes Great Hollow, but also civilizations that left earlier. The 84 civilizations trust each other and are willing to downgrade themselves, but the fear is that one day those civilizations will be driven over by a cosmic catastrophe. If they still haven't found the answer to vacuum zero-point energy by then, then it's all over.

Thinking about this, everyone felt that they shouldn't have let those civilized people leave in the first place. However, it was too late to turn back now, and they could only try their best to make amends.

So after some discussion, each civilization decided to first build a batch of probes using the energy system of a Level 5 civilization and send them to explore the area they were going to.

This can be considered a remedial and preventative measure.

In order to prevent various unforeseen events and to deter all civilizations, the Galaxy and Abyss civilizations decided that all flagships with unique technologies would not be dismantled, nor would they follow the main force. Instead, they would remain at the rhombus crystal to wait until everyone successfully mastered vacuum zero-point energy.

This is not a proposal, but a decision.

With everything prepared, all civilizations immediately entered the self-reform phase.

(End of this chapter)