The ancient return was exposed by his sister's live stream.

Yang Wanqing began to complain.

"This place is so desolate! There should at least be some seashells for me to collect on the beach, right? When I was a kid, I went to the beach... and the sand was covered with seashells."

"This isn't Earth."

"I know! But... not a single one? Not even a single crab hole?" Yang Wanqing kicked a grain of sand. "Not even a single piece of seaweed?"

Chen Siyao walked while reading the comments on the screen.

"Does Yang Wanqing still want to go beachcombing?"

"A sea without seafood is a sea without a soul."

"This sea looks like it's been disinfected with highly concentrated salt water."

"Yaoyao, keep walking forward and see if you find anything."

"Could it be related to that giant whale in the sky? That whale was so big, it devoured an entire ocean area?"

Chen Siyao put her phone back in her pocket.

We walked another two hundred meters or so.

Yang Wanqing suddenly stopped.

"Yao Yao".

"Um?"

Yang Wanqing didn't look at the sea. She looked inland... to the right of the coastline, about two or three hundred meters inland, there was a low hill.

The hills are covered with sparse shrubs and some unidentified plants, and the terrain is gently undulating.

"Over there..." Yang Wanqing squinted and looked in one direction. "Look at that."

Chen Siyao looked in the direction she was pointing.

Somewhere in the hills... a thin, grayish-white line is rising from the ground.

A gust of wind blew, and the thin thread tilted slightly, spreading out a little, but it continued to emerge.

smoke.

That's smoke.

Before Chen Siyao could react, the live chat exploded.

"Smoke!!" "That's cooking smoke!" "There's someone ahead??" "Aliens discovered!" "Wow, intelligent life in this other world?" "This is exciting! This is exciting!" "The greatest discovery on Earth has arrived!!"

"Wait..." Chen Siyao looked down at the comments.

One reminder after another came flooding in.

"Yaoyao, did you see that? There's smoke to the right front!" "On the hill at three o'clock!" "Something's smoking... It's man-made! It's not a natural fire!" "Yaoyao, go check it out!!"

She looked up and glanced at the wisp of smoke again.

It was definitely smoke. Not mist, not evaporating water vapor. The way it rose, its color, its density... it was produced by combustion.

Moreover, it is a continuous and stable combustion.

It wasn't a wildfire... Wildfire smoke is black, scattered, and irregular. This wisp of smoke was grayish-white, thin, and steadily rising upwards.

Smoke from cooking fires.

There's something burning over there.

"Yaoyao..." Yang Wanqing had already grabbed her arm. "Let's go see! Aliens! There are aliens here!"

"Don't rush." ​​Chen Siyao turned around and glanced back.

Chen Hao rode his Fuzhu horse slowly following thirty meters away, with Xiao Yue running beside him.

His gaze was also fixed on the direction of the wisp of smoke, but he didn't react in any particular way.

"Brother, there's smoke up ahead."

"Um."

"Shall we go take a look?"

"go."

Chen Siyao flipped herself onto the fuzhu. Yang Wanqing followed suit and got on the other one.

Five white deer ran toward the hills.

Getting closer.

The wisp of smoke rose from the back of a small hill. The hill was not high, and its surface was covered with low shrubs and a kind of grayish-green creeping grass.

Go around the hillside.

Chen Siyao saw it.

There was a hole at the bottom of the hillside. It wasn't big—just wide enough for an adult to bend down and crawl through.

Above the cave entrance, a thick tree branch stretched horizontally, with a few broad leaves draped over it... barely serving as a rain shelter.

Two bamboo tubes were placed to the left of the cave entrance. They weren't the finely crafted kind... the bamboo sections were roughly cut, the cross-sections were uneven, but it was clear that they were man-made. They were filled with water.

There was a small pile of dry firewood on the right. Next to it was a stone... one end of the stone had been sharpened into a blade.

Stone knife.

There were several sharpened wooden sticks on the ground, of varying lengths.

Chen Siyao jumped down from Fuzhu.

Yang Wanqing also came down.

The two people stood about seven or eight meters in front of the cave entrance and looked at each other.

This is a place to live. Tools, water, fire... everything shows signs of human intervention. It's not a wild animal.

Wild animals don't whittle sticks, cut bamboo tubes to hold water, or sharpen stones to use as knives.

The live chat was flooded with comments.

"Someone's there!! There's definitely someone there!!"

"These tools were made by humans."

"Bamboo tubes, stone knives—were these primitive people?"

"Humans from another world?"

"Or is it a humanoid creature?"

"The first contact on Earth, an epic event, is coming."

"Ready, ready!"

Chen Siyao noticed that Chen Hao did not get off the deer.

He sat on the fuzhu and looked at the cave entrance.

He frowned slightly.

It was a very light touch.

Chen Siyao saw the action, but didn't have time to ask.

Yang Wanqing had already rushed to the front of the cave entrance.

"Qingqing...don't be too impulsive."

"It's alright!" Yang Wanqing was already squatting by the cave entrance, peering inside. "Let me see..."

The cave was pitch black. The only visible part was a small section of ground at the entrance... the soil was compacted and leveled, covered with a layer of dry grass. Beyond that, nothing could be seen.

Smoke billowed from the depths of the cave, exiting through a crack in the cave ceiling at some unknown angle. The air was filled with the acrid smell of burning firewood.

Yang Wanqing stood up and glanced back at Chen Siyao.

Chen Siyao walked over and squatted down to look at the cave entrance. There was indeed light inside... deep inside, a faint orange-red flame flickered.

"There's someone inside," Chen Siyao said.

The number of viewers in the live stream had already exceeded 450 million. Official accounts from various research institutions were all active in the live stream, and the discussion in the chat had escalated from casual online conversations to more academic levels...

"National Astronomical Observatory: If this were a separate intelligent life form, its tool use level would be roughly between the Middle Paleolithic and the Early Neolithic periods."

"Institute of Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences: Intelligence level cannot be judged solely by tools. The use of bamboo as a material itself requires a considerable understanding of the environment."

"Just shout it out!"

"Shout it out!"

"What if he can understand it?"

"I was so nervous during my first time."

Yang Wanqing thought so too.

She stood up straight, cupped her hands around her mouth, and shouted towards the cave entrance...

"Hey! Is anyone inside?"

The sound entered the cave and echoed in the narrow space for a moment.

no response.

Yang Wanqing shouted again, this time with an even louder voice.

"Hey...! Is anyone there...!"

The viewers in the live chat held their breath.

"Wait a minute."

"Aliens might not understand Chinese."

"What if he gets scared?"

"Be quiet, don't scare them away."

three seconds.

Five seconds.

There was movement inside the cave.

It wasn't a reply. It was footsteps.

"Shh, shh, shh..." The sound of footsteps on dry grass. Coming from the depths towards the cave entrance.

Chen Siyao and Yang Wanqing both stared at the cave entrance.

The live chat almost stopped. More than 400 million people were staring at the same screen... a dark hole, with footsteps approaching from inside.

In the history of Earth... if intelligent life from another world emerges from there... this would be humanity's first face-to-face encounter with an extraterrestrial civilization.

Everyone is waiting.