Alien creatures destroy homes? Start by killing upright apes!

"God is in the mirror, and the mirror is in our eyes. If we close our eyes, God disappears, but we cannot close them. Because we want to see you, and you want to see us. As long as the gaze continues, God will not perish. Previous civilizations chose to close their eyes simultaneously; can you?"

Kerry crouched down, picked up a pebble, and placed a line of reply below the word "upright ape":

"No. Because we still have to farm, build machines, and raise children. If we close our eyes, we can't do anything."

The upright ape stared at the line of text for a long time.

Then it lowered its head and carved a new line of words.

"So this time, we won't fight a battle where we all perish; we'll find a third way."

"What road?"

The upright ape carved two characters.

"coexist."

Kerry's fingers tightened slightly.

Previous civilizations also tried to coexist, for three thousand years, but ultimately perished together.

Now, the upright apes are saying they coexist.

"Your previous civilization tried for three thousand years and failed. Why do you think it will succeed this time?"

The upright ape carving: "Because they are here this time."

Kerry paused, startled. "Who?"

The upright ape turned around and pointed with its front paws toward the outside of the courtyard wall.

Outside the wall are the streets of Kyoto, which are filled with upright apes.

Beyond that, there are mountains.

There are mine ruins in the mountains, where the Antio beast used its impact bones to collapse them.

Beyond that lies the sea.

In the sea, there are the wreckage of fishing boats sunk by Anomalocaris and shipping lanes blocked by giant nautiluses.

"Ten species. Last time it was just us and you, this time there are ten species. It is much more difficult for God to transform ten species at the same time than to transform only two."

Kerry stared in the direction it was pointing and remained silent for a long time.

"You intend to use the other nine exotic creatures to distract God?"

The upright ape carved a character.

"right."

……

September of the year 5914 in the Blue Star calendar, the sixty-seventh day since the arrival of alien creatures.

The refugee influx from Lesotho blocked the border for three days.

Namibi's border guards initially thought they were ordinary disaster victims.

After all, several small surrounding countries knew about the flood that destroyed the kingdom of Rasotho, and it was only a matter of time before the disaster victims fled.

But when the first group of refugees arrived at the border post, the border guards noticed something was wrong.

These refugees did not steal food, did not seek shelter, and did not request an audience with the governor.

They simply lined up and squatted quietly in the open space outside the outpost, each clutching a small piece of broken glass in their hand.

Namibi's border guard captain squatted down in front of a refugee and asked him where he came from.

The refugee was a woman in her forties, her face covered in mud, her eyes frighteningly bright.

Instead of answering the captain's question, she held up the shards of glass to her eyes, stared at her hands in the mirror, and began to count.

"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven."

She counted seven fingers.

The captain looked down at her hands—five.

A woman's right hand has only five fingers, just like all humans.

But she counted seven, and after she finished, she looked up and said in a calm tone that the captain had never heard before:

"I saw it."

"What do you see?"

"Seven fingers, God is in my hands."

The captain stood up and took two steps back.

Behind him was the wooden fence of the Namibi border post, outside which squatted more than three hundred refugees who had poured in from Lesotho, each holding a piece of broken glass and counting on their fingers.

When they count to the seventh, their expression changes—not fear, not ecstasy, but a sense of peace that comes from being accepted.

The captain sent a telegram to Governor Namibi that afternoon.

The telegram contained only one line:

—A refugee from Rashad entered the country carrying a lens, claiming to see seven fingers, and asked for instructions.

The consul replied quickly:

—Quarantine, entry prohibited.

The captain read the reply telegram twice, then walked out of the outpost and looked at the more than three hundred people outside the fence who were quietly counting on their fingers.

How to isolate?

With a gun?

They were quieter than any other refugee.

Use a wall?

They simply wouldn't go in.

They just squatted on the border line—waiting.

Namibi's people also picked up the mirror.

On the third day, a private at Namibi outpost took a small piece of broken glass from his pocket during the changing of the guard. He didn't know when he had picked it up, and he looked at his hand in it.

He counted seven.

He handed the lens to his comrade next to him.

The comrade-in-arms also counted seven.

The captain's third telegram read:

—Isolation has failed; mirror cognition is contagious. The medium of transmission is not contact, but observation. If one person watches another count seven fingers in a mirror, the observer will also count seven. No physical contact is needed; simply looking is enough.

The Winners' Kingdom, the government.

When Lu Cheng received the border report from Namibi, he was squatting in the kitchen peeling garlic for Carrie.

Carrie was cooking at the stove.

Noodles are cooked in a broth made from the bones of a water dragon, and served with stir-fried greens grown in the fields turned over by the water dragon and minced garlic.

This is a unique set meal on the entire planet Blue Star, and Lu Cheng has been eating it for half a month now without getting tired of it.

Li Wei stood at the kitchen doorway, holding the newly translated telegram in his hand, his face showing an expression as if he had just eaten half a pound of bitter garlic.

"Governor, the rate of mirror perception transmission at the Namibi border has surpassed that of the Lesotho mainland. It took more than ten days for the conversion rate in the Lesotho mainland to reach 60%, while the Namibi border only took three days to break 50%."

Lu Cheng peeled a clove of garlic and threw it into the bowl:

"Because Lesotho is a false religion, while Namibi is transmitted from person to person. Human-to-human transmission is faster than false human-to-human transmission, a principle that was proven during the plague era."

Carrie ladled out the stir-fried dish, picked up a piece with her chopsticks, and offered it to Lu Cheng to taste its saltiness.

Lu Cheng chewed for a moment and nodded.

Carrie poured the food into the plate with satisfaction.

Li Wei placed the telegram on the stove:

"There's one more thing. Governor Namibi has requested that we send technicians from the Instinct Testing Lab over there. He wants to build a testing station on the border to use fire simulations to screen out fake people."

"It's no use. The fake humans aren't afraid of fire simulations anymore. The fake humans in Lesotho have even taught the disaster victims how to use mirrors. They've already figured out that little trick of fire simulations."

"What should we do then?"

Lu Cheng pushed the peeled garlic to the corner of the cutting board:

"Let him build it! Fire simulations can't detect fake people, but they can detect who has looked in the mirror. People who have looked in the mirror react differently to fire than normal people—their fear threshold has been lowered. Seven Fingers transforms their fear into tranquility; fire can't scare them. The testing lab can't find fake people, but it can find those who have been transformed."

Two bowls of noodle soup were served, one for Lu Cheng and one for Li Wei.

Li Wei's hand trembled slightly as he held the bowl.

He ate corn porridge for more than twenty days in Lesotho, and his eyes would well up with tears whenever he saw soup noodles.

"Governor, if Namiby falls, Angula will be next, then Zambia, and then the entire southern part of Earth will fall like dominoes. The Seven Fingers are spreading at a speed similar to a steam train, while our response speed is still stuck in the horse-riding era."

Lu Cheng took a bite of noodles:

"Then let's not ride horses. Let's pull up the conversation record between the upright ape in Kyoto and President Kerry. Turn to the sixth conversation, which contains the upright ape's true attitude towards the other nine exotic creatures."

……

Taro Tanuki Country, Kyoto.

five days ago.

When Kerry entered the courtyard for the fifth time, he brought something he hadn't brought before.

A map of Earth.

He laid out a map in front of the upright ape, on which the global distribution of ten exotic creatures was marked.

Red is the upright ape, blue is the water dragon, green is the Tyrannosaurus Rex, yellow is the gibbon, purple is the giant millipede, orange is the anomalocaris, gray is the giant nautilus, brown is the giant dragonfly, cyan is the Tyrannosaurus rex, and black is the Antiomon.

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