A Colossus rushes in at the start

Chapter 99 The Survival Crisis is Too Explosive

After the bee colony's large-scale exploration began, it discovered many regions where physical rules had changed. Once matter entered these regions, it would spontaneously begin to decay.

Because in these regions where physical rules change, microscopic particles such as atoms, neutrons, and protons are in unstable excited states. Excited states will naturally transition to the ground state, which is an inherent property of matter, and entropy is always increasing.

What's even more disastrous for the many life forms and races in the main universe is that these regions, where the physical rules have been altered, are expanding at the speed of light.

However, this only applies to civilizations and races within the main universe. It does not pose a significant threat to the main universe itself, as it is expanding at faster-than-light speeds and is accelerating.

The physical rules that can only change regions at the speed of light can never cover the entire spacetime of the main universe unless the expansion of the main universe can slow down.

After the swarm completed its intelligence gathering on a small area of ​​altered physical rules within a galaxy, it basically determined that these areas of altered physical rules were directly related to the Zelian Clan.

As for the specific relationship, it is not important to the bee colony. The bee colony only needs to know that it is related to the Zelian tribe, and that is enough. Other questions can be asked directly to the Zelian tribe.

There are many regions in the universe where physical rules change like this. These are spacetimes that arrived in the main universe at different times. So even though they all expand at the speed of light, the extent of their expansion is different.

Lu Shang has reason to suspect that the areas altered by these physical rules still harbor remnants of the Zelian tribe.

As for the atomic machine in the Zelian tribe's tomb saying that the Zelian tribe had been completely wiped out, Lu Shang was honestly skeptical. Firstly, part of it was already damaged. It was originally a microscopic creation under the physical rules of the Zelian tribe, but it decayed and was damaged due to the different rules in the spacetime of the swarm. Moreover, this microscopic creation had no way of knowing whether there were any survivors after the Zelian tribe encountered a crisis outside the universe. Its so-called "complete annihilation" was just a deduction.

Thus began the space war concerning regions that altered other physical rules.

It's still the same old routine of isolating the microcosm, but this time a little strategy has been added: surprise attack.

Surprise attacks are very effective. Compared to the first battle with the civilization in the area where the physical rules were altered, which caused a large number of dark spheres to run to other parts of the main universe, forcing the swarm to send out a large number of individuals to pursue them, surprise attacks can deprive the opponent of all ability to resist before the opponent even realizes it.

When these physical laws alter the horrifying discoveries of civilizations and races in the region, and their universes cease to expand naturally, they become easy prey for the swarm to trap in their microcosms, to be taken at will.

So-called resistance is impossible. As the swarm continues to create new microcosms based on the existing microcosms, constantly dividing the internal spacetime, any civilization that wants to survive will have no choice but to surrender.

Persistence pays off. In the largest area of ​​altered physical rules discovered by the bee colony so far, they instigated the civilization within the area to find the remnants of the Zelian tribe hidden within.

As for how to determine whether someone is a descendant of the Zelian tribe, the method is simple: communicate with them in the Zelian language. The bee colony has never used the Zelian language and rules to change the civilization and communication within the region, which means that there cannot be any Zelian language texts in the region.

This means that in the area where the physical rules have changed, only the Zelian people know the Zelian language.

Of course, there are also cases where the language was learned from the relics of the Zelian tribe by the indigenous civilizations in the region, but it doesn't matter. If the desired answers are not obtained, the bee colony will still perish.

"We ask questions, you answer them. Don't weave meaningless linguistic mazes; we don't like wasting time."

Under Lu Shang's command, the planetary beings used psionic energy to create ripples in spacetime and gravitational waves to transmit information into the regions where physical rules were altered.

About a week later, a stream of information carrying gravitational waves echoed within the region where the rules had changed.

"Strange race, what do you want to know from us? Time has rotted away almost everything about the Zelian race. You will not get anything useful from us."

Upon receiving a response, Lu Shang immediately began sending out inquiries: "We just want to know what the Zelian tribe went through, and why they left their homeland in the first place?"

"...because of the chaos of the Endless Sea," the surviving members of the Zelian tribe replied.

"History has been severely lost. Only a small amount of history has survived to this day. We only remember that our homeland collapsed in the chaos of war. In order to survive, the Zelian people had no choice but to leave their homeland and find a new home."

Having learned of the Zelian people's reply, Lu Shang was able to roughly understand some of the concepts. For example, the Endless Sea probably refers to the outside of the main universe, while the homeland refers to the Zelian people's mother universe.

But what does "chaotic battle" refer to?

Lu Shang pondered, instinctively feeling that it couldn't be as simple as war. After all, among the Zelian tribe, "ship" refers to a small universe that moves across universes, "shore" refers to the main universe, and "chaotic battle" might specifically refer to something else.

"Why is there a chaotic battle in the Endless Sea?" the Babel Tower bees asked from the side.

The survivors of the Zelian tribe replied, "We don't know. By the time the Zelian tribe noticed, the chaos was already underway."

Immediately afterwards, the remnants of the Zelian tribe quickly added another gravitational wave message: "No, that's an inappropriate word. It should be said that chaotic battles are the norm in the Endless Sea, and the Zelian tribe just happens to exist in a calm sea area."

What does "calm sea" refer to?

Lu Shang couldn't help but command the planetary creatures to ask questions out of curiosity.

The Zelian people replied, "Of course, it's about stability. Now we can communicate with you stably, you can exist stably, and we can exist stably. This is the peace of the sea."

After thinking for a moment, Lu Shang had the planetary creature send another gravitational wave to ask, "What would happen if the Endless Sea became unstable?"

"Everything will perish."

The Zelian clan responded with gravitational waves.

……

After several rounds of communication, the bee colony roughly understood that the "chaotic war" mentioned by the Zelian tribe remnants was actually an increase in entropy. Entropy increase can be man-made or occur naturally. The fact that their homeland was destroyed by war, as described by the Zelian tribe remnants, was actually due to a huge increase in entropy in their mother universe, to the point that the mother universe could no longer maintain a stable state and collapsed.

The matter has been basically clarified, but it would have been better not to clarify it at all. According to the descendants of the Zelian tribe, their mother universe and the swarm's current main universe are nothing more than short-lived bubbles that will suddenly burst at any time.

Because in the endless ocean beyond the universe, entropy increase and collapse are the common phenomena.

In other words, one day in the future, even if the main universe doesn't experience heat death, the entire universe will still burst like a soap bubble...

The Babel bee swarm is experiencing an explosive sense of survival crisis!

(End of this chapter)