Armor-Piercing Munition: Face Me, Carbon-Based Monster!

One hour later, Mountain City, ground level.

After the great battle, Mountain City was already riddled with holes, with numerous buildings destroyed. The aftermath of the nuclear explosions swept across, and the hot air mixed with a slightly burnt odor carried radioactive dust, corroding every unshielded team member's body.

The fortunate thing was that these nuclear bombs were well-preserved, and even after 300 years, the chain reactions during the nuclear fuel explosions proceeded quite fully.

The radiation dose post-explosion was high, but not instantly fatal.

At least they could still live for twenty years?

In the Wasteland World, that was already considered quite a "long-lived" number.

Chen Jian had already activated Nezha's exoskeleton life-support system, and after the electromagnetic pulse's aftermath completely disappeared, communications were restored.

And this time, he no longer needed to rely on unstable radio waves, and could directly communicate with Fu Xi through the established cellular network.

"Fu Xi, report the current situation."

"Have you obtained the specifics of Mountain City's underground conditions?"

"Reporting, sir, progress is limited."

Fu Xi's voice sounded in the headphones.

"I've entered the surface system of Mountain City, but their quantum firewall reacted quickly and isolated the infected areas."

"The computing power block lost power within 10 seconds, and the information I read was limited."

"But it's already confirmed that the whole Mountain City is a virtual city based on quantum computing power."

"This explains why they need a large number of quantum computers—based on current results, the computing power needed to maintain such a large virtual city far exceeds the limits a single underground disaster recovery facility can provide."

"Understood."

Chen Jian breathed out a long sigh.

At this moment, the mysteries about Mountain City finally had a preliminary explanation.

Why they took the quantum computers from facility 006, why they chose to isolate themselves and cut off contact with the outside world, why they would destroy any forces developing on the wasteland regardless of cost....

The root of everything was due to the difference in their path.

They chose to inject human consciousness into endless quanta, abandoning their physical bodies to live eternally in a virtual world constructed by computing power.

How... blasphemous!

Chen Jian frowned, and at this time, Lei Jie, who had just completed medical treatment for the wounded and redeployed the defense line, came over.

"The situation isn't bad."

He began speaking:

"The expeditionary force suffered significant losses, but Fu Xi's timely intervention prevented further losses."

"Those level-one monsters are effectively incapacitated—only two remain, but their so-called 'protocol' has been destroyed."

"It's estimated that soon, they will instinctively leave Mountain City."

"The passage is open, we can initiate large-scale transmission shortly."

"Understood."

Chen Jian looked at Lei Jie, expressing sincerely:

"You've worked hard."

"You have too."

Lei Jie waved his hand and then asked:

"So, what's the deal with these bird-men?"

"Why did they choose to shrink underground? Why did they abandon their bodies?"

"Is this a choice a normal human would make? Anyone with even a little sense wouldn't do this, right?"

"Not necessarily."

Chen Jian slowly shook his head, then immediately said:

"The last message Lin Yu sent before entering hibernation was about 'entropy increase'."

"It's highly likely that these Mountain City people believe entropy increase is the key that leads to the catastrophe."

"Only by controlling the speed of entropy increase, can they avoid the catastrophe."

"This is consistent with the information we gathered earlier—over the past two hundred years, the frequency of post-catastrophe wave occurrences has significantly declined."

"They probably are correct... at least on this point, they should be correct."

After the words fell, Lei Jie instantly furrowed his brows.

"Entropy increase leads to catastrophe? Some kind of great filter theory?"

"Yes."

Chen Jian replied briefly, and Lei Jie continued to ask:

"But no theory proves that entropy increase is related to human bodies—this sounds like some ancient theological theory, does it even have a dime's worth of connection with basic physics?"

"You're asking me who should I ask?"

Chen Jian shrugged his shoulders.

"It's a question I should be asking you, Professor Lei!"

After Chen Jian spoke, Lei Jie sighed helplessly.

"I don't understand... but at least we can explain their previous motives."

"So what next?"

"What should we do next?"

"Negotiate with them?"

This question left Chen Jian momentarily stunned.

Negotiate?

He had never considered this possibility before.

The moment he confirmed the beast tide was connected to Mountain City, his attitude toward Mountain City was already that they were "not of our kind."

And subsequently, after seeing those obviously human-made Artificial People, he was further convinced that the conclusion between them and Mountain City could only be one living and one dead.

Because they had betrayed humanity, transforming themselves into their own completely distinct creations.

Between two species, only one can survive—this is the cold, hard natural order.

----But now, things seemed to have changed somewhat.

If these Mountain City people really made this choice due to some compelling factors, if they chose this path after repeated trial and error....

Does that mean opening communication with them and further obtaining more information is also an option?

Chen Jian subconsciously blinked, and at this moment, Fu Xi's voice sounded again at his ear.

"Preliminary data decoding is complete."

"Most data from the Mountain City computing center is encrypted using quantum algorithms, but a small part still uses traditional RSA encryption."

"I have obtained partial intelligence and conducted preliminary sorting."

"Sir, please check."

As the words finished, Fu Xi's decoded information automatically streamed across Chen Jian's smart lenses.

Chen Jian focused on observing, and most of the information consisted of useless log files.

But among them, the key information marked in red by Fu Xi immediately attracted his attention.

It was a series of "failure records."

To be precise, failure records in data simulations.

The residents of Mountain City attempted to use various methods to avoid the apocalypse, including but not limited to extreme industrialization, genetic modification, population explosion, fundamental physics breakthroughs, large-scale disaster preparedness, technological strangulation, or even "starseeker escape."

But all these attempts ended in bitter failure.

They indeed tried every possible method.

Only one attempt remained in "unfinished" status.

From the timeline, that simulation happened after "consciousness virtualization," and after choosing the path of consciousness upload, they no longer tried to find other ways out.

"Activate the ring..."

Chen Jian whispered:

"Mountain City also tried to activate the so-called 'ring'."

"But what on earth is this thing??"