Chapter 61: Shadows in History

The one who sent the article “Basic Principles of Algae Research” to Research Institute 011 was naturally Qin Yu.

The points that made the researchers at Research Institute 011 feel confused and unable to understand,

obviously were not a problem at all for Qin Yu.

Finding a suitable Laboratory for research, and putting the paper right in front of a core Researcher at Research Institute 011 without anyone noticing,

were both very easy things for Qin Yu.

The reason he chose to use ‘Entropy’ as the signature, instead of showing his open identity,

aside from the fact that his journey in this lifetime was not over yet and he didn’t want any “interference”,

the most important thing was that, when needed, he would use this ‘Entropy’ signature more than once.

In the long history of Human Civilization, this identity might appear again when necessary.

Outside his open identity, this identity would become a shadow in the long river of Human Civilization history,

His open identity might change as he needed, but ‘Entropy’ would always exist.

Just like the Negentropy Research Institute, lasting throughout Human Civilization.

Perhaps people in the distant future who knew the truth would find that, in times of crisis for Human Civilization or at key historical moments,

they could always see the shadow of ‘Entropy’.

For Qin Yu,

this, besides being convenient, was also a kind of interesting thing.

…

“A Huaxin News Agency report: According to many research institutions and teams around the world, after completing tests in various places, they confirmed that because Entropy Algae grew quickly, the living space for 236 Algae was shrinking on a large scale.”

“Right now, the average oxygen level in the global air has gone back to 25%. Social production activities kept getting less affected by the earlier spread of the 236 Algae Spread Crisis. The effects of using Entropy Algae matched what people expected perfectly.”

“Based on earlier and current guesses, the average oxygen level in the global air should fully return to normal levels in the next two months.”

“The fight between Human Civilization and the Doomsday Crisis caused by the spread of 236 Algae had won an important battle!”

“…That same day, in South American Continent, the place hit hardest by the spread of the 236 Algae Spread Crisis before, a rainforest fire that had burned for a whole month finally stopped. This happened after heavy rain kept going for more than twenty-four hours.”

“In North American State, Europa Continent, and many countries, the chaos from the spread of the 236 Algae Spread Crisis before was still going on…”

At that moment, Qin Yu was in the breakfast room of a hotel near the Jiuzhou Launch Site in Huaxia Nation.

Earlier, during the state of dealing with the doom coming, industries like hotel dining that had nothing to do with stopping the doom were all paused for a while.

By now, after Entropy Algae were widely used and the Doomsday Crisis had gone away, those industries slowly started coming back.

The production activities and all the running of society were also gradually returning to how things used to be.

There weren’t many people in the hotel breakfast room that time,

but everyone could clearly feel that, when the TV on the wall in the breakfast room began showing news about 236 Algae and the Doomsday Crisis,

the whole breakfast room became much quieter. People eating breakfast accidentally looked at and paid attention to the news on the TV.

Only after the news ended did the breakfast room get a bit lively again.

In those days, even though everyone knew it was certain that the Doomsday Crisis from the spread of 236 Algae was over, and the air condition all over the world was getting better day by day,

many people, when they woke up each day, still wanted to hear news about 236 Algae first.

If they heard any related news, they couldn’t help but pay attention.

They even became too sensitive to “doom messages” that used to be common online.

After all,

the doom of Human Civilization had once been very close to them.

“Damn… it really feels like being alive is nice, and having no doom is so great.”

“Luckily it was just a false alarm… when things get a bit steadier, I’m definitely going out and about. Otherwise, if doom comes again, it feels like I’d miss out big time.”

“Peh peh peh… shut up, don’t say those words, I get chills hearing them.”

People in the breakfast room talked to each other after watching the news.

In the hotel, from the lobby to the dining room, the whole inside kept some signs from two or three months ago, when the spread of the 236 Algae Spread Crisis was getting closer step by step.

The temporary changes made to the buildings then weren’t fixed back yet.

Qin Yu watched the news and also heard some words from the table next to him.

After finishing breakfast, he checked out and left that hotel.

…

Walking on the street,

as the sun rose in the east and slowly climbed higher in the sky,

it seemed like more and more people appeared on the street, making it noisy and busy.

The bright, slightly glaring sunlight, plus all the loud and lively sounds,

for many people who had just been through the spread of the 236 Algae Spread Crisis,

felt like returning to normal life.

With the threat of doom far away, the past few months felt like a bad dream to many people.

But, the effects of this Doomsday Crisis were sure to be deep and lasting.

At least, before this, for many people, doom seemed distant and unlikely to happen in their lifetimes.

But now, that hidden thought was broken.

It was hard to say if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

In these months,

as the crisis from 236 Algae went away, Huaxia Nation slowly left the emergency mode for facing doom.

The temporary changes for buildings made earlier were stopped.

But many people still worked on their own to change their homes on their own.

For this kind of action, the authorities gave advice but did not force anyone to stop.

After all, people just saved from doom often felt a bit unsafe.

At the same time,

for the shelters built earlier to handle the Doomsday Crisis from the spread of 236 Algae,

Huaxia Nation, and other countries around the world that could do it,

did not completely give up on finishing the shelters that weren’t done yet.

They just made the shelters smaller and better in quality,

so after building them, they could handle more other kinds of situations or crises.

…

At that moment, Qin Yu was on his way to the Jiuzhou Space Center.

From there, he would start the final journey of this lifetime.

Had it not been for the sudden outbreak of the 236 Algae Spread Crisis, Qin Yu would probably have changed his identity by this time.

However, because of the 236 Algae Spread Crisis, the ‘Moon Landing Tour’ Qin Yu had signed up for earlier was postponed by the Huaxia Nation’s space agency.

Although, to supply the Lunar Base, space tasks to the Moon during this period were not completely canceled,

under the threat of the Doomsday Crisis, things like space tourism definitely couldn’t be fully taken care of.

Only now, with the Doomsday Crisis gone, did the planned ‘Moon Landing Tour’ project restart.

Following the usual practice since the start of these Moon Surface and space tourism programs,

Qin Yu, as a tourist on the space tour, needed to undergo simple training and a health status recheck at the Nine Provinces Space Center, or other Huaxia Nation space centers, before departure.

This was also to help tourists prepare early for participating in the space tour.

After that, he would travel to the Lunar Surface from the Jiuzhou Launch Site, together with other tourists and the same group of Astronauts heading to the Moon.

“…Mr. Qin Yu. This is your room.”

“From now until your Moon landing in seven days, you need to stay at the space center for training, while we monitor your health daily to ensure you’re in good condition before takeoff and reduce the chance of getting sick in space.”

“Along with you, Mr. Qin Yu, there are a total of ten tourists joining this Moon Landing Tour…”

At the Nine Provinces Space Center, a relevant Researcher explained the situation to Qin Yu.

…

Seven days later,

at the Jiuzhou Launch Site.

The space mission to the Lunar Base this time was carrying thirty people.

Besides the ten tourists, including Qin Yu, there were also twenty Astronauts, payload experts, and long-term Researchers from related fields at the Lunar Base.

Over the past seven days,

the short pre-flight training for the ten tourists, including Qin Yu,

wasn’t expected to teach them how to operate spacecraft in such a short time.

The training mainly emphasized following the Astronauts’ orders and what self-protection measures to take in emergencies.

Any operations needed inside the spacecraft would definitely be handled by the Astronauts.

The ten tourists, including Qin Yu, were just simple passengers.

The Jiuzhou Launch Site was a large space launch facility built by Huaxia Nation after starting construction of the Lunar Base,

mainly used for launching rockets and spacecraft headed to the Lunar Surface.

This time, the spacecraft Qin Yu and others would ride naturally took off from here after ignition.

Before takeoff,

a routine pre-launch press conference was held outside the Jiuzhou Launch Site.

But Qin Yu and other tourists weren’t required to speak at it.

They simply waited for the routine press conference to end,

then began boarding the capsule with the other Astronauts to prepare for ignition and takeoff.

…

Before entering the crew capsule, Qin Yu looked out at the entire rocket and spacecraft assembly he would board.

The spacecraft was carried by a three-stage rocket, with eight boosters attached.

Its load capacity to the Lunar Surface exceeded ninety tons, making it the main transport Huaxia Nation used to get from Earth to the Lunar Surface in that era.

It was the foundation for Huaxia Nation to build and maintain a Lunar Base capable of housing five hundred people.

It was also Human Civilization’s peak product in traditional chemical propulsion at that time.

Even sitting on the launch site, it stood tall like a steep mountain or a towering building rising from the ground,

truly magnificent.

Thanks to this rocket’s excellent load capacity,

the inside of the spacecraft was quite spacious.

It couldn’t allow everyone to move around freely,

but it didn’t force the thirty people, including the tourists, to cram tightly together.

“Ten, nine…”

The countdown before ignition started,

and the tourists on board crowded by the portholes or stared intently at the screen monitors inside the cabin.

Qin Yu might not have felt as tense as everyone else on the spacecraft,

but he also looked outside the porthole.

“Six… five”

“Three… two… one!”

“Ignition! Liftoff!”

Inside the cabin, they could hear some commands broadcast from the control room.

But after the ignition command,

the people on board were filled with another sound.

It was a huge roar along with shaking from the rocket and spacecraft assembly.

For those inside the spacecraft,

it felt like their whole world was trembling slightly,

while an invisible force seemed to press on every part of their bodies.

Or like countless invisible threads connected them to the ground.

As the rocket and spacecraft assembly tried to break away from Earth with mighty power,

those invisible threads linking their bodies to Earth were stretched and pulled.

The roar was like the rocket assembly growling.

Outside the portholes, thick smoke reached up to the level of the crewed spacecraft,

but to the tourists inside, the billowing smoke seemed to rise and then sink.

Finally, the rocket assembly rejected Earth’s pull.

Even though it was still tied to Earth by gravity, it charged fiercely out of the rising smoke.

Earlier, the launch tower holding up the rocket assembly disappeared from the porthole view.

Next, those in the spacecraft saw the launch site falling away below through the portholes.

Of course,

by that moment, even while watching the scene through the portholes,

the minds of the other nine tourists besides Qin Yu seemed stuck.

Though they had all used Gravity Protective Fluid,

and the overload for crewed spacecraft in that era was mostly kept under three g’s.

While it didn’t cause much physical harm to their bodies,

the immediate discomfort was still somewhat impossible to avoid completely.

“Stage one separation! Stage two ignition successful!”

“Telemetry signals tracking normally, spacecraft orientation normal!”

Voices transmitted via wireless signal from the command hall could still be heard inside the spacecraft cabin.

By this time, the combined rocket and spacecraft had climbed to a certain altitude.

Qin Yu glanced at the image captured in real-time by an exterior camera and displayed on the cabin screen,

and also looked out the window.

Now, everything on the ground appeared very tiny within the visible view.

For Qin Yu, this kind of view wasn’t particularly new.

Although he hadn’t been to the lunar surface before,

he had already experienced the feeling of soaring, or free fall, in the sky many times.

He had looked down upon the Earth from high altitudes more than once.

“Spacecraft successfully enters designated orbit; payload fairing separation complete!”

“Space Station has acquired the spacecraft.”

At this moment,

finally,

the combined rocket and spacecraft left the atmosphere and entered near-Earth space.

Almost instantly,

it was like the invisible threads that had bound everyone aboard

were finally snapped by the brute force of the launch rocket.

The group of people were suddenly freed from the earlier high G-force pressure.

Although the protective harnesses still held the astronauts and passengers in place,

everyone could already feel themselves clearly suspended in the air.

The astronauts were fine.

For the passengers who hadn’t experienced this weightlessness before,

nearly everyone felt a sudden twinge of panic in their gut. Someone instinctively grabbed their harness,

someone else’s legs thrashed a couple of times without thinking, as if plummeting through the air.

Still,

after the initial fright and unease, the passengers clearly became excited and enthusiastic.

For Qin Yu,

this was an interesting experience,

and it was the same for the other nine passengers.

This was their first time breaking free of Earth’s gravity, truly arriving in space beyond Earth.

Though they were still separated by the spacecraft itself,

the weightlessness itself made them feel the ‘cosmos’.

It made the fact that they had left the ground and come into space feel real.

“Um, comrade, can we take pictures?”

a passenger asked an astronaut, unable to resist looking out the window at the space beyond.

The astronaut smiled and nodded,

“Yes, but don’t undo your safety belts.”

Naturally, the passengers all began to take photos now,

aiming at the cosmic space, and at the blue home planet.

Someone also tried letting go of their camera, just to see an object behave in weightlessness.

Simple, yet still astonishingly new to people experiencing weightlessness for the first time in space.