Chapter 1040 - 82: Pioneering Experiment (Part 2)

Houston City, a desolate city of oil.

The Singularity Particle Test Field has a pit that seems to lead into an endless abyss.

"Incredible..."

Lille’s scanner was operating at its maximum capacity.

A faint beam of light emitted from his fingertip into the pit, but the scanner couldn’t detect any energy reflection...

This meant Lille couldn’t determine the real depth of the pit, nor could he discern its material just by observation—

"Absolute Black Body? How is that possible..."

An Absolute Black Body, theoretically, is just a physical model, which doesn’t exist in reality.

This kind of object absorbs all incident electromagnetic radiation, regardless of its wavelength, reflecting and transmitting none.

Precisely because of this characteristic, it reflects no light, naturally making it appear purely black, and the substance in this pit completely fits this criterion...

Strangely, according to Planck’s Radiation Law, an Absolute Black Body should re-radiate energy as black body radiation according to its temperature, yet Lille couldn’t observe anything.

A strange feeling arose in Lille’s heart once more:

Now he had mastered part of the technologies involving Vibranium, gamma serum, and singularity particles, and had also received the complete theoretical models from Tony and Banner’s research...

The issues they encountered increasingly occupied Lille’s thoughts:

Gamma radiation did not, as Banner had imagined, draw infinite energy from the vacuum to strengthen the human body, as if the ’energy channel’ in the model had been deliberately cut off;

Tony wanted a miniaturized ark reactor, but not even the radioactive first generation from the movies could be built, due to unsuitable materials, and his dad hadn’t left any mysterious formula for synthesizing the appropriate elements; apart from Vibranium, no suitable material existed;

Conveniently, at the Singularity Particle extraction and test site, one, the singularity particles could open connections to other worlds, gaining energy far beyond theoretical limits; two, a strange new material appeared here.

It seemed as if these things were interconnected.

Drones began collecting materials from the pit, and Lille withdrew his gaze.

In Houston, there was indeed a self-destruct program, and the place had almost been emptied: all the High Energy Concentrated Oil was moved away, the refined oil was burned as firewood, server unit data was deleted and rewritten, then physically damaged with a chemical wash to eliminate all recovery possibilities.

The Iron Riders infiltrated first, essentially cutting off any links for a chain explosion, although some areas still exploded, these didn’t achieve the effect Dalio imagined.

Faced with such an outcome, Dalio had prepared a video here.

[Dalio: Clever and stubborn thief, Lille Lee—I admit, for now, you are stronger.]

In the empty building, Lille walked up, the robots all inactive, and the life support system long shut down. If he were human, he couldn’t survive in Houston City with its toxic gas.

Just like those decadent investors: these old world "old money" elites died here, died in the illusion that Dalio drained the world to weave for them...

It was like a group of hedonists watching a Super Dream and lying on the streets of Night City, suddenly having aneurysms burst, falling down, unaware of their own fallen delight.

V followed behind Lille, frowning slightly as he looked at the corpses: "Who are these people? Dressed like emperors, surrounded by exotic plants, living in luxury..."

Jack nodded in agreement: "Living like emperors, more like emperors than Arasaka Saburo."

With interest, Lille asked: "You know where Arasaka Saburo lives?"

"What are you saying, his son runs business with us now, how could I not know?"

"True." Lille bypassed these pathetic people and answered V’s question, "It’s not just the poor who indulge in pleasure, the powerful do too, often thinking they are indulging in something grander...

In essence, there’s little difference."

They cannot control their humanity, cannot escape this black hole, cannot govern themselves, and often gleefully use technology they don’t understand...

Some control the technology, some use technology and power to control others, naturally, some are controlled by technology.

[Dalio: But you’ll soon be finished, this technology was ultimately my investment, my discovery, it’s mine!]

[Dalio: You think you’ve won? No no no... The greatest breakthroughs are in the hands of the greatest people.]

V looked at the footage, then suspiciously at Lille: "What is this guy mumbling about?"

"Just the words of a defeated man, every sore loser howls, even if they’re scared to death, they’ll find all kinds of ways to bark, no need to worry about it."

Jack silently noted these words in his head, thinking of how to add them to his little journal.

[Dalio: The last experiment... May you and your world die with it!]

[Dalio: And I will create my new empire in a new world, a new universe, untouched by you damned thieves, leeches, and waste!]

Pop—

The screen puffed black smoke, originally set for a self-destruct, which ultimately failed.

It makes sense now...

Dalio always had the ambition of building a laboratory base on the Moon, and had been executing it, likely aware of the power of the final Singularity Particle experiment.

His original thought might have been to complete the mission at any cost, even blowing up the Moon; the Earth’s destruction was inconsequential as there was a new world anyway.

Now, the Earth has driven him away, and he might gamble everything, hoping to reach another world after the success of the final Singularity Particle experiment...

In the worst case, the Moon explodes, throwing this Earth into catastrophe—simply put, everyone dies.

Everyone dies, and Dalio has a slim chance of survival.

On this side, he also needs to make a trip to the Moon...

"Training is over." Lille said in the dim room, "Great performances, prepare to go to the Moon."

Jack said eagerly, "Then I’m out first. I have a date with Misty, waiting until after we get back would just be too unlucky."

Lille smiled, "Quite smart, go ahead."

Buzz...

The 1:1 crafted prosthetic ceased operation, then switched to automatic control mode, leaving only V and Lille there.

V looked through the broken wall at the city outside, her little mind constantly turning, or perhaps it had been turning for a long time—

For a long time, she finally organized her words and felt she must ask:

"Is this... really training? This isn’t training, is it?"

It was just a feeling.

Lille had brought her to this world many times, and to others, this world was extremely real, but only limited to combat scenarios.

To her, the logic of this world was too well-developed, and she could even feel genuine emotions from those saved—

If this was training, such detail wasn’t necessary; if it was Lille’s memory and Super Dream of those beautiful worlds, there was no need to perfect these details...

More importantly, this guy named Dalio keeps spouting nonsense, but she feels everything is connected.

Her intuition is very sharp, always has been.

This time, Lille’s response was:

"I’ll answer you on the Moon."