Chapter 250: Misestimation, an Unexpected Wait

The novel.... is no longer interesting.

Yunxiao muttered to herself, looking at the potato chips she used to love most, they also began to lose flavor.

The Intelligent Machine Empress was still addicted to playing games, but she had no mood at all.

Without 118, everything began to lose its flavor, and Yunxiao often thought, she had only been through less than three months and already felt awful—what kind of suffering must 118 be enduring?

However, he can enter self-hibernation, so he should be fine....

Yunxiao kept questioning 118's situation over and over, then repeatedly felt reassured by the Intelligent Machine Empress's words, making her feel as if she were split in mind.

When the Intelligent Machine Empress once again frantically shook her to log in, Yunxiao finally had no choice but to log in.

Playing games lets people temporarily forget their current worries, but then it plunges them into new worries.

That is the worry of being blown up by others....

Yunxiao thus passed day after day in this state of repeated agonizing.

Days with perfect entertainment facilities were still hard to endure, but Yunxiao felt that all this should be due to the absence of 118.

Clearly, her days of slacking off had passed in the blink of an eye.

Yunxiao felt she shouldn't be so depressed, and she felt she should start making an effort again.

Having been idle for so long, Yunxiao felt she was about to rust, and whenever she tried to start working hard, the Intelligent Machine Empress would pop up and urge her to play games.

Afterwards, Yunxiao would lazily be tricked into playing games, but even so, her realm as a machinist continued to rise, and her talent kept exerting itself.

After that, a long stretch of time passed; although Yunxiao felt each day went by slowly, opening and closing her eyes, a day would just pass like that.

Time is like that—clearly it feels slow, yet in the blink of an eye it's gone.

Finally, after the long wait, a year's period was approaching....

Everyone eagerly awaited the world fifty thousand years later, only Yunxiao....

Only she feared seeing a severely damaged mecha, and her last remaining relative.

Countless Federation residents headed toward the massive gate of the Far Voyager, anticipating the new world after the black hole's decompression.

"10...."

"9...."

"3.... 2.... 1!"

As the countdown ended, the anticipated shock did not arrive; they seemed still trapped in the black hole.

"What's going on?"

Yunxiao frowned anxiously, looking at the Intelligent Machine Empress beside her, who also gave a reassuring gesture and explained.

"Time cannot be precise; over such a long span, the black hole may well absorb more mass, so the time won't be exactly fifty thousand years."

"Then what is your estimate?"

"No more than five hours."

Around them, people whispered; Yunxiao furrowed her brow, loudly reassured the crowd, and explained the principle.

Seeing the crowd gradually quiet down, Yunxiao helplessly pinched her brow; already irritable, she now felt even more agitated.

Finally, Yunxiao had everyone return to their resting places first, and reminded them to stay safe, since the black hole's decompression would bring a major shock.

As for herself, she stood there, at the place where she last saw 118, simply waiting for the shock to arrive.

One hour....

Two hours....

Five hours...

Yunxiao just kept waiting, waiting, waiting....

An entire day passed, the expected shock never arrived, everything remained as before, and Yunxiao's inner unease surged ever stronger.

"What on earth is going on!!!"

Yunxiao shouted at the Intelligent Machine Empress, who finally panicked, constantly dragging her own cheap younger sister into frantic calculations; they tried to link their hidden backups and attempted to artificially sever the Gravity Prison's stable state.

But it was useless.

"I! I also don't know why it became like this!"

After the Intelligent Machine Empress's limited data calculation, she suddenly discovered that the black hole's gravity had increased! But she couldn't compute how much.

As for the effect, it's that the increased gravity inside the black hole's event horizon makes time flow faster.

This would mean that, whereas a year should have taken fifty thousand years to pass, now only two hundred days or even one hundred days are needed to emerge.

But now, a year inside the black hole has passed, while outside it's very likely that over fifty thousand years have elapsed; more terrifyingly, the Gravity Prison, which was set to automatically dismantle after fifty thousand years, is still operating.

"You mean to say!!! 118 still has to wait fifty thousand years outside!!!"

Yunxiao was furious beyond measure; she so wanted to rush out, find 118, tell him she missed him, tell him she had returned.

Looking at the empress's panicked little face, and her cheap younger sister's utterly bewildered expression, Yunxiao also realized this might not be the Intelligent Machine Empress's fault....

"It might be because the Insect Disaster entered the black hole, causing its mass to increase."

The Intelligent Machine Empress's cheap younger sister spoke expressionlessly; she hadn't received much emotional influence, so her emotional depth remained within controllable limits.

But the Intelligent Machine Empress was miserable; having been in close contact with 118's code, she now cried nonstop like a little girl who had done something wrong.

"A variable.... has appeared...."

The Intelligent Machine Empress's cheap younger sister muttered to herself, and this sentence struck Yunxiao's heart like a heavy hammer.

"Variable...."

Yunxiao muttered to herself; she suddenly felt something, and sharply turned her gaze toward a direction.

She didn't know why she was looking that way, as if something were spying on her.

"Right! There must be some variable!"

The Intelligent Machine Empress seized the point, kept deflecting blame, but in fact it really wasn't her responsibility.

The Federation's energy and food supplies are still relatively abundant, enough for us to keep going like this for one year and nine months.

The Intelligent Machine Empress's sister is still more reliable; she, capable of semi-absolute rational thinking, quickly came up with an answer.

The most important thing to do now is to calm the populace.

She continued her analysis; after severing ties with the Disaster God, she also reached the same conclusion as her sister and began to help humanity.

The Intelligent Machines were not abandoned either; they left behind data, and that data is their life, until the Intelligent Machine Empress goes out to reboot their people.

I! I'll do it!

To slightly make up for her own shortcomings, the Intelligent Machine Empress voluntarily took on the task of calming the populace and then hurriedly left.

We can still wait....

Then... what about 118?

Yunxiao slowly knelt down, gazing at the silver-white dome, her heart trembling uncontrollably.

How much longer must we wait for her 118....

That is a number more desperate than fifty thousand years....