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Chapter 4: Earth
"This gel contains the oxygen and water required for human bodies, as well as providing sufficient cushioning. This is the plan I've calculated to have the highest success rate."
After all the turmoil, Sun Jack finally glimpsed a thread of hope for survival. Without hesitation, he dove right in.
As he turned to ask the robot to come inside, he found it walking away. "Where are you going? Are you not coming in?"
"Stay inside. I need to make sure the shock absorber here is functioning," the robot said, heading outside.
Just when Jack was about to say something, the room suddenly tilted, debris and soil came crashing toward him.
Helplessly, he squeezed his entire body into the gel.
In weightlessness, surrounded by the gooey, slippery gel, though buried, he could still breathe as the substance filled his lungs. The sensation was incredibly peculiar.
But amidst the intense jolting, Jack Sun disregarded the sensation, clutching himself as tightly as possible.
He felt as if he were on a roller coaster without a safety belt, lurching left and right intermittently. Fortunately, the gel provided protection, preventing any bone-breaking impacts on his body.
After an indiscernible duration, a final, incredibly violent impact hit, and then everything fell silent.
Sensing the silence outside, Jack maneuvered within the gel toward the exit.
But just as he reached the edge of the gel, something blocked his way, preventing him from exiting.
Anxious, he turned around and forcefully kicked the dark gel several times. After about a dozen kicks, a beam of light shot out from the pitch-black gel.
He swam towards that light and the moment he emerged from the gel, damp air filled his lungs.
Cold rain was pouring from the sky outside, cleansing his body. At that moment, he felt as if he were born anew.
The wall of the cultivation cabine had been torn open, leaving a gaping hole. Jack Sun stared blankly at the raindrops continuously falling from the sky, then suddenly burst into laughter. He had returned; he had finally made it back to Earth alive!
Having narrowly escaped death, Jack Sun was ecstatic.
Some things are only appreciated in their absence. Feeling the pull of Earth's gravity once more, Jack Sun alternated between shouting and kissing the ground.
After his excitement settled, he realized he was not out of danger yet.
Surveying the wreckage around him, the entire cabine lay in ruins, barely recognizable from its previous state.
The robot was right—even in this state, the space station hadn't disintegrated in mid-air, but it wasn't in good shape either. The entire space station lay sprawled on the ground, transformed into a city of metallic ruins. If it weren't for Jack Sun being entirely encased in the gel, he would have long perished beyond recovery.
"Wait, where's the robot? Is it still functioning?" The thought made Jack Sun tense.
He swiftly searched the room, looking for the activated robot. Though it was a machine, it seemed so human-like to him.
As he reached the corridor's edge, he noticed a collapsed, crushed robot head near the doorway, sending a shiver down Jack Sun's spine.
He picked it up, only to find that the robot's head was completely unresponsive. His hands trembled slightly at that sight.
Suddenly, footsteps sounded, and the robot with a missing arm walked in.
Meeting Jack Sun's gaze while holding its head, it asked, "What are you doing?"
Jack Sun hesitated, then casually tossed the robot head aside. "Nothing. Just tinkering around."
Damn it, that was a mistake.
"Where did you just go?" Jack Sun approached the robot.
"The impact was too strong, it threw me out, and some parts got damaged. I went to find replacements." The robot pulled out a mechanical arm from the side and started repairing itself. The damaged head must have belonged to it.
"Good to see you're okay." Jack Sun patted its arm and looked up at the sky. It was continuously raining, indicating he had to leave and find other references.
"By the way, you're capable of positioning, right? Can you determine our current location?"
The robot swiftly rotated various tools from its fingers, replacing its severed arm. "Give me a moment."
A line of text appeared on its blue screen, "Connecting to the network..."
As the survival crisis waned, suppressed survival instincts emerged. With rain pouring in through various cracks, the water accumulated on the floor gradually rose up to his ankles. Jack Sun, parched, took a gulp of the rainwater while the robot was trying to connect to the network.
The strong, metallic taste mixed with a bitter tang immediately filled his mouth, making Jack Sun spat it out in agony instantly. "This rainwater doesn’t taste right."
Jack Sun's mood grew somber. Although his memories were fragmented, he was sure rainwater didn't taste like this. There was something wrong here.
After a while, seeing the robot lift its head, Jack Sun quickly asked, "Did you connect to the network?"
"I did, but whether I tried to send an alert or contact Tapai Technology's customer service, there's been no response. I couldn't even find any information about Tapai Technology online," the robot replied, but its answer didn't surprise Jack Sun.
"What year is it now? There should be historical information online, right?" Jack Sun clenched his fists.
"It's Year 721."
"Year 721? Isn't it supposed to be the Common Era? I remember... I should be living in Year 2030." Jack Sun's head began to ache.
"!!" The robot, with two exclamation marks in its eyes, looked at Jack Sun. "But my manufacturing date is in the year 2456 CE. You better explain, it seems there's a discrepancy in our understanding of time."
"I... I don't know." Jack Sun sat down with a crestfallen expression, letting the rain wash over him. "I've lost a portion of my memory."
The feeling of not knowing who he was, coupled with uncertainty about how much time had passed, was truly unsettling. He felt immensely lost and bewildered at the moment.
As Jack Sun narrated his memory loss to the robot, it began cross-referencing rapidly based on online data. Soon, it laid out a timeline.
"If what you said is correct, here's what might have happened. At the beginning of the 21st century, that's where you lived. Due to an unknown reason from your missing five years of memory, you were cryogenically frozen."
"Fifty years after you were cryogenically frozen, humans achieved nuclear fusion, an almost infinite clean energy source. Technology began to rapidly advance, breaking through barriers, and in the year 2310, Tapai Technology went public."
"In 2456 CE, I was manufactured by Tapai, but I wasn't activated that year. What happened after that aligns with what's currently documented online. On October 23, 2357, the AI crisis occurred."
"AI crisis?" Jack Sun lifted his head, gazing at the robot's cold metal body.
"Yes, the AI crisis. At that time, intelligent AI infiltrated all aspects of human life. The system iterations were becoming faster, intelligence was increasingly advanced, and they were getting closer to humans."
"Like you are now?" Jack Sun inquired.
"Yes, like I am now. Don't interrupt me; let me finish."
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