Deep Space Wandering Fleet
Chapter 374 - 373: Biological Mass Extinction Event

Chapter 374: Chapter 373: Biological Mass Extinction Event

Zhang Yuan sat in his own seat, listening to a group of people below rant about the strange culture of the Riley Civilization, and comforted them with a smile, "Let it be, let it be, we’ve already reaped quite a bounty, so it’s not much of a problem if we miss out on a little..."

"How has this trade been going? Regarding our Diplomats, is there any special report?"

The Secretary-General, Li Cheng, standing to the side, replied, "It’s still ongoing, without too much trouble. The trade will continue until they can’t bring out anything new. Our scientists are studying the aliens’ flora and fauna brought up, which will take a long time, so we won’t see any significant research results for a while."

"To date, we’ve traded away 422 sets of stainless steel cutlery, 3,309 metal weapons, 122 pieces of armor, and 64 sets of Primary Production Tools. The number of slaves traded amounts to more than 40,000 man-times..."

"About 16 national Nobles have picked up preliminary scientific knowledge from this trade."

Those stainless steel cutlery and metal weapons were actually trivial. Zhang Yuan looked up with a hint of amusement, "So, there are 16 seeds sown, which is not bad. I thought there was no interest at all."

Li Cheng said with a smile, "It’s mainly because they’re cheap... These pieces of knowledge were the cheapest on the trade list, almost the price of half a small knife, and that’s what they exchanged for this knowledge."

However, the books didn’t clearly explain how to smelt metals, how to produce flames, etc. They were books on "Mathematics," "Chemistry," "Physics," "Biological," and other seemingly nonsensical terms. Due to linguistic differences, Humans, too lazy to design specifically for them, had only roughly translated a middle school textbook and even removed some sensitive content, making these books obscure and confounding.

Another scientist explained, "Some zealous religious people see these books as Divine gifts and choose to buy them. They want to take them home and worship them as they would the Bible... I wonder what kind of expression these Fanatics will have once they delve deep into it and understand the meaning."

For a moment, everyone found the idea a little amusing.

Following that, Zhang Yuan sighed, "However, how they will be applied is beyond our jurisdiction... It’s even harder for us to predict what the future will hold."

Just this small interference had caused a global shock throughout the entire Riley Civilization. Even if such change would stop immediately after Humans left...

"The influence of a High-level Civilization on a Low-level Civilization is apparent."

"But based on our current observations and analyses, it is highly likely that even if these nations acquired chemical knowledge, they won’t apply it."

Because the religious constraints of this civilization were too many. Fire was revered as a symbol of the Divine. If chemistry could bring about fire, how would traditional doctrines explain this notion? They would probably hastily cover it up as if nothing had happened.

In this era, the fetters of religion were excessively large, even more powerful than those during Humanity’s Middle Ages.

Anyone questioning the Divine would be executed for blasphemy!

"Even if the Riley people really discovered these facts, they would hide them and not use them... These guys are still Fanatics, maybe they’ll go right into a mental breakdown!" Li Zhendong laughed gleefully on the side.

Zhang Yuan disagreed, "That’s not necessarily the case, there are heroes in every world. Don’t look down on their current ignorance, but who can truly predict the distant future?"

Those 16 seeds indeed had the potential to take root and sprout.

Chemistry would bring fire, fire would bring smelting, and smelting would bring profits.

Under the temptation of profits, it’s possible that some new variables could arise.

"Moreover, this time, the benefits are in the hands of the Royal Palace Nobles, who have enough power to fight against the entrenched theocracy. It just depends on whether they are greedy enough to abandon their original ways of thinking."

"If all the seeds die, then there is nothing we can do."

Beyond that, it becomes difficult to predict, even with the science of New Civilization History for predicting the future, given that this science must be based on a vast amount of information and can never fully predict the future.

Humans simply do not have the time to delve deeply into the industrial and ideological consciousness of this civilization, nor is it possible to stay here for hundreds of years to observe historical changes.

"What a pity! We won’t see the outcome," Zhang Yuan shook his head.

Everyone in the conference room showed a wistful expression.

Just then, Dr. Li Cheng suddenly thought of something, he directly sent a report to Zhang Yuan’s email, "Captain, here is a geographical report about Riley Star. It seems our expedition team has made a significant discovery. According to our scientists’ hypotheses, Riley Star might be experiencing a major extinction, and the Riley species could potentially be wiped out in a million, or even ten million years."

"So this group of scientists wants to invite you to the next meeting to discuss this matter. Should we offer help?"

"Especially Professor Yamamoto Ichiro, who is researching some microorganisms that can degrade certain materials... You better take a look."

Zhang Yuan was startled, complete extinction in a million to ten million years?

What did this mean?

"A million years?"

"Yes!"

Even though this time span was incredibly long, so long that Humanity might no longer exist, Zhang Yuan was still shocked and found it a bit inconceivable.

He quickly thought of some keywords, such as Ice Age, which led to the vast extinction of Human ancestors, leaving only a few thousand people.

Could it be that this Planet was experiencing a major climate disaster?

But it didn’t sound like it, especially since... What exactly was Yamamoto up to with those microbes? It didn’t seem to have much to do with climate disasters, did it?!

"Let’s go! Let’s take a look!"

...

Life in the Universe was not such a rare commodity.

What Humanity had seen and heard along the way had gradually proven this point.

As for geographic locations, on planets suitable for the development of life, given enough time to accumulate, life always seems to emerge in various strange forms.

To explain this, people have proposed various interpretations, such as "Creationism," "Cosmic Life Theory," "Chemical Origin Theory," among others.

Among these, the view most recognized by current scientists is known as the "Chemical Origin Theory."