Genius Club.

Chapter 438 The Late Comet (Additional chapter for the leader's heart door that he cannot escape from!)
"CC?"

Lin Xian looked at the familiar face in front of him:
"How did you come?"

This is such a coincidence, what I thought of came true.

"I've been waiting for you here."

CC snorted:
"Didn't we agree in the memory fragment that on this day in every world, I would wait for you in the most conspicuous place in the East China Sea?"

As she spoke, she frowned:

"You haven't forgotten, have you?"

"I certainly haven't forgotten."

Lin Xian spread his hands:
"It's just that normally, when I come to a new world on my first day, I have to try to figure out the worldview. And the most important thing is... today I ran into trouble right at the start and had to leave the city through the sewers."

"Please understand that although you have lived in this world for 20 years, for me right now, I have only been in this world for less than 12 hours."

He turned his head and looked at the ceiling of the museum:
"So... this museum is the most conspicuous place in Donghai City?"

CC nodded:
"I think so, because this place is located in the center of Donghai City and it's a landmark building, so it's conspicuous enough. I've been waiting for you on the roof of the museum since noon, but you didn't show up until the evening."

"Then an hour ago, the manhole cover in Donghai City opened with a bang. Then, there was an explosion at the museum. I knew it must be you who was causing the trouble, so I came right in."

It turned out to be the case.

Lin Xian understood.

This was my first dream today, and various things happened one after another. I was soon taken to the City of Sin by Xu Yiyi, so naturally I had no time to look for CC.

It was impossible for him to forget the agreement with CC.

At the end of the fifth dream, he went to find CC and added a dance to her, creating the most complete memory fragment for her.

The same thing happened in the seventh dream, the last time he entered the dream. He also took CC to find Li Ningning and watch the bonfire.

This time, we really have to thank Big Face Cat for his C4 bomb.

The whole Donghai City is in such chaos right now, with people playing hide-and-seek and running races everywhere, and all kinds of bionic people running around... If it weren't for the loud noise of the explosion, CC really wouldn't be able to find himself.

See CC suddenly appear.

Xu Yiyi held a weapon in her hand and took a tense defensive stance.

The Big Face Cat's Rhine Cat mask was stuck on his ear and couldn't be pulled back.

CC looked at this funny scene and tilted his head:
"Did I... come at the wrong time?"

"No"

Lin Xian shook his head:
"You came just in time!"

He turned around and pointed at the combination lock next to the hafnium alloy door:

"Take a look and see if you can crack it."

As he said this, he stepped aside and pressed the dagger in Xu Yiyi's hand:

"Don't be nervous, he's my friend, the cryptographer."

CC passed by.

He glanced at Xu Yiyi, then looked up at Lin Xian:

"You are really popular with girls... In each world, you are surrounded by different types of girls."

"Don't talk nonsense!"

Although Xu Yiyi put down her weapon, she still looked at CC vigilantly, protecting her only little brother, Lin Xian, behind her:
"This is my little brother! I'm protecting him!"

?

CC stopped where he was.

He looked at the young girl in front of him with confusion, not quite understanding how Lin Xian, this devil, could become the little girl's younger brother.

She narrowed her eyes and looked at Lin Xian:

"Are you up to something new?"

"Oh, hurry up and crack the combination lock."

Lin Xian looked at his watch and the time showed 23:17.

"We're running out of time, only an hour and a half left."

He urged:

"According to Godfather Gawain, there is a space-time particle in this exhibition hall. It is important that we steal it as soon as possible."

CC walked over to the combination lock and studied it:
"This is indeed not an ordinary combination lock. There is no password itself. If you want to open the door, you must obtain verification."

"What should I do?"

The big-faced cat took off the Rhine Cat mask and came over:
"Without the password, it can't be cracked, right?"

"of course not."

CC shook his head, took out a small computer from his waist, and used the dagger in Xu Yiyi's hand to pry open the combination lock shell:

"The absence of a password does not mean the absence of a key. In fact, identity verification information, whether it is by swiping a card, scanning a face, or scanning a fingerprint, is essentially a password comparison. The difference is that a normal password is a combination of numbers and letters, while this password is more complicated."

"But in this world, as long as there is a code, it can be cracked. Mechanical codes can be cracked using exhaustive methods; electronic codes also have similar addressing methods... In short, as long as there is enough time, there is no code that cannot be cracked in theory."

CC is indeed a professional password expert. He directly connected the password lock system and the small computer in his hand with a data cable and started to operate it.

The big-faced cat came over curiously and looked at the small computer that kept flashing:

"It seems that cryptographers are still reliable."

Ten minutes passed.

With a clear click, the hafnium alloy password door opened.

"sharp……"

Xu Yiyi was amazed and immediately began to admire CC:
"You are so awesome!"

"Okay."

CC didn't take it seriously, put away the small computer and led everyone inside.

This is a special exhibition hall. The items on display inside are obviously very precious. From a distance, Lin Xian saw a small blue electric ball hanging in the middle of the cabinet, which was crystal clear, emitting blue light.

"there."

Lin Xian trotted over and leaned on the cabinet to look inside.

Spacetime particles.

It is indeed a space-time particle!
but……

"No energy?"

Lin Xian discovered something different.

This little blue electric ball, trapped in a transparent device the size of a basketball, is very calm, stable and lazy.

Although it emits a dazzling blue light.

However, there is no active electric charge on it. Instead, like willow branches in the wind, countless blue filaments sway very slowly on the surface of the sphere, seemingly moving but not moving.

Lin Xian was very familiar with space-time particles and he could tell it at a glance.

This is a...

A space-time particle without energy.

And it is still an ordinary space-time particle, not an entangled state.

and so.

This was exactly what he had been worried about, but had not told Gawain in person.

[If you don’t use special entangled space-time particles, even if you travel back to the past, you will not be able to interfere with any history because of the constraints of the laws of space-time.]

Neither Gao Wen nor Chen Heping realized this.

The reason is that, after all, they are just fanciful theories and do not have sufficient experimental data to comprehend the laws of space and time.

But now, there's no point in saying anything.

This is not just an ordinary space-time particle, but also a space-time particle without energy.

Even if I bring it back...

The time machine cannot be activated either.

"Hey."

Lin Xian sighed inexplicably.

I don’t know how to face Gao Wen who is full of expectations after I go back.

Gao Wen must have believed that as long as they could obtain the space-time particles, humanity would be saved and the future could be changed.

However, this energy-less space-time particle directly shattered the ideals that Gao Wen and Chen Heping had devoted their entire lives to.

"Anyway, take it back first."

Lin Xian broke the exhibition glass and took out a transparent device that bound space-time particles. Together with Big Face Cat, Xu Yiyi and CC, they returned as planned.

……

Sin City.

Even in the early morning, the whole city was bustling with activity, as everyone was celebrating the success of the operation.

Only in the cave at the bottom and Gao Wen's laboratory, Lin Xian, CC and Gao Wen had no expression on their faces.

Gawain let out a breath through his nose.

He looked up from the lab table, his face full of disappointment:
"This space-time particle... has no energy."

"Yes."

Lin Xian nodded:
"It's a pity, Gawain. I don't know what to say to comfort you, but I tell you the truth. Even if this space-time particle is full of energy, it is just an ordinary space-time particle. Even if it is sent back to the time traveler, it cannot change any history under the constraints of the laws of space and time."

Afterwards, Lin Xian briefly explained the relevant laws of time and space to Gao Wen.

Gao Wen listened carefully.

Keep thinking.

As smart as he was, he quickly understood:
"I see."

He sighed:

"The laws of space and time are indeed so subtle. This is something that neither Chen Heping nor I had expected. As expected... things like space-time particles are much more complicated than we thought."

"It would be great if we could get the space-time particles earlier. If we could get them earlier... maybe we could understand a lot of things and save the world and the future in other ways."

"Eh? Wait a minute."

Gao Wen suddenly reacted, pushed up his glasses, and looked at Lin Xian:

"If the laws of time and space you're talking about are correct, then there's a contradiction here... Logically speaking, history is predetermined and the future is uncertain."

"So, starting from the moment we speak, what happened before is like spilled water, which cannot be changed or taken back; but after this sentence, the words that have not been said yet, there is still a chance to change, or just keep silent."

"This means that the future is uncertain and a path that has not yet been reached. Under this premise——"

"【Time travel can only travel to the past; it can never travel to the future that has not yet happened and has no path to reach!】"

"In that case, Lin Xian, how did you travel to the future?"

Gao Wen's logic is clear, but the question is puzzling:

"You said that you and Ms. Du Yao lived in the same era, which is the middle of the 21st century. And now it is 2624, which is 600 years in the future for you... How did you travel through time?"

……

As expected. Emperor Gawain is indeed Emperor Gawain.

The moment he finished listening to the laws of time and space, he began to draw inferences and pointed out the biggest bug in Lin Xian.

"Yes."

Lin Xian smiled helplessly:

"In fact, in my time, I and the scientists around me also realized this problem. Time travel can only go to the past, not to the future."

"But the problem with me is so strange, and it's not just me..."

He turned and looked at CC:

"It's the same with CC. She was born in 2604, but from the moment she was born, she had memories of many worlds in 2624 in her mind."

"If you want to be too picky, isn't this just another way of traveling into the future? Just like what happened to me, it's equally unscientific."

Lin Xian really couldn't find any common ground between himself and CC.

You can't...

[I am the same as CC, both of us are thousand-year-old piles, right? 】

That's bullshit.

I celebrated my 20th birthday peacefully several years ago, and there has been no sign of it disappearing so far. How could it be a thousand-year-old pile?
Shaking off this unrealistic thought, Lin Xian walked over and comforted Gao Wen:

"Gawain, you don't have to be so pessimistic."

"Although your time-travel machine cannot be used anymore, this is why I came here through time and space... Your efforts and those of Big Face Cat's father Chen Heping have not been in vain! Absolutely not in vain!"

"I will copy all your theories on the time-space shuttle and the engineering drawings back to my own time in 2024, and then, in that era, I will manufacture the time-space shuttle in advance."

"As long as I have a time machine in 2024, I can do a lot of things, travel back in time, and learn more information."

"I strongly suspect that the person who caused the great disaster in 2400 should also live in the same era as me. So, cheer up, Gawain, just think of this time shuttle as sending me back to the past."

"I will help you catch the culprit you can't catch! I will help you prevent the 2400-year super disaster you can't prevent!"

Lin Xian's bold words cheered Gao Wen up.

however.

In a blink of an eye.

He frowned and looked at Lin Xian:

"You want to bring the time-travel machine blueprints back to 2024?"

"That's right." Lin Xian nodded.

"You want to build a time machine in 2024?"

"Yes."

Lin Xian nodded again:
"And I have time-space particles in 2024. As long as I build a time-space shuttle, I can travel through time and space."

"What's wrong, Gawain? Why are you so sad?"

Seeing Gao Wen's melancholy expression, Lin Xian was puzzled:

"Isn't victory just around the corner? I have energetic space-time particles, and you have complete engineering drawings of the space-time shuttle... I just need to bring it back to 2024 and manufacture it, and then everything will be perfect, right?"

but.

Gawain still closed his eyes and shook his head gently:
"It's useless, Lin Xian, you can't build a time-travel machine in 2024."

“I didn’t say it had to be built in 2024.”

Lin Xian smiled:
"Two years later, or even three to five years later, I can accept it. You don't have to be so strict."

According to Lin Xian’s best expectations, it would be best if the time-space shuttle could be built within a year or two to avoid unnecessary trouble.

But he was also mentally prepared that such a large project would not be accomplished casually or easily, and he could not force others to do it.

Therefore, Lin Xian felt that if Liu Feng could build a time-space machine in three to five years, it could be considered as barely meeting expectations.

Just don't delay it for another ten or eight years...

Ten years is too far away and out of reach.

"I'm sorry to tell you, Lin Xian."

Gao Wen said seriously:

"Don't even think about three to five years. Even in thirty or fifty years, you won't be able to build a time-travel machine."

"why?"

Lin Xian really didn't understand this statement.

He looked around and recalled the level of technological development in Donghai City, which was not very high, far inferior to the first-tier cities in Longguo in 2024.

Since we can build a time machine in this era and at this level of technology, why can't we do it in 2024 when the technology is obviously more advanced?
not to mention……

Wasn't this huge time-travel machine in front of us made in a "slum" like Sin City? How high could its technological content be?
"What's the difficulty?"

Lin Xian asked:
"If a certain technology or material does not meet the standards, you just need to provide me with the relevant information and I can copy it back."

"No, no, you misunderstood Lin Xian."

Gao Wen shook his head, picked up the half-broken chalk on the table, and walked to the blackboard standing in the corner of the laboratory:

"The technical difficulty of the time-space shuttle is not that great. The technological level in 2024 is more than enough. After all, Chen Heping and I were able to build a time-space shuttle in an environment like Sin City... This shows that there is no bottleneck in science, technology, or materials for this device."

"As for the theory, I can provide you with the manuscript. It's not difficult to understand. You said you have the necessary space-time particles, so these problems are not a problem. But... I still have to tell you, Lin Xian, that a space-time shuttle cannot be built in 2024."

"Because, in order to manufacture a time-space shuttle, we must use an isotope of a radioactive element to make a calibration module, and this isotope does not exist on Earth in 2024."

Say it.

Gao Wen wrote a few words on the blackboard:

【Astatine 339】

"It's a radioactive element, an isotope of astatine, astatine 339."

"It doesn't exist on Earth?"

Lin Xian shook his head:
"I remember my chemistry teacher said that all elements in the universe exist on Earth. There are 118 elements in the chemical element table."

"94 of these natural elements can be found on Earth, and the remaining elements 95 to 118 can also be synthesized artificially in the laboratory."

"It's just that most of these synthetic elements are super-heavy elements and are radioactive, so many elements can only exist for a very short period of time after synthesis. The shortest half-life is only a few dozen milliseconds, and then they will decay into other elements."

"But even if it can only exist for a few tens of milliseconds, it doesn't mean that this element doesn't exist on Earth, right? Moreover, if it can only exist for a few tens of milliseconds on Earth, then the half-life is the same everywhere in the universe. It's impossible to say that there are elements in the universe that don't exist on Earth."

"If we really insist that there are unknown elements in the universe... then it can only be said to be irresponsible science fiction. After all, the atomic structure of the entire universe is fixed, and it can only have 118 protons at most, so the entire universe can only have element 118 at most."

Lin Xian had read some reports that laboratories in various countries, including the Large Hadron Collider Laboratory, were trying to synthesize element 119, that is, to inject one more proton into the nucleus, but they had never succeeded.

The chemistry teacher once said that all the elements in the universe are also found on Earth. At that time, Lin Xian also felt that it was a bit magical and even a bit arrogant, but later he looked up some information and found that...

That’s true, I can’t help but accept it.

As for the element astatine, Lin Xian had some impression of it. It must be a radioactive element.

The numbers behind it represent the isotopes of astatine.

Huh?
Lin Xian recalled the chemistry knowledge he had learned.

Astatine 339?

impossible!
The atomic number of astatine is 85. How could there be an isotope called astatine 339?

This is not scientific at all!

"What on earth is going on with [Astatine 339]?"

Lin Xian asked:

"This isotope...is not a problem of not existing on Earth, but it should not exist in this universe."

"Yes."

Gawain gave him an approving look;
"It seems that your basic knowledge is still very solid."

Then he wrote astatine 191~229 on the blackboard and explained:

"According to current human knowledge and chemical rules, there are 39 isotopes of astatine. The most stable isotope is astatine 210, with a half-life of 8.1 hours; the least stable isotope is astatine 213, with a half-life of 125 nanoseconds. After undergoing alpha decay, it will become bismuth 209, which has an extremely long life."

"According to the atomic model, these 39 isotopes should be all the isotopes of astatine. It stands to reason that it is unlikely that there are other isotopes of astatine in the universe. But..."

Gao Wen's expression turned serious and he looked at Lin Xian:

"What if the isotope [Astatine 339], like the space-time particle, does not belong to this space-time, does not belong to this universe?"

Lin Xian opened his eyes wide:

"You mean, this [Astatine 339] isotope doesn't come from our time and space? It comes from other time and space and universes?"

Considering the existence of space-time cracks, space-time particles can come from other universes, and time travelers can also come from other time and space, so Gawain's statement is not impossible.

But the problem is...

Lin Xian turned around and looked at the time-space shuttle that was the size of a semi-trailer truck:

"Then what about this time-space shuttle? How did you create it?"

Gawain turned around.

He wrote another line of numbers on the blackboard:

【XNUM X Year X NUM X Month X NUM X Day】

Seeing this familiar date, Lin Xian was stunned.

This date!

Indeed, at the Genius Club gathering yesterday, when Galileo asked Einstein when the next major breakthrough in mankind's astronomy would be, Einstein answered with the date!

After Gao Wen finished writing, he turned around and said slowly:
“March 2077, 3, is a crucial day in the history of human astronomy. On this day, astronomy has made revolutionary discoveries and subversive breakthroughs.”

"Astronomers have captured a distant comet through their telescopes... This comet is flying towards the Earth from the outer solar system."

"This is not a rare thing, there are so many comets. But the problem is that the trajectory, speed and spectrum of this comet are very strange, and they are completely different from the conventional celestial bodies observed before."

"I won't go into the details, but astronomers have already felt from their spectral analysis that this comet is definitely carrying something that doesn't belong to this universe or this time and space."

"But it will take more than a hundred years for this comet to reach Earth. People can only wait patiently for its arrival."

"It wasn't until 2234 that the comet finally arrived in the solar system, and its gravity coefficient was completely wrong, heading straight for the Earth! Fortunately, countries around the world were prepared and used nuclear missiles to smash it into pieces outside the atmosphere. The fragments orbiting the Earth took many years to fall into the atmosphere and slowly landed on the Earth."

"And since then, there have been many unscientific isotopes on Earth, including [Astatine-339], naturally."

……

Lin Xian's thoughts were still immersed in the questions that Galileo asked Einstein.

After I came to my senses, I listened to Gao Wen's story.

"I understand."

He elaborated:

"So, the difficulty in building a time-travel machine does not lie in science and technology, but in when this chemical isotope, Astatine 339, which should not exist, will arrive on Earth."

"According to what you said, the unexpected comet from another time and space, another universe, will not land on Earth until 2234 and bring the element [Astatine 339] to Earth. Doesn't that mean..."

"Yes."

Gawain nodded heavily, his tone full of regret:
"Because the date of the comet's arrival on Earth cannot be changed, the earliest time humans built and used a time-travel machine has been strictly locked."

"If you are indeed from 2024 and can only go back to 2024, as I just said, the earliest time you can use the time machine is--"

"200 years from now! 2234!"

(End of this chapter)