"The Earth's map changing so drastically—that's ancient history. Probably over two hundred years ago now, passed down orally by the older generations."
David recounted truthfully, "I just asked that old geezer in the archives. He only remembers many meteorites crashing down until even a chunk of the moon got blasted off. Oh, those fog-repelling meteorites came from that event."
The room fell silent for quite a while.
"Not trying to argue; I'm just purely curious."
Zhuang Fan pointed at the map again. "Even if there really was a meteor shower, at most it would leave some big craters on Earth. It couldn't possibly change tectonic plates, right? For the seven continents to become like this is simply inconceivable."
"That I don't know. Anyway, the earth's crust just suddenly grew legs, and who needed a hundred years? From what the old man says, it moved everything clearly into place within a few months. You could tell me God was moving house and I'd believe it. This whole thing is just absurd."
Zhuang Fan was silent for a moment. "A lot of people must have died then, right?"
"Yeah. A lot."
David's tone grew melancholic. "During the initial plate collisions, humanity probably lost ninety-five percent of its population. Many shelters claimed to be impenetrable were squeezed by the crust and became tombs outright. After that, all sorts of natural disasters kept occurring, and many more died. Anyway, from what the old man says, it was truly tragic back then."
At this moment, Zhuang Fan looked somewhat dejected. The first thing he thought of was his family—could they have survived this disaster?
The odds were probably slim.
The fragmented memories in his mind, like puzzle pieces, were becoming clear one by one:
He had loved stargazing since childhood, but light pollution obscured the night sky, so he had memorized galactic coordinates using a memory palace to save positioning time;
In high school he was obsessed with mathematical modeling; in university he studied mechanical engineering and biomedicine, later enrolling at ETH Zurich to major in neuro-robotics;
At nineteen he was diagnosed with brain cancer; at twenty-three it was complicated by pancreatic and liver cancer; at twenty-five he was listed as one of the first cryopreservation experimental subjects, and the one responsible for performing the freezing on him was precisely the authority in cryomedicine—his father.
Zhuang Fan still remembered the final moment before freezing. His father had given him an estimated thawing time of 2120, because the cryoprotectant fluid's protection period could last only until then, while the cryopod's life support system limit was 2150.
"By 2120, or perhaps even earlier, I'll personally help you thaw out. By then we'll definitely be able to cure cancer. Don't worry, it'll be fine."
His father's assurance left Zhuang Fan increasingly bewildered. What on earth had happened during the seven hundred years in between?
Seeing that Zhuang Fan had more questions, David waved his hand. "This is all I know. Any more and I'd be making things up."
"Can I go check the archives?" Zhuang Fan had an ominous premonition.
David shook his head. "You won't make sense of it. The shelter's existing records, or rather humanity's complete history, only goes back a little over a hundred years at most. Anything earlier is completely fragmented."
"So short? Why?"
"2583, the Corporate Wars. All of humanity's important records were destroyed. But anyway, nobody cares, right? It's not like we're some old scholars. Even if the world map changed, look at everyone—they're still dirt-poor."
"It's fine, I'll just take a look."
"You don't have freedom anymore! You're grounded, understand?"
David's tone suddenly rose. Seeing Zhuang Fan momentarily speechless, he resumed a heartfelt tone: "Brother, you've got plenty of schemes, but security here is extremely tight. Trust me, just stay put here."
"..."
"Oh, right."
David suddenly remembered something. "A big shot will be seeing you later."
"Who?"
David hesitated a moment, lowering his voice: "Well... it doesn't need to be kept secret anymore anyway. He's the founder of the Nucleon Group, my boss at the top—Old Mr. Xu Renyi."
The moment he finished speaking, several guards walked in. David's ear-canal comm ring also instantly received a message, and his eyes sharpened. "Mr. Xu has arrived."
Oh. The finale was finally here.
Zhuang Fan's expression was calm. "Do you need to cuff me first?"
David shook his head. "Just stay here. Mr. Xu will come over personally."
Zhuang Fan looked at David again, staring very intently. David felt somewhat uncomfortable under his gaze and left after a light cough.
When only Zhuang Fan remained in the room, he once again attempted to control the eerie fog.
Even in such a bright and clean room, Zhuang Fan could faintly sense the presence of the eerie fog, though it was too thin to be detected by the naked eye.
But under the shelter's fog-repelling devices, to say nothing of black fog, not even a wisp of shallow mist could condense.
By his estimates, absorbing enough shallow mist and then compressing it into a "black fog bullet" would probably take a very long time—distant water could not quench immediate thirst.
After another while, the door opened.
Security soldiers entered first. After a careful inspection, they stood like sculptures on either side of the door, gun barrels angled down, expressionless.
Then a middle-aged woman pushed in a wheelchair. The white-haired old man in the wheelchair was already emaciated, his withered body seeming as though it might crumble to dust at any moment.
Besides David, the blond doctor, and others, more unfamiliar faces entered. Zhuang Fan guessed they were probably all management personnel.
Xu Renyi raised his aged head, those turbid eyes carefully sizing up Zhuang Fan from head to toe, then suddenly spoke in standard Mandarin: "Young friend, have you eaten?"
Zhuang Fan was slightly surprised. Now this was truly a case of meeting a fellow townsman.
"I'm not hungry at the moment."
"That won't do. Man is iron, rice is steel; one meal missed and you grow faint with hunger."
Xu Renyi's tone was full of "concern." The moment he finished speaking, the logistics supervisor immediately went to make arrangements.
A moment later, a white round dining table was placed before Zhuang Fan, laden with a full spread of sumptuous Chinese dishes.
"Young friend, sit."
Zhuang Fan didn't know what this old man was scheming, so he sat down boldly, picked up a chicken drumstick, and started gnawing.
"Care for a drink? I have Maotai liquor cellared for three hundred and eighty years. Nobody in this era is willing to drink it anymore."
Zhuang Fan glanced at the familiar red bottle and immediately felt a sense of kinship, then shook his head. "Thanks, I don't drink."
"Very good habit; drinking harms the body." Xu Renyi nodded, poured himself a cup, and savored it carefully.
He observed the ancient etiquette of not speaking while eating, and Zhuang Fan was happy to remain idle, focusing solely on eating.
David watched from the side with undisguised envy, secretly sighing that the boss's caliber was truly on another level.
Xu Renyi consistently watched Zhuang Fan with an elder's doting gaze, yet in his eyes there was an appraising look that made Zhuang Fan extremely uncomfortable.
After the meal, the table and chairs were removed and replaced with a Chinese rosewood tea table and standard tea set.
Xu Renyi personally brewed the tea. His skilled tea-pouring technique made him seem even more like the quintessential "fellow townsman."
"Young friend, do you know how old I am this year?"
"Two hundred?"
"Hehe, wrong."
"Three hundred?"
"Be bolder."
Zhuang Fan frowned. "Four hundred?"
Xu Renyi revealed a benevolent smile. "Yes, exactly four hundred this year. I just held my birthday banquet last month."
Old but not dead... Zhuang Fan remained expressionless.
"They all call me Mr. Xu; it sounds younger that way. But I know that my lifespan is truly not much longer."
Suddenly, an ominous conjecture rose in Zhuang Fan's heart, his gaze locking onto the old man.
Xu Renyi sighed softly. "I've been timid and afraid of death my whole life; the only thing I've been bold about is lifespan extension. I've tried many methods—head transplants, body swaps, prosthetic limbs... I've tried them all. But no matter what I do, I simply can't achieve 'mechanical ascension.' I can't figure out the trick behind it."
"Mmm..."
Zhuang Fan couldn't interject, so he listened patiently.
The others understood even less of the ancient Chinese conversation. Without the boss's permission, they were forbidden from activating simultaneous interpretation.
"Young friend, do you know of the Ship of Theseus?"
"I do. An ancient thought experiment."
Zhuang Fan briefly recounted it: "A ship that has sailed for several hundred years—if it is constantly repaired and replaced, until every plank and component of the ship is no longer original, is that ship still the original Ship of Theseus? If I'm not mistaken, that's the original meaning."
Xu Renyi nodded. "Correct. In the beginning, when people wanted mechanical ascension, the idea followed this path too—gradually replacing all the body's organs with prosthetics, then replacing every neuron in the brain with transistors."
At this point, he coughed several more times, took a sip of tea to moisten his lungs, and continued: "But then the problem arose. Everyone discovered there was one region in the brain that absolutely could not be replaced with machinery."
Zhuang Fan thought for a moment and asked uncertainly, "The claustrum?"
"Yes, the claustrum."
A flash of fanaticism and loss passed through Xu Renyi's eyes. "A flat gray-matter neural structure thin as a sheet of paper. Once it is replaced or damaged, the original individual consciousness vanishes completely. That is to say, human lifespan is directly bound to the lifespan of the claustrum."
His tone was sarcastic, as if mocking himself: "So now, humans can modify themselves into all sorts of forms—take out their brains and put them in hovercars, tires, flowerpots, no problem. But the moment anyone dares tamper with the claustrum, that's it. That person is definitely beyond saving; it's equivalent to brain death."
Full of envy and longing: "What a pity. Nowadays the android faction has already produced top-tier androids that can rival human thought—perfect silicon-based life forms one after another. I truly covet them."
"So you haven't found any better means of extending lifespan either?" Zhuang Fan seized the key point.
"Young friend, I'm old, and I can't keep struggling anymore."
Xu Renyi's gaze fell back on Zhuang Fan, filled with undisguised hope. "Now, I have only one last chance left, so... can you help me?"
"How can I help you?"
The old man's pair of turbid eyes reflected Zhuang Fan's young body. Enunciating each word, he spoke softly in that ancient tongue:
"Lend me your body for a use."
"..."