"All efforts are meaningless in front of that genius. The Federation has a multitude of academic halls of fame, home to the most high-end scientific talents, but their ultimate goal isn''t to rece that genius,"


    "but to strive to be the genius''s assistant, and if the eracks a genius temporarily, they''ll just wait."


    "This is the confusion of the Federation, and the confusion of humanity."


    "Ever heard of a technological explosion?"


    "It''s when the technology of a makes apletely illogical leap forward in a short period of time."


    "The principle behind a technological explosion is that arge number of geniuses suddenly appear on this, facilitating breakthroughs in countless directions. Long ago, the Federation finally recognized the reality they had to face,"


    "which is that from ancient times to now, the progress of human society has never depended on the efforts of the masses, but on the asional emergence of geniuses."


    "It feels helpless, doesn''t it?"


    Chen Miao didn''t speak. He didn''t understand what the mayor meant, nor how his words rted to the Sea of Zombies before them.


    "Take AI pills, for example."


    The mayor suddenlyughed and continued, "Have you gotten used to the presence of AI pills in society? You might think of them as a type of prohibited substance that should inherently exist."


    "But can you imagine?"


    "A product that can control dreams, and yet, ites from the same era as cars that run onbustible engines."


    "Doesn''t it feel out of ce at all?"


    "The inventor of AI pills is a genius, a genius of our time, a madman, through and through. At least, that''s how he seems to me."


    "He and his team have cracked the technology for wristwatches and holographic projections, among others."


    "To my knowledge, that madman has proposed many outrageous ideas, many of which are in progress, one of the crazier ns being ''Mechanical Ascension.''"


    "The basic idea is that the Federation has no hope of breaking through to a star civilization within a millennium."


    "But there''s a way to rapidly elevate the Federation to a star-level civilization."


    "The concept is to have all citizens of the Federation take AI pills, enter the fourth-level dream state, where the world''s time flows 10,000 times faster than the outside, and share their consciousness with one another, effectively putting the entire poption into a connected dream."


    "There, they have ample time for scientific research and experimentation, allowing the Federation''s technology to develop rapidly."


    "Once they wake from the dream, the Federation can quickly replicate everything that was achieved in the dream, thus causing a leap in technological development."


    "But there are too many bugs in this process, such as most people not being able to wake up, or someone having a child in a dream only to find nothing upon awakening, the intense emptiness and disorientation that brings pain, or the fact that every night is 27 years in the dream, which is a great trial for the entire Federation."


    "Among other issues, these bugs have prevented the n from being smoothly implemented."


    "But thesest few days, I''ve been pondering a question. What if the n has already started? The world began Transcendentalization 27 years ago, a system that contradicts science. Do you think we''ve already entered a dream, and Transcendentalization is a product of this dream?"


    "If everything goes smoothly, in less than a month, by January 1st, we should wake up."


    "..."


    Chen Miao''s mouth began to twitch uncontrobly. He instinctively knew this spection made no sense, not because he could be sure he wasn''t in a dream, but because he knew he had traversed across time.


    Throughout history, no traveler had ever crossed into a dream, right?


    That would indeed be preposterous.


    Afterward, the Mayor of Fengtian City didn''t say any more, just stood there with a distant look in his eyes, clearly uncertain about the future. It took a long while before he suddenlyughed, "I''ve spoken some nonsense. Humanity''s development has always been driven by geniuses emerging unexpectedly."


    "I see the potential of a genius in you."


    Chen Miao shook his head, "I''m certainly not cut out for scientific research. You overestimate me, Mayor."


    "No, not every genius needs to be involved in research. I just used it as an example."


    "In history, whether facing great disasters or chaotic warfare, there has always been a genius rising to assist humanity in oveing the crisis in an unimaginable way."


    "Do you know why I insist on spending a massive amount of funds to build an army of marksmen? Not to discuss the possibility that we are all in a dream right now. 27 years ago, when the world began Transcendentalization, it started because an observatory detected aet hurtling toward the Sr System at a speed of 100 kilometers per second."


    "Heading straight for Blue Star."n/?/vel/b//in dot c//om


    "The mass of thiset is about that of the Moon, and it is thergestet ever detected by human astronomy, to put it urately, ready to impact Blue Star. Previously, whs passed by Blue Star, people happily referred to them as meteor showers."


    "Now there''s no cause for happiness."


    "At that time, it was estimated that in three years, theet would collide with Blue Star, resulting in one situation only: theplete destruction of Blue Star and the extinction of Earth."


    "There was no other possibility."


    "In thest three months, the Federation dered this message to all of humanity, wanting people to understand their imminent death. It called for every nation to fire nuclear missiles into space in an effort to shatter theet and lessen the impact."


    "Moreover, during those three years, the Federation sent several spacecraft carrying nuclear warheads into space to lodge them into theet in an attempt to minimize its size."


    "Humanity had done its best."


    "But it was all in vain. In the final 3 minutes of the countdown, the Secretary-General of the Federation calmly made onest speech."


    "I still remember that speech, which had just one statement."


    "''This is thest three minutes we humans have, please spend it saying goodbye to your loved ones. We did our best, sorry.''"


    "Tsk."


    The Mayor of Fengtian City suddenly recalled something and said with augh, "I was young back then, not yet married. I sat with my then-girlfriend, to whom I was not yet married, on the rooftop, drinking beer,ughing, and discussing life."


    "Facing death together with the person you love the most makes death seem not so important."


    "A lot of people died that day in the Federation."


    "Many killed themselves early because they couldn''t face the fear of waiting for death. Some evenmitted suicide three months prior, hoping for a dignified funeral."