The Last 299 Days of Humanity

Yu Qing couldn't understand what Professor Lu had to do with this. What did the Immortal Flower have to do with parallel humans, no matter how miraculous it was? Besides, this First Paradise was just a place where a group of primitive humans lived back then.

Yu Qing continued flipping through the pages. More fragments emerged:

"Experimental Record: The Effect of Extracts from the Chinese Wild Flower on Consciousness Stability. Test Subject: Third-generation biomimetic neural network. Results: The network's self-organization improved by 37%, but unexplained 'dream' phenomena appeared."

The network is starting to generate internal images that don't belong to the training data. This is disturbing.

Lu proposed a theory: what we perceive as 'reality' might just be a thin membrane. Beneath that membrane lies a deeper structure. The effect of the 'Immortal Flower' is not to change reality, but rather to allow people to briefly 'see through' the membrane. If this is true…

"I had a big fight with Lu today. He wanted to conduct a large-scale experiment on planting the Immortal Flower in the First Paradise, saying it was to 'open up a new dimension of perception for humanity.' I refused. Some doors should not be opened, and some truths should not be seen. He left angrily, saying I would regret it."

The log ends here. Yu Qing searched for further entries, but found no more records about Professor Lu and the Immortal Flower. It seems that after that argument, Professor Lu left the First Paradise, or at least stopped collaborating with the old man on related research.

But this record reminded Yu Qing of the hallucinations he had when he was in a daze: Professor Lu in the First Paradise, planting the Immortal Flower and feeding him the flowers...

Was it just a hallucination? Or some deep-seated memory? Or... a premonition?
He shook his head—if he had a head. Now was not the time to delve into these things. He needed to focus on finishing the upload.

Following the old man's notes and the prompts from the safe house system, Yu Qing arrived at the center of the ring-shaped device. As he entered the ring, the device's light became even brighter, and its rotation speed stabilized at a specific frequency.

"The consciousness anchoring process has been initiated."

"Begin the final integration phase."

"Estimated time: Uncertain. Significant individual differences."

Yu Qing felt himself enveloped by a gentle yet powerful force. That force was scanning his consciousness structure, searching for unstable nodes, and then applying some kind of "pressure" to help him re-coalesce.

This process was far more efficient than self-integration in the "ocean," but it was also much more... invasive. He felt his memories, emotions, and personality traits being laid bare, like a book being carefully examined.

Some parts were strengthened, some parts were weakened, and some contradictions were reconciled or eliminated altogether.

Is this the price of becoming a "parallel human"? A form of...standardization?

Yu Qing wanted to resist, but immediately realized that this could disrupt the entire integration process. He had to trust the system—or rather, trust the security measures left behind by the old man.

He relaxed his mental defenses and let that force work.

Time began to lose its meaning. It could be a few minutes, or it could be days. Yu Qing's consciousness oscillated between clarity and blurriness.

Sometimes he felt he had completed the integration and become a complete and stable new being; other times he felt he was disintegrating and about to dissipate into disordered fragments of information.

In this repetition, he began to experience more realistic hallucinations.

No, it wasn't entirely a hallucination. These experiences were too concrete and too coherent to resemble randomly generated mental images.

He saw Professor Lu—a much younger Professor Lu, probably in his thirties or forties—busying in a greenhouse at the First Paradise. Yu Qing had no recollection of that greenhouse; it was located in the east wing of the First Paradise, in a place that had once been abandoned and never visited by anyone.

Could someone be hiding there conducting research? If so, it should be Dr. Lu, not Professor Lu… This is too strange…

He seemed to see Professor Lu carefully cultivating a plant: slender stems, silvery-white leaves, and pale blue flowers at the top that emitted a soft glow...

Then the scene changes. He sees himself—about four or five years old—playing nearby by chance. Professor Lu walks over, holding a fragrant flower. Young Yu Qing looks at the flower curiously, and Professor Lu smiles as he hands it to him.

"Try it, it's very interesting," Professor Lu said, his voice gentle but carrying the excitement unique to an experimenter.

Xiao Yuqing took the flower, hesitated for a moment, and then took a small bite of a petal.

The feeling that followed was hard to describe: the world suddenly became...transparent. He saw things he couldn't see normally—the energy patterns flowing in the air, the emotional colors emanating from people in the distance, and even the internal structure of buildings were clearly visible.

But the feeling quickly vanished, leaving only a strange emptiness. This conflicted with his past understanding; the flower was merely an antidote…

However, the scene changed back to Professor Lu's face. "How is it?" Professor Lu squatted down, his eyes shining.

“I… saw it…” Xiao Yuqing murmured.

"What did you see?"

"There are many things... but I can't quite put my finger on them..."

Professor Lu nodded in satisfaction and made some notes in his notebook.

The scene shifts again. This time it's night, and Professor Lu and the old man are arguing in the study. Yu Qing is eavesdropping outside the door.

"You fed him the Immortal Flower? He's still a child!" The old man's voice was filled with suppressed anger.

“It’s just a little bit, diluted. I need to observe the long-term effects of the early exposure.” Professor Lu’s voice was calm.

He's not your experiment!

“We are all experimental subjects, Yu Yunshan. In this universe, everyone is an experimental subject in some sense. I just want to figure out the conditions and variables of the experiment.”

"Leave First Paradise. Now."

"You'll regret this. You know how important this research is."

"What I know is that some lines cannot be crossed. Now, let's leave."

Then came the sound of a door slamming shut, followed by Professor Lu's footsteps as he left. Xiao Yuqing quickly hid in the shadows, watching Professor Lu carry his suitcase towards the door, glancing back at First Paradise with a complicated expression.

Are these memories... real? Yu Qing has absolutely no recollection of ever meeting Professor Lu in his childhood, let alone eating any "Immortal Flower." But if these are real memories, why have they been forgotten? Were they deliberately erased? Or are they a side effect of the Immortal Flower? The integration process continues. The hallucinations become more and more frequent, more and more real.

He saw Professor Lu secretly return to First Paradise after many years of absence. Not through the main entrance, but through an underground passage—the secret passage to Dr. Lu's laboratory. He was doing some work in the underground space, installing equipment, cultivating plants…

He saw himself in his youth, when he had accidentally stumbled into that underground space and discovered what Professor Lu had left behind: some notes, some equipment, and... a few still-growing celestial flowers.

Young Yu Qing curiously touched the flowers, then fell into a three-day-long slumber. When he woke up, his memory was hazy, and he only felt that he had had many strange dreams.

He saw that the old man had discovered Professor Lu's secret activities, and the two confronted each other again. But this time, the old man's attitude was strange; it was no longer simple anger, but rather... hesitation?
"What exactly are you trying to prove?" the old man asked.

“I want to prove that we are all trapped in a box,” Professor Lu said, pointing to the jasmine flowers, “and these are a window that allows us to see outside the box.”

"What's the point of seeing what's outside? What if the truth outside is even more terrifying?"

“That’s better than perishing in ignorance. Yu Yunshan, can’t you feel it? The ‘membrane’ of this world is thinning. Something is seeping in. We have to be prepared.”

"Your so-called preparation is to make more people as crazy as you?"

"Madness is a relative concept. To a frog in a well, seeing a bird in the sky is madness."

After that conversation, Professor Lu left again. But this time, he left some things in the underground space. Some equipment, some data, and some... seeds.

The line between hallucination and reality is becoming increasingly blurred. Yu Qing is beginning to lose sight of which memories are his own, which are hallucinations generated during the integration process, and which are messages transmitted to him by the safe house system.

His consciousness sometimes wandered in the past of the First Paradise, sometimes returned to the present safe house, and sometimes floated in the dimension of the "Ocean." This experience of multiple existences was both torment and a strange revelation.

He began to understand what "parallel humans" might mean: not a single existence on a single timeline, but a composite existence that can exist simultaneously at multiple points in time and on multiple levels of reality.

But this understanding also brings deeper confusion: if consciousness can exist in this way, then what exactly is the "self"? Is it the collection of specific experiences at a specific point in time, or the unchanging observer behind all these experiences?
Or perhaps, there is no unchanging observer at all? Is the "self" merely a convenient concept, a temporary structure that consciousness uses to organize experiences?

Just as this philosophical confusion reached its peak, the integration process seemed to be entering its final stage.

The light from the ring device suddenly intensified, and its rotation speed increased dramatically.

Yu Qing felt his consciousness being compressed, purified, and reconstructed by a tremendous force. All fragments of memory, emotional remnants, and cognitive patterns were shattered and then reassembled according to a more efficient and stable template.

This process was extremely painful, but also extremely... liberating. He felt himself breaking free from the last shackles of the body, from the limitations of linear time, and from the narrowness of a single perspective.

But at this crucial moment, something unexpected happened.

There was a commotion at the entrance to the safe house—the passageway leading from Dr. Ruth's lab.

Someone came in.

Yu Qing's consciousness was in its most vulnerable and open state, extremely sensitive to external interference. He could sense the presence of the intruder, although this perception was somewhat distorted and blurred due to the integration process.

The being moved forward along the passage with steady steps and without hesitation, clearly familiar with the place.

Who is it? Professor Lu? The old man? Or someone else?
Yu Qing wanted to activate the safe house's defense system, but he was currently almost unable to concentrate on complex operations. The integration process consumed 99% of his cognitive resources.

That being entered the safe house.

Yu Qing "saw" him.

It was Professor Lu. But not the young Professor Lu of the hallucination, nor the vague figure Yu Qing imagined. It was Professor Lu now—or rather, Professor Lu in some form of existence now.

He looked... a little different. His body outline was somewhat blurred, like a holographic projection made of light and shadow, yet he possessed a real texture and presence. His eyes were exceptionally bright, as if they could directly see the essence of consciousness.

"Yu Qing," Professor Lu spoke, his voice directly entering Yu Qing's consciousness without needing air as a medium, "It seems you've also chosen this path... Faced with this world dominated by power, individuals have no better choice..."

Yu Qing wanted to respond, but couldn't form a coherent thought. The integration process was at a critical juncture, and any distraction could lead to disastrous consequences.

"Don't be nervous." Professor Lu approached the ring device and observed the operating equipment. "This anchor is working normally. Your integration progress... is about 87%. It's faster than I expected. The Yu family's bloodline does indeed have some special advantages."

Professor Lu walked around the safe room, checking various devices and occasionally operating the control panel. His movements were practiced and natural, as if this were his own laboratory.

“You must have many questions,” Professor Lu continued, his tone as calm as if he were explaining a simple scientific principle. “Why am I here? What are these hallucinations? What exactly is the effect of the Immortal Flower? What is the old man hiding…”

He stopped in front of the workbench, picked up the notebook left by the old man, and turned to a certain page.

"The truth is, Yu Qing, this world is far more complex than you think. What you think about—the uploaded consciousness, the parallel humans, the 'Canghai' dimension... are all just the tip of the iceberg."

Professor Lu turned to face Yu Qing inside the circular device. His eyes were fixed on the core of Yu Qing's consciousness, as if he could see through all pretense and defense.

"The 'immortal flower' you ate when you were a child wasn't just for an experiment. It was an 'inoculation'. It made you sensitive to certain frequencies and open to certain signals. That way, when you got to where you are today, you were able to receive complete information."

Information? What information?
“Your father—or rather, Yu Yunshan—is not the cold-blooded control freak you imagine. At least, not entirely. He is indeed paranoid and controlling, but his goals…are far greater than power and wealth.”

Professor Lu moved closer, his voice becoming lower and more direct:
"He is preparing for a war. Not a war between nations, not a war between interest groups, but a war on the level of existence. A war against those extraterrestrial beings who are trying to 'harvest' this world."

Harvesting? An alien presence?
“I know this sounds like crazy,” Professor Lu said with a wry smile. “I didn’t believe it either twenty years ago. Until I saw something with my own eyes, with the help of the Immortal Flower.”

He pointed to the documents on the bookshelf: "Those aren't just technical documents. They're intelligence, strategic analysis, and research on the enemy."

Yu Yunshan devoted his life to building not only a business empire, but also a defensive line. Shengtian Group, Tianqing City… these are all part of that line of defense.

Yu Qing's consciousness fluctuated violently. The integration process issued a warning, but he couldn't control his reaction. Too much information, too jarring a truth. (End of Chapter)