Chapter 1 No Brain Core?!

After a few seconds of stunned silence, Hao Ren finally exclaimed, "No... brain core?! Isn't that your vital organ?"

The eldest son didn't speak. Instead, a wave of complex, chaotic thoughts that almost caused a splitting headache suddenly crashed over him. Hao Ren initially thought he was under a mental attack, but he quickly realized that he was receiving a flood of inexplicable memories and knowledge. He realized this was a more advanced form of communication: the eldest son probably felt that dialogue was too inefficient, so it directly shared its knowledge and experience.

Hao Ren was dumbfounded after sifting through these memories. "This is..."

The eldest son on Planet Zhum had no brain core because it had evolved its brain core into another form ten thousand years ago!

Typically, a mature eldest son would have several brain cores, with the number not exceeding double digits, but this one on Planet Zhum was different. In order to accommodate that vast virtual world and to better interface with the programming languages developed by the Zhum people, the eldest son here had deliberately reshaped its body. It had broken down its brain core into countless nerve clusters evenly distributed throughout its body. These extra nerve clusters could grow more nerve tendrils, which were the key organs for connecting to those external mechanical devices. Decomposing the brain core into countless small parts also had another effect, which was to have ample backups: even if two-thirds of the entire planet suffered a disaster, the remaining one-third of the nerve clusters could maintain the integrity of the virtual world.

The current eldest son had essentially dismantled its brain and integrated it into all parts of its body, with more than a million "mini-brain cores" distributed beneath every inch of Planet Zhum's land. Moreover, most of them were now surrounded by lava and fire, dying in batches.

It was impossible to take it away – even if Hao Ren could find an interstellar engineering team right now, it would take a long time to separate all the mini-brain cores from the planet. These distributed brains were originally a safety measure against disasters, but now they had become the biggest obstacle to preserving the Zhum civilization and the eldest son's life.

Ten thousand years ago, no one had imagined that this planet would suddenly change its orbit and fall into the sun.

"If we abandon the virtual world's data and only take the humans and your soul, compressed into a few 'mini-brain cores,' would that be possible?" Hao Ren desperately searched for alternative solutions. "Are the capacities of those mini-brain cores insufficient?"

"Mother said that the soul is the most complex information, and more than half of my mental world is used to accommodate those souls," the eldest son replied. "The other things in the dream only take up a small part; even if we abandon those… it's useless."

More than ninety percent of the eldest son's mental capacity was already used to carry the souls of those billions of Zhum people, while the other parts of the virtual world—including everything from mountains and rivers to landscapes, clouds, and mist—were the most insignificant. It was impossible to take the Zhum civilization away by compressing the data.

A communication from the Tortoise Rock Platform suddenly interrupted Hao Ren's thoughts: "Partner, the sun has set, but the planet is severely damaged. If this continues... I'm afraid the communication between you and the virtual world won't last. This unit has detected that the electrical surge signals beneath the planetary strata are weakening."

"I want to sleep," the eldest son's voice invaded Hao Ren's mind at the same time. "So tired... so hot... If this continues, the feeling of the real world will also be transmitted to the humans in the dream. Let us sleep, and everything will be fine after we fall asleep. Mother will come back..."

"I said I would take you to find your mother, and I'll do what I say!" Hao Ren interrupted the eldest son's voice loudly, and a lightning-like thought suddenly flashed through his mind. "Communication… communication… That's right! There's another way!"

The eldest son curiously watched his movements.

"Souls are also data, in the end, right?" Hao Ren looked at the shapeless shadow of light in front of him. "The Zhum people can input souls into your body through devices, so in theory, the souls in your 'brain' should also be able to be input elsewhere!"

The eldest son hesitated. "In theory… it's possible, but…"

"There are no buts. As long as it's theoretically feasible, it's better than euthanasia," Hao Ren looked at the ball of white light with a burning gaze. "I can't take away the body of this civilization, but I can take away all the souls—give me the virtual world's database and the transcoding method, and I'll send your souls to a safe place!"

The data terminal, which was eavesdropping on Hao Ren's conversation with the eldest son, interjected, "This plan is theoretically feasible, but we need an unprecedentedly huge database. The data volume of billions of souls plus an eldest son is no joke. Where do you plan to store them?"

"I have a database—the Crystal Nucleus Research Station," Hao Ren felt his thoughts were exceptionally clear, and his brain was in better condition than ever. "That's a research station, and it was specifically designed to study the eldest son. Its database is many times larger than the eldest son's brain capacity."

"Then how do we send this data over there?"

"Establish a communication link. We have a fleet of probe drones. Use those drones as relay stations to lay a broadcast line from Planet Zhum to the Crystal Nucleus Research Station in space. If the bandwidth isn't enough, turn on the Tortoise Rock Platform's high-power antenna. There will always be a way."

"What about the interface? How are you going to extract the eldest son's memory bank from Planet Zhum? The bandwidth of this interface must be very high, otherwise it's impossible to transfer the souls of billions of people in a few dozen hours."

The data terminal's questions came one after another. When it came to this last one, Hao Ren suddenly froze, but the eldest son suddenly spoke at this moment: "Near the planet's equator, it can be opened. There is a large data release point there. I can release the data from there... but it can only be used once. The sun will burn it."

"Data release point?" Hao Ren was a little surprised. "What's that for?"

"Once, the younger brothers and sisters still wanted to return to the real world, but that was the plan before the planet fell."

Hao Ren immediately understood. The facility the eldest son mentioned was probably the Zhum people's "return to reality" plan recorded in those previous materials. He didn't expect this facility to be buried deep underground, and that it would still be usable even now.

He clapped his hands and said to the data terminal on the line, "Alright, all the elements are complete. Are there any more problems?"

"This unit has already issued a recall order to the drone fleet and has begun writing the drivers needed for the data chain. The only remaining problem is time—Planet Zhum decomposes in thirty-six hours. Let's race against the sun."

"I'll win," Hao Ren's lips curled up slightly as he looked up at the eldest son's soul shadow. "Now I'm going back to the real world to prepare. I'll keep this connection open. Do you know Nolan? The communication is being routed through her. Next, we have thirty hours, so..."

"I will try my best," a thought was directly transmitted into Hao Ren's mind. "Mother said to do things to the very end."

As expected, it always brings up its mother.

Hao Ren smiled and exited this strange direct connection state. Nolan's somewhat dull face reappeared before his eyes. Because she was carrying a large amount of data communication, the latter's thinking had been suppressed to the lowest value. She could only vaguely understand what was happening now, but it was difficult to make any vivid responses. Hao Ren knew that now was not the time for small talk and explanations. He could only help Nolan sit down in a safe place. "I'm going to be busy. You just wait here."

Nolan looked at the person in front of her sluggishly, and finally nodded slightly.

Hao Ren withdrew to the real world. Vivian and Lily immediately stepped forward with concern to ask about the situation. Hao Ren waved his hand at them. "Leave all the autonomous machines here to maintain this data chain. Let's go back to the ship."

The autonomous machines waiting on the side gathered around and placed their mechanical tentacles on the eldest son's ganglion, replacing Hao Ren's position.

The group returned to the bridge of the Tortoise Rock Platform, and Hao Ren strode to the control console. "Terminal, what's the situation?"

"The drone fleet is moving towards this side and has switched to high-speed communication mode. The bandwidth of the probes used for detection is limited, so we need to design an extremely precise link to ensure the transmission is successful. Whether the specific bandwidth is sufficient will only be known after the database is extracted. The Crystal Nucleus Research Station has begun to reorganize its resources. The database capacity should be sufficient, but it lacks virtual reality programs. After the souls of the Zhum people and the eldest son are transferred, we need to build a virtual world in the Crystal Nucleus Research Station's mainframe, but that's something for later."

"What about communication with the eldest son?"

"Just completed re-positioning. Relying on the autonomous machines you left underground, communication is still being maintained." As the terminal spoke, it opened the holographic projection in front of the control console. The projection showed a vague and uncertain ball of light and a few lines of text. Those texts were greetings from the eldest son.

"The eldest son's mental mode is very different from ordinary creatures. This simple communication link can't convert its thoughts perfectly, so it can only display text, but it's enough for now."