The Merciful dark forest. In the Three-Body World, Cheng Xin was the first to speak. Her voice carried immense confusion and shock, as if she had just witnessed a natural disaster beyond the scope of her understanding.
"It's terrifying... that Lion El'Jonson, how could he... how could he exterminate the populations of several Worlds without hesitation? Those were all lives..."
Her gaze swept over Thomas Wade and Luo Ji, her brow furrowed, clearly unable to process cruelty of this magnitude.
She took a deep breath, trying to understand another matter that perplexed her even more from a logical level.
"And I don't understand... Sevatar, in that situation, his Legion was nearly crippled, his father had gone mad, and the entire battle was stacked against him."
"Wasn't surrender the most rational choice? Is that 'Primarch' genetic father really everything to them? Is it worth letting the entire Legion be buried with a father who has no hope left?"
"You're using human emotions again to understand actions on a cosmic scale, Cheng Xin."
A cold, hard voice filled with impatience interrupted her.
It was Thomas Wayne.
He didn't even look at the screen, merely bowing his head and meticulously wiping a pistol in his hand with a fiber cloth, as if that cold metal were more real than the grand tragedy on the screen.
"Talking about 'life' and 'being buried with' is a luxury. What that Lion El'Jonson did was correct. When control cannot be maintained, clear out the unstable variables and concentrate power to hold the core. That is survival. Your 'reluctance' is meaningless on a cosmic scale."
Wade looked up, his gaze sharp as a scalpel, filled with disdain for inefficiency.
"As for Sevatar, the fact that he didn't surrender proves he is more 'rational' than you imagine."
"He roared and questioned his father not out of love, but because he realized the program he was loyal to had collapsed. So he abandoned the old goal of 'salvation' and instead set a new, more destructive goal: to be buried together."
"To make the entire Empire pay the ultimate price for his father's madness. From this perspective, he executed it brilliantly. Advance, advance by any means necessary, even if the goal is mutual destruction—it's far more efficient than a meaningless surrender."
Cheng Xin's face turned pale at Wade's cold words. She wanted to retort, but found her language so pale and powerless before the other man's inhuman logic.
Just then, a voice rang out, terrifyingly calm, as if it had long since seen through everything.
It was Luo Ji.
He had been standing by the porthole, staring out at the eternal darkness like a monk in meditation.
"No, Wade, you're mistaken this time. You only saw the tactics, but you didn't see the essence of the terror."
Luo Ji turned slowly, his eyes showing neither pity nor admiration, only a detachment as if he had seen through the laws of physics.
"Cheng Xin, you are shocked by the Lion's exterminatus order, but that is actually a... understandable, finite cruelty. It is merely a physical clearing."
"Like a surgical operation to excise necrotic tissue—painful, yes, but with clear boundaries. For the destroyed Worlds, their suffering has ended."
His gaze became deep, as if piercing through the screen to see the shadow named Konrad Curze.
"But Konrad Curze, the terror he represents, is something entirely different."
"He doesn't want to destroy your body; he wants to pollute your soul. He will make you see the future you least want to see, make you believe that all beautiful things will eventually rot, and make you doubt yourself in endless despair until you become a monster just like him."
Luo Ji's voice carried no ripple, yet it made the temperature in the observation room seem to drop several degrees.
"In the dark forest, if you expose your coordinates, what awaits you is a photoid—a precise, efficient strike without any emotion. You will die, your civilization will vanish, and everything will return to physical silence."
"That is terrifying, but... it is a clean, total end. It ends your suffering."
He paused for a moment, seemingly organizing his words to describe a terror that even he found alien.
"But in that World, facing an enemy like Curze, Death is not the end."
"He will catch you, not to kill you, but to keep you alive, to let you watch with your own eyes as your beliefs, honor, and sanity are flayed and dismembered bit by bit, until you kneel and beg him to grant you a 'release' like his own."
Luo Ji's gaze finally fell upon Cheng Xin's fear-stricken face, and he spoke in a cold tone that was almost like talking to himself:
"So, in a way, the dark forest Law even seems somewhat... merciful. Because under its law, you at least still have the right to die."
"But facing an enemy like Curze, I'm afraid even a quick Death is a luxury."
--- Three-Body World. In the distant void, a droplet-shaped probe floated silently, converting this human debate, along with the visual data regarding betrayal and destruction, into a pure stream of information. It crossed light-years to be injected into the shared mental space of the Three-Body World's supreme decision-makers.
There was no sound here, only the collision of thoughts, purer than the deepest silence.
The Military Governor was the first to break the stability of the consensus field, his thoughts carrying a coldness and confusion akin to precision-guided weaponry.
"Incomprehensible. Analysis of the Lion's behavior leads to the conclusion: extreme waste of strategic resources."
"Executing total physical clearing on multiple Planets with potential utility value—even to eliminate rebellion, one should choose a method that preserves infrastructure and ecosystems. This behavior violates the basic axioms of civilizational expansion."
His thoughts focused on those Worlds consumed by flames; each represented matter and energy that could have been utilized, but now only useless dust remained.
The Science Archon's thoughts followed immediately, his angle of analysis more fundamental, filled with questions regarding biological logic.
"Analysis of Sevatar's behavior leads to the conclusion: highly anomalous. When the progenitor (Curze) had lost function, the Legion's combat power was severely damaged, and surrender could maximize the preservation of the organization, he chose self-destruction."
"This was not for survival, nor for victory, but for an abstract concept called 'being buried together.'"
"This behavior completely contradicts the basic logic of biological entities to continue their own existence and genetic information."
"This is a... procedural self-destruction, but the trigger condition is not based on the optimal solution for survival."
"In his thoughts, Sevatar's final command to 'make the Empire bleed' was like a lethal virus code whose sole purpose was to destroy the entire system rather than repair or preserve any part of it."
The Military Governor cut in again, "If our expeditionary fleet were to have a civil war during the war with the Earth civilization, there is no way we would take similar actions. The goal is to acquire a new World; destroying the target equates to negating the entire meaning of the war."
"These... 'bugs,' their logic of war is chaotic."
Just then, the Three-Body Princeps spoke:
"Your analyses all point to the same conclusion. But you only saw the phenomenon; you did not touch the core."
The Princeps unfolded the star map.
"We have been analyzing this species called 'human,' analyzing their social structure and their technical level. But we have ignored the most critical variable."
His thoughts turned to the story of 'Curze and Sevatar,' as if examining a dangerous microbe under a microscope.
"Observe this social relationship called 'father and son.' When the progenitor displays obvious error and madness, the progeny, instead of choosing to break away or replace him to ensure the continuation of the population, chooses to be destroyed along with him."
"This means that in their decision-making priorities, abstract concepts called 'emotion' and 'loyalty' hold a higher weight than 'survival.'"
A ripple representing 'confirmation' flashed through the Science Archon's thoughts:
"Yes, Princeps. Emotion—an inefficient biological algorithm filled with redundant information and highly prone to logical errors."
"Exactly,"
The Princeps's thoughts became sharp. "We always thought we were facing a group of fragile carbon-based organisms that had mastered low-level technology. But now it seems we were wrong."
"What we are truly facing is a chaotic variable whose behavioral patterns, upon gaining powerful individual strength, are amplified infinitely by emotion. Their basis for decision-making is not the optimal survival strategy, but is based on honor, revenge, love, hate, and even pure madness."
"The technological gap can be calculated, but this variable... is incalculable."
"We can use deception to make Earthlings afraid to send messages to the dark forest, but that is limited to the surface."
"If a human individual ignores the safety of their own race and simply wants to retaliate against us by choosing to send a message, could the human government prevent it?"
The consensus field fell into a deeper chill born from the realization of a brand-new threat.
"The threat level of the human civilization must be reassessed."
The Princeps's thoughts finally turned into an unshakable command, echoing in the consciousness of every Archon.
"The threat variable is not their technology. It is this... chaos. It must be... corrected."
In the virtual space of the ETO, there was dead silence.
This silence was not an absence of thought, but rather countless thoughts crashing and colliding at high speed before falling into a brief collective standstill.
The images on the screen—that glorious yet savage Imperium of Man, the patricide triggered by madness, that merciless galaxy-scale purging—the amount of information far exceeded any revelation the ETO had ever received from the Master in the past.
The first to break the silence was a consciousness codenamed Evans. His data stream carried a fanatical, almost joyful ripple.
"Did you see? This is the truth we have been explaining to the Master all along! The essence of humanity is beyond saving!"
His voice echoed in everyone's consciousness, filled with schadenfreude and delight.
"Look at that so-called 'Imperium of Man'! When they mastered the power to cross the stars, they did not move toward reason and Order, but established an even more arrogant, more pathological collection of lies! Isn't this just the ultimate amplified version of our current civilization?"
Evans's spearhead was aimed directly at the tragic father and son on the screen.
"Especially that Sevatar! He is the perfect manifestation of the poison of humanity! His father had gone mad, his cause had failed, but what did he do?"
"For a hollow concept called 'loyalty,' he dragged tens of thousands of warriors to execute a meaningless burial! This isn't greatness; it's a virus! A self-destructing virus that will spread infinitely! The Master has finally seen clearly—cleansing is the only correct path!"
"You're wrong."
A calm female voice, carrying the rigor of scientific research, rang out. It was the consciousness codenamed Aristotle, representing the Redemptionists within the organization.
"You only saw the virus, but you didn't see the power. You didn't understand the true emotion the Master sent back—it wasn't disgust, it was vigilance, an unprecedented vigilance."
Her thoughts turned into a clear logical chain, presented before everyone:
"The Master discovered for the first time that in humans, there exists a 'variable' that Their logic cannot calculate. That individual named Sevatar, his behavior is 'extremely anomalous' in the Master's model because he abandoned survival, the highest directive in all biological programs. What drove him was the underlying code called 'emotion.'"
"This emotion can both allow them to create that massive empire and allow them to set it ablaze without hesitation."
"This precisely proves that humans are not worthless bugs! We possess something the Master does not! This chaotic power is exactly why we are worth 'saving'! The Master's arrival is not to destroy us, but to use Their supreme rationality to correct and compile this chaotic program of ours!"
"Correction? Saving?"
A cold, steady voice, like a rock, cut into the argument.
It was Pan Han.
As one of the actual executors of the organization, his thoughts contained no fanaticism or fantasy, only absolute reality.
"Both of you are immersed in your own delusions."
Pan Han's consciousness swept over everyone present. "None of you have grasped the core message the Master sent back. It wasn't a confirmation of human decay, nor an assessment of human potential. It was..."
He paused for a moment, letting the word explode in everyone's consciousness.
"...fear."
The data stream of the entire virtual space came to a halt.
"The Master felt fear for the first time."
Pan Han's voice became increasingly cold. "What They fear is not that empire's fleet, nor the Lion's Planet-exterminating weapons."
"What They fear is that an individual like Sevatar would resolutely choose mutual destruction because of 'honor' or 'loyalty'—emotions that seem completely illogical to Them."
"The Master can calculate how long it takes for Earth's civilization to develop into a Level 2 civilization, but They cannot calculate when a Wallfacer like Luo Ji might broadcast our coordinates to the entire Universe out of despair or pure madness."
"Before, in the Master's eyes, we were bugs—annoying, but our behavior was ultimately for survival and was predictable. But now, this footage has made the Master realize we aren't bugs; we are a... chaotic virus. Our behavioral patterns are completely unpredictable."
Pan Han's gaze seemed to pierce through the virtual space, looking toward the distant Earth.
"And for a higher civilization, what is the most effective way to handle an unpredictable virus with a potential lethal threat?"
He did not wait for an answer, directly giving the conclusion:
"It is not repair and guidance. It is a complete formatting."
"Evans, your dream is beautiful. But from the Master's perspective, the cost and risk of guiding a group of 'viruses' like us are far higher than simply clearing us out and establishing Their new Order on a blank Earth."
"The Master's vigilance is the most dangerous signal for us. It means Their patience with humanity is rapidly vanishing."
Finally, Pan Han's will turned into a final command, branded like iron into the depths of every ETO member's consciousness.
"So, listen clearly. Our mission, from now on, has changed."
"Before the Master arrives, our primary goal is no longer to sabotage human technological development. It is 'stability maintenance.'"
"We must become the sedative for this civilization. We must penetrate every corner of human society to identify, control, and stifle those individuals and signs that could lead to 'irrational' outbreaks."
"The moment the Master's fleet arrives in the Sol System, we must ensure that Earth is an anesthetized, docile 'safe zone' that will absolutely not commit any act of mutual destruction."
"We must manage this madhouse for the Master until They personally arrive to execute the final 'correction.'"
Pan Han's voice became resolute and beyond doubt.
"The Master's fear is our new mission."