Chapter 295 |
"This is really an interesting thing. I just completed the preliminary transfer of Earth's humans. Now only a few resistors remain on Earth. It’s worth trying this stuff to see if it can spark something with the Tiberium mine, or maybe even create a new generation!" Yuri said with great interest as he looked over the genetic raw liquid and some related experimental data that Josh had just traded over.
After learning from Vickers the true significance of the "Black Water" genetic raw liquid, Josh naturally did not forget his old friend Yuri.
"But precautions must be taken, because this thing is ultimately an imperfect copy, prone to evolving into dangerous and uncontrollable extreme lifeforms like the Xenomorph!" Josh warned.
After translating and organizing all the data left in the ships and buildings left behind by the Engineers, Josh finally truly understood what Black Water was.
It is a replication product of the "Deacon’s" blood.
Here, the Deacon does not refer to the Deacon Xenomorph that appeared at the end of the movie.
The true Deacon is a terrifying creature the Engineers discovered by chance during their long civilization.
This creature looks basically identical to the Deacon Xenomorph but is actually as huge as a mountain.
Through observation and study, the Engineers found that this miraculous creature could easily destroy a planet’s ecology and then reshape the entire ecosystem.
Therefore, the Engineers named this creature “Deacon” with a religious connotation—meaning it is an existence that helps gods reshape the world.
At the time, the Engineer civilization faced a dilemma.
Though they developed a powerful civilization and enjoyed an extremely long lifespan—around thirty thousand years—they somehow had reproduction problems.
They saw hope for their species’ continuation in the Deacon.
Thus, they worshipped this creature as a faith—that’s the origin of the murals in the Engineer base.
So those murals don’t actually depict Xenomorphs but the original Deacon.
However, an obvious problem arose: such a powerful creature was extremely difficult to control, and this highly intelligent being did not want to become the Engineers’ experimental subject.
Thus, fierce conflicts broke out. Eventually, the Engineers reluctantly killed the Deacon and collected its blood.
Using its blood combined with their own genes, they began spreading genes throughout the universe, trying to create life like themselves.
Humans were born in this process.
This corresponds to the opening scene of the movie where the "Sacrificial One" drinks the Deacon’s blood and becomes the seed of life.
In the deleted script of the movie, when the protagonists discovered the Engineer’s corpse, David translated the text on the door—a proverb:
"Our lord is born from the chosen one; His sacred blood is our salvation and will sow new life in other worlds through our bodies."
This describes that process.
But the Deacon’s blood is limited and precious.
In the uncut movie version, the opening showed not just one Engineer but an entire sacrificial ritual.
Dialogues between several Engineers also indicated the preciousness of the Deacon’s blood.
Josh’s previous life saw a heavily edited version, so at first he did not know this.
The true Deacon’s blood is dark gold, not pure black like ordinary Black Water.
Only the true Deacon’s blood can thoroughly reorganize genes without mutating into Xenomorphs.
So what exactly is Black Water?
The answer: it is a genetically engineered replication.
During replication, the Engineers directly incorporated their own racial genes into it.
Thus, in future life creation, they no longer needed to sacrifice their own kind to merge genes.
It was during the mass production of Black Water by the Engineers that humans were born.
However, though genetically identical, humans were not the species the Engineers hoped for.
Therefore, within the Engineers, two factions formed over how to handle humans.
One faction wanted to preserve humans; the other wanted to destroy them.
The preservation faction visited Earth several times over thousands of years trying to teach humans.
Various related relics the protagonists found were left by this preservation faction.
They even took a male infant from Earth to educate him, hoping he would guide human development.
But soon after returning to Earth, that infant was nailed to a cross by other humans—something everyone understands without saying.
Obviously, the preservation faction ultimately failed and the destruction faction prevailed.
They planned to release Black Water to completely wipe out humans and Earth’s life to recreate new species that fit their will.
During the Black Water loading process, it leaked and many Engineers became infected by Black Water.
The Black Water they replicated was not as stable as the original Deacon blood.
Hence, as in the movie, some mutated directly, some like the male lead gradually decomposed, and some evolved into Xenomorphs.
Aided by Josh’s large robot army exploring the planet’s depths, Vickers found those dormant Xenomorphs underground.
But they were only ordinary Xenomorphs—no Deacons, no Queens.
The entire planet was doomed except one Engineer who escaped into a ship’s cryo pod.
Besides this, in the Engineer civilization’s system data, although Vickers did not find the Engineers’ home planet, she found another planet besides Earth where the Engineers created life.
This planet is designated LV-426 in the Prometheus human world.
The humanoid species born on this planet were the ones truly valued by the Engineer civilization.
That’s right—this planet is the one David destroyed in the sequel, Alien: Covenant.
No wonder Josh thought when watching the movie that the life on that planet seemed very similar to Engineers but somewhat backward.
Also, when the Engineer ship landed, their behavior wasn’t like welcoming kin but more like pilgrims.
If that wasn’t the Engineers’ home planet but, like Earth, a life form created by the Engineers using their blueprint, everything makes sense.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be careful. Earth was destroyed once; I won’t let it be destroyed a second time so easily!” Yuri nodded in response to Josh’s warning.
After ending the call with Yuri, Josh stopped providing Black Water to other traders in different dimensions.
Josh thought that besides Yuri, a super scientific leader, other dimensional traders would find it quite difficult to control this thing. He got along well with current traders and didn’t want to lose anyone over this.
Of course, not all traders lack the ability.
For example, Anakin from the Star Wars world and Starscream from the Transformers world still have some maneuvering space.
Anakin’s technology is advanced enough and he also has the Force—a power with huge potential.
Starscream, as a mechanical life form, naturally has some advantages over organic life forms.
But Anakin is still just a Jedi apprentice, and many things are inconvenient for him to do.
As for Starscream...though calmer after receiving the leadership module and less violent than before, he remains a hegemonist. Who knows what chaos Black Water in his hands might cause.
So handling Black Water with just Vickers and Yuri is enough; Josh can just wait to share the results.
After dealing with Black Water matters, Josh turned his attention back to his own world.
After the last conversation with Karl Renner, that old guy’s actions were nothing if not swift. In less than half a month, he had already secured the agreement of the anti-Bear (Soviet) forces in Czechoslovakia and Hungary.
As long as Austria could provide them with funding and supplies, and send troops at critical moments to help resist the Bear, they would declare, immediately after shaking off Bear control, to join the United Kingdom of Austria as autonomous regions.
After this was confirmed, Josh and Austria also began discussing the selection of a test site for the nuclear explosion.
This matter troubled the Austrian leadership greatly.
There was no way around it. Austria, as a continental country, has many mountains but mostly fertile land; there were basically no deserts or wastelands. Under these circumstances, no sane person would drop a nuclear bomb on their own territory.
Because of World War II, Austria had no overseas colonies, and its overseas international relations were very ordinary. So it couldn’t follow Britain or France in dropping bombs overseas.
Thus, it was very difficult to find a suitable nuclear test site, especially for testing the tremendously powerful “Big Ivan” bomb. They needed to make both the Bears and the Americans feel the power of the bomb, but without causing actual damage.
Josh wanted to drop it on Tokyo, but now he couldn’t even consider Tokyo. From south to north, American troops were stationed everywhere.
Dropping it there would be tantamount to declaring war on the United States.
Might as well drop it on New York directly.
Originally, the Moon was a good location but it was too far from Earth to achieve a deterrent effect.
“No need to hesitate, just drop it at the North Pole, an airburst!” Finally, Josh stared at the globe for a long time and made the decision.
The North Pole region is located over the Arctic Ocean; there is no land, and it is surrounded by subordinate forces of the United States and the Bear.
Conducting an airburst here would minimize the harm caused by explosion and radiation, but the shockwave and electromagnetic pulse would still be fully detectable by both the United States and the Bears.
Moreover, this location was far enough from Austria’s homeland, and the missile’s trajectory would be chosen from the border area between the eastern and western camps of Germany. The entire process could be observed by both camps, showcasing the intercontinental missile’s range and accuracy.
This would be enough to provide sufficient deterrence to the whole world.
Josh didn’t believe that after seeing the range and accuracy of the intercontinental missile and the power of Big Ivan, the Bear would still dare to make a move.
As for the United States, it was even less likely—they might maintain a facade of alliance with Austria, but would absolutely not take action.
Time passed quickly, and June arrived.
In the past half-year, due to a series of anti- Stalinization movements led by Khrushchev, internal conflicts within the Bear had escalated once again.
Many allied countries began showing anti-Bear tendencies.
The Western camp led by the United States seemed to see an opportunity and started to get involved.
However, because of the Bears’ overwhelming military deterrence, most movements remained underground until the first leader appeared.
That leader was Poland.
As Europe’s well-known troublemaker, Poland never disappointed.
Thus, the famous Poznan incident broke out.
Poznan is an important industrial city in Poland.
In June 1956, during the 25th Poznan International Fair, hundreds of thousands of citizens took to the streets, staging strikes and protests, which escalated into armed conflict.
Although quickly suppressed by the Warsaw authorities, it drew sharp criticism from the Western world.
At that time, the Bear clearly did not realize the power of Western public opinion or the influence of the Poznan incident. During the subsequent handling, they surprisingly chose to compromise with Poland, withdrawing troops stationed there, allowing Poland to achieve de-Bearification.
However, during this process, one Western country adopted an avoidance strategy.
That country was none other than the United States.
This was good for many countries suffering economic decline because of Bear policies; seeing the Bear’s compromise, they immediately began to follow suit and wanted to de-Bearify.
But at this point, the Bear realized something was wrong and immediately started tightening control over allied countries.
However it was already too late.
Soon, similar movements broke out in Hungary and Czechoslovakia.
Facing this situation, the Bear immediately wanted to send troops to suppress them.
Before Bear troops entered these two countries, Hungary and Czechoslovakia, under Josh and Karl Renner instructions, carried out a provocative move:
They openly sent a clear telegram requesting support from the United States!
At this time, the United States obviously could not support them.
Although the East-West camp confrontation was set, the United States really did not want to start a war with the Bear at this moment, so it adopted an avoidance stance regarding this matter.
Not only did it refuse to aid the two countries, but to show it didn’t want trouble with the Bear, it also withdrew the troops originally stationed on the borders of the two countries—that is, the troops stationed inside Austria—and gave the same orders to Austria.
Thus, the Austrian army and the US troops inside Austria began to withdraw together.
However, after they began to withdraw, the US troops in Austria found that the Austrian army, originally on their flank, was moving into Czechoslovakia and Hungary.
Meanwhile, in the rear areas inside Austria, large numbers of troops appeared at some unknown time, subtly surrounding the American troops who were redeploying.
Since World War II, American troops in Europe had been steadily reduced, now numbering only about a hundred thousand, most of whom were in Germany. The troops stationed in Austria only amounted to three divisions, mostly light rapid reaction units.
The Austrian forces appearing around them, however, numbered at least two army groups, all heavy formations.
Many of the equipment these US troops stationed in Austria had never even seen before.
At the same time, the skies began to roar with new fighter jets completely different from the Phantom III planes they were used to.
Austria’s operation left the United States stunned, the Bear stunned, and the whole world stunned.