Chapter 895: Subsequent Plan |
The great chaos had already arrived. Under these circumstances, every replicate wanted to seize more resources. Almost the instant Xiao Yu left, they understood this principle. And when one replicate understood it, that basically meant all replicates understood it as well. After all, in essence, they were still the same person. They possessed the same mode of thinking.
Almost every replicate had the same sentence resounding in its mind, “Seize resources! Seize resources with everything possible!”
Because in this galaxy, there were no longer stars, those convenient and efficient places from which resources could be obtained. And to carry out intergalactic voyage also required many resources and spare parts as support. To attempt intergalactic voyage with only a single spaceship was simply courting death.
It was all replicates that were competing for resources, not just those replicates that controlled spaceships. The replicates controlling detectors had no combat ability, so they immediately opened data interfaces, attempting to obtain combat power that could be used for themselves through fighting in the virtual world. Inside the construction bases, the fighting among the worker replicates was even more brutal.
Under the control of these replicates, many robots began picking up whatever tools they could and, together with their masters, began attacking others. One robot stopped the work in its hands, casually grabbed something like a steel pipe, and walked toward a computing terminal nearby, while that computing terminal controlled something like a lift machine that came rumbling toward the robot. The robot had no time to dodge before it was crushed flat. Then that lift-like machine did not stop, but continued charging forward until it completely crushed another computing terminal, also eliminating the replicate that lived within that computing terminal…
From time to time, a spaceship would seize an opportunity and violently rush near a construction base. Its orders would then be issued, demanding that the replicates inside the construction base immediately produce more computing terminals or build new spaceships. But generally, no one paid attention to it. Even if someone did, it would be impossible to complete these production tasks in a short time. More often, while it was still waiting, spaceships from other places would already have flown over and destroyed it, or a few attacks would accidentally land on the construction base, causing large plumes of smoke and flames to rise, throwing the construction base into total chaos…
This was a riot even more chaotic than any other form of riot. Even when intelligent lifeforms fell into chaos, no matter how disorganized or undisciplined it was, they were at least divided into several camps, and forces within the same camp generally would not attack one another. But in the Virtual Life Civilization at this moment, how many camps were there? More than trillions. Every virtual lifeform was an independent camp, and every virtual lifeform was engaged in fighting!
“This is exactly the situation I wanted to see. Do you see it?” Xiao Yu said calmly to the Architectural Civilization.
The current Virtual Life Civilization no longer had any organization or order. They had completely descended into madness, and this gave Xiao Yu many opportunities to exploit. Xiao Yu could completely launch large numbers of detectors into the Virtual Life Civilization to gather intelligence. Even if some virtual lifeforms discovered these outside forces and inferred that Xiao Yu had not really left, what could they do? At present, they did not even have enough strength to protect themselves, so how could they have the energy to care about such things?
The Architectural Civilization seemed to have been stunned by the information Xiao Yu sent over. Only after a long time did they reply to Xiao Yu, “Th-this is truly a scene like hell. It is too chaotic… Before you destroyed Virtual Life Number One, you had already predicted this situation?”
“Yes.” Xiao Yu said. “Using the virtual lifeforms I captured, I completely analyzed their thought patterns and carried out simulations using those thought patterns in my simulator… My conclusion was that under such circumstances, they would definitely descend into chaos… If I had not been certain, how could I possibly have risked killing Virtual Life Number One?”
“How long will this chaos continue?” the Architectural Civilization asked.
“Because of their special circumstances, this chaos will continue for quite a long time… After the chaos subsides, it is estimated that at least seventy percent of the replicates will have died. The remaining thirty percent of the replicates will then form different alliances of power. The most likely outcome is that different factions will form with Star Cluster-Class battleships as their leaders, and the struggle for resources will unfold among these factions. But you must understand, with such a special form of existence, the alliances between their powers cannot be stable. Rebellion and destruction among them will become as commonplace as everyday meals…”
“We have some concern about the future.” the Architectural Civilization replied. “No matter how unstable that faction may be, by then the most basic order will still have formed, and once there is order, that means they will have the ability to calmly judge the current situation. At that time, they will definitely discover that you have already arranged a blockade outside, preventing them from leaving… Once they discover this, they will certainly unite. Even if it is only thirty percent of the replicates, that still represents tens of billions of spaceships. You may be able to defeat them, but you cannot possibly annihilate them all.”
“Yes, that is indeed the case. I can defeat them at that point, but I do not have the ability to annihilate them all. But that does not matter. Since I made the first step of the plan from the beginning, how could I have failed to prepare for this situation as well?” Xiao Yu said with a somewhat mysterious smile. “Do not worry. Looking one step ahead and seeing seven is a basic quality of a war leader. Before destroying Virtual Life Number One, I had already considered every possible situation.”
“The ability of civilizations like yours, war-related civilization, frightens us.” the Architectural Civilization replied after a moment of silence.
“This is a basic quality for war-related civilization like ours to survive.” Xiao Yu sighed. “Those war-related civilization that did not have this ability were all destroyed in war.”
At this moment, Xiao Yu once again thought of the one million microscopic civilization spaceships he had let go. Before leaving, they had once said to Xiao Yu, “You use war as the opportunity for development, and in the end, you too will inevitably be destroyed in war. This is the destiny of all war-related civilization. No one can escape it.”
For some reason, Xiao Yu actually felt a trace of sighing emotion in his heart.
The chaos had continued for more than a year, while Xiao Yu remained hidden in the dark, closely observing the situation here. The billions and hundreds of billions of detectors Xiao Yu had previously scattered out had already placed this region of space under tight surveillance. Under such tight surveillance, no virtual lifeform spaceship trying to escape could possibly evade Xiao Yu’s sight.
Just as the Architectural Civilization had said, during this period, quite a few virtual lifeform spaceships had been lucky enough, either obtaining the wreckage of other spaceships or seizing enough resources from construction bases. In short, their material reserves had become sufficient to support an intergalactic voyage. So they quietly withdrew from the current chaos, attempting to escape to other galaxies and slowly develop there.
In other galaxies, there were large numbers of stars and planets, and vast amounts of resources that could be obtained easily… As long as they had these resources, and as long as they possessed the most basic industrial development ability, they could build a crude base for themselves. That crude base would then rapidly develop into a complete base, and the base would continue to expand, becoming larger and larger. Eventually, they would gain the ability to build spaceships, and thus the outline of a new Virtual Life Empire would appear…
But Xiao Yu would absolutely not allow such a thing to happen. During this year and more, Xiao Yu had already destroyed more than one billion virtual lifeform spaceships that were trying to escape for this purpose, and all of it had been carried out in secret, without attracting the slightest notice from the other virtual lifeforms.
The boundless chaos was still continuing. By this point, it was conservatively estimated that about forty percent of the virtual lifeforms had already died in this chaos. Although not every one of the forty percent that died had its own spaceship, even so, at least fifty billion spaceships had been destroyed.
That is right. Before Xiao Yu destroyed Virtual Life Number One, the total number of spaceships in the entire Virtual Life Civilization had already reached roughly one hundred and twenty billion. This was such an enormous number that it made one feel a little despair. If not for this whole sequence of plans being carried out, Xiao Yu would have had no hope at all of destroying this vast empire.
During this period, Xiao Yu was also doing his utmost to stockpile warships. Xiao Yu had previously stored many stars and also possessed complete construction bases. The battle to destroy Virtual Life Number One had caused Xiao Yu severe losses. Now was Xiao Yu’s rare chance to catch his breath.
The rise of one side and decline of the other was proceeding under these circumstances. Xiao Yu’s number of warships was continuously increasing, while the number of warships in the Virtual Life Civilization was continuously decreasing. Xiao Yu knew that the time for the final battle, the time to completely destroy the Virtual Life Civilization, was no longer far away.
This mighty empire, whose overall strength was comparable to an level 8 war civilization, would be completely destroyed by his hand.