Cixin Liu - The Three-Body Problem

On the seventeenth day of the Stable Era, five hours after the predicted time for sunrise, the world was still under cover of dark night. Multitudes thronged at the foot of the pyramid, their innumerable torches flickering in the chill wind.

“The sun will probably not rise again. It is like at the end of Civilization Number 137,” Wang said to Mozi.

Mozi stroked his beard and smiled confidently. “Do not fret. The sun will rise soon, and the Stable Era will continue. I’ve already learned the secret of the motion of the universal machine. My predictions cannot be wrong.”

As though confirming Mozi’s words, the sky over the horizon brightened with dawn’s first light. The crowd around the pyramid shouted in joy.

The silvery light brightened far more rapidly than usual, as though the rising sun wanted to make up for lost time. Soon, the light covered half the sky, even though the sun was still below the horizon. The world was already as bright as midday.

Wang looked toward the horizon and saw it giving off a blinding glare. The glowing horizon arched upward and became a curve that spread from one edge of his visual field to the other. He soon realized that he wasn’t seeing the horizon, but the edge of the rising sun, an incomparably immense sun.

After his eyes adjusted to the bright light, the horizon reappeared in its old place. Wang saw columns of black smoke rising in the distance, especially clear against the glowing background of the solar disk. A fast horse rushed toward the pyramid from the direction of the rising sun, the dust from its hooves forming a distinct line across the plains.

The crowd parted before the horse, and Wang heard the rider scream at the top of his lungs: “Dehydrate! Dehydrate!”

Following the rider was a herd of cattle, horses, and other animals. Their bodies were on fire and they moved across the ground like a burning carpet.

Half of the gigantic sun’s disk was now above the horizon, taking up much of the sky. The earth seemed to slowly sink down against a brilliant wall. Wang could clearly make out the fine structures on the surface of the sun: eddies and surging waves filling the sea of flames; sunspots floating along random paths like ghosts; the corona lazily spreading out like golden sleeves.

On the ground, both those who had already dehydrated and those who hadn’t began to burn like countless logs thrown into the belly of a furnace. The flames that consumed them were even brighter than glowing charcoal in a furnace, but were quickly extinguished.

The giant sun continued to rise and soon filled most of the sky. Wang looked up and felt his perspective shift. Suddenly he was no longer looking up, but down. The surface of the giant sun became a fiery earth, and he felt himself falling toward this brilliant hell.

Lakes and ponds began to evaporate, and puffs of white steam rose up like mushroom clouds. They rose, spilled open, and dispersed, covering the ashes of the dead.

“The Stable Era will continue. The universe is a machine. I created this machine. The Stable Era will continue. The universe…”

Wang turned his head. The voice belonged to Mozi, who was already on fire. His body was encased within a column of tall, orange flame, and his skin crinkled and turned into charcoal. But his two eyes still shone with a light that was distinct from the fire consuming him. His two hands, already burning pieces of charcoal, held up the cloud of swirling ashes that had once been his calendar.

Wang was burning up as well. He lifted his two hands and saw two torches.

The sun briskly moved to the west, revealing the sky behind it. It soon fell below the horizon, and the ground seemed to rise against the brilliant wall this time. A dazzling sunset swiftly turned to night, as though a pair of giant hands had pulled a black cloth over a world that had turned to ash.

The earth glowed with a dim red light like a piece of charcoal just retrieved from a furnace. For a brief moment, Wang saw the stars, but soon steam and smoke hid the sky and covered everything on the red-glowing earth. The world sank into a dark chaos. A red line of text appeared:

Civilization Number 141 fell into ruin in flames. This civilization had advanced to the Eastern Han Period.

The seed of civilization remains. It will germinate and again progress through the unpredictable world of Three Body . We invite you to log on in the future.

Wang took off the V-suit. After his mind had calmed down a bit, he again had the thought that Three Body was deliberately pretending to be merely illusory, while in fact possessing some deep reality. The real world in front of him, on the other hand, had begun to seem like the superficially complex, but in truth rather simple, Along the River During the Qingming Festival .

The next day, Wang went to the Nanotechnology Research Center. Other than some minor confusion due to his absence the day before, everything was normal. He found work to be an effective tranquilizer. As long as he was absorbed by it, he was no longer bothered by his nightmarish worries. He deliberately kept himself constantly busy the whole day and left the lab only after it was dark.

As soon as Wang left the Research Center building, the nightmarelike feeling caught up to him. He felt like the starry sky was a magnifying glass that covered the world, and he was a tiny insect below the lens with nowhere to hide.

He had to find something to occupy himself. Then he thought of Yang Dong’s mother Ye Wenjie and drove to her home.

Ye was alone at home. When Wang entered, she was sitting on the sofa reading. Wang noticed that her eyes were both myopic and presbyopic, and she had to switch glasses both when she read and when she looked at something far away. She was very happy to see Wang, and said that he looked much better than the last time he had come to see her.

Wang chuckled. “It’s all because of your ginseng.”

Ye shook her head. “What I gave you wasn’t very good. We used to be able to find really high-quality wild ginseng around the base. I once found one about this long…. I wonder what it’s like there now. I heard that it’s deserted. Well, I guess I’m really getting old. These days, I’m always thinking about the past.”

“I heard that you suffered a lot during the Cultural Revolution.”

“You heard it from Ruishan, didn’t you?” Ye waved her hand, as though trying to wave away a strand of spider silk. “In the past, it’s all in the past…. Last night, Ruishan called me. He was in such a hurry that I had a hard time understanding him. All I got was that something seemed to have happened to you. Xiao Wang, let me tell you: By the time you’re my age, you’ll realize that everything you once thought mattered so much turns out to mean very little.”

“Thank you,” Wang said. He once again felt the warmth that he had missed. In his current state, his mental stability depended on two pillars: this old woman, who had weathered so many storms and become as gentle as water, and Shi Qiang, the man who feared nothing because he knew nothing.

Ye continued. “As far as the Cultural Revolution is concerned, I was pretty lucky. Just when I thought I had nowhere to go, I found a place where I could survive.”

“You mean Red Coast Base?”

Ye nodded.

“That was truly an incredible project. I used to think it was just made-up rumors.”

“Not rumors. If you want, I can tell you some of what I experienced.”

The offer made Wang a little worried. “Professor Ye, I’m only curious. You don’t need to tell me if it’s not appropriate.”

“It’s no big deal. Let’s just imagine that I’m looking for someone to hear me talk.”

“You could go visit the senior center. You wouldn’t be lonely if you went there occasionally.”