"We have a long future ahead."
After all the humans had left the ascent-descent module, Mr. Ga repeated this sentence in his own language.
Then it maneuvered the flight module upward, heading back to the spaceship parked in Tianshui Star's orbit.
During the ascent, it looked through the porthole at the increasingly small black dots in the city below.
It knew those were humans gawking at the spectacle. Looking at those black dots, an expression of extreme disgust appeared on its face.
"Truly a group of ugly, revolting creatures."
It had never seen a species that made it so uncomfortable. Flesh and skin all turned outward, while bones were buried inside, practically like a sloshing pile of shelled raw meat.
Letting such creatures board its own ascent-descent module was simply soiling its spaceship.
Mr. Ga thought to itself, if not for the requirements of the Doomsday Rules, it would never have come to this star system to make contact with such a disgusting species.
But what gratified it was that this trip had actually brought unexpected gains.
First, Meltstar's abundant magnetic substrate resources were enormously valuable, fetching very high prices in the star sea market.
Second, this "Tianshui Star Civilization" was a newly born level-1 civilization, far too immature. Even the Awakened Ones within the civilization were still in a naive state. It was practically a piece of fat meat delivered right to its mouth.
Mr. Ga's mouth chewed emptily a few times.
Over these days, it had forcibly suppressed the urge to kill these disgusting human creatures, patiently negotiating trade with them, all for the sake of this piece of fat meat.
But what surprised it was that the human Awakened One, who was equally disgusting in its eyes, was actually uninterested in Authority, in trading for the "tree."
This was what every Awakened One in the star sea cared about most. Why did that disgusting human not care?
Was it because of ignorance, or some other reason?
Mr. Ga did not know, but it thought to itself that it did not matter.
Time was still long. Before it finished devouring this civilization clean, it would not leave.
......
If humans knew that their appearance was equally disgusting in Mr. Ga's eyes, they would probably feel quite indignant.
But this mutual disgust was nothing strange. Even among fellow humans, people would find each other displeasing due to differences in hair, eye, and skin color.
Let alone two species whose body structures were completely opposite.
In human eyes, Mr. Ga, with bones outside and flesh inside, was very disgusting, like a mantis-person. In Mr. Ga's eyes, humans, with flesh outside and bones inside, were even more disgusting, like a walking pile of blood and meat.
But what humans found revolting was not these things, but its two faces.
One hypocritical face when dealing with ordinary humans, one enthusiastic face when dealing with human Awakened Ones.
As Gao Liangwei had said, this kind of secondary identity confirmation from an external civilization would make the general public's "Awakened One anxiety" even more severe.
Previously, Han Qiu had used this anxiety to crazily harvest fans, who waved flags and shouted cheers for him.
But now Shi Jingyi had risen abruptly, completely snatching away his "Awakened One" ecological niche.
Mr. Ga, this alien mid-level civilization individual's acknowledgment of Shi Jingyi's status, was more intuitive and useful than Han Qiu saying ten thousand times that he himself was an Awakened One.
So after the contract was signed, the academy had not been quiet for a single moment.
Countless people from inside and outside the academy wanted to visit Shi Jingyi, wanted to talk to her, ask her questions.
Shi Jingyi's original social account, registered the year before last, which had only posted one or two updates in total, also gained tens of millions of followers in just twenty-four hours.
This frenzy had already seriously affected her normal life. The academy had no choice but to announce the closure of the visitor channel, and she no longer received personnel from various organizations.
Officials also called on people not to disturb her work, but the effect was mediocre.
Especially after Han Qiu, having lost a large number of followers, posted a highly aggressive video.
In the video, he directly named Shi Jingyi, his face full of righteous indignation.
"Dean Shi, since you are an Awakened One, I suggest you should, like me, give the public an explanation.
That Mr. Ga from the Star Scar Merchant Group clearly does not take ordinary humans seriously, and the implication between the lines is that other Awakened Ones will also become like it in the future.
So shouldn't you, Dean Shi, state your position to the public, guarantee that you absolutely will not become someone like Mr. Ga, guarantee that you absolutely will not discriminate against the general public, and prioritize the interests of humanity as a whole?
If you do not publicly state your position, it proves that you are the 'Mr. Ga' among humans, deep down feeling superior to others. This kind of Awakened One, we would rather not have!"
Han Qiu's video was less a suggestion than nonsense, carrying a menacing momentum that if Shi Jingyi did not state her position, he would represent the countless masses in revoking her human status.
If it were only him, it would not have stirred up much of a splash, but quite a few of his fans thought the same way, believing Shi Jingyi should publicly state her position, share her thoughts to reassure the public.
This public opinion quickly became turbulent, continuously intensifying in the final days of the rule.
Gao Liangwei had previously told Guan Tong that as long as the public knew Shi Jingyi was an Awakened One, they would be reassured, even if she did not publicly hoist the banner of "never abandoning."
But from the current public opinion, that was not the case at all.
However, unlike Guan Tong's situation at the time, where he was unilaterally attacked, Shi Jingyi, because she had a group of staunch believers, had not seen public opinion become one-sided.
Even though she had not publicly spoken out, these people still trusted her, actively refuting the remarks attacking her.
Amid this entanglement and tug-of-war, the final days of the rule period flashed by in an instant.
At nine in the morning on March 23, following the sound of the Fire Thief's voice, this rule officially ended.
【Congratulations on passing the trial of the twenty-seventh Doomsday Rule】
【Rewards have been distributed to your Storage Box】
【The twenty-eighth Doomsday Rule will be issued in seven days】
Unlike other rules that generally ended completely once the time was up, this time when the rule's time arrived, it did not completely end either.
Given that the Star Scar Merchant Group would develop Cang Star long-term, would establish a liaison station on Tianshui Star, would provide humans with technology according to the contract, and other such matters... this rule would visibly bring long-term impact.
This situation was somewhat like the 【Extraterrestrial Parasitism】 rule back then.
That rule ended when it ended, but the impact brought by the parasitized forms ran through many subsequent rules, causing long-term and virulent sustained damage to humanity as a whole.
Now a one-hundred-year lease on Cang Star was sitting right there. If nothing unexpected happened, the Star Scar Merchant Group would "accompany" humanity through all the remaining Doomsday Rules.
Was this a good thing or a bad thing? Humanity currently could not make a judgment yet. It could only be verified by time.
From the current perspective, although communication with Mr. Ga was not pleasant, humanity believed their side had gained quite a lot from the trade contract.
Setting aside other things, just waiting to obtain and digest the hundred-plus advanced technologies in the trade contract, humanity's overall technological level could take a giant leap upward.
This was very important for humanity's trend of maintaining leapfrog accelerated development.
If humanity wanted to achieve in one year the development speed of thirty or fifty years in the peaceful era, it absolutely had to continuously input advanced technology from the outside.
But technology alone was not enough. There also had to be a matching organizational structure that would not drag things down.
On the next day after this rule ended, March 24.
Beixing, Xisiya, Lury, Manchidon, Heilanja, and Namelica, the six nations, simultaneously announced that in order to truly unite all of humanity, the six nations would formally establish a Joint Government in April.
As for Suroma, before the new government was established, it would temporarily not sit in the Joint Government.
After this heavyweight news was released, its popularity unsurprisingly suppressed all other events.
Many people said that dawn had finally come, that humanity could finally stop its internal friction.
The first Doomsday Rule was issued by the Fire Thief in April 2040. By next month, which was April 2043, exactly three full years would have passed.
Over these three years, how many people had died from the Doomsday Rules, and how many had died from humanity's internal strife?
If this Joint Government could have been established earlier, the current situation might be more optimistic.
For a time, many voices discussing Guan Tong appeared online again, believing that his action of killing Bruce had greatly accelerated this process.
But there were still people who did not approve of his actions, feeling that Suroma's massive population and advanced technology had been lost due to the great explosion, a huge loss to humanity as a whole.
These people believed that if this matter had been handled better, this lose-lose outcome could have been avoided, and humanity could have retained more strength.
Praise or blame, Guan Tong had no time to care about it right now. His current energy was placed on guarding against the Star Scar Merchant Group.