If a civilization wanted to develop in the long run, it was necessary to leave their home planet. The resources of a planet were limited, and gathering all members of a civilization on one planet was a huge security risk. Therefore, every intelligent race with normal thinking ability had to step into space after completing the technological accumulation on the home planet — or some other field. In short, they had to leave their cradle.
But the Aerymian elves were faced with a desperate predicament: the distance between their cradle and the nearest supply point was enough to make any junior space civilization flinch. With their initial aerospace technology, it was impossible for them to reach there. They could not find a pedal and resource source in their own star system like other civilizations, and then slowly study various aerospace technology with the support of sufficient materials and energy. There was also no way for them to find a small station on Proxima Centauri that they could reach in their lifetime.
If a normal civilization wanted to step into space, unless they were talented enough to research deep space navigation technology and hyperdrive directly on their home planet without making any mistakes, they would have to find a springboard in their own original star system, and use other suitable planets as a foothold to conduct a series of research. The initial accumulation of technology for the FTL engine was accompanied by great danger. Many of the powerful experimental facilities could not be built directly on the mother planet. Moreover, the most primitive FTL engine fuel could only be mined on a large scale in gas giants that were not suitable for survival. Even without these two conditions, there should at least be another sun around the original star system — the distance could not be too far, at least to ensure that the first pioneers could reach it within a generation.
But the Aerymian elves had nothing. They had just rushed out of the gravity circle, and they had to face an insurmountable moat. Unless they had a way to directly develop deep space navigation facilities without any transitional technology, they would be trapped in this barren land tens of millions of light years away.
It was not impossible to directly build a deep space starship with only one home planet, but it required not only talent, but also great luck. The Aerymian elves did not have such good luck. They did not find the right path and exhausted all the non-renewable resources on the planet. Then, they could only face the barren road of tens of millions of light years and slowly wait for death.
The planet began to dry up, the astral resources were extracted, and even the planet itself was reshaped into a more efficient solar floating island. Then, the floating island was slowly reorganized into other forms. This group of elves trapped in the cradle could only use their limited resources to constantly modify and carefully plan for the continuation of their civilization. Their home world was unrecognizable, and more and more overwhelmed. The Aerymian elves, who once thought that they had reached the pinnacle of civilization, were getting weaker day by day. In the end, they could only live with a lonely sun and a floating island that had been reshaped countless times. The population also began to decline under the cruel Resource Restriction Act.
"When I was born, Aerymian had reached the critical point of collapse," Hilda said quietly. "No matter how much we loved our home, resources would continue to be consumed. In a lonely star environment, there is no real sustainable resource circulation system. In the last few hundred years, we even had to find ways to extract energy and materials from the sun. For this, we built a lot of coronal stations. It is a very dangerous facility, costly and not stable enough. The operation of each coronal station requires a huge human and material cost, sometimes even the lives of many excellent magicians. This is just a stop-gap measure. "
Hao Ren looked at Hilda curiously. "So when you realized that you could not build a deep-space spacecraft, you decided to build a portal?"
"Yes, it was a grand plan that my husband came up with when he was still alive. Unfortunately, until he died in a coronal station explosion, we could not build a truly stable super portal that could lead to the depths of the stars." Hilda sighed. "After his death, I spent 30 years building a huge space-time accelerator with all the resources of the country. That thing almost exhausted all the energy accumulated in the three coronal stations over a hundred years. But when it was first activated, it caused a huge accident. I was on the observation tower with the ministers to witness the opening ceremony... and then everything exploded. I don't know how serious the consequences of that thing will be, so now I have to go back as soon as possible. My people must be in a mess, they need someone to calm them down. "
Vivian glanced at Hilda thoughtfully. "I don't know why, but I always feel a kind of sympathy for the Aerymian elves..."
Lily nodded understandingly. "Because they are very poor."
Everyone stared at the heartless husky. Was this the right time to say such things in such a serious occasion?
Y 'zaks smiled and looked around at the others. "Now you know what I meant when I said to the demon hunters, don't you? Resources are precious, and we cannot afford internal friction. When I first came here on the migration ship, I heard an old man say that any civilization in the process of development has a 'fault tolerance'. This fault tolerance is determined by their home resource reserves, the development ability of the race, the home environment and other factors. The higher the resource reserves, the better the surrounding environment of the home world, and the stronger the development ability of the civilization, the higher the fault tolerance, and vice versa. If a civilization wants to develop, it must move to nearby places before the resources of a region are exhausted. For this reason, they must learn to protect the environment to reduce damage, plan the route to avoid going astray, and most importantly, avoid internal friction to prevent waste. The resource reserves and the surrounding environment of the home world are determined by God. People can only decide it themselves. Many races were born in fertile places, rich in resources, and around the planet were abundant resource production areas and springboards. So, they wantonly wasted and used all their resources on civil war. In the end, when they came to their senses, they found that they could not even build the last spaceship to go to Alpha Centauri. Some races were born in desolate and barren places, and they had to be careful with every step they took. In the end, whether they could leave the cradle alive was still unknown. There are many unfair things in the world, but nothing is more unfair than the fate of a race. To be honest, I feel that Earthlings are a bit like well-off prodigal sons. In your solar system, there are large and small springboards like Mars and the Moon, and giant resource stations like Saturn and Jupiter. Every planet around you is filled with fuel and spacecraft shells, and they are all very close. Almost all of them can be reached by spacecraft using the most primitive chemical fuel, but you are busy dropping more bombs on your own people. This is very stupid, as stupid as the bunch of idiots in my hometown. Look at the Aerymian elves, their fault tolerance is even negative... "
Hao Ren looked at Y 'zaks in surprise. It was rare for the big demon to speak in such a long and intense tone. The fierce-looking big guy was usually very amiable and never said much. He vaguely realized that Hilda's story had touched a sensitive point in the big demon's heart, and this may have something to do with the latter's past.
After noticing the strange look on the people around him, Y'zaks waved his hand apologetically. "My words were harsh, please don't mind."
The corner of Vivian's mouth curled up slightly. "No... I think what you said is very good, so good that it should not come from the mouth of a demon."
Y'zaks smiled bitterly and spread out his hands. "You are not the first to say that."
"After coming to the Otherworld, I have thought a lot," Hilda suddenly said after a long silence. "For the first time, I confirmed the existence of other races and even other worlds, and also confirmed many of the conjectures of our scholars. During the two days on Earth, I happened to watch your science program, and knew what your star system is like, and how far you are from the nearest star. It was incredible. We were curious about whether our surrounding environment was normal, but we could not find any reference, so we were not sure whether the Aerymian elves were too stupid or too unlucky to be where they are today. Now I am relieved. Maybe we really should not blame those scholars. "
"Except for special cases, there are very few intelligent races that are really stupid," the MDT suddenly said. "As long as they are enterprising, it is praiseworthy. The rest of them should not be blamed even if they go astray and end up trapped on their home planet, because stepping into the sea of stars is indeed a very difficult task, and a lot of times it depends on luck. Sometimes, a race can't find a way to get rid of gravity, not because they are not diligent or smart enough, but simply not lucky enough. "
A slight buzzing sound came from somewhere in the spaceship.
The virtual image around the bridge brightened again, and a dazzling sun appeared in the corner of the image.
"We have arrived in Aerym," the MDT said.
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