Chapter 323: Chapter 322: Causes and Consequences

One of the military experts suggested, “Your Highness, for an interstellar civilization that has just stepped into the universe, even the population is very valuable. I still advise against slaughtering their population. A rookie civilization that has developed to this level by its own strength still has quite a bit of potential.”

“This civilization’s populace is usually full of vitality and ambition, making them perfect candidates to become scientists. At most, we can offer them a slightly better treatment.”

“Exactly, exactly, fortunately, this is a rookie civilization; otherwise, they might not have fallen for it! The Ten-thousand-year Worm is quite renowned after all…” The officials around him chatted and laughed merrily.

The scientific research strength of the Badit Civilization itself was not strong; otherwise, they wouldn’t have just barely reached the threshold of a third-level civilization after such a long time, but they had one trump card–cultural brainwashing!

Capturing the populations of other civilizations, it was all about various cultural influences and brainwashing–enticements like the “sweet air of freedom,” “art and elegance,” “the magic power of money,” “work for five hundred years and enjoy a fine life,” and so on. Eventually, they could be manipulated for their use.

The reason they identified humans as a rookie civilization was because human flight paths were too close to the Cosmic String.

Despite human scientists being very cautious and having conducted extensive calculations, they believed that a distance of twenty million kilometers from the Cosmic String was relatively safe.

But how could twenty million kilometers be enough?

At least it should be…

Thirty million kilometers, right?

This was the generally accepted distance among interstellar civilizations.

Don’t underestimate that extra ten million kilometers; that’s the difference between the standard and the wild!

Also, during high-speed travel, infrared radiation was basically unavoidable and could be observed from afar. Thus, a normal fleet could easily light up the path ahead to avoid potential risks.

But this fleet, traveling at high speeds and skulking about, not even turning on its lights, seemed afraid of being discovered…

Thus, through these small clues and a not-so-confident mentality, it could be fairly assessed that this was an inexperienced, rookie civilization!

Of course, this judgment was not accurate.

In just that moment, during two rounds of information exchange, they probed that humans were a rookie civilization.

The first message sent by the humans, “A high-dimensional prison at Eta Carinae has exploded, allowing a multitude of super lifeforms to scatter and escape…”

The Badit Civilization didn’t know anything about this!

Everyone broke out in a cold sweat.

They only knew that a supernova explosion had indeed occurred at Eta Carinae. As for the high-dimensional prison, they had vaguely heard about it, so they were unable to discern whether the information provided by humans was true or false.

In the end, it was Prince Bart who decided, “We are disguised as a Level 6 Amoeba Civilization. How could there be information unknown to the Amoeba Civilization? So… just say we already knew about it!”

“Just take a gamble.”

“If it really doesn’t work out, then abandon the plan!”

Incredibly, they were lucky enough to bluff their way through.

Regarding the second message sent by the humans, “The Negative Energy Network Space construction spaceship of the Noah Civilization has arrived at the Orion Arm. Currently, the construction progress of the Pan-Galaxy network system is at 55.67%.”

Upon seeing this message, the Badit people nearly cried laughing, completely confirming that this civilization was a rookie civilization!

Concerning the Noah Civilization’s god-level project… Negative Energy Network Space, a Superluminal Communication System, isn’t it a well-known fact?!

Oh, right, even the number in the middle was wrong. Can you even use such information for probing and trading?

If under these circumstances, they couldn’t take a huge advantage, it would be a disgrace to their ancestors!

So, having analyzed that humans were a rookie civilization, the Badit Civilization’s spaceship immediately transmitted a massive amount of Ten-thousand-year Worm radio signals to the human fleet. These signals, resembling natural radiation in the universe, were highly likely to be overlooked by the human fleet’s radar under tense situations, allowing the digital virus to enter an incubation period.

To securely pass a few hours of this incubation period, the Badit Civilization pretended to be mysterious and asked for “super-computational computers,” then sent 879G of completely useless large files.

Yes, these 879G of files, Prince Bart proudly believed, were his “stroke of genius,” reaching the pinnacle of cunning and conspiracy.

Just by sending these files, they delayed for a considerable period, providing plenty of time for the lurking Digital Life.

These 879G files were entirely compatibility files that could run on various civilization computers and indeed had no destructive power. Their purpose was to divert all human experts’ attention to these utterly useless files!

Yes, look, I openly sent so much information; are you analyzing it, or are you not?

Even if the communication room’s defense was well-done, a massive number of experts were certainly analyzing what these files were and whether they might pose any security issues.

Humans couldn’t possibly know that their external detection devices had been completely infected and were in the incubation period!

This way, the plan was successful…

Prince Bart watched as the human interstellar fleet began to show a series of disarrays, clearly the result of communication malfunctions.

He couldn’t help but fantasize in his mind about returning triumphantly with this large fleet and receiving the adoration of tens of thousands.

“The other side must still be completely befuddled, haha!” All the Badit people burst into laughter.

Concerning the “Ten-thousand-year Worm,” a Digital Life weapon only producible by a Sixth Level Civilization, it was precious indeed. But it could only produce its greatest effect when the opponent was a rookie civilization; once used, it was just used.

Because the Ten-thousand-year Worm had too great a reputation. It was a product left behind from the interstellar wars fought by high-ranking civilizations a million years ago, still traded in the interstellar trading market. Any conventional civilization aware of this thing would take precautions.

As for why there was such a strange thing, this belonged to the mysteries of a Level 6 Civilization or an even higher-level civilization; from the perspective of a Low-level Civilization, it could only be described as a product of magic.

Just patiently waiting for a while, the spaceship finally traveled near a Cosmic String. Prince Bart gestured grandly, a fanatic smile appearing, “Let’s go, and receive that one… belonging to our fleet!”

“Gentlemen, trigger the gravity of the Cosmic String to accelerate our spaceship…”

…