The dawn was the first to sail into the labyrinth.
The moment the ship's hull touched the logic walls, the surrounding formulas began to reorganize frantically, attempting to lead the fleet toward different forks in the road.
But the light from the three hundred ships remained linked as one.
The Emerald Network spread through the labyrinth, its mirror reflections revealing the essence of every fork;
The Spear of Thunder pierced through the false illusions of optimal solutions; the book emblems of the Hybrid Civilization stamped a veto mark of 'No Thoroughfare' on every evaluation light screen.
And Bai Cheng stood at the bow of the dawn, the structure of the entire labyrinth reflected in her silver eyes.
She could see those teardrops suspended deep within the code.
They were trembling slightly now, as if in resonance.
"Found you," Bai Cheng said softly.
The oath of starlight earrings erupted with unprecedented radiance, a light that penetrated the logic walls like a gentle rope, winding toward those imprisoned starlights in the deepest reaches of the labyrinth.
The very moment the light touched the first tear.
The entire logic labyrinth suddenly went still.
All flowing formulas froze, and all evaluation light screens went dark.
From deep within the labyrinth came a very soft sigh, one that seemed to have been suppressed for three thousand years.
"Finally..."
The voice sounded exhausted, yet carried a sense of liberation.
"Finally, someone is willing to come and listen... to our story."
The walls of the labyrinth began to melt.
It wasn't a collapse, but a flowing like tears.
The pure white logic structure shed its cold outer shell, revealing the mottled, crack-filled base color beneath.
And upon that base color, what was engraved was not some profound mathematical theorem, but—
Lines of handwritten diary entries.
【Experimental Log · Day 1: We created the first testing ground. The Mentor said this is to explore the ultimate form of civilization. I believed him.】
【Year 7: Subject No. ST-774321-Branch-00472 was cleaned up due to excessively high emotional variables. I signed the report. That night, I dreamed of a group of translucent beings singing at the edge of the Star Abyss.】
【Year 342: I began to secretly keep some records that were judged invalid in the database. I know this is a violation, ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ but those lives... they shouldn't be completely forgotten.】
【Year 1700: The Supreme Overseer discovered the records I kept. I was demoted to a Seventh-Sequence Observer, and my permissions were cut by 87%. But I kept a backup of that tear. It was shed by a child before they vanished in the first civilization to be cleaned up. I hid it in the deepest part of the ocean of code.】
【Year 3000: I'm finding it harder and harder to tell who the test subjects really are. Is it us observing them, or is it them, through their way of living, judging us—these ghosts who only know how to calculate?】
The handwriting in the diaries varied, clearly coming from different 'Observers'.
And at the end of every diary entry, a congealed tear stain remained.
The labyrinth dissipated completely.
Ahead of the fleet was no longer a cold logic structure, but a vast sea of stars composed of countless floating diary pages and teardrops.
In the center of the star sea, twelve hazy figures floated.
They were shrouded in a pale blue data halo, their faces indistinct, but each held a heavy experimental log in their hands. The covers of the logs were slowly peeling away, revealing the base color of the handwritten diaries beneath.
The leading figure looked up.
The halo fluctuated slightly, revealing a pale and weary face.
His eyes were pure silver-white without any pupils, but at this moment, that silver-white was reflecting the light of the fleet, reflecting the oath of starlight in Bai Cheng's palm,
And reflecting... that giant mirror woven from the Emerald Network and mirror reflections, mirroring all forgotten lives.
"We are the Observer Group - Seventh Sequence." His voice remained steady, but beneath the exhaustion, something was being suppressed that was about to burst forth. "And the first batch of prisoners... of this three-thousand-year experiment."
He raised his hand, and an emblem appeared in his palm.
That emblem was exactly the same as the one recorded in Abraham's gray light mirror—a heavy book, a longsword of rationality, and a tear suspended in the center.
"The book is the Experimental Compendium, the rules we must obey."
"The sword is the power that enforces the rules, and the supervision hanging over our heads."
"And the tear..."
He paused, his silver-white eyes turning toward the eleven equally weary figures behind him.
"Is the evidence of our guilt... that we secretly kept for ourselves every time we signed a cleanup protocol over these three thousand years."
There was dead silence in the fleet.
Enoch's voice suddenly came from the flagship of the Hybrid Civilization, carrying an uncontrollable tremor: "So the cleanup orders for the fusion experiments back then... you were the ones who signed them?"
The leading figure, codenamed Recorder Seven, nodded slowly.
"I signed them," he said. "Every single one. Because the rules dictate that experimental branches with excessively high emotional variables must be cleaned up promptly to avoid polluting the overall data environment. I calculated that if I didn't sign, I would be formatted by the logic correction program myself."
Behind him, another figure spoke softly: "But we kept memory fragments of all the cleaned-up lives. Hidden in the deep redundancy zones of the database, hidden in the encrypted annotations of the logs, hidden in... every single tear."
"Why?" Bai Cheng asked.
Recorder Seven remained silent for a long time.
He held up the experimental log in his hands, and the pages automatically turned to the final entry.
The date on the diary was three days ago.
The handwriting was so scrawled it was almost illegible:
【Year 3007 · Seventh Star Swirl】
【Variable ST-774321-Ω has begun actively collecting forgotten data】
【The Mirror Abyss fragment network is reconstructing a complete mirror image of history】
【The echoes of the Forgotten Star Abyss have found their home】
【My calculation model shows: following the current trajectory, there is a 0.07% probability that this collection of variables can touch the boundaries of the rules themselves】
【Should I report this data?】
【If reported, the logic supervision program will immediately initiate a full cleanup protocol, and the probability will return to zero】
【If I conceal it...】
【I want to see what kind of flower that 0.07% possibility will bloom into】
The diary ended there.
There was no signature below, only a fresh, not yet congealed tear stain.
Recorder Seven looked up, his silver-white eyes staring directly at Bai Cheng:
"Because for three thousand years, we have been waiting."
"Waiting for a group of true variables, a group of lives not domesticated by rules, a group of souls who dare to question 'on what grounds'."
"To tell us."
The eleven figures behind him all stepped forward at once.
Twelve experimental logs were flipped open simultaneously, and on the last page of each, a similar diary entry was written.
All bore fresh tear stains.
"Tell us," Recorder Seven's voice finally began to tremble, "when the test subjects have learned to read the experimental reports, when those being defined have picked up the pen of definition, when the wrong answers have united into an army."
"How should the story be written from here on?"
The fragments of the logic labyrinth slowly drifted away in the void.
