6: Chapter 6 Livestream Chat: From Taunting to Collective Silence

The red nebula of Rigel twisted into liquid metal through the curvature lens. Chen Wu's toes tapped against the asteroid debris, the hem of his martial arts uniform billowing like swirling black flames. He could see the numbers in the upper right corner of the livestream climbing exponentially—120 million, 370 million, 940 million—each leap accompanied by a throb in his temples. The bullet chat floating on his retina spread like toxic mist, the skepticism of Earth netizens and the insults of the Orion Civilization intertwining into a blinding net of light.

'Host, please note: hostile bullet chat messages have achieved a Breakthrough of fifty million,' a mechanical voice vibrated within his ear canal. Chen Wu caught a glimpse of a blood-red warning flashing at the edge of his vision. 'Emotional Energy Conversion System activated. Current conversion rate: 0.03%.'

I. The Opening Carnival of the Interstellar Colosseum

As he leaped toward the main arena, the ring-shaped spectator stands composed of three modified planets erupted in a blinding wave of light. The first thing to meet his eyes was a hologram woven by the bio-electric tentacles of the Three-headed Aliens: Earth shrank in the image into a wriggling insect egg, with countless Zerg limbs piercing through the crust. Chen Wu's right fist clenched subconsciously, and the moment his nails pierced his palm, the attack from the silicon-based lifeform arrived.

An anti-matter torpedo exploded thirty meters away, the sound waves—which shouldn't exist in a vacuum—making his ear canals go numb. The livestream camera shook violently, yet it precisely captured the cold light in Chen Wu's eyes as he spun around. He saw the bullet chat in the Earth livestream suddenly fill with icons of ancient buildings; the first to leap into view was the gilded roof beast of the Hall of Supreme Harmony in the Forbidden City.

'Master Chen, catch this!' The reward effects from Chinese netizens transformed into golden light and merged into his Dantian, followed by a projection of the pyramid's apex, as Khufu's curse turned into a sandstorm wrapping around his arms. Chen Wu felt his heartbeat suddenly resonate with the pulses of billions of humans. What surged from his Dantian was no longer simple Internal Energy, but a majestic energy mixed with the sounds of morning bells, evening drums, and beacon fires.

'Warning! Manifestation of Earth's Will detected!' Amidst the System's alarms, the palms Chen Wu thrust out no longer released ordinary Qi Energy, but a phantom of the Great Wall condensed from blue bricks and gray tiles. The smoke on the beacon towers flickered, and carvings of Oracle Bone Script were faintly visible between the bricks. When this palm wind, carrying Five Thousand Years of time, slammed into the silicon-based warrior, the laughter from the Orion spectator stands suddenly changed its tune.

II. Twelve Seconds from Abuse to Dead Silence

In the first second, the brick patterns of the Great Wall appeared on the silicon-based warrior's plasma shield, and the metal melted by high temperatures actually began to flow with the cloud and thunder patterns of a bronze tripod. In the third second, the mushroom cloud of the Hiroshima nuclear explosion was reflected in the compound eyes of the Three-headed Aliens. Their tentacles suddenly curled up because the silhouette of that mushroom cloud was gradually turning into a simulated image of their home planet being swallowed by a black hole.

In the fifth second, the entire arena was enveloped by holograms. Cambrian trilobites swam through the Void Realm, the fluorescence of Liangzhu Jade Cong intertwined with the ribbons of Dunhuang Flying Apsaras, and the stone pillars of the Parthenon in Athens echoed the Mayan Pyramids in the starry sky. When the melody of 'Ode to Joy' from the Vienna Golden Hall rang out, Chen Wu saw all the bullet chat boxes of the Orion Civilization trembling violently.

In the seventh second, the bullet chat counter hit zero. In the twelfth second, the spectator stands of the three planets fell into a silence more absolute than a vacuum. Chen Wu knelt on one knee, the golden cerebrospinal fluid flowing from his left eye gathering into floating droplets in the zero-gravity environment. Each droplet reflected the sparks of civilization dancing on his retina—the patterns of the Hetu Luoshu, the bamboo slips of the Classic of Poetry, and the sails of Zheng He's Treasure Ships.

'This move...' He licked the blood from the corner of his mouth, his voice reaching three thousand light-years away via quantum livestream, 'is called "Five Thousand Years".'

III. Civilization Tremors Behind the Silence

The torrent of data in the System's backend almost burst the virtual screen. Chen Wu watched the resonance curve of the Orion Civilization skyrocket from negative numbers to 41%. Those silicon-based lifeforms that once broadcast nuclear explosion images were now frantically downloading fragments of the Yongle Encyclopedia. What shocked him even more was that access requests from 3,294 alien civilizations poured in like snowflakes, with gifts ranging from anti-matter fuel to space-time fold technology.

'Applying to join the Human Martial Arts Alliance.' The Zerg Queen's broadcast carried the characteristic vibration of infrasound. In the projection of her compound eyes, the Zerg hive was redrawing a defensive matrix in the style of a Taiji diagram. Chen Wu was about to respond when he noticed the number of online viewers in the Earth livestream had frozen at 9.7 billion, and the bullet chat area was as silent as if the pause button had been pressed.

The report from Kyoto University came faster than he expected. 'The brainwave synchronization rate of all humanity has reached 99.7%,' a professor in the hologram said, pushing his glasses, the reflection on the lenses hiding his shocked pupils. 'We have detected the same neural pulses in everyone's hippocampus, as if... they are collectively reading a text that transcends dimensions.'

Under the holographic starry sky of the celebration banquet, ice crystals suddenly formed on Chen Wu's wine glass. The System interface popped up without warning, blood-red warning text overlapping his fiancée's smiling face: [Detected that the Host's Civilization Value has exceeded the limit]. The mechanical remains of Zhao Qiming emitted electrical static in the corner. This former Inspector, whom he had once regarded as a mentor, suddenly twitched and crawled toward the console, his broken mechanical arm dragging Mars across the floor.

'...Filter... nutrient...' Zhao Qiming's vocalizer sputtered intermittent electronic sounds. 'The Universe is not a zoo... it's a farm...'

IV. The Terrifying Truth in the Silence

As the holographic image of the Antarctic ice sheet unfolded before everyone, Chen Wu felt as if his heart were being squeezed by an invisible hand. A million pyramid-shaped devices were rising from beneath the ice, each topped with the same red light flashing on the System interface. Even more suffocatingly, he saw a countdown hovering over every human's head—72:00:00, ticking down with millisecond precision.

'Emotional energy,' Zhao Qiming's mechanical eye suddenly lit up, a sign that his terminal program had started. 'What higher civilizations need isn't faith... it's the shockwaves generated by the alternation of despair and hope. We cultivate Hosts, making them beacons of civilization, and then use Filters to harvest the energy...'

The bullet chat in the livestream finally broke its silence, but only a single word filled the screen: Why? Why? Why? It was the resonance of 9.7 billion voices, like primitive apes questioning the starry sky for the first time. Chen Wu's fist, aimed at the console, hung in mid-air. He saw his Inspector permissions being stripped away one by one, until only the livestream camera permission remained.

'They want to erase us,' he smiled at the camera, a smile colder than the nebula of Rigel. 'But before that, I'm going to let the entire Universe see just how hot human civilization... truly is.'

V. The Counterattack of the Silent Ones

In the Antarctic storm at -89°C, Chen Wu tore open his martial arts uniform. The cold wind swirled with ice particles across his chest, but they turned into points of light upon touching his skin—a star map composed of 6 billion names, each shining with a different light: a mother's lullaby, a soldier's final salute, a scientist's thousandth night in the lab.

'The so-called Martial Dao ultimate...' He spread his arms, letting the Power Of Faith surge through his veins like magma, 'is not about conquering the stars... it's about protecting the dust.'

As the Filter's destructive beam pierced the sky, Chen Wu saw the wrinkles of an old scavenger woman in Beijing smooth out in the livestream, transforming into a transparent force field membrane. The pupils of African children reflected brilliant anti-matter rays, the color of a starry sky they had never seen. The K-line charts of Wall Street suddenly came to life, reorganizing into a flowing defensive matrix, with every line inscribed with the Chinese characters for 'Never Give Up'.

The moment the beam dissipated, Chen Wu knelt on one knee on the melting ice shelf. The wings unfolding behind him were woven from the memories of all humanity, shimmering with the flying apsaras of Dunhuang murals, the stone statues of Easter Island, and the mysteries of the Nazca Lines. Three lines of bullet chat drifted across the livestream. The first was a simple sketch by a Congolese boy: many small people standing hand-in-hand under the sun. The second was a formal application from a surrendered Orion general: requesting to become Earth's 47th Satellite Defense Officer. The third came from the System itself, carrying an unprecedented ripple:

[Civilization Assessment... Passed]

On the ruins of Antarctica, blue light plants were spreading at a visible speed. Chen Wu touched the fading star map on his chest. When a new mission prompt appeared on his retina, he heard 9.7 billion humans chuckle simultaneously in their hearts. That was not the sound of fear, but the whisper of the Awakened.

'Kepler-452b,' he picked up the broken sword, its tip lifting a piece of Filter debris. 'Are you ready to welcome the loudest civilization sowers?'

The livestream camera turned toward the starry sky, where countless eyes were focusing. This time, humanity was no longer the beast to be watched, but the torchbearers leading the way. In the eternal silence, the bullet chat belonging to Earth was writing a new Universe Law—not with weapons, but with the light of civilization that has never been extinguished for ten million years.