47: Chapter 47 The Deterrent Effect of Turning Off the Lights

Chen Mu leaned against the window; the crowd of protesters outside had already dispersed in the heavy rain.

On the main road, flattened placards and several flagpoles knocked over by the wind remained everywhere.

He switched to the shop page, his gaze falling upon the S-Class Mothership.

[ Cosmic Mothership · S-Class ]

[ Associated Theme: Alien Invasion ]

[ Basic Ability: Can provide energy for soldiers and aircraft, can carry Star-Exterminating weapons. ]

[ Price: 100 million fear value for permanent purchase, 10 million fear value for a one-time rental. ]

[ Weapon System: None ]

[ Defense System: Standard Deflection Shield ]

[ Special Equipment: Stellar Energy Extraction Device ]

Stellar Energy Extraction Device Function: Extracts a massive amount of energy from the surface of the target star; a single extraction can store enough energy for the mothership to operate at full power.

Side Effect: During the extraction process, the radiation intensity of all light wavebands of the target star will be temporarily and significantly reduced.

Recovery Time: Depends on the duration of extraction; for a single mothership, it cannot exceed five minutes of Earth time.

Chen Mu looked at this information, thinking that as expected, it didn't come with any weapons.

After all, some of those weapons were even more expensive than the mothership itself, and they weren't necessarily cost-effective to use. Besides, Chen Mu was also on Blue Star; he couldn't kill himself, could he!

He clicked to purchase it directly and deployed it around the Sun, joining forces with the arriving Cosmic Illusion troops.

[ Current fear value: 32 million ]

After making all these preparations, he took out his phone again and drafted a tweet.

At this moment, his Twitter inbox had already exploded, filled with various expressions of how humanity would not kneel.

Chen Mu disdainfully deleted them all with one click and then sent a new round of tweets.

[ Ambassador of Guga Planet: Residents of Blue Star, greetings. ]

[ Over the past week, I have heard voices from every corner of this planet. You have held up placards, shouted slogans, and expressed your stance in your own way. ]

[ I respect these voices. After all, the reaction each civilization shows when facing the unknown is the most authentic reflection of that civilization. ]

[ I am notifying you of some news: tomorrow at 9:00 AM sharp in the United States, the fleet will conduct a deterrent shielding of the Sun. At that time, solar radiation will be significantly blocked for a duration of three minutes. ]

[ These three minutes have no other meaning; they are simply to let you see clearly that your nuclear bombs, your submarines, your tunnels, your street warfare, and your "striking the enemy halfway across" are worthless in the face of an absolute technological generation gap. ]

[ If, after tomorrow, you continue to waste my time with those clumsy photoshopped videos and street slogans, continue to worship humans who hold guns to others' heads as heroes, and continue to use unanimous opposition in the United Nations to bolster your courage. ]

[ Then the next time, it will be thirty minutes. ]

[ The time after that, it might be three days, three weeks, or three months. ]

[ And the time after that, your sun might never shine again. ]

[ Final friendly reminder: Tomorrow at 9:00 AM, please prepare lighting equipment in advance. ]

[ This is not a joke!!! ]

Within twenty-seven minutes of the tweet being sent, global Twitter servers experienced another massive traffic surge, the largest since Chen Mu began tweeting.

The head of Twitter even splashed out billions of dollars to buy a massive amount of servers in the Middle East just to stabilize the situation.

[ I am a solar physicist. The luminosity of the Sun is approximately 3.828 × 10^26 watts per second. The total energy consumption of human civilization for an entire year is roughly equivalent to the energy released by the Sun in one-millionth of a second. ]

[ If what Chen Mu says is true, then the Guga Planet civilization is at least a Type II civilization, while our Blue Star is a Type 0.7 civilization. ]

[ The technological generation gap between a Type II civilization and a Type 0.7 civilization is not like a Macedonian phalanx versus a machine gun nest; it is like ants versus a bulldozer. ]

[ I don't want to believe this is true. But if the sun really goes dark tomorrow at nine, even if only for three minutes, then all discussions about tunnel warfare and street warfare can stop. In front of a Type II civilization, we have had no military options from the very beginning. ]

[ It's fake, it must be an illusion. Last time it was the alien fleet in the Kuiper Belt, this time it's "blocking the sun." It's the same every time: create a visual effect, send a tweet to scare people, and then wait for our knees to go weak. ]

[ Chen Mu, you got one thing wrong: humans are afraid of the dark, but humans hate it more when others tell them what to be afraid of. ]

[ You want to block the sun? Go ahead. Block it for three minutes, and I'll just sleep for three more minutes. Block it for thirty minutes, and I'll light a candle and eat breakfast. ]

[ You don't actually think we'll kneel just because you turned off the lights, do you? We are human. Our ancestors lived in caves for tens of thousands of years. We are not afraid of the dark! ]

[ I am in Shinjuku's Kabukicho. It is 5:00 AM, and everyone on the street is looking at their phones. People have started carrying mineral water, candles, lighters, batteries, and instant rice home from convenience stores. The shelves at Lawson and 7-11 were empty in five minutes. The clerks said this is the fastest panic-buying speed since they opened; it's even faster than the day of the 311 earthquake. ]

[ No one on the street is shouting slogans. No one is holding up signs. No one is saying "humanity will not kneel" anymore; everyone is just buying supplies. ]

[ To Chen Mu: You turn off your sun. We will hold up our flags. ]

[ You say it will go dark for three minutes tomorrow at nine. Very well. We will raise candles in the darkness. Every candle is a flag, and under every flag stands a person who refuses to kneel. ]

[ You can block the light of a star, but you cannot block the sound of humanity singing in the darkness. ]

[ Tomorrow at nine, Paris. Champs-Élysées. We will be standing there. Turn off the lights. ]

[ I am in Moscow. It is early morning here; my husband hasn't gone to work yet, and the children are eating breakfast. I translated this tweet for them. ]

[ My eldest son asked: "Mom, will the sun come back?" ]

[ I said: "Yes." ]

[ He asked again: "Then what if next time he doesn't let it come back?" ]

[ I didn't know how to answer. ]

[ I lived through the collapse of the Soviet Union. I was eight years old then, and my mother stood in front of an empty shop, not knowing what to feed us. But at that time, at least the sun rose as usual every day; at least the sun did not abandon us. ]

[ But if even the sun can be turned off, then what else is reliable? ]

[ I live in a slum in Rio. There are no streetlights, no running water, no police here. We have long been accustomed to being forgotten by the world. ]

[ Now an alien says he wants to turn off the sun. Do you know what we think? ]

[ We think: "Great, go ahead. After the sun is turned off, the rich districts and the slums will be equally dark. You won't be able to see the road in your luxury car, and I won't have to pay electricity bills in my tin shack. Within three minutes, whether you are a billionaire or a homeless person, there is no difference in the darkness." ]

[ Thank you for the equality you have given us, alien. ]