Silent Ark

Chapter 12: The Amber Era

Day 12, third cave.

Located somewhere in the center of the Sahara Desert, about 400 kilometers from the nearest large human settlement.

When the cave appeared, all living things within a radius of 400 kilometers—some insects, lizards, camels, and more than 3,000 Tuareg herders in a small oasis—simultaneously went into a state of frenzy.

This state of rage is strange; it doesn't resemble anger, because anger always has an object—a specific person or thing, a specific event.

But this rage has no motive; it is purely destructive, deconstructive, and conflict-driven. It's not because I dislike this person and want to fight them, or because I dislike something and want to tear it down. Rather, it's the very act of "wanting to destroy."

The "thing" that is the target of destruction is a dispensable accessory, and there is no pattern to it.

More than 3,000 herders stopped all their purposeful activities—grazing, talking, walking, drinking—within four minutes.

Then they started taking things apart—their own tents, their own clothes, even the stones on the ground, and each other.

They had completely lost their minds; they didn't use any tools to dismantle it.

They were bare-handed; if their nails broke, they used their teeth; if their teeth broke, they banged their heads against them. The pain they should have felt didn't cause them to show any emotion.

There were no cries of pain, only demolition, which lasted for six hours.

Six hours later, all the creatures collapsed at the same time; some were dead, and some were still alive.

Those who didn't die all fell into a deep coma, during which their brainwaves exhibited an unprecedented pattern—not any known sleep waves, coma waves, or epileptic waves—but a uniform, featureless, flat line like white noise.

It's as if all the information structures in their brains have been shattered into uniform powder.

The few awakened individuals who managed to escape also developed the same symptoms at different times after the initial reports.

CERN designation: Sovereign Body-ι.

Internal communication name: Wrath, Tide of Ashes.

The Investiture of the Gods records: The Consuming Tide of Wrath

Godhood: A pure, indiscriminate urge to destroy. It is the roar of the universe's heat death tendency at the level of consciousness. It does not represent righteous anger, but rather the violent energy that remains after logic and communication have been completely severed, capable of disintegrating all things.

Higher Dimension: A crimson storm sweeping across multidimensional space, composed of scorching plasma and the law of fragmentation, leaving behind only a uniform soup of basic particles in its wake.

The thirteenth day, the fourth point.

It is located at the North Pole.

There were no approaching creatures this time, because there was nothing moving within a thousand kilometers of the North Pole—they were not dead or unconscious, they had simply slowed down.

Three days ago, there were still twelve researchers stationed at the research station near the North Pole.

When the fourth hole appeared, they didn't go berserk, they didn't lose consciousness, they didn't laugh—they just slowed down.

First, my movements slowed down, then my thoughts slowed down, then my breathing slowed down, and then my heartbeat slowed down.

However, their perception of "slowness" is also reduced in sync—so they are unaware that they are slowing down.

From their subjective experience, everything was normal.

They are still working, still recording data, and still talking to each other.

But from an external perspective—images recorded by a monitoring drone still above the research station—their movements have slowed to the point where it takes four seconds to complete an action that would normally take one second.

And it continues to slow down.

In the drone's footage, their mouths are moving, but no sound comes out—because the frequency of the sound waves has dropped below the range of human ears and drone microphones.

They continue the act of "living" in an eternal, quiet state, unaware that they have frozen in time.

CERN designation: Sovereign Body-κ.

Internal communication name: Insomnia, the Abyss of Stagnation.

The Investiture of the Gods includes: The Stagnant Abyss

Godhood: The ultimate victory of entropy is the embodiment of heat death. It is not rest, but the complete cessation of all movement, thought, and the desire for evolution. He extinguishes the stars prematurely, and allows civilization to cease its questioning in contentment, ultimately returning to the tranquility of nothingness.

Higher dimensional form: an absolutely dark void in the universe where even time tends to slow infinitely, and any energy or information that enters it will gradually dissipate and be forgotten.

Day 14, fifth hole.

Located deep in the Amazon rainforest of South America.

The moment the hole appeared, the information density within a radius of 200 kilometers began to decrease.

The matter did not disappear.

The trees are still there, the river is still there, and the animals are still there.

But the "information" is decreasing—the texture of leaves becomes blurred, the complexity of their edges decreases, the ripples of the river become simple, with only one circular frequency, birdsong becomes monosyllabic, losing its melodic structure, and even the sound of raindrops falling changes from "pitter-patter" to a uniform "tap-tap-tap-tap-tap"—as if all sounds have been compressed into the same kind.

An awakened individual who entered the area reported that he felt his memories being taken away.

It's not forgetting—forgetting is gradual and selective.

This is a siphon, like a drain being opened, where water flows out evenly and indiscriminately.

He looked at a tree and knew he "should" know it—it should have a name, a category, and memories associated with him—but that information flowed away from his cognitive framework like water.

Three seconds later, the tree in his eyes turned into a "green, three-dimensional, meaningless shape".

Then he himself began to turn into "meaningless shapes".

With the help of friends outside the affected area, he struggled to escape the area when he was about 60% siphoned off.

The siphon stops the moment it exits.

But the lost information was not recovered, and he never remembered what the tree was called.

I will never remember anything before I was three years old, and I will never remember my mother's name.

It wasn't because his memory archives were hidden or "deleted," but because that information was eaten.

What you eat will not come back.

CERN designation: Sovereign Body-λ.

Internal nighttime name: Greed, the Throat of Eternal Hunger.

In the Investiture of the Gods archives: The Ever-Hungry Maw

Godhood: The cancerous law of endless devouring and growth. It represents the instinct of a system losing its balance, expanding infinitely until it collapses. Not only matter, but also knowledge, emotions, and time are all objects of its devouring, but the devouring is only for the sake of devouring itself.

Higher dimensional form: A super black hole existing on the spatial structure, but its event horizon is composed of countless struggling and grasping hands, eternally sucking in everything, and its interior is infinitely compressed, meaningless "possession".