Ye Wenjie, watch my moves closely.

Chapter 14 Contact Symbols

Inside the office, Lei Zhicheng let out a heavy sigh.

After leaving Cheng Lihua, he went to all the places he could, but the Red Coast Base was still undeclassified, so how credible could the information in his hands be?

Ye Wenjie sensed the deep sense of powerlessness in Lei Zhicheng's sigh.

But it's strange.

Hearing that Cheng Lihua did not believe Lei Zhicheng's report, Ye Wenjie did not feel much relief at surviving the ordeal. Instead, she felt some sympathy for Lei Zhicheng's plight.

His behavior was the complete opposite of his previous smooth and diplomatic style.

It's like he's become a completely different person.

"What do we do next?"

Lei Zhicheng's voice came through the crack in the door again, sounding like he was talking to himself, "The resolution on the change of ownership of the base has been drafted into an official document. The Second Artillery Corps is discussing the takeover with the Chinese Academy of Sciences. I don't know where I'll be going next."

"In the future, Red Coast may take on some projects to observe the universe, but without corresponding support from the country, it will probably be disbanded soon."

"Yang Weining?"

"I've already decided where Lao Yang will go."

"People outside are gradually being exonerated. He was removed from his position as chief engineer to protect him. I will write a report to my superiors to ensure he is not affected. He will return to the research institute and continue his academic work. Someone like him is not suited to anything outside of academia; he would be bullied."

"Ask Xiao Ye, Ye Wenjie."

"I've never liked her. She's aloof, doesn't communicate with the outside world, and has a strong sense of individualism. We're a group, and the group comes first."

"It won't be difficult for her to be exonerated and return to a normal life. She just needs to sever ties with her father, Ye Zhetai, just like her mother did back then."

Outside the office, Ye Wenjie's hand was gripping the documents so tightly they were deformed.

Unwilling to listen any longer, she quietly got up and walked out of the Red Coast building.

After Ye Wenjie left, Lei Zhicheng, who was just a door away, stood with his hands behind his back under the red flag, his face serious. "I know that Xiao Ye resents me and hates me. I took advantage of her trust and seized her academic achievements."

Xiao Ye has a genius-level mind, but her background has dragged her down.

Publishing those research findings under her name only harmed her.

When Cheng Lihua arrested her, Lao Yang begged me to protect her. I reported this to my superiors.

Without the Red Coast base, I couldn't protect her.

But without results, I couldn't protect the Red Coast base.

Let's consider it a kind of exchange.

"To be honest, sometimes I even wonder if the rope broke by accident that day."

"I had just finished talking to Ye Wenjie when the base's grounding electrode malfunctioned. The safety rope has monthly inspection records, so why did it have to break on that particular day?"

"I went back to look for the broken rope, but I couldn't find it."

"If Lao Yang hadn't almost died too, I would really suspect that Xiao Ye was the one who did it."

"Sigh, Lao Yang is a taciturn guy, he wouldn't understand even if I explained it to him. Xiao Ye tends to get stuck on things and has a problem with me. We can't see eye to eye either. Everyone else at the base is thinking about how to leave, but only you can listen to these things."

After his trip to the city, Lei Zhicheng became more talkative.

Lei Zhicheng, who should have been wary and distant of Li Youyu, blurted out everything without hesitation.

"You're not a bad guy, are you?"

After venting his frustrations, Lei Zhicheng blurted out a nonsensical curse.

Li Youyu smiled. Cheng Lihua's attack on Political Commissar Lei was more severe than expected.

As the political commissar of a highly classified national defense project, he knew he shouldn't have said so much, but he still did. Now he can only rely on his intuition to find an excuse.

Whether someone is a bad person or not depends on who defines it.

Li Youyu wanted to continue his plan. "Political Commissar Lei, do you know about contact symbol theory?"

"Contact symbol theory?"

Lei Zhicheng thought for a moment, but couldn't recall anything like it. "Never heard of it."

"This idea comes from Bill Matthews, a sociologist at the RAND Corporation in the United States. He argues that contact with extraterrestrial civilizations is merely a symbol or a switch; regardless of its content, it will produce the same effect. If a contact occurs that merely proves the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations without any substantial content—Matthews calls it a meta-contact—its effect can be amplified through the psychological and cultural lens of human groups, exerting a huge and substantial influence on the progress of civilization. Once such contact is monopolized by a certain country or political power, its economic and military significance is beyond imagination."

Li Youyu recited the original text from memory and said, "Political Commissar Lei, please imagine how human civilization would evolve if a meta-contact occurred?"

Meta-contact simply refers to humanity's awareness of the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations.

In fact, Lei Zhicheng was doing just that.

If Cheng Lihua didn't suspect him, then that material about the Trisolaran civilization would be on the leader's table right now, and he would have been the one to facilitate the initial contact between humanity and the Trisolarans.

"Of course, we'll plant red flags all over the world! Humanity will then step completely into that utopian world!"

Lei Zhicheng did not hesitate.

"Political Commissar Lei, this isn't an organizational meeting, so don't be so serious. Be more lively and try to observe from an observer's perspective."

Li Youyu offered a reminder.

"Observer?"

Lei Zhicheng understood the meaning of the word, but he had never thought about it that way.

So he tried to cast aside ideologies and races in his mind, and his thoughts soared into space to observe the evolution on Earth.

In several key countries, he placed himself, Ye Wenjie, Cheng Lihua, and Yang Weining on the list, replacing the will of the state.

The imagined world of red flags has vanished.

Due to differing stances, the meta-contact has evolved into different factions within China.

He saw that the war was still going on, the powerful were getting stronger, the poor and weak were gradually dying out, some countries had already set foot in the solar system, while others were still struggling to make ends meet.

In the end, the world was divided into several superpowers that fought each other.

Even humans in space no longer consider Earth their home...

Lei Zhicheng traced the logic of the evolution of the hypothesis and discovered that the history of civilizations in various countries has been emphasizing one thing: it is impossible for humanity to make contact with extraterrestrial civilizations as a whole.

So, once meta-contact occurs, will humanity experience a situation similar to the anti-Japanese war forty years ago, where "global traitors" emerged?

Lei Zhicheng suddenly woke up from his fantasy, a cold sweat breaking out on his back.

"Matthew's theory may not be correct."

Lei Zhicheng refuted, but his rebuttal was rather weak and feeble.

Trying to treat humanity as a whole is something only the most naive idealists would do.

Lei Zhicheng suddenly felt somewhat relieved that Cheng Lihua had delayed reporting the Three-Body Civilization's findings due to her selfish motives.

"So, you didn't want me to report it before because you had this in mind?"

Li Youyu said, "What we hold in our hands is a fuse that can ignite the world. Ye Wenjie won't tell, I won't tell, and you certainly can't tell."

Li Youyu sat up straight and said with utmost seriousness, "If we want to report this, we can't go through any intermediaries; we can only report it directly to that person, point-to-point."

"Who?"

Lei Zhicheng asked.

"The one who sent you to pick up Ye Wenjie."