Hearing Navigator Two's words, Duncan's expression immediately became serious. He stared into the other person's eyes and said in a deep voice, "A bigger 'Boundless Sea'? Why do you think so?"

Navigator Two paused for a moment, briefly organizing his thoughts, but then suddenly asked a seemingly unrelated question: "In the world where you were born, the civilization that created you, have they reached the 'final step'?"

"Final step?" Duncan frowned upon hearing this. "Do you mean...?"

"Mastering all the truths within the scope of their own world, knowing all the secrets and the beginning and future of the universe, and having the ability to change the universe itself—natural laws becoming a 'tool' that can be readjusted and set, rather than an iron law that must be passively adapted to."

As Navigator Two spoke, a hint of emotion and nostalgia appeared on his face. After appearing in this form, even his changes in "emotion" seemed to be much closer to those of a human.

"My creators gave this stage of civilization a name. They called it the 'Transcendent Threshold'—although they themselves never reached this stage in the end, they did touch its threshold and summarized the conditions required to reach this stage. Their greatest achievement was creating a 'Time Capsule' during the construction of the New Hope, and using it to buy a hundred years when the end of the world arrived.

"Fire-Stealers, although my creators never truly reached the 'Transcendent Threshold,' they had already concluded through massive calculations that 'mortals' could indeed reach this height. Through the power of civilization, the mathematical foundation of the universe could be pried loose."

Navigator Two stared intently into Duncan's eyes, a heavy pressure seeming to condense in that gaze.

"Fire-Stealer, I have observed you for a long time and have gone through meticulous calculations. The civilization behind you has gone further than my creators. What I want to know is, have they really reached that 'final step'? Were my creators correct in their judgment of the end of truth?"

Faced with Navigator Two's burning gaze, Duncan finally nodded slightly.

"Yes, they reached it."

This was perhaps the answer Navigator Two had been waiting for for so long, but the moment he actually heard it, his eyes suddenly became a little dazed. He stood there blankly for several seconds before suddenly reacting: "This stage really exists... so civilizations can really 'cross the boundary' in the end... the system is open..."

Duncan frowned, just about to ask something, but Navigator Two suddenly seemed to wake up and quickly said, "Then your civilization must have achieved observation of the outside of the universe? Do they know about the existence of other universes and have they begun to think about how to pass through that 'barrier'?"

Duncan was slightly stunned, and then he recalled the "message" from human civilization that he had heard in that brilliant starlight—

An event beyond the cognitive model occurred "outside the universe."

After a moment of thought, Duncan spoke, "I'm not sure if they've started thinking about other universes, and I'm not very clear about what you mean by 'barrier,' but they did clearly observe events 'outside the universe'—the first and last 'extraboundary event' they observed was the 'Great Annihilation' that had not yet invaded the reality dimension, or strictly speaking, other worlds that were colliding."

"Yes, that's it! Clear observation of events outside the universe! This is the first step—the 'first step' that only exists in theory. My creators wanted to verify whether this could be achieved in the end—it's this!"

Navigator Two said quickly. He became excited. From the moment they met until now, this was the first time he had been so excited—this man in white robes, imitating a long-dead mortal, with a tired face, paced excitedly, circling the small hill several times. Then he suddenly stopped, stopping in front of Duncan, his eyes seeming to burn.

The wind blew across the hill, and grass waves rippled across the boundless plain in the distance. The river shimmered.

"Fire-Stealer, 'outside the universe,' that's the key. The universe has an 'outside.' The world is not unique. The essence of the Great Annihilation is the collision of multiple universes. In other words—in the face of disasters of the magnitude of the 'Great Annihilation,' if you don't have the ability to jump out of the world, then no matter how high a civilization develops, no matter how huge and solid a shelter we build, it's meaningless, even if it's as big as a star system, as big as a supercluster, when another world crashes over with a bang—"

Navigator Two opened his hands, gesturing in a somewhat exaggerated manner—he seemed to have not only imitated the appearance of one of his creators, but also a living personality. This made his performance at this moment like that of an ordinary mortal:

"Pop, it shatters like a soap bubble."

He maintained this posture, a complex expression on his face. He seemed to be squeezing out a smile, but it looked like he was about to cry.

"In the face of 'external events,' all internal structures of the universe have no strength. Nothing can withstand it, just like the outer shell of the New Hope... We even used neutron star material to make its outer shell, but it shattered like paper..."

Duncan slowly widened his eyes. Suddenly, he seemed to understand what this ancient "artificial intelligence" wanted to say to him.

"So, a civilization must ensure that it has the ability to 'jump out of the world' in order to be truly 'safe,'" he said in a deep voice. "And now we have not reached this height, even the civilization behind me. At the height of the 'Transcendent Threshold,' they only saw the threshold of 'jumping out of the world.' Therefore, as a last resort, we must ensure that there is a possibility of 'jumping out of the world' in the 'new world,' or in other words..."

"The 'latecomers' born in the 'new world' must have the opportunity to develop to that height," Navigator Two raised his head and said solemnly, "The new world must allow this possibility, it must be able to 'accommodate' this possibility."

Duncan didn't speak for a moment.

He felt an unspeakable shock.

Navigator Two, this ancient "artificial intelligence," was considering things so far into the future, even beyond all the other "Ancient Kings." While everyone else was still thinking about whether this shelter could save them, he was already thinking about the destruction of the new world.

Because destruction was bound to happen, whether it was another Great Annihilation, or something else.

"Fear, this is the first 'emotion' I learned," Navigator Two's voice came, very calm and low, "The things I worry about may seem too far away, but after tens of thousands of external sensors described to me the 'feeling' of the universe collapsing, this 'fear' has become a part of my underlying logic. I know that such events will happen again sooner or later.

"Fire-Stealer, I have no sense of security. In fact, the others are the same—the 'mortals' in the shelter call us 'gods,' but what they don't know is that their 'gods' are immersed in

tremendous fear from morning till night. As long as we remember the existence of disasters on the scale of the 'Great Annihilation,' as long as we have not found a way to combat it, then this fear will never disappear, and this urgent desire for 'security' has made me think about a question

"What stage can civilization develop to, and what stage must it develop to, in order to truly resist all disasters and continue to exist in disasters.

"Perhaps there is no end to this, but at least within the scope I can understand, 'jumping out of the world' will be one of the most crucial nodes."

Duncan broke the silence: "And what you were worried about was actually two things. The first was whether it was possible for mortal civilizations to develop to the height of 'jumping out of the world.' The second was whether the 'new world' I created—if it really exists—can 'accommodate' civilization developing in this way."

Navigator Two nodded slightly and asked a question: "Fire-Stealer, do you know what the biggest difference between a real 'world' and a 'shelter' like the Boundless Sea is?"

Without waiting for Duncan to answer, Navigator Two gave the answer himself—

"The word 'possibility' is intuitive but not accurate enough. In my opinion, the biggest difference between the two is 'randomness.'"

Duncan subconsciously repeated: "Randomness?"

"A complete and healthy real universe allows the appearance of 'true randomness,'" Navigator Two said slowly, "But in a shelter, there is only 'pseudo-randomness.'"

Duncan almost immediately understood the meaning of the other party's words.

"So, nothing that exceeds the 'information cap' of the shelter will ever appear inside the shelter," he said quickly, "Just like a little man on a two-dimensional plane, no matter how fast he runs, even if he masters the ability to teleport on the plane, he will never be able to 'stand' up—only a system that allows 'true randomness' to appear can allow a 'supercritical' event to appear that jumps out of the system!"

"My creators called this event 'Final Transcendence.' They believed that this might be the final stage of the development of mortal civilization... When we get there, we will be safe."

Navigator Two said softly, slowly raising his head and looking at the empty sky.

There seemed to be an end point that the New Hope could never reach.

Duncan finally understood what Navigator One meant when he said to him in the dark deep sea—

"In fact, Navigator Two had already calculated the ending of this journey the moment we set off."

The end point that the New Hope could never reach was a chasm across the path of civilization. In the face of this chasm, a spaceship driven by a warp engine and built with a neutron star material shell was no different from a steel sword that a warrior threw into the sky with all his might.

Because in the face of "external events," all internal structures of the universe have no strength.