Easily taking down the Refuge put Feng Jun in a good mood. He had originally intended to build a factory for producing Anti-corpse liquid here, but by a fortunate coincidence, he stumbled upon a Refuge. It seemed he should go out more often when he had time; perhaps there would be some opportunities he could encounter.
With the Refuge's permissions, Feng Jun could completely control this Refuge. The previously broken fusion core had also been repaired by the people Yan Xin brought. In the Refuge's office, Feng Jun talked a lot with the artificial intelligence Ling Jiu. This primary intelligent AI possessed complete logical thinking abilities and could communicate with Feng Jun like a normal human. It could be said that if someone who didn't know Ling Jiu's identity were to interact with her, they wouldn't be able to tell that the person they were communicating with was a virtual projection of an artificial intelligence.
Feng Jun had many curious questions about this world. What he was most concerned about was the whereabouts of the nine interstellar colony ships launched by the former government. Where did these rulers and elites go after abandoning Earth?
However, Ling Jiu could not answer this question. The QD10096 Shelter was sealed after it opened in 2192, and it was not until 2213 that the former governments abandoned Earth and launched the colony ships. Because Refuges completely cut off contact with the outside world after being sealed, Ling Jiu did not know the whereabouts of these colony ships.
“Regarding your question about the colony ships' whereabouts, I apologize, but I cannot answer you, as my information database was only updated until 2192. I am unaware of anything that happened in the outside world after that. However, I can give you some references. Based on the existing data, I can roughly deduce the destinations of these colony ships after they left Earth.” Although she didn't know the exact whereabouts of the colony ships, Ling Jiu still listed a few approximate locations for Feng Jun.
If Earth's habitability index is set to 1, then the closer a star system is to this number, the higher its similarity to Earth and the more habitable its environment. For example, take Earth's neighbors, Venus and Mars. At first glance, Venus appears more like Earth than Mars, but its similarity index is only 0.44. In contrast, Mars is much smaller than Earth and lacks a dense atmosphere, yet its similarity index is surprisingly 0.7. For most exoplanets, especially hot Jupiters very close to their stars and ice giants farther away, their similarity indices are generally below 0.5, making them extremely uninhabitable. Only a small number of rocky planets with moderate temperatures, including ocean planets, are an exception.
Some moons around Jupiter and Saturn in the solar system have similarity indices between 0.5 and 0.7. Currently, almost all planets with an index above 0.7 are exoplanets.
The first is Proxima Centauri b, our closest exoplanet, which has a similarity index of 0.86. It is an exoplanet located within the habitable zone of the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri, approximately 4.2 light-years from Earth, in the constellation Centaurus. The planet's mass is about 1.17 Earth masses, and its orbital period is 11.2 days. Because it is located within the habitable zone.
The second is Teerth C, which has a similarity index of 0.89. Its parent star is an ultra-cold red dwarf, but this planet is close to the habitable zone, 5.9 light-years from Earth. However, there is a fatal problem: this planet is highly likely to be tidally locked to its star, just as the Moon is tidally locked to Earth, so we always only see the Moon's near side. Therefore, for this planet, it is the same: one side always faces the star, and the other is perpetually in darkness.
The third planet is Kelt-95, with a similarity index of 0.85. Its parent star is a Sun-like yellow dwarf, and Kelt-95 is located precisely within the habitable zone, 6.3 light-years from Earth. However, it is worth noting that this planet is 2-3 times the size of Earth and has two moons. Furthermore, its two moons are also similar to habitable planets, with similarity indices of 0.83 and 0.85, respectively.
As for even more distant places, there are some habitable planets, and some even have similarity indices as high as 9.52, already confirmed as habitable planets. However, considering the extremely long distances and current human technology, they are not within Ling Jiu's prediction range.
After reviewing the data provided by Ling Jiu, Feng Jun asked, “Where do you think they are most likely to go?”
“According to my data calculations, the rulers are highly likely to go to Proxima Centauri b and Kelt-95. This is because the trajectories of these two planets are nearly identical. If Proxima Centauri b is not suitable for colonization, the colony ships can still head to the slightly more distant Kelt-95, as there are essentially three Earth-like planets in its habitable zone,” Ling Jiu stated directly. “Of course, they might also split into two groups, with some of the nine colony ships heading in the direction of Teerth C, as putting all your eggs in one basket is not safe.”
After listening to Ling Jiu's explanation, Feng Jun already had a rough decision in his mind. The colony ships were launched in 2213, and their planetary engines were said to be a kind of sub-light warp drive, capable of traveling at speeds infinitely approaching 99% of the speed of light. However, sub-light travel is a very complex concept in modern physics, involving phenomena such as time dilation and length contraction from relativity. Specifically, when an object approaches the speed of light, to a stationary observer, time on that object will slow down; this phenomenon is called time dilation. For example, if a spaceship travels at 99% the speed of light, 2 minutes for the people on the spaceship would feel like approximately 14.18 minutes for an observer on Earth. This effect becomes more and more significant as the speed approaches the speed of light. This means that once the colony ships left Earth and began sub-light travel, their timeline was no longer the same as Earth's, and it was unknown whether other situations would arise during the journey.
“You’re worried they might turn back, aren’t you?” Ling Jiu suddenly said.
Feng Jun was somewhat shocked after hearing that. He was indeed worried about this matter. How should he face those rulers if they returned?
“Tell me,” Feng Jun said, although he was surprised Ling Jiu had seen through his thoughts, he still gestured for her to continue.
“Although I don't know how the colony ships' engines work or what speeds they can achieve, it's impossible for them to have built warp drives or superluminal drives. According to my database simulations, in 2213, humanity could at most build sub-warp drives approaching 90% of the speed of light. Reaching Proxima Centauri b, which is 4.2 light-years away, would likely take nearly 2500 years or even longer. Moreover, since they chose to leave Earth, it's highly unlikely they would turn back. You basically don't need to worry about those rulers returning to cause you trouble. You can safely re-establish order in the wasteland and rebuild the grand light of human civilization. Or, you can be content with the status quo and become a tech warlord in the wasteland,” Ling Jiu said word by word, even mentioning Feng Jun's concerns.
Feng Jun felt much more relaxed after hearing that. As long as those rulers wouldn't turn back, he could steadily develop in this world. But when Ling Jiu called him a “tech warlord,” he couldn't help but laugh.
“That term, ‘tech warlord,’ is that a term humans set for you before the war, or did you make it up yourself?” Feng Jun asked with a smile.
Ling Jiu had been speaking expressionlessly until Feng Jun asked that question, then she clearly paused before saying, “It's a term I conceived myself. After the Refuge closed, I was responsible for overseeing its entire operation. The Quantum Computer needed to perform regular data computations to ensure the activity of its circuits and crystals. I simulated various human survival scenarios after the Doomsday outbreak. Among them, in a zombie world, rulers who controlled technology and large military forces but were not interested in rebuilding the order of the human world could be called tech warlords.”
Feng Jun laughed, “Since there are tech warlords, are there Barbarians or local magnates too? What all did you simulate?”
“There are many specific scenarios. When the Refuge closed, there were no zombies. The zombie Doomsday after the war was just one simulation. There was also an ice age Doomsday caused by war, where global temperatures dropped and the ice age returned. Or a flood Doomsday caused by nuclear war, where all the glaciers at the Earth's poles melted, and floods erupted on the surface. Or even a Doomsday where humanity was completely wiped out, and new species rose up.” Ling Jiu began to list the Doomsday scenarios she had calculated.
Feng Jun was initially quite interested as Ling Jiu described a few, but once the novelty wore off, he started to get a bit bored. At this point, Ling Jiu, who had been rambling on, suddenly stopped her simulated narration.
“Hmm? Why did you stop?” Feng Jun had originally intended to interrupt, but Ling Jiu stopped on her own.
“Based on your facial micro-expressions and pupil size, I determined that you no longer wished for me to continue speaking, so I stopped my narration,” Ling Jiu's face returned to its usual calm expression.
Feng Jun carefully observed Ling Jiu's face, which resembled a classic Eastern maiden: fair skin, bright and expressive eyes, gracefully curved willow eyebrows, all complemented by a bun hairstyle and traditional Hanfu, giving her the unique beauty of a classical girl. However, her expression remained consistently placid, appearing desireless and giving off a sense of serene disinterest.
“I'm curious about your name. Does ‘Ling Jiu’ mean you have eight other sisters?” Feng Jun asked.
Ling Jiu showed no reaction to this question but proceeded to give Feng Jun the answer he sought.
Ling Jiu was her name; her original designation should have been Primary Intelligent Artificial Intelligence Unit 09. She was an artificial intelligence configured by the Imperial Government in a Class A Shelter. Unlike ordinary AI, Primary Intelligent Artificial Intelligence had some restrictions on thinking and learning lifted, allowing her to perform calculations that mimicked human thought. However, there were still restrictions on her computational capacity. This was because, on the Doomsday timeline, the entire world had a unified understanding: all fully simulated artificial intelligence development was prohibited. Even robots had to display robotic characteristics; the distinctions between humans and machines had to be clear.
Originally, Primary Intelligent Artificial Intelligence was also explicitly forbidden, but from 2178, when the initial signs of war appeared, regulation in this area weakened. The government invested more resources into war development. Some private institutions and even powerful scientists began to secretly, and even semi-publicly, research artificial intelligences that were closer to humans.
However, at this time, humanity still had not fully lifted the restrictions on artificial intelligence, so a compromise artificial intelligence was defined: Primary Intelligent Artificial Intelligence. It could imitate human thought processes and emotions, but its computational ability was restricted. This was intended to assist humans in large-scale scientific research or help them pilot large warships in space.