At 8:20 in the morning, the Personal Terminal on her wrist began to vibrate right on schedule. Liang Qiao was the first to wake. The first thing she did upon opening her eyes was to press down on Chu Hui's calf that was wrapped around her waist, deftly extricating herself from the embrace that had enveloped her so completely.
Beep beep—
The power-restriction day had ended, and the various cooking appliances in the kitchen began operating right on time. It must have been ingredients Chu Hui had prepared the day before. After washing up and stepping out of the bathroom, Liang Qiao rolled up her sleeves to fetch breakfast.
The room had no real soundproofing to speak of, and she hadn't deliberately softened her movements either. Hearing the noise, Chu Hui opened his sleepy eyes and stared blankly into space for a moment, then drawled out Liang Qiao's name in a lazy, stretched voice.
Liang Qiao didn't answer. As was her habit, she used silence to signal him to continue, but after waiting a good while without hearing the expected response, she had no choice but to set down what she was holding and walk toward the bed.
What's wrong?
Standing not far from the foot of the bed, she asked the question with her eyes. To her surprise, he answered with silence of his own, sitting up on his own accord to take off his sleep shirt.
A thin pullover top. He crossed his hands behind him, pinched the hem, and tugged it upward, his waist and back straightening slightly to reveal an extremely smooth, supple line. His fair skin was gilded with a thin layer of golden light from the sun outside the window.
She watched for a couple of seconds before seeming to remember something. Picking up the shirt draped over the sofa, she walked toward him. Not bothering to wait for him to finish pulling off the one he was wearing, she reached out and took hold of his wrist directly.
"What are you—" The shirt happened to be covering his vision, and both his hands were stuck mid-air. Liang Qiao's fingertip shifted slightly, brushing over his protruding wrist bone. She lowered her head and pressed a kiss somewhere at random.
A featherlight kiss landed on his eye through the fabric. The next second, the grip on his wrist loosened as well. Chu Hui took the opportunity to pull off his sleep shirt, asking with feigned ignorance: "Why'd you kiss me."
Liang Qiao didn't pick up on the flirtatious undertone in his words, simply answering: "Didn't forget."
Their good-morning kiss.
At that, he really couldn't hold back his laugh. He let out a light snort, then raised his bare arms to loop around her neck. Liang Qiao followed his motion and bent her head down, pressing another gentle kiss at the corner of his lips.
Three months of closed-door training, with barely a word exchanged between them—originally Chu Hui hadn't thought he missed her all that much. But now, with her standing right in front of him, he couldn't bear to be apart from her for even a second. Kissing and kissing, his legs habitually hooked around her waist, and he insisted she carry him to the bathroom before he'd wash up.
The two lingered together for a while, and at least managed to finish breakfast and head out before nine—today was December 31, 3795, the day of Langria Federal Academy's class of 3795—that is, their graduation ceremony.
They parted ways at the dormitory entrance, not taking the same mode of transport. Liang Qiao, as usual, walked to the Skyrail station to board the packed Line 2, while Chu Hui drove the new car he'd bought just last month.
A graduation year that came once every five years was nothing short of grand. Many distinguished alumni who had walked these halls would be invited back on this day to bestow insignia upon the graduates, and there would also be many teachers and juniors coming to observe the ceremony. As a result, the Skyrail station was unusually crowded today—a single glance was enough to spot several figures in identical uniforms.
Liang Qiao stepped through the door with the crowd, finding her usual spot against the car wall and standing there in silence, watching the space around her get squeezed away until not a sliver remained.
"Liang Qiao!"
An acquaintance she often ran into at the Skyrail station made her way through the crowd with difficulty and came to stand beside her. The moment she leaned against the door, she started cursing the god-awful morning rush hour with no shortage of resentment. Liang Qiao occasionally offered a response when the woman ended a sentence with a question mark, but it never amounted to more than a "mm" or "yeah."
"The moment I get my first quarterly paycheck, I'm buying a car!"
Pei Qiansu ended her lengthy tirade with that declaration just as the Skyrail arrived smoothly at the station. The two walked off the platform side by side and, together with several others in the same uniform, stepped onto the escalator.
As the highest-level public education and technology inheritance system established alongside the New Federation, Langria Federal Academy's importance to Federation education went without saying. Its graduating year was held once every five years, and graduates needed to pass both their graduation application and final assessment to earn their qualifications—the difficulty of either being on par with hand-building an Air-ship. Otherwise, the Academy's deferral rate wouldn't have remained perpetually high, exceeding the graduation rate by a full three times.
This year, only a little over nine hundred students passed the graduation assessment, ranging in age from sixteen to fifty. The youngest graduate was said to be a female Beta who had completed in just two short years what took ordinary people eight years to finish. Not only did she qualify for the graduation assessment, she also became a member of the 3795th graduating class with the highest overall score.
One could say she was a genius through and through—though in this institution renowned for its rigor, geniuses were hardly in short supply.
…
As the escalator touched down, the distant toll of a bell drifted from straight ahead—the Academy Tower's weekly Monday nine o'clock morning chime. From this position, looking up, one could see the tower's very peak directly.
As the landmark building of Langria Federal Academy, the Academy Tower's surface was clad in alternating layers of deep gray and cold blue structural panels. During periods of insufficient daylight, the materials automatically lowered their reflectivity—like today, in the depths of winter. The entire tower appeared wrapped in cloud shadow, exceptionally magnificent.
"Pei Qiansu! Liang Qiao!" Once through the Academy gates, they ran into even more acquaintances. Yu Yue approached from behind, Shang Xuefan at his side.
The four of them, along with Wei Ting, formed a single combat team. They had been through countless exams of all sizes together since teaming up in their third year—including, naturally, the all-important graduation assessment.
"Where's Wei Ting?" Pei Qiansu greeted the two and asked offhandedly. Yu Yue replied, "Oh, he pulled another all-nighter in the lab last night. He's probably headed over ahead of us by now."
"You're kidding—how many nights in a row has he pulled?"
Yu Yue and Pei Qiansu fell into step together, and Shang Xuefan naturally drifted over to walk beside Liang Qiao, striking up a conversation: "So you went to the Old Third District this time?"
Of the five of them, everyone except Wei Ting was from the School of Security and Risk Studies. Going to the Union Security Agency was a direct match for their specialty, so they had all participated in this round of closed training—they just hadn't been assigned to the same district.
Hearing his question, Liang Qiao gave a soft "mm" without volunteering anything more. Shang Xuefan had to scramble for something else to say: "So how was it—feeling confident?"
"Not bad."
"So that means there is one?" Liang Qiao's "not bad" was practically a sure thing, so Shang Xuefan asked instead, "I heard the environment in the Old Third District isn't great?"
"A little."
That probably meant it was quite bad.
"No wonder you look a bit tired."
This time Liang Qiao slightly raised his eyes and said, "Mm."
Hard to talk to.
Behind them, the other two's conversation had already jumped from Wei Ting to where they'd gather after the ceremony ended, while the two of them combined hadn't exchanged more than ten sentences. Shang Xuefan helplessly curved the corner of her lips and said, "Maybe we'll get to go on missions together in the future."
"Mm."
Shang Xuefan: "…"
The graduation ceremony was held, as in previous years, at the Federation's most renowned Ark Memorial Hall. With over nine hundred people, everyone had an assigned seat. By the time Liang Qiao and the others arrived, the hall was nearly full—a sea of lively, peaceful faces, each wearing the same expression of ease and anticipation.
And of course they should anticipate it—the Ark Memorial Hall at the center of the Academy was opening its doors for them at this very moment, the Federation Twin Towers would shine bright for them day and night for ten straight days, and from the moment the graduation insignia conferral ceremony ended a few hours later, 90% of the Federation government's vacant mid-to-high-level positions would be offered to them first.
Finally, life was no longer endless training and coursework, no longer graduation assessment applications repeatedly rejected, but a bright, bright, bright open road ahead.
The whole world would make way for them—at least today, almost no one would doubt that.
Yet even in the most lively and joyful atmosphere, there were always those who didn't fit in—at least for Pei Qiansu. Noticing the person approaching them from ahead, she abruptly stopped mid-sentence and stepped out from between Liang Qiao and Shang Xuefan.
From the second year onward, the Federation Academy's training model shifted from individual to group, and from then on, whether in cooperation or competition, everything was conducted within these unchangeable groups. The 3795 cohort, along with retained students from previous years, totaled nearly ten thousand people, but 90% of the time, the top scorer on every exam came from either Group 95V01 or Group 95V07. The leader of the former was Pei Qiansu, and the leader of the latter, Sheng Fuzhou, was now standing right in front of them.
If either of the two had been anyone else as team leader, they might have put on a show of greeting each other upon meeting. But of course, it had to be Pei Qiansu and Sheng Fuzhou. Three years of fierce competition had made them find everything about the other insufferable, and the moment they met, sparks were bound to fly. The teachers and classmates who knew them had naturally come to view the two groups as mortal rivals—which, in truth, they were.
Both Alphas exuded an imposing aura, each seemingly determined to overpower the other in sheer presence, and even the chatter of surrounding students quieted considerably. It wasn't until Chu Hui, who had just arrived, walked out from behind Sheng Fuzhou with a yawn, lazily looking at the people across from them, and said, "What's this, picking a fight in the Ark Memorial Hall?"
Pei Qiansu had no friendly expression for anyone in Group Seven and said, "That's not out of the question."
Sheng Fuzhou refused to back down, saying, "Fine then, let's settle the whole score from these past few years."
Chu Hui rolled his eyes, stepped past the crowd from behind Liang Qiao, and said, "Yeah, yeah, yeah—just be careful your training scores get voided after you settle it."
At these words, both of their expressions shifted—they had just finished Union Security Agency training and were already confident in their results, so naturally neither wanted to jeopardize the opportunity over a brawl, but neither was willing to back down in front of the other first. For a moment, neither moved.
"Are all Alphas like this?" Shang Xuefan teased Liang Qiao in a low voice, then reached out to pull Pei Qiansu, saying, "If you want to fight, take it to the training grounds. Fighting in the Memorial Hall is pointless."
Seeing this, the person behind Sheng Fuzhou also reached out in time to hold him back, saying, "It's graduation day today. Don't bother with someone from Group One."
The two groups offered each other face-saving outs, both openly and subtly, and managed to talk the two down. But they still glared at each other with hostility, bumping shoulders hard as they passed, and went to find their seats.
"What a show," Chu Hui said, letting out a merciless snicker as he watched Sheng Fuzhou secretly rub his shoulder. "Thanks for adding a cherry on top of my already good mood."
Sheng Fuzhou shot him a glare and said through gritted teeth, "I'll give her a proper beating sooner or later!"
"I'll make him beg for mercy on his knees sooner or later!" Pei Qiansu clenched his fists hard. "What's he so cocky about? They ranked behind us in the graduation assessment anyway! Not a single likable person in that whole group—one's a hothead, one's a pretty vase, one's a poser, one's a fake, and then there's Sheng Fuzhou, the pure imbecile."
Liang Qiao: "…"
"Don't you think so, Liang Qiao!"
Before Liang Qiao could answer, Wei Ting spoke up weakly from the side: "Actually… Chu Hui probably doesn't count as… a pretty vase…"
He and Chu Hui were both from the School of Power Engineering. Besides teaming up for the assessment, they also shared some overlapping research topics. If Chu Hui counted as a pretty vase, then she'd have to be the most expensive and most useful vase there was.
After he finished speaking, Liang Qiao beside him also gave a soft "mm," but Pei Qiansu didn't pay much attention to that quiet acknowledgment. Instead, he crossed his arms and looked at Wei Ting, who had spoken, saying, "Whose side are you on, exactly?"
"Um…" Wei Ting lowered his head weakly again and said, "Yours."
"That's more like it." Pei Qiansu's emotions came and went quickly—once appeased, he immediately cast the annoying group out of his mind and turned to chat about other things with Wei Ting. Liang Qiao skillfully kept her silence, sitting quietly and listening.
Sigh.
Twenty minutes before the graduation ceremony officially began, the academy's teachers arrived at the Memorial Hall first and took their seats on the outermost ring according to the arranged layout, enclosing all the students in the middle.
Sitting right next to Liang Qiao was Teacher Atari from the School of Safety and Risk Studies. She primarily taught the mandatory third-year courses and had also co-supervised Group One's Extreme Environment Safety Studies with another teacher, so she was fairly familiar with Liang Qiao and the others. She smiled and greeted them, saying, "Today's lecturer is Professor Nate."
The final lesson of the graduation ceremony had been a tradition in Langria for nearly a century, and those who came to teach it were no less than pillars of the New Federation government. Last year's lecturer had been Jiang Changqing, one of the current members of the Federation Parliament—now the director of the Federal Citizen Security Agency.
"Elian Nate?" At the sound of that name, Wei Ting's eyes lit up, and he confirmed with Atari: "Isn't she in the Extraterrestrial Ring City?"
Atali smiled and said, "I heard the principal personally invited her. Besides, she's the chief designer—she doesn't have to go down to the construction site herself."
Elian Nate was the Federation's most renowned engineer, and could well be called one of the most legendary figures of this era. Not only had she been the first to propose the concept of the Extraterrestrial Ring City, she had also truly steered it onto the right track. The Federation Chronicle hailed her as a groundbreaking figure, and a large portion of her followers even believed that she had advanced human civilization single-handedly.
"No wonder there are so many people at this year's graduation ceremony." Pei Qiansu glanced toward the back of the memorial hall. People were packed in, standing and sitting, filling every available space—several times more than in previous years. Clearly, they had all come to see this engineer.
"Professor Nate's fervent followers are only growing in number, especially among engineering students," Atali said with a smile, glancing at Wei Ting before adding gently, "Keep your composure. The professor wouldn't want you all to get too worked up."
But Wei Ting was no longer taking in anything else. His gaze was fixed on the direction of the entrance, and he nodded vigorously. "Mm-hm, mm-hm!"
Already worked up, then.
Elian Nate was past ninety, but she was hale and spirited, with a light and agile bearing. The moment she appeared at the door, thunderous cheers erupted in the memorial hall. No surprise showed on her face—instead, she offered a warm and kindly smile, stepped up to the podium, gave a slight bow, and made a brief introduction of herself.
Liang Qiao watched her quietly.
This woman, who had weathered seventy years of turbulent change and was nearly the same age as the New Federation itself, carried an all-encompassing presence. The way she spread her hands, raised her arm, and spoke was completely different from the frontispiece photograph Liang Qiao had seen in Chu Hui's Introduction to Load-Bearing Limits. It made one involuntarily want to listen to her. She wasted no time on pleasantries and quickly moved into the main topic, writing two characters stroke by stroke on the holographic projection screen—death.
This was today's lesson.
The seated students gradually fell silent.
The enormous characters stood at the edge of the podium in a striking manner, and everyone looked at the scene in surprise, until Elian Nate's figure walked out from between the two characters. With a smile on her face and an unhurried demeanor, she began to speak of a history that everyone knew all too well—
In that year, Earth entered a cross-generational environmental catastrophe. The Granmoth volcanic group, located at the junction of the tectonic plates in the Old Third District of the Americas, erupted in a massive chain reaction in the dead of a silent night. Prolonged pressure buildup and crustal movement released glowing magma and astronomical quantities of greenhouse gases[1], and these enormous volumes of methane, carbon dioxide, and sulfides overwhelmed the natural absorption capacity in a short period, directly altering the composition of the atmosphere[2].
Within just a few years, the global greenhouse effect intensified markedly, and average temperatures underwent an extremely abnormal surge. Excessive evaporation from the ocean surface caused water vapor to accumulate in the troposphere, ultimately forming a sustained and rapid water cycle[3].
Torrential rains first appeared in the low-latitude regions, and no one realized this was only the beginning. For decades, extreme precipitation continued with almost no discernible seasonal interruption. Rivers flooded across the globe, sea levels rose, and city clusters that had been stable throughout history gradually sank. As thermal expansion of the oceans compounded with melting ice, countless coastal civilizations began to disappear as well.
In the merciless deluge, human society experienced, for the first time, large-scale geographical migration in the truest sense of the word.