Final Civilization

Chapter 9: The Dark Web

After resolving the money issue, Han Ming studied the black USB drive for a moment, changed into casual clothes, put on a black mask, and headed out.

He took a taxi for over an hour to a village within the city called Meng Village in the suburbs of Qingyang District. He had been here a few years ago to handle a client's lawsuit. The unlicensed internet cafes here only required 30 yuan, and some spirited young guys would help you boot up the computer. There was no surveillance, and you didn't need to use your own ID card to get online.

Inside the black internet cafe, the air was thick with secondhand smoke, filled with the stench of feet and sour odors. A front desk girl wearing fishnet stockings and hot pants led Han Ming to a 'private room'.

If a yellowed cloth curtain could be considered a partition.

"Red Bull is 5 yuan, boxed meal is 20," the non-mainstream girl said to him while chewing gum.

"Not needed, thank you."

The non-mainstream girl rolled her eyes and turned to leave directly. Han Ming looked at the computer, took the black USB drive from his pocket, and plugged it directly into the port.

Soon, several DOS command windows that he couldn't understand popped up on the screen, automatically running code. After about two minutes, a black browser popped up.

The page was very simple, without any decoration, filled with neatly arranged categorized search sections.

Han Ming thought for a moment and directly typed the three characters 'Wallfacer' into it, then clicked search.The search speed was very fast. The retrieval process was no different from what he experienced on his own computer. The only difference was that the search results displayed a large number of unknown foreign websites, in all sorts of languages.

Han Ming searched for over an hour but still found nothing.

The vast majority of the content was also related to *The Three-Body Problem*. A small portion were other literary works using these three characters as codenames or metaphors.

He also tried other keywords that had appeared in his dreams, 「Wallbreaker」「World End」「Infinite Wealth」, and it was the same. Hundreds of thousands of related pieces of information were retrieved, making it impossible to find a trail.

Therefore, Han Ming combined the two different keywords 「Bank Account Infinite Wealth」 + 「Wallfacer」 to search again.

This time, the retrieved results were surprisingly only about a dozen pages.

Han Ming's gaze focused, and his spirits lifted immediately.

Among them, he saw a very special piece of information. Although it was in English, Han Ming's English proficiency was good, and he immediately understood the content.

【Researching the existence theory of the Infinite Vault will effectively help Wallfacers make more precise decisions when facing civilization threats. The Sacred Realm of Science has made a major breakthrough in this field!】

The phrases 'existence theory of the Infinite Vault' clearly were not information from *The Three-Body Problem*. Han Ming realized this might be the information he was looking for, so he directly clicked on that website.

The website was information published by an entity called 【Sacred Realm of Science】 on a hidden forum. The more Han Ming read the content, the more alarmed he became.

Simply put, this content stated that 【Sacred Realm of Science】 was an organization assisting Wallfacers in resisting the end of the world. They had gathered numerous social elites and scientists, mainly researching the 'Infinite Vault' possessed by Wallfacers, to determine what civilization level the civilization destroying Earth had reached, and then how humanity should respond, and other such topics. It all seemed very science fiction.

However, after reading this, Han Ming was simply left with a face full of question marks.

"Shouldn't infinite wealth be a special account led by national power? Why does it still need research?"

"Could it be that the numbers in the bank account are generated by supernatural forces?"

Countless questions rose from his heart. Han Ming copied the organization name 【Sacred Realm of Science】 again and searched for it in the browser. Soon, he followed the trail and found quite a bit of information.

This organization was established in the UK and seemed to have branches in several countries. It was very mysterious because when Han Ming tried to search using his own phone, he found he couldn't find much related information at all.

Han Ming found a website for the Sacred Realm of Science. The homepage featured a row of serious, large characters.

「All humanity unites resolutely by the side of the Wallfacers, defending the miracle of human civilization!」

"All humanity unites..."

Seeing this passage, Han Ming frowned slightly. Some mysterious organizations were already operating and conducting research around Wallfacers, and they hadn't appeared recently.

Looking at it this way, it seemed there was more than one Wallfacer!

He didn't know if there were any Wallfacers within this organization, but Han Ming felt this organization definitely knew about the existence of 「Wallfacers」「Wallbreakers」, and knew about the existence of the end of the world!

Han Ming scrolled down and found that this organization had held some forums in his own country. He couldn't find any contact information or address details. All forum participants were invited by targeted invitation, and they were all upper-class society figures or notable names in the scientific community.

He continued searching dozens more websites but still gained no further harvest. Just then, Han Ming suddenly found a 4-year-old website snapshot in the sedimented pages, also related to the Sacred Realm of Science.

But the difference was, this time, he found a photograph.

The content of the photo was a group photo from a youth forum. There were over twenty people in it, their bearing distinguished and noble, mostly white people. Yet, Han Ming's gaze immediately locked onto the only Asian face among them.

He looked at the screen, his gaze focused, his expression revealing surprise.

Because the girl in that photo, standing at the left edge of the crowd with a smiling face,

was precisely Tao Jie!

Han Ming looked at that face, his gaze somewhat dazed. The time of the photo should have been when Tao Jie was still in the UK. She hadn't encountered the car accident yet, her face radiant with a sunny smile.

At this moment, Han Ming recalled the words Lin Xiaoyi had told him in the morning, and his expression became grave.

His subconscious told him that if Tao Jie was associated with this Sacred Realm of Science, then her question to Lin Xiaoyi about the end of the world was not due to her mental health issues.

Click.

Han Ming took a photo of the picture with his phone, then deleted the search information, removed the USB drive, settled the bill, and left.

On the way back, Han Ming found the new contact information Lin Xiaoyi had given him. After pondering for a moment, he dialed the number.

The phone rang for a long time, but no one answered. When Han Ming called a second time, the other party directly hung up.

It seemed Tao Jie didn't want to answer a stranger's call. Han Ming thought about it, then used this number to search on WeChat. The result was a user with a cartoon avatar, named 「Three-Body Alien」

This didn't seem like Tao Jie's style, but Han Ming didn't dwell on it. He sent a verification message to the other party.

「Tao Jie, it's Han Ming. Do you still remember me?」

The message was sent. He waited a few minutes but got no reply. Deciding to leave it for now, and taking advantage of the fact that it wasn't dark yet, he took a taxi to the 4S dealership, planning to pick up his car.

Han Ming had a C200, bought a few years ago. It drove quite smoothly, so even though his income was decent, he hadn't planned to change to a better car.

For him, a car was just for transportation, including the apartment he lived in now. It basically met the quality of life he desired.

Every month, he would send a sum of money to his parents. Han Ming's family wasn't wealthy but was also not doing poorly. His mother was a retired university teacher, and his father was formerly a railway police officer. The old couple lived a peaceful life in the mountain city. They didn't lack the money Han Ming sent each month but rather hoped he would start a family sooner.

Han Ming picked up the car and used the infinite-amount bank card to pay again. This time the amount was relatively high, but as expected, the payment went through very smoothly.

Sitting in the car, he opened his bank account. The amount hadn't decreased at all.

Clearly, that wasn't an actual balance, but literally infinite!

"Hah... With this much money, work seems to have lost its meaning."

Han Ming gave a bitter laugh. The abnormal wealth didn't excite him. Instead, it was the sense of emptiness from his values facing a destructive disaster.

If Han Ming weren't a person of excellent temperament, if it were someone else, they might have long fallen into madness, letting themselves be consumed by insane desires.

But Han Ming didn't. Another reason was that those bizarre dreams forced him to remain vigilant.

Returning to his apartment, the sky had darkened, and the city's night lights began to glow. Han Ming planned to make a simple dinner, but unexpectedly, Director Qi's call came at this moment.

Han Ming disliked being involved with work on weekends, but he couldn't refuse the 'Cold-Faced Nun'. So, without overthinking, he answered directly.

"Director Qi."

"Attorney Han, I'm sorry to disturb you on the weekend."

"Is something up at the firm?"

"There's a case that requires you to come over, if you have time."

It sounded very polite, but Han Ming knew that if it weren't something particularly important, Qi Rong wouldn't contact him at this time.

So Han Ming responded directly,

"I'll be at the firm in 20 minutes."

...