When humanity dug through the universe...
Mars Hartdegen
Chapter One: A Bangkok Encounter
December 2025 — Phnom Penh, Cambodia, by the Mekong River
This is bar street. Don't expect December in Phnom Penh to be cold—quite the opposite, it's the high-temperature dry season. Sophea, hiding in a Circle K enjoying the air conditioning, envied the life in big cities. Unfortunately, Phnom Penh had no subway. Though there were many tall buildings, he still felt it wasn't modern enough.
Just a few days ago, he got his passport. Tonight, he would take an international bus to Bangkok, Thailand.
In the early hours of December 24th, he arrived in Bangkok, exchanged a small amount of baht, and waited for dawn. This was his first time leaving Cambodia.
Thai and Khmer had many similarities, but also many differences—still not mutually intelligible. Luckily, English worked in major cities. Born in 2008, Sophea was handsome—not too tall nor short—he wouldn't hit his head on the subway ceiling, but was still taller than most people on the street.
At 3:30 AM, as expected, the streets were nearly empty. He stepped into a 7-Eleven and grabbed a drink. By chance, he spotted a briefcase. He picked it up and asked the clerk, but no one knew whose it was. He held onto it, waiting for the clerk to check the CCTV so it could be returned to its owner. Inside the briefcase were several sheets of A4 paper filled with mathematical formulas he couldn't understand, and a USB flash drive—Type-C no less, the latest model, which could plug directly into his phone.
When he connected it to his phone, he was shocked. The drive contained a document and a massive file—321 GB in size. Fortunately, his phone had enough storage space, and an unstoppable idea began to take root in his mind.
As you can guess, in just thirty minutes, the entire file was copied to his phone. Though he couldn't open it just yet, he waited quietly for dawn.
At 5:30 AM, a petite woman with two braids and a casual outfit rushed into the store. She was looking for the lost briefcase. After verifying with the clerk, she got it back. But she hadn't noticed the USB drive was still in Sophea's phone. Realizing this, he dashed out, pulled it from his device, and tried to catch up with her.
The woman, with long hair and Bluetooth earphones, hadn't heard him at first. Sophea shouted in English, and only then did she turn around. She looked like a high school student. After a brief exchange, he learned her name was Samnang. After hearing the Latinized spelling, he jokingly nicknamed her "Samsung."
Finally, dawn arrived. This Christmas Eve, there was no snow in either Phnom Penh or Bangkok, but the city began to wake up. Bangkok's subway resumed operation.
The streets filled with commuters. Though the malls wouldn't open until 10 a.m., Sophea didn't mind. The morning heat wasn't too bad. He strolled along the subway line and eventually arrived at Nana Station. Buying a ticket, he boarded a subway train—for the first time in his life.
Chapter Two: Would You Accept This Christmas Gift?
Having experienced many new things, Sophea played around all day until evening. He booked a hotel to rest. Though he hadn't brought a computer, he opened the USB drive on the hotel's computer. He was originally feeling drowsy, but upon opening the file, he instantly sobered up.
"What... kind of sci-fi novel is this?"
Sophea muttered to himself. The file turned out to be a fully independent AI model. When he opened it, he was stunned—it was a full blueprint for a light-speed starship!
He thought, No way—does such technology really exist? Then he reconsidered: If it were fake, why would the data file be so massive? What should he do? So he downloaded other local offline AI models to analyze the document. The results were, again, unbelievable. Sure, AIs in 2025 sometimes made things up or flattered users excessively. But now, many AIs independently arrived at the same conclusion, even after deep analysis!
He wasn't even 18 yet—an age where fear simply doesn't exist. He took this discovery as a kind of cosmic Christmas present. Despite not being religious—and even being criticized by fellow Cambodians for refusing to participate in any religious activity—he found no reason to back away.
The document boldly listed several addresses. These were research facilities developing light-speed starships. The nearest one wasn't in Bangkok, but not far either—it was in Pattaya.
"Then I'll go check it out," Sophea thought.
It was only a two-hour drive or three hours by train. Feeling at ease, he went to sleep.
Early the next morning, Sophea arrived at Bangkok Hua Lamphong Station, the city's central rail hub. He boarded the morning train to Pattaya. Bangkok's meter-gauge trains were of far better quality than Cambodia's. Near noon, he got off at Pattaya Station.
The address listed in the USB data was near Terminal 21, a shopping mall. But how would he get there? That's right—an elevator to a hidden floor, accessible with a specific code, led to 9 floors underground.
Some people are just lucky, and when luck comes, it's unstoppable. After easily entering the code, the elevator took him straight to B9. Was it a creepy, high-security underground research bunker? Yes—but the entire place was lit by daylight-style lighting, a bright and warm yellow mimicking natural sunlight.
As he stepped out of the elevator—alone—he was immediately noticed by the security guards. He was just panicking, unsure how to explain himself, when—once again—luck struck.
The woman he had met at the Nana 7-Eleven in Bangkok was just pressing the button to leave. Sophea urgently called out to her. Though he didn't speak Thai, he yelled something that sounded like "Samsung." Samnang instantly recognized him.
Actually, Samnang was of mixed Thai-Cambodian heritage and could speak Khmer too.
Samnang quickly reopened the elevator doors. She didn't say a word, just grabbed Sophea's hand. The sudden touch made his heart race—he had never been in love before!
Samnang was beautiful. Wearing her work uniform and a badge—though Sophea didn't catch the details—she pulled him back inside. The two security guards didn't say a word. Before they could ask who Sophea was, Samnang had already brought him into the office area.
What followed was like a scene from a sci-fi film. A vast underground space held enormous machinery. Around the lobby were circular pipelines. Sophea guessed these were underground transport tubes used to deliver materials discreetly without using the elevator.
Then Samnang spoke in English:
"Old friend, thanks again. The file I left at the convenience store—it was my latest work and I didn't even have a backup. Without you, it would've been a disaster!"
She looked Sophea up and down, then continued:
"Well, there's no helping it. I bet you looked inside the file, right? Otherwise, how would you have found us? But there's no time to explain. I'm bringing you in. You can tell—we're not the bad guys, right? We're not here to silence you for discovering a secret, right? We're actually looking for volunteers. But time is incredibly short, because…"
Sophea, still wide-eyed at the huge team of researchers and Samnang in uniform, noticed her concerned expression and replied:
"Alright. Mind if I guess what's going on?"
Samnang nodded.
Sophea let his imagination fly:
"You're part of some research institution, studying something secret. But it's not dangerous or evil—otherwise I wouldn't have made it in this easily. You didn't even change the elevator code. You must really believe in what you're doing, right?"
Samnang was visibly moved. He went on:
"I'm guessing some government or international body is against you. So, you're racing against time to finish your project or relocate it. And you need volunteers for an experiment—one that probably isn't even legal yet?"
Samnang nodded again:
"You got it exactly right."
Then she turned to a man operating one of the machines.
"Dad, come here!"
This man was Samnang's father—the lead researcher of the project. The entire program ran on the genius of this father-daughter duo. Other scientists were there for support, but they were the heart of the operation.
At first, the father was furious at his daughter's recklessness. But when he saw that Sophea was young and handsome, much of that anger faded.
Samnang added:
"Dad, this is the person who found my USB drive. Can you talk to him? See if he'd like to come with me."
The three of them sat down at a transparent table—futuristic, yet resembling a café setting—where the entire plan was revealed.
"Yes, now you know everything," said Samnang's father.
"Many global organizations are trying to destroy us. Criminal gangs want to hijack our tech. Both the underworld and the overworld are trouble. This might be our first and last experiment. If it succeeds, at least I'll know my life had meaning as a human."
Sophea finally understood: Samnang and her father were building a light-speed spaceship! Though it could theoretically leave the galaxy, their true goal was to witness the end of the universe. That, they believed, would make this life truly fulfilled. Though the mission could be scaled down—to merely visiting the far future and seeing the culmination of all cosmic civilizations—the end goal remained: uncovering the ultimate truth of the universe.
After Sophea digested all this, Samnang's father added:
"Yes, we don't have much time. Before they confiscate our equipment, our informants estimate we have 12 hours—maybe less—before departure. My daughter and I plan to go. Her mother, also Cambodian like you, passed away years ago. I can't go back in time to save her... so I'll go forward—with my daughter."
Sophea looked around. Most people would assume this was a scam. But he had clearly arrived at an underground research base beneath a shopping mall. Everything was real—unless he was hallucinating, there was no reason to doubt it.
The father smiled gently and said:
"Sigh… I'm just disillusioned. The world is such a mess. I want to see humanity's final destiny—and go there with my daughter. Honestly, I feel guilty. I devoted all my time to research. No normal life. No real fatherly love, or romance. You know why I'm especially happy today?"
Sophea shook his head, then nodded for him to go on.
"Samnang… she's been obsessed with science since she was five. She could recite the names of all planets and moons. But she's never fallen in love—not even once. So when she held your hand and brought you inside, I felt like maybe she finally found a boyfriend. That brought me real peace of mind."
Samnang blushed furiously and shot her dad a look—clearly embarrassed.
Sophea, who had never been in love, stared at her in awe and said to her father:
"You... well, now isn't the time for thank-yous or pleasantries. To put it simply: I'm in."
His heart was pounding like never before.
December 2025—a time of no world wars, but enormous geopolitical tension. Sophea had little hope for the future. Young as he was, he wanted to act on impulse. Looking around at all the futuristic equipment, he could no longer contain his excitement.
Every device was there—even an atomic arranger, which could reorganize atoms to create any organic material. Meat, vegetables—no longer necessary. And no, it wasn't for counterfeiting money. With this, they had everything. Even the CPUs in the lab's computers weren't built with photolithography—they were assembled atom by atom.
Chapter Three: A One-Way Journey
Indeed, with technology like this, there wasn't much they needed to bring. Sophea simply copied some files from his cloud drive and phone. With the ability to rearrange atoms, anything else could be created onboard. There was only one thing they couldn't take with them: time.
Once aboard the ship, there would be no going back. A vessel traveling at light speed moves only into the future. Not even the most advanced technology could allow them to return to the past.
Sophea and Samnang had now tasted the sweetness of love. They sat across from each other, discussing their roles while exchanging smiles, eyes full of affection. Meanwhile, her father, Kwanjai, stared blankly into space. His drifting gaze hinted at something—perhaps his belief that one day, powerful technology would grant all their dreams?
Five Hours Later, Pattaya Beach
Evening on Pattaya Beach was lovely, with plenty of people around. Thanks to their ultra-advanced technology, atoms could be compacted to an incredible degree. Though they couldn't be folded into two-dimensional form, a 1,000-cubic-meter space could be compressed into something the size of a car.
Yes, the three of them rolled what looked like a "small boat" onto the beach. There was even a life preserver hanging on it.
This "boat" was actually a disguised spaceship, which would launch vertically. It wouldn't jump to light speed instantly, but its liftoff was similar to a normal rocket. Once cloaked, it became invisible to radar and the naked eye. On the sand, it would seem to vanish—leaving only a depression where it once sat.
All three boarded the vessel. The interior wasn't massive—it didn't use TARDIS-style spatial compression—but it had everything they needed. Among their gear were several rings. What were those? Antimatter generators—the ship's energy source. Essentially a miniature version of CERN's facility in Switzerland, but billions of times more powerful.
A nearby foreign tourist sunbathing suddenly saw a flash—the "boat" disappeared! All that remained was a deep indentation in the sand, far deeper than a regular boat could've made.
Had he imagined it? There was a pit, but no photo—no evidence at all.
Inside, Kwanjai smiled. His dream was about to come true. Looking out from what now deserved to be called a starship, no longer just a "boat," they could see its real name written on the outer shell:
Doomsday – The Starship of the End of the Universe
Kwanjai gently gave a command. The ship began to expand, gradually enlarging everything inside. All the objects they'd brought had been tightly compressed at the atomic level. Now they returned to normal form.
Within just over ten minutes, they had cleared the atmosphere—without alerting anyone on Earth. No radar had detected them. But just then, military vehicles swarmed Pattaya Beach—far too late. The ship had already escaped Earth's gravity. In a blink, it reached the far side of the Moon, preparing to engage light-speed travel.
Of course, the human body couldn't handle instant acceleration. Full speed would take six months to reach. By this point, the ship's internal space had expanded to 100 square kilometers.
Once the spatial restoration stopped, that was the ship's true size—previously it had only been compressed.
Through the window, it looked like a scene from a computer-generated film. They rapidly passed Earth, then the Moon, and then—nothing exciting. Mars would still take a few more hours. The stars outside remained static. Even at light speed, their movement was imperceptible due to the vast distances.
Looking back at Earth from the porthole, there were no borders visible. No mushroom clouds. They had no idea what had happened after they left.
Inside this flying city, the three wandered freely, as if the entire metropolis belonged to them. Sophea and Samnang no longer held back—they embraced openly, gently touching each other's faces. The phrase "get a husband, forget your dad" seemed to come true in that moment.
After a long time without seeing her father, just as the couple considered using the ship's systems to search for him, an alert flashed:
One of the small vessels has departed from the mothership.
What was going on?
Chapter Four: Love Runs in the Blood
By the time they realized something was wrong, the starship had already left the solar system. To be precise, two weeks had passed. They had just reached the Oort Cloud, the outermost edge of the Sun's gravitational influence—the heliopause.
At first, they assumed that Kwanjai, Samnang's father, was simply giving them space to enjoy their time as a couple. After all, they were aboard an advanced spacecraft—what could possibly go wrong?
That was until they discovered a video file in the system.
After watching it, they fell completely silent. There was no way to undo what had happened.
Kwanjai had always been a man of deep emotion. The real reason he joined this project wasn't a love for cosmic truth or some noble scientific goal. No—his true purpose was to travel to the future in the hope of finding a time machine that could return him to the past... to save his deceased wife.
Yes, he had jumped ship!
A few days ago—according to ship time, which by now had advanced centuries into the future (currently year 2578 on Earth)—the spacecraft had only been traveling for two weeks, but Kwanjai had used one of the escape vessels to return to Earth, arriving in the year 2345. He hoped that by then, humanity would have developed time travel and he might be able to save his wife, who had died from illness long ago.
The video was a personal recording from Kwanjai—a farewell message for Sophea and Samnang. Samnang wept in Sophea's arms. Tears welled in Sophea's eyes too, but he tried to comfort her:
"Look… in our universe, there are no 'living' or 'dead.'
Everyone just exists in their own time, right?
In 2025, before we left, we already knew that by 2225, we'd be considered dead.
But we left, and now your father lives in the 24th century.
Isn't that a kind of life too?
And your mother—she was alive before 2009.
Didn't we learn enough relativity to understand this?
Don't be sad.
They're all still alive—in their own time."
His words offered a bit of comfort, but Samnang was still crying. Sophea continued:
"Honestly, I'm not very optimistic about going back in time either.
I don't know where the parallel universes are.
But… what if your father is right?
What if he does succeed?
Maybe—just maybe—we might also return to the past before the universe ends."
Even though it all felt vague and far-fetched, Samnang was not an ordinary woman. She was a scientific powerhouse, a genius on par with Madame Curie. After letting her emotions run their course, she wiped her tears, took a deep breath, and stepped forward to embrace Sophea from behind.
Sophea turned around and said softly:
"I'm not going to call you Samsung anymore.
I'll call you Eve."
Samnang gave him a playful shove. For the first time, her body language resembled that of an ordinary teenager girl.
Chapter Five: Time-Lapse of the Galaxy
Light speed—too slow?
Even at the speed of light, crossing the Milky Way would still take 100,000 years… at least from the outside perspective. But from inside the ship, if one traveled at exactly 100% light speed, no time would pass at all. Instantaneous.
But what about near light speed? Could they see a time-lapse-like journey through the galaxy?
Unfortunately, no.
Because of the Doppler effect and severe blueshift, all light from the front would compress toward the rear. The human eye wouldn't see anything. However, at 90% of light speed, you might catch a glimpse resembling time-lapse photography.
To see the entire Milky Way in under a minute, you'd need to travel at approximately 0.99999999999999999999982c.
Samnang, the genius scientist, explained patiently to Sophea:
"You won't be able to see it—even with advanced instruments.
Unless we choose to cruise at 0.9 to 0.95c, then some visuals might survive.
Stars would trail across the view, with a slight bluish tint.
The galactic disk would appear compressed, like rippling waves.
Star clusters would blur past us—giving the illusion of motion.
Imagine it like a long-exposure deep space photo out the window."
At this point, their ship was traveling at 25% light speed, and still accelerating.
Sophea sighed lightly:
"To think… we've actually left the galaxy behind, but still can't capture a single good photo without simulation?"
"We can," Samnang said.
"Once we fly far enough above the galactic plane—you know how hard it is to turn around—we could shoot a top-down image from the ship's rear.
But only if we slow down to below 90% light speed.
Otherwise, redshift would wash it all out.
At 50% light speed heading outward, you'd get a fairly clear view—just a little overly red."
"So… should we slow down?" Sophea asked.
Samnang replied while tapping away on her phone calculator:
"Honestly, even I don't know everything. Let's first see what equipment we have onboard.
If we never hit full light speed, and instead stay at 95%, it would still take 9,856 years (ship time) to reach the top of the galaxy—roughly 30,000 light-years away.
Think we'll live that long?"
She looked up and added:
"So yeah. No slowing down. Time matters. But don't be too pessimistic—
We're still accelerating. Let's go explore and see what tech we've got on this ship."
"Right! Maybe we've even got immortality tech onboard!" Sophea said excitedly.
It made sense—if they could rearrange atoms at will, surely eternal life wouldn't be so far-fetched. Especially on a ship destined to witness the end of the universe—surely it must be equipped with that kind of technology.
When Sophea asked the ship's AI, the answer was surprisingly optimistic. They could slow down. From Earth to light speed took one year of acceleration. So decelerating to half light speed, snapping a once-in-a-lifetime photo of the galaxy from above, and then speeding up again—would only take a little extra time.
About one year in total.
"Yes! I have to capture a shot of the Milky Way from above!" Sophea said to Samnang after getting the AI's response.
Samnang nodded. The plan to decelerate and re-accelerate was worth it.
At this moment, the ship was traveling at 55% light speed, climbing above the ecliptic plane.
Curious about "up" and "down" in space?
The Earth's North Pole and the Sun's North Pole are roughly aligned. Although the solar system isn't perfectly flat, it's mostly aligned with the galactic plane—so Earth's "north" is essentially the "top" of the Milky Way.
While accelerating, the two of them shamelessly roamed around the ship. It was like an upgraded, non-humid version of Pattaya—a perfectly replicated city without garbage, mosquitoes, or flies.
One of their final possessions from Earth was the Sony Alpha 1 Mark II, the last top-tier flagship camera they brought with them. Sophea mounted it at the rear of the ship to capture the galactic disk during deceleration and re-acceleration. With a 13mm lens, it would take two years to climb above the galactic plane to that vantage point—about 30,000 light-years away.
So, what did the camera capture?
At first, everything looked normal…
Then came the heavy redshift—colors washed out…
Then, near invisibility…
During deceleration, the galactic disk slowly became visible again—bathed in red hues…
Then, as they accelerated once more, it vanished into distortion again.
Chapter Six: Small Town Life
This was Pattaya 2, a near-perfect recreation—like something straight out of a video game. Cooler than the real Pattaya, more serene, yet complete with familiar landmarks like the Terminal 21 shopping mall. But on this ship, there were only two humans, and they could do whatever they wanted.
The starship itself was enormous—essentially the size of an entire city. When they first rolled it onto the beach disguised as a lifeboat, did all three of them really push it by hand?
Surprisingly, yes.
The antimatter engine had never actually stopped running. The deep depression it left on the beach was just a visual illusion. In truth, the ship had the mass of a small mountain. But due to its advanced mass-manipulation tech, humans couldn't perceive that weight at all.
For example, a 100-kilogram person would feel a loss of just 23 nanograms due to the ship's artificial mass field. The scientific community and world governments were aware of this—but ordinary people hadn't caught on yet.
Aboard the ship—whether you called it the Doomsday or the Pattaya—it could transform into any city they liked. Since the ship could rearrange atoms at will, any kind of shape-shifting was possible. But the couple decided to keep things as they were.
Now, the new Adam and Eve had returned to their favorite pursuits. Not long after, Eve—Samnang—became pregnant.
This ship was basically heaven. Every day brought new discoveries. For Sophea, who wasn't even a scientist, everything he found filled him with childlike joy. As for Samnang—she understood far more. She knew that the pipeline circling the ship, identical to the one in the basement of Terminal 21, was in fact a super collider—the antimatter source for the ship's propulsion.
The ship had already surpassed 90% of the speed of light. The universe outside was no longer visible. By the day Samnang gave birth, they had reached 98% light speed—traveling faster than humanity had ever dreamed possible.
According to the ship's AI simulations, they were now directly above the Milky Way galaxy. But even if they stopped at that moment, a 10mm ultra-wide-angle lens still wouldn't be able to capture the whole thing. They needed to fly even farther to take in the entire galaxy—at least from a "near-naked-eye" perspective. (Of course, image stitching doesn't count.)
And there it was—the blue shoreline, completely empty, yet breathtakingly real. A Pattaya with no people, serene and pristine.
It was paradise.
Chapter Seven: The Unidentified Spaceship
So, were they just supposed to sit back and wait for the universe to evolve?
Now was the era of third-generation stars. Would they travel far enough into the future to witness the fourth, fifth generations… until the end of the universe? The heat death? Would the ship one day be surrounded by aliens after hundreds of billions of years?
Or was the universe simply too vast—far emptier than Earth's remote deserts—that even with many alien civilizations, they'd still never encounter another?
If other travelers weren't moving at their exact speed—even if they were traveling at 98.1% the speed of light compared to their 98%—the relative difference would cause them to flash past each other in an instant. Due to relativity, they wouldn't even see each other clearly.
Sophea talked to Samnang. They had finally become parents—a daughter. The ship's AI systems were currently taking care of the baby. Samnang had the heart of a loving mother, but found it difficult in practice. After spending nearly her entire life as a scientist, she was clueless about the basics of daily life. Back in school, she had hardly any friends—whether at home or in class, she always secretly read science books instead of socializing.
It wasn't that she disliked people—she simply preferred diving into complex theories. Like some guys who love gaming more than dating, she had loved science more than anything.
They had long become accustomed to the view—or lack thereof—outside the ship: endless blackness, like a curtain slowly being drawn back. Nothing new, day after day. In fact, looking through the front-facing porthole was like being blind—just total darkness.
Then suddenly, the ship's warning lights blinked.
A light blip appeared on radar. Another spacecraft was approaching on an almost identical trajectory—traveling at 0.981c, just a hair faster than their 0.98c.
The relative speed difference was only 0.001c, but due to the effects of relativity, it was like a ghost streaking by.
They remained synchronized for less than a second. Gravitational shifts, inertia fluctuations, micro-engine disturbances—all of it caused their paths to diverge almost instantly.
The two ships exited each other's reference frames and began to blur, stretch, collapse—then disappeared into their respective time curtains.
It was a moment of pure special relativity romance—as brief as a quantum leap.
No one had time to wave. And maybe… they would never meet again.
The whole thing was utterly shocking.
Was it a false alarm caused by a system glitch? Or had they really observed another ship? Could it be humans? Was it possible that after Sophea and Samnang left in 2025, humanity had launched other ships and managed to catch up?
Highly unlikely.
They had no galactic-level positioning beacons. At light speed, you couldn't send any data back. Even being tracked was impossible.
Unless… another ship had launched at exactly the same time and trajectory. But even that felt absurd. Their flight path had been jointly decided by Sophea and Samnang. Unless someone could read their minds?
After Sophea told Samnang what he had observed, both of them stood there stunned. If the ship wasn't right behind them—and more advanced than theirs, yet still undetectable—then the only remaining possibility was this: it wasn't human at all.
From this location, there was no possible way to communicate with Earth.
A review of the surveillance system revealed only a single, incredibly blurry frame. You couldn't even make out the shape of the craft. Combined with some telemetry data, the ship's AI managed to generate a rough image—but it could only be taken as a reference.
Unless the other ship had matched their timing exactly, it could not be human.
This strange incident came to an end with no way of tracking or analyzing it further. At near-light speed, it was virtually impossible to visually detect such a tiny vessel—enemy or friend.
Just in case, they decided to alter their flight path.
The Doomsday ship was simply too advanced. Even Samnang, as its lead scientist, didn't understand all of it. After consulting the AI, they learned something new:
They could approach the event horizon of a black hole to slow time itself.
But the ship hadn't suggested it earlier—because it wasn't entirely safe.
Also…
The ship was equipped with a warp drive—capable of faster-than-light travel using space folding. However, activating the warp engine wouldn't freeze time—it would just move them great distances faster. It wouldn't help them reach the future.
"Unbelievable!" they said in unison.
Just then, their baby cried behind them.
After some further study, the AI gave its assessment. Under normal circumstances, they had nothing to worry about. Even if the encounter had been with an alien vessel, it was likely benign. But what if that ship really had followed them—and was truly advanced? Would someone really chase them for tens of thousands of light-years just for fun?
"I don't know if this is a Dark Forest scenario," Sophea said, "but when in doubt, better assume the worst.
Look—do we even have weapons on this ship?"
The AI answered:
"Yes… technically. But not effective.
Only antimatter can be used as a weapon.
And it's too unstable—it would cause catastrophic damage."
Now—what did they name their child?
Having left Earth behind forever, they decided to abandon their surnames. Since this whole detour began with a mission to photograph the Milky Way, they gave their daughter a name worthy of the stars:
Panorama Galaxy — "Galaxy" as her family name, "Panorama" as her given name.
Chapter Eight: The Wall-Touching Mission
Since safety comes first, and nobody had ever truly proven whether the Dark Forest theory was real or not, the best choice was obvious: run.
After reprogramming their flight path, the two decided to activate the warp engine.
And when they checked the specs—they were stunned.
The ship's warp drive could jump 80,000 light-years in a single leap!
So of course…
Yes—they decided to leap all the way to the southern part of the Milky Way, to visit south of the river, but in this case, southern Milky Way, and take a panoramic image of the galaxy from that side too.
But the human desire to explore is endless.
At first, they were focused on moving forward in time. But since no technology could currently determine where the center of the universe was—assuming the universe was even a sphere—it made them wonder:
What if they tried to reach the edge of the universe?
What's out there?
And what lies beyond it?
According to the AI, if the universe was truly a closed spherical structure, its volume would be over 15.6 million times that of the observable universe.
And what AI gave them this figure?
None other than a familiar name:
ChatGPT 4o.
The AI calculated:
Assuming one jump covers 80,000 light-years, it would take approximately 1.44 billion jumps to go from the universe's center to near its edge.
That was only a theoretical estimate, of course. Actual conditions would depend on cosmic expansion, curvature, and countless unknown factors.
So then the question was:
How long between jumps?
The answer: 1 second between each jump.
But even so—could this high-performance starship survive 1.44 billion jumps? Would there even be enough time to compute that many trajectories?
What if they accidentally jumped into a black hole or onto a planet—wouldn't that be instant death?
"That's 16,637.75 days!"
"Even in the most conservative estimate, our universe is at least 15.6 million times larger than the observable part," Samnang said.
"High-performance? Sure—for humans. But for the universe? Our tech is total garbage!"
Behind them, little Panorama burst into giggles.
The two parents could only smile helplessly.
Then, the ship's AI chimed in:
"I don't consider myself outdated.
Sure, what you say is true—it would take a long time, and you might not live that long…
But don't forget, I can rearrange atoms.
That means I can...?"
The AI posed the thought like a question.
Both of them were smart—Sophea answered first:
"You mean… you could lock our atoms in place, suspending our bodies, keeping us from aging or dying?"
Even Samnang was amazed.
Despite a lifetime in science, she hadn't thought of that.
As for the risks? According to the AI, they were virtually zero. It insisted it was powerful enough to pull it off.
"So… are we heading to touch the wall?" Sophea asked, smiling.
Samnang thought for a moment, then raised her fist with flair:
"Touch? No—smash it!"
Then, in full Reagan-mode:
"Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"
Her bold humor made even the AI burst into laughter.
And baby Panorama?
Grinned from ear to ear—though she didn't make a sound.
Chapter Nine: Tearing Down the Cosmic Border Wall
The next day, thanks to the AI's incredible efficiency, there was almost no preparation time needed—they were ready to act. Baby Panorama slept between her parents, waking naturally. In space, a 24-hour day no longer had much meaning. Switching the lights on or off became sunrise and sunset. Even biological rhythms had lost their consistency—blood pressure fluctuated unpredictably, and Samnang's menstrual cycle had slowly faded into irregular spotting.
The three of them entered three stasis pods, preparing for a deep atomic-level freeze that would effectively suspend their bodies. This wasn't cryosleep—it was something far beyond: the atoms of their bodies were slowed to nearly a standstill, not quite absolute zero, but close enough that aging stopped entirely. To put it simply: if your atoms moved a hundred million times slower, your aging would also slow down by a hundred million times.
And so, the Doomsday ship set off on its epic journey to conquer the edge of the universe!
Sure, the ship was high-performance—but how big was the universe, really? Even the AI couldn't know for sure. If the Milky Way was closer to the universe's edge, but they happened to jump in the wrong direction, they'd be wasting double the time.
So how could they detect which direction the universe's edge lay?
Truthfully—there was no way.
Microwave background radiation? Useless.
So the AI made a bold call: it would randomly choose a direction and perform billions of warp jumps, hoping to eventually reach the boundary.
The AI reminded them: based on current models, the true universe could be 15.6 million times larger than the observable universe.
So unless they mentally prepared for the possibility that it could be 156 million times larger, they shouldn't bother trying.
And so, flying just below the speed of light at 99.999%, and jumping again and again using the warp drive, the ship performed over 1.2 billion jumps before the AI noticed something strange.
Ahead, the density of stars had plummeted. Fewer galaxies. Fewer celestial bodies.
And these stars were… different.
Back on Earth, it was once assumed that farther objects were older—simply because their light had taken longer to reach us. But in this zone, the primordial matter from the Big Bang seemed to have settled here directly. These stars were from slower-evolving galactic regions, less developed than our Milky Way.
It was like this:
The first stones tossed onto a riverbank appear "older" than the ones smoothed and polished by years of flowing water.
Those left in the current keep evolving—appearing "younger" in comparison.
And then, disaster struck.
The ship's AI began to fail.
It had never malfunctioned before—but now it was slowing down, like it had insufficient memory. The AI was shocked by its own aging.
Panicked, it initiated emergency defrost for the three humans.
Moments later, they awakened.
10,000 years had passed—ship time.
But outside…
300 billion years had passed.
The AI scanned a nearby star. It was likely a fifth-generation star. The surrounding space was sparse—mostly fourth-gen stars, and very distant traces of third-gen ones. But those were only ancient light echoes—the stars themselves had long since vanished.
The AI confessed that it was struggling, though still functioning at 70% capacity. It then detected something at the five o'clock direction—a region with virtually no matter, and a zero-point field density shockingly low—billions of times emptier than standard vacuum.
Was this the result of the continued expansion of the universe? Was the very structure of the vacuum thinning?
The AI pushed all its remaining processing power to calculate.
Suddenly, a shocking result appeared on-screen.
Everyone—including the baby—was stunned.
Current speed of light: 210,000 km/s
That single line… meant:
The universe had collapsed.
Light was now slower than ever.
No wonder the computer had lagged.
As the universe expanded, the speed of light decreased.
In that moment, they had perhaps become the first humans to disprove Einstein's relativity.
Or rather… the last.
This change didn't affect humanity much—but it did degrade the ship's performance.
Even so, the AI confirmed: if 210,000 km/s was the new light speed, then their current velocity still equaled 100% light speed under new physical laws. Thus, time was still frozen.
And crucially—the warp engine still worked just fine.
The AI detected something one new light-year away—by the updated speed of light—and it looked like there was… nothing.
Could it be the edge of the universe?
The AI ran a curvature analysis using microwave background radiation and redshift data, measuring spacetime deformation.
The result—according to the FLRW metric—confirmed it:
This was the cosmic boundary.
But what was beyond it?
Nobody knew.
The universe itself was still expanding. The boundary continued to stretch. But now that they were here, it wasn't receding faster than light anymore. It could be chased. It could be reached.
This was the moment—the fulfillment of human destiny.
A small unmanned probe was launched from the mothership.
Samnang kissed her baby, embraced Sophea, and went to prep the launch sequence.
Sophea and the AI made final preparations for the touchpoint experiment—attempting to physically contact the edge and analyze its material properties.
But even after the probe launched…
Samnang didn't return.
Instead—she called Sophea over video.
You must never underestimate a scientist's determination.
She had gone herself.
Sophea and the AI had no chance to stop her.
She had cut off AI command access and was now piloting the probe alone, heading straight for the edge of the universe.
Chapter Ten: What Is "Nothing"?
Samnang was about to arrive. Because she had to decelerate, her time no longer synced with the mothership, and video communication was impossible.
Despite this, she couldn't suppress the joy surging within her.
But then, the ship alerted her:
"Unknown matter ahead—exerting repulsive force."
Repulsion?
There had never been a single confirmed case of repulsive force in the known universe!
Could this be a white hole? Or perhaps… a black-colored white hole?
Thankfully, the repulsion wasn't too strong. Given the vastness of the universe and the immensity of its boundary, the total repulsive force might be enormous—greater than a black hole's gravity—but spread across such a vast surface, it became manageable. The antimatter engine could still counter it.
A mechanical arm extended forward.
They were about to touch the shell of the universe.
What lay beyond the shell? Could it really be heaven?
How thick was it?
As the mechanical arm made contact with the "wall," the ship emitted warning alarms. But Samnang chose to continue.
She extended the arm about a kilometer, still no response.
She'd reached the arm's limit.
Eventually, Samnang retracted the arm.
At first, she didn't notice anything strange.
But after reestablishing text communication with the mothership, Sophea noticed something weird:
The mechanical arm wasn't damaged, but the inner surface had turned outward—as if the arm had been turned inside out like a shirt worn backwards.
Because their timelines were desynchronized, Sophea and Samnang could only communicate via text, very inefficiently.
Samnang, however, wasn't deterred. Since the mechanical arm wasn't enough, and as they were just "cosmic travelers" without moral restrictions about what lay beyond, she made a bold decision:
She would fire the antimatter cannon at the wall of the universe!
Sophea was alarmed, confused, grasping at theories—until the AI aboard the mothership revealed something astounding:
The shell of the universe was not made of matter, nor energy—not even dark matter or dark energy.
It was composed of negative matter, with inverted dimensions.
When positive matter came into contact with it, there was no annihilation.
Instead, positive and negative matter would switch roles.
Sophea shuddered and asked:
"Then… if a person touched it…"
The AI replied solemnly:
"Based on existing theory, a human would not survive.
And even if we could technologically 'restore' them afterward, ethically, they might no longer qualify as the same person.
It would be worse than cloning—a complete breakdown of personal identity."
Sophea and the AI urgently sent a message to Samnang:
Stop. Now.
This needs to be studied. Don't go in. It's dangerous.
Beyond the negative matter, the AI theorized, was negative dark matter and negative dark energy.
But Samnang still didn't know any of this.
She merely believed antimatter could neutralize the problem.
After pulling back a safe distance, she fired the antimatter cannon.
"Boom!"—or not really.
There was no sound at all.
Everything was calm.
The breach in the wall measured about 3 kilometers deep—not much, but just enough for a small ship to pass through safely.
Scans detected nothing—literally no known forces or particles.
Even in 2025, human science couldn't detect dark matter or energy. Now, even after 300 billion years, neither the mothership nor the scout ship had any further knowledge.
And yet—the outside of the universe was right in front of her.
Surely this wasn't going to be another Columbus mistake—mistaking a continent for India?
No.
Sophea and the AI were even more certain than Samnang—this was the edge wall of the universe.
Just then, Sophea sent a message to the screen:
"About why the probe's arm came back reversed—
it's because…"
But science is a fire that burns in men and women alike.
Samnang didn't read the message carefully. She didn't even pause.
She simply… went out.
And in that moment, it became literal:
"I'm outside now."
Chapter Eleven: Wall-Smashing Mission
The Doomsday ship rushed after them, carrying Sophea aboard. He took another small craft and set off to chase Samnang, while their baby continued to sleep soundly on the mothership.
According to the surveillance footage from the mothership, Samnang's craft disappeared the moment it exited through the breach. Sophea zoomed in and analyzed the footage frame by frame—and what he saw was… deeply unsettling.
The outside of the universe—was it just too dark?
Couldn't they just switch on some massive lights?
Was it really that simple?
The deeper Sophea examined the footage, the stranger it became.
At the moment the small craft disappeared, it didn't just get darker—it looked as though it had turned transparent. Every atom passing through the cosmic shell seemed to lose opacity, almost as if it became invisible.
What did this mean?
Even the AI had no answer. Sophea, not being a trained scientist, was completely baffled.
Then—nothing at all could be captured by their equipment.
Were the stars too far away to reflect anything?
Could they use intense artificial lighting to illuminate the void?
The mothership activated its external floodlights, an ultra-advanced system. Even though the speed of light had dropped to 210,000 km/s, the light's luminosity rivaled the Sun's surface.
But inside the universe, only planetary atmospheres like Earth's made the sky appear colored. On the Moon, the sky was black.
So—if there was nothing outside to reflect light, even powerful beams would show absolutely nothing.
And that's exactly what happened.
As Sophea's small ship drifted just a few dozen meters from the mothership, communication started to become unstable.
Interference?
Both ships ran emergency diagnostics.
What was causing the disturbance?
The shocking result: even though they were only separated by meters, they were now existing in different time zones.
Sophea moved his ship slightly—left, right, up, down—and the AI detected something astonishing:
You've heard of fluid gradients—where liquid has dense and diluted zones?
Well, near the cosmic wall, it felt like time itself had thinned out.
And when reviewing the video again—the moment Samnang's ship disappeared, the scene blurred and turned transparent—it became clear:
Outside the universe, there wasn't just an absence of light.
Light couldn't exist there at all.
The universe was still expanding. Could they just wait for the expansion to pull the small craft back in?
Unlikely.
The "hole" was too small, and they weren't sure of the small ship's exact position. Even if expansion worked, the outer shell would pose a problem.
What was this shell made of? Negative matter?
It could invert objects—flip them inside out. Material dimensions seemed reversed.
A meter-long rod might come back as negative one meter in length.
If a human underwent that…
How could anyone survive?
"So, is the space outside the universe safe, then?"
Sophea asked the AI.
"If there's nothing strange out there, we should be able to pass through, right?"
"I don't know," the AI replied.
"This is humanity's first time exploring it.
But… the very concept of nothing is terrifying."
After answering, the AI stuttered slightly—perhaps due to temporal desynchronization.
Still, Sophea was determined. He piloted his small craft out to retrieve his wife, scattering a trail of fluorescent powder to mark his return path.
As he moved forward, some of the fluorescent particles touched the negative-matter wall.
At first glance, they didn't change.
They simply stopped—frozen mid-air.
As he approached the breach, the repulsive force returned. But it was weak—Sophea easily passed through.
And then—
Nothing.
Total signal loss.
Again.
Now the mothership's AI panicked.
It shut down all graphical systems to maximize computing power. It crunched everything it had left.
Finally, it arrived at a terrifying conclusion…
Chapter Twelve: What Does "I Don't Have Time" Really Mean?
Outside the universe.
Now this was the true definition of "nothing"—no fields, no quantum fluctuations, and most importantly, no time.
Anything that exited the universe wouldn't be damaged.
But without time, it would be like a paused screenshot—completely frozen, unable to move even slightly.
So how could they move someone back from such a place?
It was more terrifying than a black hole without gravity.
A black hole at least slowed time.
Even being torn apart inside one still meant an end.
But a realm without time—that was eternal torture.
The ship's AI calculated that the cosmic boundary was only about 10 centimeters thick.
According to the surveillance footage, the transition into total darkness and blur occurred across that distance.
If they passed through it quickly, their atoms might not have been damaged.
So—they were likely still alive.
But now, both Samnang and Sophea were trapped in a place with no time.
There was no way to move at all.
After extensive, difficult calculations—despite being limited to 70% capacity—the AI finally proposed a wild idea:
"Bottled Time."
You've heard of bottled air, right?
Well, what if time could be crystallized?
The AI proposed to synthesize time crystals and use a mechanical arm to deliver them to the boundary, spraying time at the edge.
Would it work?
The antimatter engine roared at full speed.
Refining enough time crystals was no easy task.
Four years passed.
Did the expanding universe touch them yet?
Had they collided with negative energy, negative matter, dark negative matter, or dark negative energy?
The AI never stopped working.
Eventually, it had enough crystals and used the atomic assembler to build a long pipe.
It pointed the pipe outward and began spraying time crystals into the void.
Near the edge, the pipe tip brushed against the cosmic wall—and flipped inside out.
But it remained intact.
The time crystals began to exit the universe.
The monitoring feed began to show faint visuals.
Time and light were escaping the universe.
Yes—escaping, not just entering.
They increased output, pouring more time outward.
The camera on the pipe's tip scanned frantically for the lost ships—but without time, light couldn't propagate, so unless time was everywhere, nothing could be seen.
At that moment, time crystals had become "ether."
This method of delivering time via a pipe was almost one-dimensional—but remember: outside the universe, there might not even be dimensions.
If they also needed to export dimensions, then they were truly out of options.
All they could do was wait for the expanding universe to crash into the lost vessels.
But what would happen if dark negative matter and energy collided with them?
No human—or AI—could predict that.
Yes, you guessed it:
Outside the universe, there's no light,
No time,
And even more shockingly—no dimensions.
So how do you transmit time to a place with no time?
How do you send dimensions?
What kind of god-tier civilization could solve that?
Not even the ship's AI had a clue.
No time was already terrifying.
But no dimensions—that was worse than being zero-dimensional.
The only good news was that things from inside the universe could exit.
So as time crystals were sprayed outward, they carried dimensional structure with them.
How?
No one knew.
No theory could explain it.
Did the time and dimension diffuse into the void?
Stay in place?
Accelerate endlessly outward?
Meanwhile, Sophea and Samnang weren't just trapped in a place with no time—
They were in a place with no dimensions,
Unaware of where they were.
Even their consciousness was frozen.
Their physical form had lost all meaning.
But three-dimensional matter remained 3D when exiting.
So the time-spraying pipe went wild.
Ever heard of spraying time?
Or spraying dimensions?
Well, now you have.
Four years passed.
Then three more.
Seven years total.
The AI never gave up.
And the universe kept expanding.
Then, suddenly—boom!
(Just kidding. There was no sound.)
But the surveillance system recorded a strange implosion.
The AI identified it—it was one of the lost ships!
What happened?
It had finally collided with the expanding universe.
But the ship still lacked time and dimensions.
The AI immediately sprayed time at it.
It was Sophea's ship!
His ship had partially imploded.
He quickly suited up and sealed off the damaged zone.
As he studied the situation, he suddenly saw the pipe reaching out to him.
The mothership AI transmitted everything.
Realizing what had happened, he connected to the time-supply pipe, pulled himself back into the universe, and quickly boarded another small craft.
This time, he carried time crystals, and carefully avoided touching the skin of the cosmic wall.
Why?
Because the inner layer was made of negative matter, which could invert positive matter.
And the outer layer was composed of dark negative matter and energy—even more dangerous.
Who knew?
Maybe there was even negative antimatter out there.
Chapter Thirteen: Homecoming
The mothership AI and Sophea began their long journey to search for Samnang.
He was now relying on his physical body, and no one could say how long the search would take—years? Decades? Who knew?
They were still so young when this began: Sophea was just over 17, and Samnang had just turned 18 years and one month.
Now, a small AI aboard the mini model of the ship was taking care of their child, while Sophea remained determined to continue the endless search—maybe for the rest of his life.
And then—
Ten years passed.
At 27 years old, Sophea finally received a signal:
A rescue from the edge of the universe.
Yes, once again, it came in the form of a silent implosion.
Samnang's small craft had been found!
Clutching the pipe like a firefighter, Sophea rushed to retrieve his wife.
Samnang, miraculously, wasn't injured—but she was a total mess.
The implosion had hit her hair, leaving more than half of it destroyed, though her body remained unharmed.
Disheveled but relieved, she listened as Sophea and the AI explained everything that had happened.
She felt overwhelmed with joy—grateful for this powerful love, and honored to have witnessed humanity's greatest secret.
"Life… is just too beautiful."
But… was the universe created by a god?
Well—if so, they'd have to go outside and check for themselves!
It sounded depressing, sure.
A universe over 15.6 million times the size of the observable universe—
Could they fly around its spherical structure?
Forget "until the seas dry up and rocks crumble"—there were no words for how long that would take.
"So… is the universe actually spherical?"
Samnang asked Sophea and the AI.
Neither had a definitive answer.
It probably was.
Even after everything, Samnang's scientist heart refused to let go.
She truly wanted to know.
The ship's AI replied:
"Now things are even trickier.
The speed of light here is only 210,000 km/s.
As the universe expands, the speed of light continues to drop."
Samnang asked again:
"So, outside the universe, where there's nothing—not even dimensions—and light can only move if we carry time crystals with us…
What is the speed of light out there?"
That question—
Stumped the most advanced AI in the universe.
After retrieving data from their earlier experiment—when they had fired light outside the universe—the AI made another shocking discovery:
The speed of light outside the universe… is infinite.
Because outside the universe, there is no time.
And where time doesn't exist, nothing can move.
Not even dimensions.
So if one brings time with them—
Light isn't just fast—
It's limitless.
Sophea's eyes lit up. He had a sudden realization:
"Then I think… the so-called vacuum fields inside the universe—
Maybe they really are some kind of ether.
Some medium.
Just like light slows down in water,
Maybe this ether binds light to time.
In water, light slows—but time isn't affected.
But here, in this universal medium,
When light slows down, it's because time slows down too.
And yet…
When we sprayed time crystals outside the universe—
Light speed became infinite."
Sophea's eyes gleamed with clarity.
Then he said, in Japanese:
"真実はいつも一つ!"
"There is always only one truth!"
"The fake vacuum of the universe…
It must contain some kind of all-pervasive element
That binds light speed and time together!"
Now came their next big plan—
Even the AI was a little scared:
To gather enough time crystals to fuel a small ship
and let it circumnavigate the entire universe,
to measure its shape.
It was practically impossible.
Like a creature the size of a Planck length,
trying to walk around the entire Earth—
while carrying its own lunch.
Chapter Fourteen: Endgame
The bad news: the speed of light had slowed, and the universe, now 300 billion years old, was aging.
But the good news?
It was possible to survive outside the universe.
As long as one carried time crystals, oxygen, and life-support essentials, they could exist.
Out there, the speed of light was infinite—and that meant machines could operate at unlimited speed.
At the tip of the time conduit extending into the outside, the surveillance camera suddenly caught a flash of light.
The AI and the couple were stunned.
This region hadn't been touched by time crystals.
How far away was the flash?
No one knew.
Based on spectral analysis, it was different from anything inside the universe.
No redshift.
No blueshift.
No way to gauge its distance—no dimensions.
And light could only travel if time existed.
So how…?
Was this another Big Bang in a distant universe?
It looked like light—but spectral data showed: it wasn't light at all.
"Oh well… maybe the monitor's broken?" they joked.
Now 28-year-old Sophea, 19-year-old Samnang, and 10-year-old Panorama Galaxy huddled together, looking back toward the universe.
It was time to go home.
The AI asked,
"Aren't we going to the end of the universe anymore?"
The three exchanged smiles.
"That home is long gone," Samnang said.
"Let's find an Earth-like planet… recreate Earth.
I miss 1G gravity."
"The ship already has 1G," Sophea replied.
"But that's simulated, Dad!" their daughter chimed in.
"I want to see where you came from."
"Then we'll build it for you," Sophea smiled at her.
But by now, no telescope—no matter how powerful—could see the Milky Way.
It was gone, merged with Andromeda and countless galaxies over these billions of years.
Sophea pulled out the last photo ever taken of the Milky Way's underside, and the time-lapse footage of them leaving it.
He showed it to his daughter, saying gently:
"Sweetheart, this…
This is where we came from."
Meanwhile, the ship's AI had already launched 15 of 20 scout ships, heading once more toward the edge of the universe, while the main vessel began jumping toward the center.
And the three of them—aboard their ship—lived a life of joyful leaps through space.
The fourth-generation stars waved at them from afar.
Inside one such star, the AI detected a highly concentrated neutron zone, capable of triggering an extreme r-process—a rare and powerful stellar phenomenon.
And so the question remained:
Could the limit of light speed be broken
by removing the fields within the universe's pseudo-vacuum?
Could light speed be decoupled from time?
Then, on the ship's screen, the AI displayed a single line of text—
its own thoughts:
"In this universe, the speed of light is not a true absolute constant.
It is constrained by a stable structure embedded in a pseudo-vacuum background field.
Some theories suggest that the universe exists in a metastable "locked vacuum" state, which determines the current speed of light.
Under extreme conditions—or with the manipulation of an advanced civilization—it may briefly enter an "unlocked vacuum" state.
This could break the speed of light barrier, distort the ratio between space and time, and allow ships to achieve superluminal jumps without violating local physics.
In such a state, even 'zero-time computation' becomes possible, surpassing all traditional processing limits..."
And the three of them?
They left.
This time, to a planet strikingly similar to Earth.
They landed on a beach, with a vast, deep blue ocean stretching out before them.
It looked almost exactly like their old home on Earth—
Pattaya.