The Universe Jumper Chapter 02 Part 01
Chapter 02 Part 1/2: The Qin Mausoleum
Jiang Liu rested in a guest room in the Qin Mausoleum. Although no one has visited this place for a long time, the robots managed to keep the place very clean. It was evident that every single detail in the yard was very delicately taken care of. The yard was very quiet; Jiang Liu hadn't slept peacefully for an entire night for a long time. Normally, he relied on drinking large amounts of alcohol to sleep, but to his surprise, he slept well that night.
The next day, it rained early in the morning, and after the rain ended, the sky turned blue and the clouds were faint. For autumn in the northwest, a cold day preceded a session of rain. Jiang Liu flew over here from the tropics, and he didn’t have any winter clothes. As soon as he opened the door in the morning, the cold air forced him to retreat back into his room. A food trolley also entered through the door along with the cold air. The trolley was knee height and it was designed to look like the copper horse carriages in the Qin Mausoleum. A black-lacquered box was on the trolley.
Jiang Liu opened the lid of the black-lacquered box, and he found that there were a few breakfast items, a bowl of noodle soup, and a few pieces of cut fruit. He was secretly delighted by this--- he knew that Yun Fan appeared tough on the surface but was soft at heart.
After eating breakfast, he went to the main hall in the museum and he pressed a copper-coloured button on the wall. Yesterday, Yun Fan told him that this was a call button connected to her office.
At this moment, Jiang Liu heard footsteps behind him. Although the footsteps were still far away, he could tell that the steps were taken with determination and power. It was obvious that the footsteps belonged to a man. Jiang Liu turned around instinctively, with his body slightly angled--- this was the most instinctive defensive posture.
He saw a thin, tall man climbing the steps in the museum. The man wore a pair of gold-framed glasses, a black button-up shirt and black pants, and his expression was stern but handsome. When the two of them saw each other, both of them were taken slightly aback. After hesitating for two to three seconds, they spoke at almost the same time, "You are?——"
"I'm looking for Yun Fan." Qi Fei said first.
"What are you looking for her for?" Jiang Liu asked.
"Who are you?" Qi Fei asked back, "Are you also here to look for her?"
"I am... I am her agent. You can talk to me instead." Jiang Wei smiled.
Qi Fei frowned and looked at Jiang Liu, who also looked back into his stare while maintaining a frivolous smile. Within the span of a few seconds, it looked like three or four rounds of intense fighting commenced in their eyes. Both of them then heard the sound of light steps on the floor and they turned around at the same time.
"Jiang Liu," Yun Fan walked to the front of them, stood still and said, "If you keep sprouting out nonsense, I won't let you stay here anymore."
Jiang Liu smiled and looked at Yun Fan and said, "Okay, I’ll listen to you. I won't say that I’m your agent. We’re living together already, so identity is not important."
Yun Fan stared at him fiercely and said, "I found out that your family’s plane is parked at the airport. If you dare to talk nonsense again, I will ask my friends at the airport to help me contact your Uncle Bo in just a moment.
"Okay, okay, I won’t, I won’t." Jiang Liu waved his hand.
He clearly saw that during the time when these fews words were exchanged between himself and Yun Fan, the facial expression of the man dressed in black changed several times like the different phases of the moon. Several thoughts passed through Jiang Liu’s mind. This man and Yun Fan must know each other. If his guess was correct, then there must be something between the two of them. He secretly lifted up his hand, and used the microcamera on his ring to take a picture of Qi Fei. He rotated the ring to get the virtual assistant to search up information about Qi Fei. Within the few seconds of his conversation with Yun Fan, Qi Fei also did the same thing, but with his glasses by tapping the temple of his glasses twice with two of his fingers. Qi Fei thought that Jiang Liu hadn't seen it, but Jiang Liu saw it clearly. Jiang Liu knew that Qi Fei also saw his movement.
"What are you here for?" Yun Fan asked Qi Fei.
"I have something to ask you." Qi Fei glanced at Jiang Liu, "but I need to talk to you alone."
Jiang Liu smiled and said, "What a coincidence, Fan’fan, I also have something to talk to you about alone."
Qi Fei briefly sneered and then said, "Did no one ever teach you that it's impolite to randomly interrupt when others are talking?"
Jiang Liu was still smiling, and he said, "Did no one ever teach you that it’s impolite to criticize other people’s actions?"
Yun Fan interrupted them and said, "You two, whoever has something to say, follow me to my office."
Yun Fan turned around after speaking. Jiang Liu was the first to follow after Yun Fan, but just after taking two steps, he felt a heavy force pushing down on him and dragged him for a few steps. He stretched out his left hand to block, but Qi Fei withdrew his hand from Jiang Liu’s shoulder. He changed his tactic into grappling and tried to restrain Jiang Liu’s left arm. Jiang Liu dropped down his left hand, and at the moment when he made contact with Qi Fei, he drew an arc with his hand and pushed down with his open palm. This allowed him to redirect Qi Fei's grapple and then attack his rib area. Qi Fei ducked sideways. After probing each other’s moves, both of them had an understanding of each other’s close combat abilities and that they had encountered a powerful opponent. When Yun Fan turned around, she didn’t see anything. All she saw was them following behind her with one person on the left and the other on the right, and they were looking at each other cautiously.
In the office, Yun Fan brewed a small cup of green tea for each of them. The first two batches were discarded and the third batch, which was clear and light, was served. Both of the tea cups were brown--- she treated them equally.
"Which one of you will speak first?" Yun Fan asked. Seeing that neither of them spoke, she added another sentence, "No way will either of you talk to me alone. We will talk right here. If you want to speak, then speak. If not, then that’s fine too."
Jiang Liu glanced at Qi Fei, and Qi Fei also looked at Jiang Liu.
"I’ll go first then," Jiang Liu said, "I did a new noise reduction and filtering process on the ultra-low frequency signal last night. The traces are clearer, and now I can see the complete outline of its outer appearance. The time I estimated before is basically reasonable. The next step depends on what you want to do."
Yun Fan thought for a moment, "Do you have a way to initiate communication?"
Jiang Liu said, "Not sure, I’ll have to try. If you go to a place with me, we can figure it out on site."
"To where?"
"Don’t worry about that just now. I’m only going to tell you that we can try it there."
"Let me think about it first." Yun Fan bit her lip, "If—"
Qi Fei suddenly interrupted her, "No ‘ifs’. I won't allow it."
Yun Fan’s eyes slightly widened and she looked at him. From the moment Qi Fei arrived, Yun Fan became abnormally serious. From the very beginning until now, she never looked directly at Qi Fei in the eyes. However, when she was walking or looking through her documents with her head lowered, it seemed like she was constantly paying attention to every single move that Qi Fei made. When the side of her face was towards Qi Fei, the side close to Qi Fei was extremely stiff; it was as if beside her was a wall that she didn’t want to confront. Regardless of how obtuse Jiang Liu could be, he was still able to detect this kind of stiff atmosphere. However, at this moment, after Qi Fei said these words, Yun Fan looked at him with surprise for the first time. It was as if a faint crack had appeared in the air, and behind the crack was a flood of emotions that was about to gush out. At that moment, it seemed to freeze, but it also seemed to want to make an appearance.
Qi Fei seemed to realize the blunder he just made, and he retracted his strong tone from earlier and said, "I am here to investigate the matter regarding Qin Mausoleum signal transmission and reception. I have an investigation letter from the Alliance. Without my approval, no one is allowed to leave this yard."
"What signal transmission and reception?" Jiang Liu asked.
"According to reliable information source monitoring" Qi Fei said solemnly, "Qin Mausoleum has been emitting ultra-low frequency electromagnetic signals recently, and the intensity has been increasing. We have reason to suspect that there is illegal equipment here used for engaging with external communication."
"There’s also ultra-low frequency signals here?" Jiang Liu was the most surprised.
"I don't know what ultra-low frequency is." Yun Fan said.
"You didn’t install the instrument?" Qi Fei asked.
"Does it look like I understand these kinds of instruments?" Yun Fan said.
"I don't think it's you either." Qi Fei nodded, "Then there must be an organization with an objective that has used your site." He said as he glanced over at Jiang Liu with a seemingly nonchalant yet deliberate intention. "Have you left this area for a long time in the last six months? Has anyone been here? Has anyone approached you asking for a way to enter the area?"
"You don't need to check," When facing Qi Fei’s questions, Yun Fan didn't seem disconcerted, "I don't understand what ultra-low frequency is, but I know what’s going on with the signal communications. The instrument was not set by me, nor was it set up by some organization."
"Then what's going on?" Qi Fei frowned.
Yun Fan looked at Jiang Liu, and then at Qi Fei. Her eyes lingered on the eyes of the two people for a moment--a very short moment, but her eyes were sharp like a blade. She seemed to want to see who would instinctively evade her gaze at that moment; she was testing their credibility.
"Actually, I know that you each have your own objective," Yun Fan said. "I won’t shy away from saying that I do indeed have secrets here. They are the secrets that you want to hear about. I don't want to thoroughly investigate what you two are here for. The world is in chaos, and everyone serves their own leader. That has nothing to do with me; I just need someone to help me. I can take the two of you to a place today. When you get there, most of your questions will be resolved. But then after that, the person who I can trust and work with will depend on which one of you two can really help me."
As she spoke, she stood up, walked to the wall opposite to the tea table, and stretched out her hand and lightly touched the wall. Only until then did Jiang Liu realize that what he thought was a wall decorated with a real painting when he first came here two days ago, was actually a virtual display. Both the high definition virtual screen display and the three-dimensional impression of the painting were all very realistic. Obviously, the display was carefully adjusted to prevent any visitors from discovering the secret of this wall.
Now, the virtual display of the painting disappeared, revealing a thin circular line in the wall and a straight line in the centre. Yun Fan stood in front of the wall, and the light pattern of the facial recognition system brightened. Then, the entire wall moved backwards, and separated along the line in the center and retracted to both sides, revealing a deep passage behind it.
"This leads to...?" Jiang Liu seemed to have guessed something.
"The Qin Mausoleum." When Yun Fan said this, she had already started to move forward, so her voice drifted away and the echo was elongated. The back of Yun Fan’s figure walked into the dim tunnel, and her pale cyan-coloured skirt swayed gently like a faint fluorescence.
Qi Fei and Jiang Liu followed Yun Fan. Jiang Liu's curiosity intensified as he moved forward. He looked at the dark and deep tomb tunnel in front of him, and the gears in his mind began turning at a high speed as he tried to guess what kind of magnificent wonder he would encounter up ahead. Jiang Liu had heard of the mysterious grandeur of the Qin Mausoleum for a long time, but never thought that one day he could enter the Qin Mausoleum. When Jiang Liu walked down the dark passage, he was inexplicably nervous. The scene that he pictured in his mind was a door made with adobe-clay that blocked the way, and behind the door, were complex arrows and swords.
But when he passed through the adobe-clay arcade set up by modern-day people during the excavation and arrived at the dirt-covered tomb passage, Jiang Liu was disappointed to find that there was no ‘magnificient wonder’ here at all, and there were no arrows, crossbows nor swords. The tunnel was very wide and long, and very dark. The place was illuminated by a flashlight, and occasionally, the door and the terracotta gatekeepers, who had lifelike postures, could be seen. If he had never seen terracotta warriors and horses before, he would have been amazed to suddenly see such realistic sculptures right now, but he was already anticipating this sight in his mind, so his line of sight did not dawdle on these statues. He stared straight ahead into the dark where he imagined a “beast” to be.
They seemed to have been going down an incline. The dirt path was not steep, but the gradual descent was still detectable. After moving downwards for a few hundred meters, they turned left, and continued descending.
None of the three spoke; only the shuffling noise of footsteps propagated in the darkness. Jiang Liu couldn't help but admire the determined girl in front of him. She led them through the dark, without any hesitation in her steps, and without the panic that an ordinary girl would have shown. Although she looked petite and slender, she actually had an amazingly powerful inner strength. He could imagine that in the days when he and Qi Fei were absent, she also walked through the darkness alone. He was surprised where this strength of hers came from.
At the same time, he could sense that the man dressed in black, Qi Fei, was walking beside him. Qi Fei's steps were almost silent, yet steady and swift. It was evident he had undergone many years of professional training. He couldn't identify Qi Fei's fighting technique from the short fight they had just now. Perhaps it was kickboxing with hybrid moves, or some innovative military fighting technique. All in all, the style of his moves was short, direct and brutal. Qi Fei was almost walking shoulder to shoulder with Jiang Liu at this time. The tunnel was originally not wide, and it was even more cramped when two tall men walked side by side, but there was almost no physical collision between the two. Sometimes, Jiang Liu deliberately tried to test his reaction by leaning towards Qi Fei's side, but every time Qi Fei instinctively avoided him accurately. Jiang Liu knew that this person's vigilance and mannerisms were at a professional level. Without years of nonstop training, it would be impossible for the body muscles to respond so instinctively.
Jiang Liu could perceive the boundary separating Qi Fei and Yun Fan. On the previous day, although Yun Fan’s speech made it seem like she wanted to push others out by a thousand miles, her expression was still soft, and from time to time, she’d let out playful smiles as she cracked a few small jokes. But today, she has completely become a stone bodhisattva1. Other than having a calm and expressionless face, there were no other words that could be used to describe her. Jiang Liu knew that this crack in this ice was more complicated than having ambiguous intimate sentiments.
"We’re here." Yun Fan stopped, fumbled on the wall, and then she pushed open a door that was hidden extremely well.
"Here?" Jiang Liu couldn't see clearly in the dark.
"We have to take a short lift. Be careful." Yun Fan stepped in first and lit a dim yellow lamp. It was enough for them to see the small space behind the secret door, which turned out to be a simple elevator. "My grandfather was the one who led people to build this section of the tunnel; it’s not part of the Qin Dynasty remains. You don’t need to show this kind of expression."
Only then did Jiang Liu and Qi Fei snap back to their senses, and then stepped in. The space inside the small lift was very small, and the three people were almost cramped close to each other. All three of them felt embarrassed, so they turned their heads away and stared at a wall.
The elevator descended slowly and stopped after a long few seconds. The three people came out into a deeper and darker tunnel. A little red light that was within eye view flickered in the darkness. The red light was glaring, like the eyes of a giant beast, and it was creepy.
"This is the place," Yun Fan pointed to the red light, and squatted down as she spoke. Using a little brush that she always kept with her, she gently brushed away the dirt at the bottom of the wall.
Jiang Liu could tell that the dirt that covered the surface of this area was often brushed away since there was a clear boundary with its surrounding area. As the area Yun Fan brushed clean became larger and larger and as she pushed away the finer dust with her hands, the red light source became clearer. There were some silver-gray flashes around it, and they also became more and more distinctive in the dark. Jiang Liu's heart began to race, and he began to realize how unusual this object in front of him was.
The beating signal came from within the adobe-clay wall. It was emanating not from any modern installed instrument, but it was coming from the adobe-clay itself. In other words, there was some unknown instrument in the adobe-clay.
"What is this?" Jiang Liu asked.
"A signal detector." Yun Fan said, “My father deduced that it may be a neutrino detector. It originated from the Qin Mausoleum.”
"What?" Jiang Liu's eyes widened.
Neutrino detectors were detectors that humans began to develop in the last century. The detectors were generally located in the mountains and relied on large tanks of water as the detecting medium. This was also a major invention that won the Nobel Prize in Physics in the 20th century and it was a very modern scientific achievement. In the 21st century, only four countries have built neutrino detectors, but only three, which were located in Kamioka in Japan, Jin’ping Mountain in China, and the Rocky Mountains in the United States, have effective signal detection. However, Yun Fan said that there was a neutrino detector in the Qin Mausoleum built more than two thousand years ago. What was the principle behind it?
"Why is there a neutrino detector here?" Jiang Liu crouched down to examine the glowing adobe-clay wall and couldn't help asking, "What is the principle behind it?"
"I'm not too clear," Yun Fan stood there, watching the flashing red light quietly, "I only know that in the underground palace of the Qin Mausoleum, there is some kind of device that can detect neutrinos. After the neutrino enters the detecting medium, it will interact with particles of matter and a certain type of radiation will be emitted to the surroundings. This device actually detects the secondary radiation. There should be a conduit between the inner underground palace and the detector, so that the signal from the internal detector can be directed to the external detector. However, it’s buried in thick soil, and I didn’t dig it out either.”
"Is this why there’s liquid in the underground palace of the Qin Mausoleum?" Qi Fei interjected, "If it is to detect neutrinos, it would make sense, but why use mercury?"
Jiang Liu was also confused, "It's really unclear. Other neutrino detectors observe Cherenkov radiation emitted from pure water. It seems that no one has tried mercury before."
"But I remember that very early on in Oak Ridge, United States, they did use mercury in neutrino related experiments." Qi Fei recalled carefully, "It seems that it made use of mercury’s unstable heavy nucleus. I can't remember the specific experimental process."
"I've also heard of that. I’ll go back and look it up at night," Jiang Liu said.
"I’ll also go to the database to research it." Qi Fei answered the conversation naturally.
After Qi Fei said this sentence, he suddenly stopped. Jiang Liu also stopped talking for two or three seconds. Both people realized that the discussion just now was too much like a tacit dialogue between classmates or colleagues, and this was a situation that the two of them did not want to see. The two froze again. At this time, Qi Fei remembered asking Yun Fan about the oddity.
"Why is there a neutrino detector in Qin Mausoleum?"
Yun Fan said softly, "This is the remnants they left behind when they departed so that the descendants of the Qin Mausoleum know when they will come again. When the signal becomes stronger, it is when they reach the earth again."
Qi Fei's face changed slightly for a moment, "Are they...?"
"Aliens." Yun Fan said calmly, "I’m guessing...that this is a signal to contact their spacecraft."
"So, the recent transmission of ultra-low frequency electromagnetic wave signals from the Qin Mausoleum," Qi Fei said, "is also the result of this device?"
"I can only think so." Yun Fan said.
"Wait a minute," Jiang Liu suddenly thought of the question, "How do you know it’s a neutrino detector? We only see the red dots flashing, so if you didn't say anything, no one will know that it’s a neutrino detector. How did you know?"
"My father told me. I don't understand the technical principles behind this," Yun Fan said. "I’ve only seen the light flickering here since I was very young. At that time it was much weaker than it is now."
Jiang Liu asked, "Then how did your father know?"
"My grandfather told him."
"Then how did your grandfather know?"
"My grandfather once had a peculiar encounter. You won't believe me if I tell you, so it's better to not say it." Yun Fan gently shook her head.
"If you don't tell me, how do you know that I won't believe it?" Jiang Liu insisted, "Just let me listen to what you have to say."
"She doesn't want to talk about it." Qi Fei suddenly interrupted, "Do you not have ears? Yun Fan doesn't want to say it."
"She's afraid that I won't believe her ," Jiang Liu was unwilling to show weakness, "but I will believe her. Yun Fan, tell me."
Yun Fan looked at the dark tunnel ahead with a very soft voice, "I still remember that when my father brought me here for the first time, I was only ten years old. At that time, I really liked reading and I read many historical stories. My dad mistakenly thought that I would like to learn about these ancient ruins, but he was wrong. I was shocked the first time I came. It was too dark here. He pushed away the dust and showed me the faint red light. I didn’t want to look at it at all. I felt like there was a monster squatting in the dark waiting to devour me. I screamed, ran out immediately, and then refused to come back with my dad again. Until eight years later, before my college entrance examination when I was 18, it happened again. At the time, I was arguing with my dad. The two of us were stuck in a cold war. I ignored him for several days. He dragged me to this place again to show me the flashing red lights. At that time, I saw clearly that the intensity of the red light signal strengthened. When I was younger, the red light floated like a ghost, but when I was 18 years old, it was already as remarkable as a heartbeat. But even so, at that time, I still refused to believe what my father said."
When she said this, she turned her head and said, "I will never forget that moment. I don't want to go through it again, so I will only show you this today. Whether you believe it or not, I won’t force anyone."
With that, she reopened the secret door of the elevator and walked in. "I'm going back up, " she said.
Jiang Liu and Qi Fei have encountered each other.
What do they want? They themselves know, they mutually know, and Yun Fan knows. A lot of times, everyone understands the complicated relationships, but no one speaks about it blatantly, nor is it necessary to reveal it.
A word, one step; a frown, a smile; a wave, a movement; and everything is understood.
Translator’s Notes
Stone bodhisattva
This describes a person who is expressionless and doesn’t talk.
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