The bombs went off exactly three minutes after that last conversation. Jocelyne's call had been recorded and in the future historians would remember it as Wafner's last words. Whole branches of psychology and philosophy would have been interested in them, since they contained the thoughts of a man who, however insane, had demonstrated considerable acumen.
Whole branches of psychology would arise that had that last conversation as a basis, which compared the democratic and free thought of Jocelyne with the absolutist and dictatorial one of Wafner. Within a few decades a new term would even be born, 'Wafnerism', aimed at indicating the mental condition of a person who has spent too much time in power to be unable to let it go.
But above all, that conversation would be remembered as the last attempt at peace before Mushroom Day.
As soon as the countdown ended, the teleportation device installed on the bombs transported them over the cities they were intended to hit
Finally, with the subjugation of the Empire, the world had achieved peace. However, it was not a victorious peace.After the explosion of the bombs, most of the cities of the world had been completely destroyed. Hundreds of millions of people had lost their homes. Several historical places were reduced to ashes. Where there had been wonderful cities, now there was nothing but rubble and ruins.There was no mourning, but tears were shed nonetheless. Millions of people had lost everything: homes, property, even memories. The number of refugees was incalculable. For several days, all the nations of the world had to do their utmost to contain the wave of desperate people.But then, after the tears, the world recovered. Everyone rolled up their sleeves and got back to work. After all, there were two things humans were very good at. The first was to destroy; the second was to rebuild.Millions of people set about rebuilding their cities, house by house. It was
Sobek was in the middle of the sea. He was placidly lying on the water on his stomach, barely moving his legs to be able to float. Incredibly, despite his enormous bulk, he wasn't sinking.It was a beautiful sunny day and the warm rays warmed his back and dorsal sail. If he wasn't careful, Sobek could have fallen asleep from how relaxed he was. The movement of the waves that cradled him did nothing but make them fall asleep even more.However, he had thoughts that kept him awake.'It's useless to wait any longer now. While the world isn't quite a utopia yet, it is safe and peaceful enough for me to have offspring without worrying too much about the consequences. Before I was too scared of what could happen to my son, but now that would be an irrational fear.Sobek wanted to have a child, he had wanted it all his life. To generate offspring was the intrinsic desire of almost every living being, written in their DNA. Sobek hated the idea of having to leave
For several months, Sobek stood on the river bank, not moving an inch. Even the slightest movement worried him: he was seriously afraid of inflicting too much weight on the egg and breaking it, or not heating it enough and freezing the baby inside.He didn't even dare to sleep. Fortunately, after five evolutions his brain had become so powerful that he was able to stay awake almost continuously. Sobek would not have been surprised to discover that he had assumed the ability to sleep with only part of his brain, as dolphins did.So the weeks and months went by. Sobek didn't move a muscle; when he wanted to eat he used his [Personal Manger], and when he wanted to drink he stretched his neck slightly and plunged his muzzle into the river. If anything, even a tiny crab, dared to come within five meters of the egg, a deep growl would emerge from its jaws and the unfortunate creature would sprint away. Sobek had noticed several animals, humans and even drones watching him fr
It had been a while, and the world was changing rapidly.Now that most of the problems on Eden had been solved, the cities had been rebuilt, the economy had stabilized and everything seemed to be going well, humanity finally had the opportunity to look at new goals. To be precise, humanity was aiming for expansion.With world peace now achieved and teleportation technology at hand, there was literally no reason to remain anchored to their homeworld. After all, humanity has always been hungry for exploration, for colonization. Now that their world had no more unexplored places, humans aimed for space. And even the animals, despite their simplicity, began to be interested in those bright dots they admired every night in the sky.Thus the Eden Union had launched several exploration missions throughout the inner solar system. They aimed to explore all the rocky planets and even a large part of the asteroids, so as to increase their knowledge, acquire new resources a
Another year had passed, and the world kept moving on.The expansion of humans into the solar system seemed unstoppable. Dozens and dozens of missions had been sent to different moons and planets, studying their composition, atmosphere, surface and so on. Thanks to teleportation technology, traveling through space was no longer a problem. Fixed colonies had now been built on several asteroids to act as mineral deposits to obtain resources that would then be sent throughout the solar system to be used for the most disparate projects.Davis now numbered over two hundred cities. While he still needed to import many things from Eden, the factories and infrastructure built on the planet were rapidly making him self-sufficient. The population now numbered about three hundred million people and billions of animals that proliferated everywhere on the red planet. Within a few years, Davis would become the first fully autonomous planet outside of Eden, achieving an immense goal
Another year had passed. And the world had continued to move on.Sobek could barely keep up with the rest of the planet now. The technological and scientific level progressed so rapidly that he didn't have time to get used to one novelty that another immediately appeared.Aphrodites now looked completely different from her appearance a few years ago. Oceans, continents and countless small islands were formed. Thanks to the huge mirrors positioned in space, the planet was able to receive the right amount of sunlight. However, many planetary scientists had begun to consider whether it was not possible to accelerate the planet's rotation in an artificial way using gravity control technology. At the moment there were only plans on paper, but in the future they could come true. Meanwhile, some small settlements had already been established on Aphrodites, and thousands of animals had decided to travel there to explore a new resource-rich planet.Davis was now effectiv
Two more years had passed. A very short time, but which had marked new changes.The humans had finally begun the construction of the great looking glass to obscure Afrodithes. Using teleportation technology and bases established on main-belt asteroids, they had brought tens of tons of materials into the planet's orbit. Those materials had then been transformed into an initial structural system which would then be connected with glass to reflect sunlight.The mirror would not have been thick: the structural system was barely a micrometer wide. With the teleportation technology and the technological advances that humanity had achieved it was almost more difficult to build the mirror than to transport the materials to the right place.Afrodithes, meanwhile, had now become very similar to Eden. Its dense, carbon dioxide-laden atmosphere had been almost completely converted to one similar to that of humans' home planet. The modified plants had almost completely clear
Two more years had passed. The advance of humanity towards the stars continued inexorably.The hypotheses of the scientists had proved to be correct: using a combination of gravity control technology and energy obtained from the Dyson sphere, although still incomplete, they had managed to accelerate the rotation of Aphrodites. The planet was slowly accelerating, though not too fast. There was generally talk of an hour each week. At this speed there was no risk of destroying the infrastructure already present on the planet. Yes two years, the rotation period had gone from 2082 hours to 1978 hours. Continuing at this rate, it was expected to reach 24 hours in 'just' another 38 years.Once this process was completed, the huge orbiting mirrors could finally be taken off. The day/night cycle would no longer be artificially determined and there would no longer be the risk that something would go wrong due to the impact of a micrometeorite. In addition, the accelerated rotati