Remembering the Mission

To find this important person, the common sense thing to do was to head for a village, town or better yet, a city. A good place to start was this city market called Gaochang, where Saint Tami was bringing them. It is pointless to continue to wander in the wilderness waiting to bump into people. Assuming this is the right place and right era, and Wei Li Na could only assume her Second Brother did not mislead her, then there is a good chance of encountering this important ancestor and saving him from his tragic fate.

Isn't it when she was still stationed at the edge of the galaxy, Second Brother told her between hiccups and sobs, he said, "Little Li Na, you are the family's only hope. Because you're so far from Earth, you've benefited from the time-space distortion. So the phenomenon has not affected you yet. But it will soon catch up to you! You're doomed, too!"

Second brother's reception was fading, but he persisted and continued to sob and explain at the same time, "According to information left by Eldest Brother, there has been a disruption in the timeline. Somebody has gone back into the past and killed our family's direct ancestor, thereby causing a domino effect, thereby making our entire clan non-existent in the universe. All descendants have disappeared. The only reason you and I still exist is because I was stationed half-way across the galaxy, while you're here at the borders. The distance to Earth has given us a buffer. My children who I had to leave to get to you, they are now non-existent. I'll soon be gone, and so will you!

Eldest brother sent me this transmission, I'm sending it to you now. These are coordinates for a wormhole. Follow it exactly, and you should find that person. He must NOT die prematurely. He has to get married, have children and keep the bloodline alive, for all our sakes. I've dug up the family genealogy, we don't know much about this ancestor, other than he is surnamed "Wei". If you find a way, a DNA test should confirm it."

After sobbing a few more moments, and Wei Li Na's clumsy attempts at comforting her brother. She wished she could be there with him, she wished so much she could reach out into the communication screen and give him a hug, but no sooner the thought left her mind, did he disappear into non-existence. He was the last of her family, and now they only existed in her memory. So long as she was alive, she could only remember them.

She had to make a quick escape, as the domino effect of the timeline was catching up. She got her own spaceship into gear, gave the coordinates to Dave, and sped off outwards to look for that wormhole.

The laws of time and space make time travel to be possible. At least, traveling into the future was definitely possible. Wei Li Na does it all the time. All she has to do is travel close to the speed of light, away from Earth. Deep space travel is essentially a kind of travel. When she gets back to Earth, she would only have aged one or two years, but the people she left behind had already aged ten to twenty years. That's how to travel into the future of other people.

But traveling backwards into the past is still unknown, and largely theoretical. In theory it is possible to travel back in time through a wormhole, a very mysterious entity found in space, so called tunnels that make jumps in time and space. It's difficult to say if it is possible to go back in time because nobody has ever survived a trip into a wormhole and returned to tell the tale.

And that is exactly what Wei Li Na had to do to endure, for the sake of her own survival and that of her entire bloodline. But even if she does not live, at least she could live long enough to save her clan. No matter the hardship, she could withstand it. Even just finding a wormhole was highly improbable. It took her 8 years of wandering until she found the one her brothers told her about.

She used up another year, planning and strategizing with Dave on how to enter the wormhole without certain death. Which was achieved by sacrificing the haul of the ship, then eventually the entire ship which disintegrated on impact. She encased her body in two meters of lead, like a coffin. That also burned up, but the extra measure kept her body intact, so she was able to arrive at this time and place with her life. At great cost, she made the trip here, now the success or failure of this mission was up to her abilities to adapt in this world.

Wei Li Na's mind had been wandering for a while, so much so she was getting concerned glances from Disciple Ren and Disciple Yan, "Brother Li Na looks wistful and sad." In these unstable times of unrest, everybody had a sad story. As these disciples had their own tragic stories as well. Although they did not mean to pry, they would offer some comfort if they could.

"Yes" Wei Li Na gave a curt reply, not wishing to talk on the matter in more detail. The disciples knew not to ask. Disciple Ren gave her a pat on the back, looked forward, not saying anymore.