Chapter 6 Trisolaran Governor Meeting_3

"I think you've done an excellent job,"

Sophon Governor: "I know!"

But do you know the agony of this position?

Do you? Human civilization is brimming with lies and deceit, yet they are so harmonious.

I watch their strategems and betrayals every day, yet I'm deeply fascinated by them.

I clearly know it's a cup of poison, but I can't control myself, its entire being tempts me to drink it.

I'm about to break down, we, with our transparent thoughts,

might never truly understand the beauty of that deceit,

the unspeakable, ultimate beauty of love and lies!

"I can't bear this torment any longer."

Having said that, the Sophon Governor slowly walked away...

The author's note:

Let's talk about the level of the Trisolarans' stratagems. Some believe that during the early stages of the Trisolaran crisis, the Trisolarans' capacity for stratagem was weak, almost incapable of scheming or seeing through schemes, while their capacity increased later on.

I partly agree. I think the Trisolarans' strength lies in mathematics and computation, as this is also their mode of communication and the survival crisis they faced, their strategic level is in modeling and computation, and in the later stages, they must have made some breakthroughs in imagination.

Their weakness is stratagem; they even struggle to comprehend "Romance of the Three Kingdoms," which, in their view, is an intricate mathematical text that can be understood with considerable thought and imagination.

This reveals the Trisolarans' mode of thinking; everything is built on modeling and computation.

Sometimes they are immensely powerful, sometimes quite naive, and the comment often made in jest is the Sophon's line, "Please help us eliminate humans, and then we'll eliminate you."

This left Wallfacer No. 2 at a loss for words, forced into an awkward response, "Although the goals align with those of ETO, such a direct expression might cause discomfort among some of our comrades and lead to unpredictable consequences."

In the original work, there are many instances of the Trisolarans' stratagems, but in later stages, the Trisolarans seldom employ schemes. They always observe humanity from the shadows, waiting for humans to show a flaw before delivering a fatal strike—that's what a true strategist does, waiting for the right moment.

For example, let's look at the Trisolarans' ruse.

In the early Crisis Era, when the Trisolarans promoted the Earth anti-escape law, the content of their exchange with Wallfacer No. 2 was about the art of deceit and guile in the "Tales of the Three Kingdoms" (Romance of the Three Kingdoms) and how it frightened them like patterns on a snake.

Then, the Trisolarans said, "We used to be indifferent to humans escaping, as long as they do not exist within the Solar System, but now we have adjusted our plans and decided to stop human escape. Letting an enemy with completely opaque thoughts escape into the universe is very dangerous."

See, how subtly they play their little scheme. It's clearly because of the existence of the Cosmic Dark Forest; they are afraid that if humans escape from the Solar System, they are more likely to expose themselves and in turn expose the Trisolarans to attacks from other cosmic civilizations, which led to the promotion of the anti-escape law.

But they start with a bunch of pleasantries to invoke empathy with the ETO, then they say, "We used to not care, but now we feel it's dangerous for you to escape, so that's why I want to promote the anti-escape law."

Their rhetoric is modest throughout, letting the ETO feel superior and educating the Trisolarans, with the aim of preventing the ETO from thinking about the underlying implications of the anti-escape law.

In everyday life, we often feel that humble people are very sincere, and since the Trisolarans have transparent thinking, it makes their words even more believable.

Such stratagems are used by ordinary people too but sometimes are not very effective. However, the Trisolarans, who have compiled most of humanity's stratagems and combined them with their modeling and deduction, will employ them with great accuracy and convenience. From this perspective, the Trisolarans have a significant advantage in simple deception.