Chapter 47 Tyler's New Direction_1

Mister Taylor had cultivated a piece of land in the backyard and planted some vegetables. He tended to his vegetable garden every day, but his skills were poor enough that he often could not tell weeds from vegetables, frequently hoeing out the latter by mistake.

Every day, Rey Diaz would open his door just to lie on the lounger, watching the sun as though deep in thought, with no one knowing what was on his mind.

Destiny is indeed marvelous; Rey Diaz and Tyler had been at each other's throats for decades, each wishing nothing but death upon the other, only to end up as neighbors.

The breach had stripped Tyler of his purpose in life, yet he had to live, to live for facing the wall; he never thought he would end up as neighbors with the guy he had fought for decades.

Rey Diaz had also been essentially breached. Big countries overcame small ones with technology, with resources… Small countries' resistance against big ones relied on nothing but a spirit of "fighting to the death." Rey Diaz was ready to confront the Trisolarans with the courage to drag two civilizations down to hell with him.

Regrettably, his path was blocked. Using censure bullets to sink Mercury was impossible now, but he couldn't come up with any other plans. Damn Logic, how could he have fallen into such a ludicrous situation.

Lin Sen came looking for him, seeing from a distance a man in the vegetable garden absentmindedly tending to his plants, indistinguishable as either vegetables or weeds.

"Mister Taylor, forgive my intrusion into your peaceful world," Lin Sen began.

"Strictly speaking, this is Logic's peaceful world, and indeed, you have disturbed it," Tyler's pun was very apt.

"I'm here to seek your help," Lin Sen said.

"Ah... I knew you wouldn't let me be at ease for long. I've been waiting for you, just didn't expect you to make me wait this long. Tell me, what do you need me to do? I promised Logic that my resources, including myself, are at his service," Tyler formally said.

"Apart from Ding Yi, you are the most knowledgeable person on macro atoms. I believe it would be a pity to abandon your previous research," Lin Sen said.

"My team hasn't given up, but the progress is very slow now due to the opposition in the human world. Don't be fooled by how humans currently act as if they believe I haven't been breached, but if I ever have the capacity to point a gun at them, they will surely try to stop me.

It's not a matter of whether I will do such a thing, but rather if I have the ability to do it.

It's nearly impossible I'll ever have the chance to lead an independent future Space Fleet; their precautions against me won't be less than those against the Trisolarans.

However, when it comes to research on macro atoms, there is no one more suitable in this world than me," Tyler replied.

Macro atoms (here macro electrons, just called macro atoms as per the habit from Ball Lightning) possess the general characteristics of ordinary electrons. They are macroscopic electrons visible to the eye with a diameter of several tens of centimeters because they can "refract" (light is an electromagnetic wave, and it can traverse dimensions) visible light.

Macro atoms exist in the form of two-dimensional strings ( ). Macro atoms can undergo macro nuclear fusion reactions, which are enormously destructive. The material destroyed by their energy ceases to exist in a quantum state.

Once stimulated, macro atoms become Ball Lightning, which moves very slowly at a speed of 426.831m/s, making Ball Lightning easy to avoid and hence limiting its use on the battlefield.

```

"Have you ever considered why our world sees the emergence of macro-atoms? Sophons are essentially protons, and protons can unfold into two dimensions. Could macro-atoms be the result of other particles expanding from their dimensions?" Lin Sen asked.

"An interesting question, indeed. Protons originally exist in an 11-dimensional space, which is to say that protons are 11-dimensional. When they are unfolded into two dimensions, Trisolarans can etch circuits on their surface.

Macro-atoms are also electrons from 11 dimensions reduced to two dimensions. We can excite them into an excited state with lightning and other means, transforming them into ball lightning. There's definitely a relationship between the two. You want me to research the relationship between them," replied Tyler.

"This is just an imperfect plan. We can consider it from two aspects: on one hand, by studying macro-atoms to understand the characteristics of Sophon dimensionality reduction and the possibility of constructing a Sophon Shielding Room.

On the other hand, we explore whether there are anti-macro-atoms in cosmic space, what their properties are, whether the annihilation of macro-atoms and anti-macro-atoms can release more powerful energy, if it's sufficiently destructive, and if it can carry out attacks from a distance," suggested Lin Sen.

"Sophons are mainly capable of monitoring humans from a higher dimension, with only electromagnetic waves and gravity being able to traverse dimensions. It is possible for other materials to cross from lower dimensions to higher ones, although under very strict conditions.

According to my science advisory group, Sophons generally unfold to six dimensions before they can receive electromagnetic signals; above six dimensions, they cannot receive electromagnetic signals (Sophons in six dimensions are already too small to receive electromagnetic signals). They unfold in six dimensions to observe us, and yet we have no means of detecting them.

As for the Sophon Shielding Room, someone proposed using an electric field to shield Sophons, which is a joke. Sophons are charged, and even if the electric field is strong enough to deter Sophons from entering, it's useless. After all, it's meant for human use. Sophons can enter our bodies, appear in our eyes to monitor what we see, in our ears to listen by detecting the vibrations of our eardrums. They are not even in the same dimension as us.

We enter the Sophon Shielding Room, and they can enter with us; we leave the Sophon Shielding Room, and they can leave with us. We almost have no way to deal with six-dimensional Sophons," Tyler replied.

In the original work, the Sophon Shielding Room was built by humanity after the Great Migration. In other words, it took humans 60 years into The Deterrence Era to develop the Sophon Shielding Room. It's safe to say that the Sophon Shielding Room is anything but simple, yet it definitely doesn't involve theories that humanity cannot comprehend. The technological level during the Crisis Era was restricted, and humans in The Deterrence Era didn't feel the need to develop it. Once The Deterrence Era ended and humans recognized the threat, they were able to develop it immediately.

If an electric field shield alone could prevent Sophon surveillance, that would greatly underestimate human governments. The Sophon Shielding Room certainly uses an electric field, but it surely also employs methods to restrict the dimensional reduction and expansion of Sophons.

Lin Sen is not yet clear on the principles involved, but they are definitely related to spatial dimensions. Only by compressing Sophons in more than six dimensions can we truly limit their monitoring capabilities.

However, Lin Sen doesn't need to understand the details. He only needs to establish the goal, find the solutions, and implement them.

"I know; I'm just making a suggestion. I'm also aware that many people are researching the Sophon Shielding Room now. In fact, they haven't even found the theoretical support for it yet, as this is an area no one has researched before," Lin Sen replied.

"Indeed, we currently have no way of dealing with it. As for anti-macro-atoms, that might be worth exploring…" Tyler seemed to understand Lin Sen's intentions.

Researching anti-macro-atoms and macro-atoms is not just to study their combined annihilation power, but to explore the secrets of their dimensionality reduction. Knowing the secrets of dimensionality reduction, one can attempt to use certain methods to stop Sophons from reducing dimensions, which would be the real Sophon Shielding Room.

Tyler inwardly sighed; if the Sophon Shielding Room could be developed successfully, it would be the best weapon against the Trisolarans. And he sensed that behind this plan, there surely lay deeper schemes. It seems that Lin Sen and Logic are indeed far superior to himself in terms of strategy. They have clearly presented their intentions, but it appears that there's no way to stop them.

"That's great; I hope you can start working on it soon," said Lin Sen.

"Then don't interrupt my work. I'll be leaving now," said Tyler, as if he had stepped out from the shadow of the crumbling wall and left directly after speaking.

```