CAT Chapter 52: Yesterday Once More

A gentle breeze swept through the jungle, causing the vines and leaves to sway softly, and the vast expanse of the forest trembled lightly in the wind.

The crystalline tree trunks gleamed like purple crystal, prompting one to wonder whether they would shimmer at night. When that time came, the entire world would glow, like something out of a dream.

Ling Yi observed the tree beside the spacecraft.

It was a tree, but one vastly different from any on Earth. Its shape resembled a massively enlarged pondweed. Its main trunk rose from the ground and suddenly branched out into dozens of limbs some fifteen to sixteen meters above the ground, spreading outward in a circular pattern. These branches followed the same principle, suddenly flaring out at certain points—then they continued, entangling and twisting into strange, intricate forms, with even the glowing, vine-like tendrils appearing to be part of the plant itself.

He then looked through the spacecraft’s window at the thick grass on the ground, which concealed the soil beneath it. He noticed that the grass shared the same structure as the trees, only smaller.

A sense of confusion took over him. He wanted to go down and collect a sample for closer inspection, but the strange creature they had encountered earlier made him hesitate.

No further instructions had come through, so they donned their exoskeletons and fell into a temporary stalemate.

Everyone who had witnessed the earlier scene felt a bit uneasy.

The Colonel, restless, stomped his foot. “How’s everyone doing?”

He was asking the other teams.

The squad leaders reported in, all with similar updates: they were standing among the strange purple vegetation, the scenery was breathtaking. Three teams had also discovered unknown creatures in the water—varying in size and shape—but had not engaged with them.

Ten minutes passed without any signs of disturbance. Lucia had not issued a new warning. After Svenya gave the order to continue exploring, they disembarked from the spacecraft and spread out, moving with much more caution than before.

Following their protocol, the next task after setting up the various sensors was to collect soil samples.

The soft grass crowded tightly together, and they could not yet see what the soil was like underneath. They would need to clear some of it first.

“Shh…” A sharp intake of breath came from someone.

He had tried to pull apart the grass stems, attempting to expose the soil beneath, only to discover that the plants seemed to have grown as one. Each stem pressed tightly against the next, with no gaps between them.

They had no choice but to force their way through.

Surprisingly, the crystal-clear plants were incredibly tough. Ordinary tools couldn’t cut through them.

The Colonel, skeptical, stomped on the grass several times.

One of the exoskeletons was six to seven meters tall, made of special high-density materials, and weighed several tons. The massive force from a few jumps should have trampled the grass into a mess.

But contrary to expectations, the grass seemed untouched, still as beautiful as ever. The stems and leaves that had been compressed under the exoskeleton’s foot sprang back to their original position the instant it moved.

“What the hell is this place?” the Colonel cursed.

He pulled out an energy weapon. The high-energy particle beam it emitted was one of their sharpest weapons, and if it couldn’t work, then there was no hope.

He fired the particle beam at a distant spot, and a blue laser blade began to slice through the grass.

Finally, it worked.

Where the laser blade passed, the stubborn plants toppled over. The Colonel took long strides forward, intending to clear a path, but the familiar scene happened again: the plants he had cut through melted away.

Purple slime oozed from the plants, and it looked like a puddle of water had formed on the ground. The image of the protective suit being corroded into black liquid flashed in his mind.

“Damn it!” the Colonel muttered. “I’m not letting this thing win today!”

Ling Yi frowned but didn’t linger to see how the Colonel would deal with it. He turned and walked toward the riverbank, some ten meters away.

The soil on land was inaccessible. Surely, the riverbank would offer something different?

At the river’s edge, the plants were much shorter, but still densely packed. Ling Yi tentatively took a few steps forward until he was very close to the water’s edge. His unease grew as he looked at the same deep purple hue of the riverbed.

He crouched down and reached into the water, feeling it.

It was slippery and cool, like jelly, or the gel-like culture medium used in Lin Si’s lab.

His pupils contracted.

The riverbank, the riverbed, were all made of the same material—the same thing as the plants on land. It wasn’t just these plants… The trees, shrubs, and grass—they all had the same form, the same structure, covering the entire planet.

A chill ran down his spine, and he rushed back to where the others had gathered.

Sure enough, the Colonel was still battling the puddle. He had thrown nearly every type of material he could find into it.

But it was useless. Everything had been corroded.

Other teams had also hit a dead end. Though scattered across the planet, their situations were nearly identical—not even small differences, but the same exact problems.

All they could do was record the temperature, humidity, and wind direction. They couldn’t do anything else.

Svenya sighed deeply over the comms. “We’ll find a way.”

“Not happening.” The Colonel gave up on the puddle, and Ling Yi led him toward the river.

After touching the riverbed, which felt just like the grass, they exchanged a glance.

“I read a story once, about star whales,” Ling Yi suddenly said.

The Colonel, frazzled, didn’t catch much of it. He muttered, “This damn planet’s messing with us. It’s like a dream.”

“In the story, star whales are creatures that live in space. They’re as big as a planet… After Earth’s end, humanity captured one of these whales and rebuilt their civilization on its back. Then, with weapons and electric shocks, they forced the whale to carry them in the direction they wanted to go.”

The Colonel raised an eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing… But if these things are a single organism, and they have life… It could be terrifying,” Ling Yi said, looking up at the pale purple sky and the few clouds floating by. “All of this—it’s alive, right?”

The Colonel kicked at the grass. “Definitely alive.”

After a long silence, Lucia finally spoke. “The possibility of these unknown objects being inorganic is zero.”

No matter how the universe changes, the simplest rules remain unchanged.

Quantum fluctuations, the Big Bang, interactions, the creation of elementary particles. Atomic structures were set in stone. Even if the periodic table reaches a thousand elements, it’s impossible for something this strange to be inorganic. So even though we can’t observe the structure of these things, we can be certain they are not simple inorganic matter.

As for whether they’re alive, that remains to be seen. Further exploration is needed.

They had explored so many planets, but this was the first time they had encountered something they couldn’t approach.

After a long, fruitless exploration, the dozen or so teams finally returned to the spacecraft. Their only takeaway was a few liters of air.