Chapter 569: Intergalactic Combat_1

The "Great Magnet," composed of more than fifty warships, was continuously emitting waves of refined force fields.

This force field wasn't particularly large, but it caused spatial variations that further affected curvature.

Rather, this force field, combined with curvature technology, only affected objects undergoing a curvature reaction, such as spaceships entering curvature.

The main forces of the Trisolarans immediately realized that their speed had slowed, while the Earth Corps methodically advanced.

At this point, they were also puzzled: wasn't humanity's main force engaging the raiding fleet? How could they appear tens of light-years away in such a short time?

However, their decision-making was swift; a portion of Trisolaran warships immediately launched a countercharge to create an opportunity for the main force to withdraw.

In an instant, the battle became tense once more, with the Earth Corps crossing the planetary system and launching relentless attacks against the enemy.

Many enemy ships fired objects resembling "The Waterdrop," but Zhuang Yue initially didn't pay much attention to them, since The Waterdrop couldn't play much of a role in such a battle.

It wasn't until the enemy on the radar suddenly shifted from directly ahead to above and ahead that Zhuang Yue realized something was amiss.

Through the gravity map, it was discovered that thousands of Waterdrops formed a sparse and immense net, and the space where this net existed seemed to be "rolled up" by these Waterdrops.

It was as if the space was being rolled up like paper, mysteriously causing the Earth Corps' pursuit vector to deviate from the Trisolarans' escape vector.

No matter how hard the Earth Corps' spaceships tried, whether it was attacking or navigating, they experienced significant deviation.

Experts from the scientific community, providing technological support for the war, speculated that this must be a kind of spatial displacement technology; like normally, the universe is made of three contiguous blocks of space, A, B, and C, but for their own purposes, the Trisolarans connected block A directly with block C.

Long ago, humanity had already witnessed this technology.

During humanity's first battle with Venus, a portion of J135 had fallen into a similar Venusian trap: after traveling a certain distance, they inexplicably returned to the starting point.

Venus had linked the starting point in a very small space with another node within the space, so when the J135 reached that node, they were instantly back at the starting point.

Clearly, the Trisolarans' technique wasn't as adept as Venus's; they could only cause spatial displacement.

This was different from spatial distortion; simply put, spatial distortion is like a crease forming on a piece of paper, which follows a predictable pattern.

Whereas spatial displacement is almost as if a small part of the paper suddenly separates from the whole, at one moment folding in half, and the next, becoming a steep slope.

In short, the Trisolarans could make this small piece of "paper" take on any shape they desired.

The experts at the scientific community believed that destroying the space within a certain range ahead should be able to break the enemy's control over the space.

Simply put, tearing up blocks A, B, and C of space completely would naturally eliminate the displacement occurring within these spaces.

Hence, Zhuang Yue immediately ordered the detonation of the Dark Matter Detonators, bombarding the space ahead intensively.

Until the space in front was riddled with holes and widespread collapse occurred, the spatial displacement, as expected, also vanished.

The Earth Corps crossed the collapsed space and continued the pursuit; by this time, most of the Trisolaran main forces had already reached the speed of light.

Zhuang Yue ordered, "Dig them out of the 'ground'!"

Suddenly, hundreds of spaceships in formation vanished from their original locations; these were ships equipped with jump-drive engines.

It's just a shame that the Solar System State doesn't have many jump-drive engines, otherwise there would be no need to advance so cautiously.

The Earth Corps also briefly entered the speed of light.

The current speed of the hundreds of jump-drive spaceships is six times the speed of light, but time dilation has not occurred, only time has been contracted.

For example, taking a curvature spaceship for a six light-year journey, no matter how much time the passengers spend in curvature travel, it is six years later upon arrival at the destination.

Whereas taking a jump-drive spaceship at six times the speed of light to travel six light-years only results in it being one year later upon arrival.

This means that a six light-year distance was traversed in one year, which is one-sixth of the time taken by a curvature spaceship.

There was no return to the past, nor reversing of time.

Physicists from the Academy of Sciences call this time contraction.

The motion that results in time dilation is currently limited to accelerated flight, namely conventional flight using matter jet engines.

To put it simply, the theory of time dilation suggests that after exceeding the speed of light, time reversal will occur.

If you accelerate to beyond the speed of light, then due to time dilation, you will arrive at the destination before you have even left.

The advent of jump-drive spaceships has made people realize that light-speed flight, apart from acceleration, does not produce time dilation.

Before this, curvature travel did not result in time dilation.

For instance, when Cheng Xin and Ai AA left the Solar System in Year One of the Galaxy, they traveled 286 light-years in a curvature spaceship, and when they left light-speed travel, both the Solar System and their destination were in 286 Years of the Milky Way.

If time dilation had occurred, then upon reaching their destination, the Solar System would have been in 286 Years of the Milky Way, but their destination would still be in Year One of the Galaxy.

Because the photons travel at the same velocity, it's as if they were moving alongside the light emitted by the sun in Year One of the Galaxy, traveling for 286 light-years until the light from Year One of the Galaxy finally reached the destination.

This did not result in time reversal because, at the time of departure, the destination was 286 years before the Galaxy Year.

The biggest difference between time dilation and no time dilation is here: with time dilation, time becomes a variable.

For example, when Cheng Xin departed, the Solar System was in the Year One of the Galaxy, but her destination was at 286 years before the Galaxy Year, with both timelines being variables.

Without time dilation, upon completion of light-speed travel, the Solar System is in 286 Years of the Milky Way, and at the same time, the destination is also in 286 Years of the Galaxy, time is a constant!

The phenomenon of time dilation has only occurred on spacecraft using acceleration, but human conventional spacecraft can only achieve 46% of light speed, which is almost the limit for matter jet engines.

Increasing speed is basically impossible because each additional 1% speed increase requires a massive amount of energy.

The standard cruising speed for regular human warships is around 35% of light speed, an energy consumption that is still within an acceptable range; any higher would seem wasteful.

Since acceleration does not reach light speed, time dilation is not apparent, and physicists believe that no flying object can reach absolute light speed using acceleration, not even photons, which only exceed 99.5% of light speed. This is probably due to a God-level Civilization altering the nature of photons.

Following the plan, the Earth Corps' hundreds of jump-drive spaceships disengaged from jump-drive travel and immediately began operating "The Great Magnet" in unison.

Space and curvature both exhibited significant changes, and it wasn't long before the Trisolarans' main force, engaged in curvature travel, fell from this space, forced to terminate their curvature flight.