Information tides is a rather broad term, many phenomena can be called this. We first need to understand the Xyrin Apostle’s "Unified Information" theory, knowing the concept that everything is information, then it’s easy to understand what information tides are. In the Void, information tides are those information fluctuations which are violent and large in scope. The Void is zero, so any information that appears is "non-zero" (this is also why everything is less than the Void); this violent oscillation of non-zero information is the information tide. Phenomena like Genesis, Doomsday, large-scale Order Field creation or collapse, and World Fragments that are evaporating can all be grouped into this category.

We are now at the edge of a destructive wave, so naturally, we are facing the last situation: an enormous World Fragment that is "evaporating" has appeared on the Fleet’s warning radar and it seems it is coming straight at us.

"Wow, I didn’t expect the first piece of cosmic debris we discovered would appear in such a grand way," Sandora and I were teleported back to the command hall of the Imperial Admiral at the first moment, and upon seeing the size of the World Fragment displayed on the central holographic projection, I couldn’t help but exclaim, "...It’s almost the size of a Constant Star System, and it’s a material-rich zone, there might be celestial bodies inside, should we dodge or..."

"Let’s ram into it," Sandora happily decided, "The Fleet’s protection power is strong, with such a large Joint Shield, a mere World Fragment colliding is no problem. We can take this opportunity to study closely, maybe we can find out what the essence of the destructive wave is. Taville, have your team ready, all equipment online, we are preparing to do some research."

Bingdisi happened to fall out of the Teleportation Gate at this time (not sure in what state she was transferred, but she fell from mid-air), and jumped up immediately after hearing Sandora’s words: "Damn, your research spirit is really insane!"

"Xyrin style, Xyrin style," I could only wipe the cold sweat from my forehead and laugh foolishly at Bingdisi, "By the way, you came too?"

"Nonsense, even if I am still a senior leader," Bingdisi puffed out her chest, "There are quite a few people behind, all coming to see how the World Fragment we collided with this time looks, Lin Xue said it’s quite large and very worth seeing."

Bingdisi’s thickness of face is still as unbelievable, this person who idly roams around the Eco District and ship city every day without standing on duty for ten days can even say "senior leader" in front of me and Sandora. But I am used to this female hooligan, in one ear and out the other as if I didn’t hear, effectively controlling adrenaline secretion. As Bingdisi’s words fell, several Teleportation Gates unfolded on the officer platform, and Qianqian and her elder sister drilled out of the Teleportation Gates in succession, with the remaining four of the Tiaozi Five finally following... are these bored people finally finding something to do, right?

"Finally some fun! Finally some fun!" Qianqian, like a runaway horse, ran around me twice, and finally hung on to my arm with a swing, "These days were boring to death, Ah Jun, you come here every day without keeping me company..."

Qianqian has indeed been bored recently, I quite understand this. The Royal Fleet left the Imperial District for ten whole days, without a single stop during this period, traversing the most desolate route in the Void, and since departure, encountered only a poorly developed Chaos Universe, which has evolved to the dusk stage, a dull world, as Little Crow said, "can’t even be dragged back as a nest." During these ten days, the Imperial Fleet’s basic activity was to set up frontier posts along the way, occasionally slowing down to deploy some detectors, and then all the experts and scholars stared blankly at the noise transmitted back by the detectors for half an hour before continuing. Can you not feel idle enough to go mad?

Qianqian is purely here for the lively atmosphere, but others still have serious business to attend to. One of Taville’s mass projections stands on the officer’s platform; this is a mission combining research and exploration, so Taville, as the Chief Scientist, is also here as a consultant. She once again verified the signals from various warning radars, confidently reporting: "Course confirmed, our Fleet will collide head-on with the World Fragment, impact time is expected in ten minutes. This is an exciting research opportunity, very grateful for Her Majesty’s wise decision now."

Sandora smiled faintly: "I am eagerly anticipating it as well."

Only Bingdisi keeps muttering on the side: "Damn, your research style hasn’t changed in eons, is there still time to get off the ship?"

"If you can catch up with the main force, it’s okay to jump off now," I patted this female hooligan (speaking of which, already a girlfriend, isn’t it a bit inappropriate to continue describing her this way?) on the shoulder, then looked up at the countdown on the large projection, "Let Little Crow watch outside the Order Field, maybe she can track which ’direction’ the World Fragment came from."

Little Crow was lying on the nearby railing stretching her neck hard to look outside, this girl retains the nature of wild birds, naturally a character who likes to fly around and doesn’t like being cooped up in a cage. Hearing that a ’fresh and fun big thing’ is going to appear, she was already eager, naturally getting excited upon hearing my words. Only hearing a ’caw’, this bird was about to dart out, but I held her head down at the last moment: "Don’t rush, go to the engineering department, put on your ’armor’ first."

The armor I mentioned is Little Crow’s external gear, for this silly bird before curing her astigmatism, an external radar set is still quite necessary; she can carry several workstations to aerial photography outside the Order Field for this unprecedented spectacular collision shot.

Little Crow reluctantly "cawed" but the excitement of ’flying out to play’ still outweighed her slight discontent, she nodded to me, then disappeared in the blink of an eye from the officer platform.

A few minutes later, an Escort Ship ejection channel at the end of the Imperial Admiral’s transverse arm opened, and Little Crow, fully equipped with super gear, looking like a final boss in a science-magic hybrid, shot out with a streak of purple light from the ejection channel. This girl really considered herself as a spaceship being launched, she specially left a trail of glowing flames behind her tail when she darted out of the ejection channel, pretending it was the afterimage of a spaceship’s lights. To optimistically estimate, the cognitive disorder of this bird can never be cured in this lifetime, she has broken the boundary between living beings and non-living objects, now she thinks she’s a ship...

And less than a minute after Little Crow left the Order Field, the shipboard broadcast gave the last warning before impact: "Attention, confirm large-scale information contact with this Fleet’s Order Field, fusion-impact process has begun, everyone prepare for shock resistance."

A burst of brilliant light first erupted from the front end of the Order Field.

World Fragments and normal space debris are different, they are not purely a conglomeration of matter or energy. For a World Fragment large enough that has not completely evaporated, its structure is like this: the core is a normal region barely hanging, where the residue energy and matter of a certain universe temporarily maintain stability in a small stable zone; further out is an unsettled transition zone, where collapsed laws and violently mutating matter, energy, space are entangled together to form a chaotic storm surrounding the fragments; the outermost layer is the "evaporation layer," where the destroyed universe rapidly assimilates into the Void, just like dry ice sublimating quickly at room temperature and disappearing precipitously, but we are still accustomed to calling this process "evaporation." This "evaporation layer" no longer possesses any stable information structures, it’s not matter, nor energy, sometimes not even Chaos, it’s just a large cluster of meaningless information, like a flower but not a flower, like a shadow but not a shadow - this cluster of information is the instantaneous intermediate state of falling from non-zero to zero, it cannot enter the Order Field.

The brilliant radiance currently erupting at the front end of the Order Field is caused by the evaporation layer, as the World Fragment strikes the Order Field, the mathematics environment of the evaporation layer and Order Field creates a violent counteraction, producing a magnificent visual effect. However, this visual effect is mainly the stress response of the Order Field itself, the evaporation layer is essentially invisible to the naked eye within the Order Field, and that light can be said to be the last flickering flame of its existence. 𝘧𝓇𝑒𝑒𝑤ℯ𝑏𝓃𝘰𝑣ℯ𝘭.𝘤ℴ𝘮

"Although your research method is crazy, this is indeed spectacular." Bingdisi shielded her eyes as she looked at the scene on the holographic projection. Now, the brilliant light curtain is rapidly expanding, and this feeling of an incoming assault is truly breathtaking. The Order Field is an immense egg-shaped space, like an ellipsoidal bubble floating in the Void, and now the front part of this ellipsoidal bubble is rippling with waves of colorful patterns, indescribable colors are rapidly spreading along the edge of the Order Field, as if the entire Fleet is plunging into a massive colorful whirlpool. Yet, this scene didn’t last long; after the World Fragment contacted the Order Field, the evaporation layer would quickly be exhausted, and just a few minutes later, some phantom-like things appeared before our eyes.

They looked like huge meteorites, but their structure and shape were obviously more complex than meteorites. These continually emerging phantoms, some are only hundreds of meters, while others are several kilometers or even hundreds of kilometers in size. They appear out of nothing in the Order Field, coming straight at our Fleet, and soon enough, I realized what these things were: they were actually fractured celestial fragments.

A certain planet fragmented in the aftermath of a global apocalypse, turning into a vast swarm of newborn meteorites. Yet, before these meteorites could be weathered by time, they were already engulfed by a torrent of jumbled information. Now they’ve lost their physical form, becoming like phantoms that record the final moments of a world—though they remain mere phantoms.

"How about a thrill?" Sandora suddenly remembered something, giving me a mischievous smile, then ordered from the command seat below, "Don’t filter these phantoms, let them crash directly."

In the next second, I understood what Sandora meant by "a thrill." The overwhelming space boulders indeed collided with the Imperial Fleet unimpeded! Although they ultimately lacked physical form and couldn’t inflict any damage on the fleet, these illusory shadows penetrated the ships’ Shields and Armor effortlessly, sweeping through. They passed through the spaceship and naturally through each of our bodies—well, this scene was truly exhilarating. I felt like I was speeding sub-light towards the Kuiper Belt, failing to brake and turn, crashing straight through hundreds of Little Crow asteroids!

In a short period, huge phantom meteorites swept through the command hall of the Imperial Admiral repeatedly. Shadows of giant rocks whizzed past us everywhere; they turned out to be so dense, something unnoticed from a distance?

However, it merely appeared spectacular; everyone present was honed through gunfire and explosions, nerves as solid as steel. Mere visual impact could only alleviate our boredom. Sandora knew this, of course, and wanted this magnificent collision to clear the nearly half-month’s accumulated stagnant atmosphere. Her simple and direct method proved quite effective—Bingdisi swung the Meteor Hammer fiercely, preparing to rush at Sandora: "Are you crazy? Is scaring people that fun?"

In reality, this female hooligan’s face showed no sign of being frightened; her actions merely proved she had regained energy.

After overdosing on heroine pills, she feels fierce! Fierce! Da!

That’s about it.

But once these phantoms drift past, we can’t continue this game, as the collision has entered the mid-stage, and the core part of the World Fragment is reaching the Imperial Fleet’s Order Field.

The core part still retains the normal spatial-temporal properties, where massive Celestial Fragments and chaotic Initial Energy exist. The colossal force of the universe’s apocalypse often gets partially trapped in this Zone—these are the truly dangerous parts of the collision. Many cross-dimensional civilizations see "encountering World Fragments" as the greatest peril during Void exploration, mainly because they might crash with these Tai Chu Energies. But the Imperial Fleet’s Joint Shield fears not even doomsday, naturally unafraid of such collisions. Sandora ordered the enhancement of shield readings and commanded individual warships to autonomously assess and clear celestial debris or energy groups heading their way. Meanwhile, Taville’s expert team closely monitored various sensors, preparing to analyze the collision.

Bingdisi stared at the scene in the holographic projection and suddenly whispered, "It’s coming!"

As she spoke, a storm appeared out of thin air within the Order Field.

A fierce storm of light and high temperature, intense yellow-white "fire" light expanding from a point, instantly forming a dazzling nova in front of the Imperial Fleet. Within this halo, giant Celestial Fragments began raining down on us.

Light and heat might be the forces accumulated at the universe’s final moment; they could be remnants from destroyed Constant Stars or perhaps the aftermath of the big bang at the universe’s birth. In any case, anything is possible, as apocalypse destroys the spatial-temporal structure of a world, mixing all "events" since its creation indiscriminately. Hence, the phenomena resulting from this collision are unsurprising. While these broken star Fragments look like ordinary matter, they’ve mutated in the apocalyptic flood of information. They may be fragile or possess the power of world Origin and unparalleled sturdiness, even becoming some kind of Extraordinary Material: actually, the Empire’s initial Extraordinary Material came about similarly. In ancient times, Xyrin Apostle scientists discovered some extraordinarily strong products from the universe’s apocalypse. Through inspiration, they continually crafted a perfect information structure on the mathematical level, eventually creating the widely used Extraordinary Alloy, Extraordinary Crystal, and Extraordinary XXs in various devices today. This is why Taville is so eager to research this grand collision; apocalypse is disastrous, but the World Fragment post-apocalypse often brings surprises. Massive information gets entangled due to the apocalypse, and the mutation outcomes from macro parameter random combinations often leave Imperial Scientists amazed.

However, Taville’s research on World Fragment structure this time has a more crucial objective—to determine whether this World Fragment originated from the Hometown World—this location is an absolutely desolate Area. We’ve confirmed it’s a hundredfold more desolate than other explorer teams discovered Desolate Zones; there’s hardly any Universe here. The Hometown World lies in this "direction," and now a Cosmic Debris floats towards us... actually, everyone’s heart is lifted, though no one openly says it.

May the fragment not originate from the Hometown World.

A group of work ships went out to intercept some material fragments, while the Energy Raider mounted atop the Imperial Admiral collected samples of those Tai Chu Energies effortlessly, and other projectiles turned to dust under the Escort Fleet’s gunfire, a magnificent spectacle.

Watching this scene, my sister couldn’t help muttering: "Hmm, so the debris swarm reported by the exploration team looks like this? It’s surprisingly majestic."

"Well, in fact, we’re probably the only ones encountering such a grand scene," Sandora chimed in beside me, her tone somewhat peculiar, "The probability of head-on collisions with a World Fragment in the Void... haha, previous explorer teams only scanned this debris with radar fully active. We bumped into this vast swarm all at once; this low probability can’t be taken as reference."

"Anyway, with Void Creature present, any probability incident can happen," Bingdisi casually patted my shoulder, "Event vortex, probability beacon, walking Halo emitter, miraculous species warding off evils even in death..."

I glared at this female hooligan: "If you keep quiet, nobody will take you for a mute."

Looks like relationship changes won’t make me hopeful for Mr. Da Bing’s tongue and character.

The collision process lasted several hours. The World Fragment we encountered was indeed enormous in scale. However, no remnants of civilization nor other things of scientific value were found in the World Fragment, so after gathering some samples, the fleet expelled remaining debris from the Order Field. Taville’s scientists, after an intense flurry of activity, completed sample testing.

Taville sent the test report to Sandora and me with a trace of excitement on their face: "It’s confirmed this World Fragment is not from the Hometown World. But traces of weak information remnants from the Hometown World were found in the fragments; we’re on the right course!" (To be continued. If you like this work, welcome to Qidian (qidian.com) to vote for recommendation tickets, monthly tickets. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users, please go to m.qidian.com to read.)