Sender: Donna
Date: 19/10/4623
recipient:*****
Email title: Greetings from Core City
Dear Jane:
How are you doing lately? I am writing to you now while sitting on the train heading to Ulian. After staying in the core city for a week, I now have some free time.
This nearly week-long trip to the core city was quite tightly arranged. Our team of less than twenty people went through more than a dozen inspections. In addition to some coalition government officials whose names we cannot name, several high-level officials from AHgAs also participated via virtual projection. It seems that they are going to make a documentary of some kind, and we just happened to catch up with it this time.
Although there is a lot of red tape here, I still feel that the trip is worthwhile. Jane, you must come to the core city with your own eyes. I will never forget the first time I saw this city through the light rail window——
Huge, gray buildings rise from the ground. You can barely see the windows at first glance. They are like tombstones one after another, standing in the thick fog of late autumn.
There are no pedestrians or traffic on the streets above ground, like an abandoned dead city. We sit quietly in the carriage suspended in the air, like a group of untimely visitors, traveling deep into the hinterland where death lives.
I kept looking out the window, and occasionally one or two empty parks appeared in the concrete forest. They reminded me of the scene in Askia before, but there was no one on those lush green lawns, and there were no red and white runways. It was empty, with only some strange-shaped monuments standing in the center of the park. Most of them were silver, and a few were the same gray color as the surrounding buildings. They are full of symmetrical beauty. Some look like antlers, others like wings—or a pair of giant hands reaching for the sky.
But when the light rail goes from the surface to the underground, everything returns to the world we are familiar with - just like our underground base, the underground stations here have smooth white walls and spotless floors. When we put our tickets into the ticket gate one by one, brightly colored road instructions appeared on the curtain wall in front of us.
There are crawlers and elevators everywhere, forming a giant network that encompasses the entire underground station in the core city. But they were so well disguised that many people jumped when the tracks started.
From the station where we got off to where we stayed, I estimated the actual number of steps I took. It might be less than two hundred steps? Elena, who was traveling with us - the girl who had learned singing with us before - said that this place didn't look like a place for transporting people, but like a place for transporting machines.
When she said this, I actually felt that way. When standing on the conveyor track, everyone maintained the same posture. Everyone was silent, staring blankly ahead, letting the tracks under their feet take them to different carriage entrances. Each of the images was exquisitely crafted and exquisite. It's enough to look like a real android.
In the next few days, I ran out whenever I had free time and took a lot of photos. From the introductions of the travelers, I learned that those high-rise buildings standing like tombstones were not abandoned. Most of them were office buildings or buildings. The production workshop is not without windows - it’s just that compared to the size of the high-rise building, those thin and narrow windows are like a texture of concrete.
I originally wanted to apply to have a look on the ground outside the building, but the application was approved, but I ran out of time, so I had to give up. In a tall building on the innermost side of the core city, I saw the outline of the Mother City. I wanted to take a photo and show it to you, but photography was not allowed there.
The Mother City is far from the image I imagined. Its appearance looks like an oval egg, like a drop of mercury falling on the ground. It is said that shortly after the Mother City emerged, this seemingly thin shell opened up on its own, forming a semicircular cavity that covered the Mother City.
There are special maintenance robots in the mother city to inspect this shell. Whenever potential bad pixels are found, they will report to the city's workshop, produce them, and then replace them.
It wasn't until last year that District 3 successfully reproduced a maintenance robot for the first time. It looks like a ray, but without tail spines. During maintenance, it will tightly adhere to the shell of the mother city. , diagnosis is made by detecting changes in the amount of light entering different areas.
This protective shell can greatly reduce the negative effects of extreme weather, but it is a pity that we still do not fully understand the technical principles behind it.
When I heard these introductions, I felt very emotional. At that moment, I suddenly felt that this was like a metaphor for civilization - everything in our current world is based on these sixteen mother cities. It is precise, complex, and contains It holds a power that is beyond our reach, but it itself is so mysterious and fragile, full of unknowns and dangerous.
There are also some museums in the core city. Due to time constraints, I was not able to visit them all. I hope I can have the opportunity to come back in the future. It would be even better if I could go with you.
That’s all for today.
Wish you all the best.
Donna
(Hell, I just typed the original name again...it's really hard to get used to a new name)
19/10/4623
——
Sender: Donna
Date: 25/10/4623
recipient:*****
Email subject: I just found out you are training!
Dear Jane:
I was still wondering a few days ago why you haven't replied to your letter. Today when I was chatting with Tulan, I found out that your 24-week special training has started. Congratulations!
I just joined the job the day before yesterday, but today the police department and the Social Security Bureau went on strike at the same time. Except for a few essential personnel who were still on duty, everyone else went on a demonstration. The old man who wanted to handle the handover with me couldn't be found at all. I didn't expect that the first thing I did when I came here was to write a complaint email... But in this way, I just have time to calm down and read the previous files these days. It's barely a bad thing.
Wulian is close to the southern inland sea. Although there are no cruise ships sailing directly from other regions, it is also an important transportation place. In particular, it is rich in wine, so it is more prosperous than Tanyi. The old houses on the street are all colorful, like a fairy tale town.
When I met my colleagues in Wulian for the first time the day before yesterday, they were all shocked and condemned the blatant use of child labor in Mercury Needle - it took me a lot of effort to explain our working mechanism to them. Including the fact that we can theoretically retire at the age of 25, everyone's attitude suddenly became very envious.
I seem to be the first mercury needle sent here. The people here don't care much about chelation. Their life pace is very slow, they only work 35 hours a week, and they have about one month of treatment every year. In addition to paid leave, the department also has a well-established paid leave system - if you work 40 hours or more in a week, the Friday of the next week will also be included in the weekend holiday, and you can take an extra day off.
They call this the big and small week system.
(End of chapter)
