48 Hours a Day

The first sentence of Lin Sisi’s essay went like this—’Does our there our universe have aliens? It is a topic our planetary observation team has been studying.’

‘With constantly developing science and technology, we receive new and updated news every day. Like the vast universe, the planetary observation members know that our human civilization is still in its infancy. If other intelligent beings do exist outside the solar system, how do they view us? Are their intentions toward us good or malicious?’

…

Zhang Heng raised his eyebrows. For a child of Lin Sisi’s age, this weekly diary’s writing style and contents were surprising. Zhang Heng remembered how she looked like in the photo. Thin and having some sparse bangs on his forehead, she was hardly noticed by the crowd.

Thus, only a few people knew about the knowledge this ordinary little girl possessed. Zhang Heng spent five minutes reading the entire weekly diary, only to find its contents completely different from what he had thought.

Earlier, he had talked to Lin Sisi’s class teacher, Li Yan, discovering about the existence of this entry. Maybe the other party was too nervous at the time, and there was some ambiguity in her writing.

In fact, Lin Sisi mentioned two types of aliens in her entry. According to the different attitudes that they had toward humans, she divided the aliens into two categories. One species was willing to help humans, and the other group was malicious and aggressive toward them.

According to Lin Sisi, these aliens had come to earth as early as the Cretaceous period. Equipped with strong disguise and learning ability, their species were supposed to be on the top of the food chain. Unfortunately, as they were living here on earth, the third extinction event happened. It wiped out almost all animals and plants on the earth, including dinosaurs, killed in the colossal catastrophe. Even the alien species did not manage to survive the extinction event.

But they did not die right away. The mother served as the core of reproduction escaped the extinction event through a long period of hibernation. Since it did not know when the extinction event would end and whether the environment was suitable for survival after everything was settled down, it slept for an exceptionally long time this time and was only awakened recently.

When it woke up, it found something better than a dinosaur.

And that was the human beings who stood at the top of the food chain.

“This will be the greatest disaster faced by human history. But unfortunately, human beings did not realize that they are being hunted. The prelude of this battle was about to begin,” Lin Sisi wrote at the end, “The adults are all busy with their affairs and waste their time on things that do no matter much to them. Fortunately, the planetary observation team members have found a way to prevent this disaster. We will fight for the fate of humankind.”

…

Zhang Heng put down his mobile phone. In the eyes of ordinary people, Lin Sisi’s weekly journal might look like a child’s fantasy. Especially at the end, where she mentioned that she would fight for the fate of humanity. Usually, only boys would write something like this, and it was hard to believe that a timid girl like Lin Sisi would have such a passionate side.

It was a pity that she and her planetary observation team did not manage to prevent this catastrophe.

A few years later, when everyone recalled this summer, they would only remember that three little brats refused to listen to their parents, came to the river to play at night, and eventually drowned. The other parents would use this unfortunate event to educate their children about the consequences of not listening to them.

Zhang Heng wondered if the three of them would make the same choice if they were given another chance.

Unfortunately, they had departed this world.

Most of the contents in this weekly journal were about the evil aliens who came to this world during the Cretaceous Period. Most of the contents matched the things that Zhang Heng saw in Workshop No. 3. Now, Zhang Heng had gained a better understanding of those things. Unfortunately, Lin Sisi did not write about the methods to stop those aliens in her weekly journal.

However, Zhang Heng did manage to find some useful clues between the lines.

He had been investigating those things for some time now, and he had to admit that those aliens were indeed very cautious. Even though he risked his life to venture into Workshop No. 3, he did not find anything useful to help him deal with them. Besides, the oldest member of the three planetary observation team’s members was only fourteen years old. It was unlikely that they could find so much information on their own. Especially the fact that they knew that those aliens had been living on the planet earth since the Cretaceous Period. Not even the best archaeologist could completely restore what happened tens of millions of years ago.

So they must have received some kind of help. Coupled with Lin Sisi’s classification of those aliens, Zhang Heng realized that there were likely to be two types of life forms that could be considered as aliens in this quest. Other than the aliens trying to exterminate every human being, there was another type of aliens trying to help humans. However, that might not be their pure motive. Zhang Heng figured that they might have had grievances with the former.

After all, this was just a game. Zhang Heng did not care about their purpose. As long as they had a way to help him destroy the weird creature at Workshop No. 3, he would not mind working with them.

Now, he was back dealing with his original problem.

How would he find out more about the clues that the planetary observation team left for him?

Zhang Heng knew that he was going to lose sleep again for a few days. He was used to having 48 hours of active time in the real world, but when he came into the dungeon that adopted the 24-hour system, he started to feel that 24 hours were not enough for him. He had to continue to go to the school to ensure that the aliens would not suspect that he was onto something.

With no teammates to rely on, Zhang Heng could only entrust Bai Qing to investigate the planetary observation team. He sacrificed his sleep and went to the hotel where she was at early in the morning. After the two of them exchanged the secret code, Bai Qing opened the door and let Zhang Heng enter her room.

“…you are saying that there is another group of aliens here?” Bai Qing asked in surprise after hearing what Zhang Heng told her.

“The other group of aliens may not be on Earth,” Zhang Heng said. After analyzing the current situation, he knew that those aliens were still searching for something after making the three children look like they were drowned in the river.

“We should be looking for the same thing as well. I don’t know what that thing is, but it is obviously related to the three children. We have to think about where to start.”

“Planetarium. You said that the three of them would often leave the neighborhood together. And they called themselves the Planetary Observation Team. I think they went to the planetarium, “Bai Qing said suddenly.

Zhang Heng frowned, “I did consider this possibility, but the distance between the planetarium and their residence is too far away. It is almost ten kilometers. After considering their age, it was impossible for them to do that.”

“No, no, no. I’m talking about the old planetarium. My grandmother’s house is around there as well. I lived there for a while when I was a child. So I knew there was an old planetarium there. The place became a spot for teenagers to gather after the new planetarium is opened. It’s been many years since I’ve been to the old planetarium,” Bai Qing added, “The old planetarium is very close to where they lived. It’s a ten-minutes walking distance.”