4.6 Billion Year Symphony of Evolution

Book 2: Chapter Seven “Inside”

Last chapter recap: Lin encountered an oval worm and fought its immune system.

Red grains were everywhere in Lin’s vision. They mixed together with the blue fragments and formed an unique scene.

This was what the troops Lin’ left behind in the oval worm’s body saw. Everything here had turned into floating fragments. The blue cells that formed the esophagus and other organs inside the oval worm were invaded by tye viruses and then destroyed from their inside, starting with the nucleus the outer membrane. Because Lin killed the immune cells, the viruses grew without limits. It guessed that the oval worm only had this pile of cell fragments left inside.

Lin’s remaining troops slowly swam in this environment filled with the corpses of cells and viruses. Almost all of them were dyed red by the viruses. Watching the horrific scene, many thoughts occurred to Lin.

Terror, anxiousness, puzzlement, but there was no joy.

What were the viruses really?

According to Lin’s knowledge at the moment, the virus was a strange organism. They would not divide or feed. They just floated along the currents of water. If they came into contact with other cells, they burrowed into the outer membrane and used the cell as a machine to reproduce before destroying the entire cell.

Then like this, they created more viruses, infected more cells … …

Was their goal to destroy all cells? The viruses would not limit themselves. They would endlessly increase and then destroy everything.

When all of the cells that could be killed were killed, the viruses would also die from lack of food. Only a small number of viruses would survive and then float along the water to far away places to infect other cells.

These bright red viruses were the same. They killed the oval worm’s cells to increase their number but the great majority of the viruses couldn’t find cells. Viruses that couldn’t infect cells would die after a period of time.

Kill everything that could be killed and then wait for death, was this the virus’ purpose? What was the meaning of their existence?

However, the viruses that infected Lin’s bright red cells were unique because they could be carried in cells which they wouldn’t destroy. Even now, Lin didn’t know the reason.

Lin suddenly found that it didn’t know the meaning of its existence. Continued evolution?

This seemed to be a problem worthy of more thought but Lin felt that it wasn’t time to be idle.

Lin’s mothership was undergoing repairs. Cells at the edge of the wounds the oval worm had torn started to divide. At the same time, Lin gathered the cells outside which hadn’t entered the oval worm’s mouth and the large devourers to move towards the oval worm’s body. Lin planned to examine this monster that had eating it and made it suffer such great losses.

The corpse of the oval worm laid on the ice near the mothership. Fortunately, the ice had not melted. Otherwise, its corpse might attract other cells.

Lin first had the devourer bite through the joints on the oval worm’s segmented limbs. It tried to break off these segmented limbs.josei

Then Lin had ten thousand cells form an exploring team to move into the mouth of the oval worm. The esophagus that used to be here was gone. There were only cell fragments floating around.

The exploring team that entered quickly met up with the troops inside that had been almost completely infected by the virus, turning red. There were only several tens of thousands left.

While it was a slight waste, Lin kept watching them to prevent the viruses inside these cells from doing something unusual. Lin would not allow there to be more than ten infectors.

The virus was so terrifying. It was something that damaged the enemy but didn’t benefit Lin either. They had completely destroyed the cells inside the oval worm. Lin almost couldn’t find any food.

Maybe it shouldn’t have attacked with the virus? But in that case, at best, Lin only would have been able to drive away the oval worm, and not kill it. Was this profitable or not? Lin would only know after exploring the entire worm.

Lin first had the team search in the position where the esophagus was. This place was wide, and Lin thought that this place was in the oval worm’s roundhead. The range of the flashing exploding balls couldn’t light up the entire space.

There were only the fragments of cells and viruses in the surroundings. These viruses had died. It could not be seen from their appearance but when Lin had the cells touch them, they would not burrow in.

Lin’s exploring team continued to go deeper. It tried to see if there was anything that hadn’t been damaged by the viruses. If all of the cells inside the oval worm’s body had been destroyed by the viruses, then this battle really wasn’t profitable.

What was that?

Lin suddenly saw a long and thick tentacle floating among the corpses of cells and viruses.

This tentacle clearly was also made from cells. It seemed to have broken due to the attacks of the viruses. Due to this, Lin could see the middle was hollow and could hold many cells.

Yes, this tentacle like object was actually a passageway for cells to move though. Lin had seen them before at the oval worm’s wounded joint.

Why hadn’t this kind of passageway been destroyed by the viruses? Just because it had broke in the middle?

Lin had a devourer move to the opening in the passage to check. It found that there were many blue cells inside but they were lying on the walls of the passage as though they were died. It could only see one or two occasionally wobble.

No matter, the fact they survived under the viruses’ attack, it meant that Lin still had spoils.

Lin had some small devourers and basic cells stay behind. The devourers entered the passage to consume the blue cells while the basic cells formed a small round structure to deconstruct and digest food.

After, Lin’s remaining cells moved deeper along this passageway into the body of the oval worm. It seemed the deeper it went, the more things it would encounter that the virus hadn’t destroyed.

In the process of going in, Lin found another passageway. The passage was also broken and the inside was also filled with blue cells.

Lin left some cells there and continued to go deeper. Soon, it encountered more passages.

A third, a fourth … … Lin found more and more cells as it went deeper. These cells criss-crossed and filled this space. They were of different thicknesses. Some passages stretched and ended in a fort that led to unknown places. There were more and more forks and the passages grew narrower and narrower

These passages were slightly different but were similar in some aspects. The thickest part all stretched towards a chamber.

If Lin tore apart a passage, there would be a large number of blue cell corpses that spilled out. They seemed to have completely died, but the viruses hadn’t done this.

It was so strange. How had they avoided the attacks of the virus? There wasn’t any cell fragments in the water here. The virus hadn’t spread here?

Maybe the viruses had only destroyed the cells in a part of the oval worm. But if that was the case, how come the cells in the depths had almost all died as well?

The oval worm had torn Lin’s mothership in half but the remaining half was still well and not affected at all. For the oval worm, would a portion of the cells being killed mean that the entire organism was killed?

More and more puzzled, Lin continued to swim deeper. In the end, an enormous object appeared in front of Lin’s exploring team.

What was this?

This oval shaped object was enormous, and about the size of the oval worm’s segmented limb pincer. This was made out of cells and the end of all the passageways here were connected to this structure. This seemed to be an important organ.

Was was the use of this thing?

As Lin pondered it, this thing moved. It quickly expanded and then contracted.

What happened?

Lin had the cells retreat but left a devourer to watch this thing. Lin was extremely curious about this thing.

However, Lin waited for a long time but the thing never moved again.

…. …Fine.

Lin’ll just eat it

Translator Ramblings: The debate of whether a virus is even a living organism or not is still under debate. Lin needs a lot more cells to start pondering the purpose of life.

The video below is white blood cells attacking an invader, but I think that’s the closest imagery I can get to imagining Lin’s cells as the white blood cells attacking the oval worm.