Plague Doctor

Strange noises and gory images. They rushed into Wang Ruoxiang’s mind as well as the consciousness of the 49999 selected individuals all over the world. The One was assaulted by the mental wave, back at the command central, people like Elder Tong and Yao Sinian were exposed to the same fate. They bore witness to how Locust Illness brought down many different civilizations. There were so many different cultures, and races. These people exhausted everything they had but they were powerless against the abnormal locusts. They were eventually consumed and everything turned into nothingness…

They also saw how the Yith travelled through time, carrying the Locust Sickness’ DNA with them. They cleverly skipped through time to avoid extinction.

The 50000 individuals were carefully selected. Even though this wave of mental input was strong enough to destroy a person’s mind, all the selected individuals had a strong enough constitution to sustain it. Some were angered by what they saw, others were silent in thought. Some scientists were beyond joy. The temporary flashes of knowledge were everything they had been searching for. The invitation by the Yith was already lighting up their mind. This was not an easy invitation to accept. Their families, friends, lovers… were not on the list. It was hard to put down everything, to go to the future, to become the Yith.

“Doctor Wang, we admire you greatly.” Teacher Fan said calmly. “Your intelligence, learning capability, observation power and logical mind is top notch among humanity. It was you who first hypothesized the Locust Sickness’ pathology. We Yith welcome you.” Wang Ruoxiang was currently outside the patient’s room but she could still hear Teacher Fan clearly. ‘Allow this world to go to ruination and escape alone to the future?’

“You Yith made this decision under these circumstances?” Wang Ruoxiang mumbled as if to herself.

“You humans put too much emphasis on concepts like family, race, relationship and country. Consider the concept of Imagined Community proposed by Benedict Anderson, an imagined community is a community due to their shared benefit. When necessary, building, participating and protecting this community is rational; but when it’s unnecessary—when these communities can no longer bring benefit, abandoning them is another rationality.”

“You mean… abandoning our parents and children is rational?”

“That depends. I know this is very hard to accept for emotional creatures like humanity but this is not a multiple-choice question. Your escape will not cause their destruction, if anything, the escape is a chance for you to survive, to continue your civilization. Then accepting this chance to survive is rational.”

“Isn’t that selfish?”

“The essence of nature is selfish, you’ve done research into that already.”

“Then if necessary, you two will abandon the Yith race?”

“Of course, everything depends on the situation. A physical shell can adapt, so can one’s consciousness. Nomenclature does not matter, form does not matter, emotion does not matter, concepts like ‘family’ do not matter… Nothing matters, except the result.”

“Then what kind of result you’re looking for? What is your goal?”

“I’ve already told you, the Yith are reaching for the epitome of intelligence. We will use rationality and science to reach that summit.”

“So… you do not believe in any form of emotion?”

“Broadly speaking, rationality is also a type of emotion. Our passion for rationality and science, our determination towards pursuit of intellect is an emotion. Narrowly speaking, emotions are imagined feelings instigated by chemical reactions of hormones. It is irrational, temporary, weak, blind, stupid and it can influence rationality. However, rationality can trump emotion.”

“Rationality can trump emotion, is that your mission?”

“If that aids in your understanding, you can see it that way. We are observers, archivers, thinkers. We search for essence of things.”

“I wonder if you have heard this biological hypothesis that humanity came up with up…” Wang Ruoxiang mumbled but in reality, she was only conversing in her mind, “To maintain a vibrancy of life, a lifeform has to maintain diversity in their gene pool. For a race, even a sickness DNA can be good. Certain illness DNA coding can be of miraculous use under certain circumstance to help the race survive. Therefore diversity is crucial in both biology and in thinking…” With her brows arched, she looked towards Teacher Fan inside the patient’s room. “I notice your race’s lack of diversity. You should have plenty of diversity since you are compiled of different civilizations but since your collective consciousness has blind faith in rationality, that limits your frame of thinking. A race like that will never reach the summit of intelligence. From my perspective, rationality alone will not allow one to witness the pure essence of things.”

“Doctor Wang, that is a brilliant insight.” Teacher Fan replied, “We wish to discuss this with you further but you only have 10 minutes left. Please make your decision quick, please make the rational decision. Do not be blinded and shackled by emotions.”

At that moment, the selected were all joined to the Yith. The conversation between Wang Ruoxiang and Teacher Fan crossed their mind. Family… Imagined Community… Friends… Selfish… Emotions, shackle the mind…

The tsunami was coming and humanity was just a small boat waiting to be capsized.

At the desert wasteland frontline, Lou Xiaoning glared her right eye and said, “What emotion, what rationality, why don’t you tell that to people like Xue Ba?! If they didn’t act so foolishly, they might still be with us today. I don’t know about others but, I Lou Xiaoning will answer you now. I am not leaving, I’m not a coward.”

“This is my home.” Deng Ximei said softly, “I won’t go too, I can’t bear to leave my home.”

“Life has meaning because it is fleeting.” Cai Zixuan sighed, he too was selected. “I’m staying too.” He was unable to let go as well. How could he? His family’s warmth, his mother’s cooking, his girlfriend and everyone else…

Hearing these, Teacher Fan appeared to frown slightly, “You are only seeking your own death.”

“I do not wish to become a creature like the Yith.” Wang Ruoxiang had her decision as well. “I see that as another form a death, a non-life that is soaked in formalin.”

People like Uncle Dan, Ma Feng, Malachite, Peacock, Uncle Tong and Yao Sinian agreed. Some of humanity would accept the Yith’s offer but not them. They would fight to the end. “We humans are different from the Yith.”