Tap, tap, tap, tap…
Only when the playful clicks of small high heels vanished around the corner did the three of them finally co back to themselves from their shock.
“Xu Yan, sis…”
Cheng ngxue’s eyes were full of envy.
“So cool.”
“Wasn’t she always like that?” In Jiang Ran’s mory, that girl—only a year older than them—had been mature and dependable ever since they were little.
He lowered his head to look at the petition.
The presidents’ signatures on it were almost all from the campus’s most influential major clubs—enough to show just how much weight it carried.
“No matter what, that’s one big problem handled. Let’s go to the Film Cara Club first.”
The three of them rushed over without stopping, and Yan Rui happened to be there as well.
Yan Rui was genuinely happy for them, and he took them all over the place to handle the paperwork.
Thus—
the Film Cara Club, which had been clinging to life for years, was allowed to cling to life for one more year;
Jiang Ran beca the new club president, and Cheng ngxue and Qin Feng were the only two mbers.
“Now I can finally graduate and leave campus with peace of mind.”
After Yan Rui finished explaining a few club matters, he said goodbye to the three of them and left with his last personal belongings.
“Yay! From now on, this is our secret base!”
Cheng ngxue tried to throw herself onto the sofa, but the thick dust froze her stiff in midair. On her tiptoes, she retreated.
“Maybe we should clean first?”
An exhausting afternoon later,
the long-sealed activity room was finally cleaned up.
The Film Cara Club had a lot of old stuff—most of it of unknown use, unknown condition. Jiang Ran and Qin Feng didn’t dare move anything randomly;
they piled it all into a corner.
“Can I bring my Rhine Cat plush from the dorm?” Cheng ngxue asked.
“Is that really necessary?”
Jiang Ran looked at the narrow club room.
“There isn’t much space to move around to begin with.”
“Oh co on, my dorm bed can’t even fit it anymore~”
“Fine. Do whatever you want.”
Jiang Ran had never been a club president before, and he didn’t know what he was supposed to do in the activity room anyway. They weren’t planning to run real club events, so he let Cheng ngxue arrange things however she liked.
Qin Feng, on the other hand, was seriously organizing the bookshelf, in a pretty good mood.
“Honestly, ever since I was little, my dream was to have a secret base like this—to do crazy things with my friends.”
“Every boy has that dream.”
Jiang Ran smiled faintly.
“As for crazy things… what we’re doing—could it be any crazier than this?”
If they really could master the ability of [texting the past], it would practically an revising the past, manipulating history;
it would practically an… a god looking down from on high.
“Next, we go pick up our good buddy—the Positron Cannon—and bring it ho.”
…
More tedious procedures, plus a guarantee letter, and at last they saw the legendary [Positron Cannon] in the school warehouse.
It was about the size of a microwave—boxy and square, with a cylindrical “barrel” on the front about the size of a volleyball.
The “barrel” was solid, its internal structure unclear.
According to Yan Rui, it was a modified CRT picture tube that could fire a positron beam.
But he’d only read that description off a label;
whether it was true or not was unknown.
And now, the label stuck to the machine had already been burned away, leaving no way to verify anything.
“Why does it sll like sothing’s burned?”
Jiang Ran leaned in and sniffed.
“It really is coming from this thing.”
Qin Feng sniffed too.
“A capacitor blew and leaked.”
“Wow, professional. Can you fix it?”
“We’ll have to carry it back and check. Hopefully the core components aren’t burned—those I really can’t fix.”
After a pause, Qin Feng shook his head.
“Not just can’t fix it—I don’t believe this thing can fire a positron beam in the first place. In physics, that’s absolutely impossible.”
“If you’re bad, practice more.”
“What a joke. Do you even understand the basic principle of an electron gun?”
“Every electron gun has its own constitution.”
“…”
Qin Feng had both arms wrapped around the Positron Cannon and couldn’t exactly throw hands.
“Fine. You win.”
…
After hauling it back to the Film Cara Club activity room, Cheng ngxue finally saw the legendary Positron Cannon for the first ti.
“It’s like a giant cara!”
Jiang Ran blinked.
Honestly… it really did look like one.
Both were boxy and square, and that front “barrel” really did resemble a cara lens.
Maybe that was the seniors’ idea of romance back then.
Qin Feng took out his tools and inspected it carefully.
“It’s not a big problem. The power supply module is burned out, but the core components are basically fine. Of course… I’m not sure whether they’re fine, because I have no idea what these core components even are.”
Jiang Ran waved a hand.
“We’re on the sa side. You don’t need to be that rigorous. How long until it’s fixed?”
“About four or five days.”
“Alright.”
Jiang Ran went to the small blackboard.
“In these four or five days, you’re responsible for fixing the Positron Cannon. I’ll try to resolve the other problems.”
He picked up the chalk and wrote two questions with rapid tap-tap-taps:
[1. What is the principle by which an SMS crosses spaceti and is sent into the past?]
[2. Why do only I (Jiang Ran) have mories from before the temporal shift.]
It would be best to clarify these two questions before the formal experint—only then would they feel safer.
Qin Feng lifted his head and glanced at the board.
“The first question—I’ve been thinking about it these past few days. If the Positron Cannon really fired a positron beam and hit the distribution box… what exactly would happen? Today I suddenly had a new idea.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“I think what reacts with the [positron beam] is mainly the [high-voltage transforr] inside the distribution box.”
Qin Feng stood and pointed at the distribution box outside the window.
“My guess is that when the two collide, they produce a field that crosses spaceti—or, how do I put it… right. A [spaceti black hole].”
He introduced a new term.
“This spaceti black hole is very special. It should be extrely, extrely small—maybe it isn’t even the existence of traditional matter. But it connects to spaceti in the past, and… it can also absorb radio waves within a few ters around it.”
Jiang Ran propped his chin and thought.
A spaceti black hole, absorbing radio waves—it did sound plausible.
After all, in the usual sense, a cosmic black hole absorbs surrounding matter with its imnse gravity;
not even light can escape.
“Go on.”
“After that, it’s simple.”
Qin Feng spread his hands.
“The radio wave carrying that text ssage was absorbed by the spaceti black hole, traveled into the spaceti from three days earlier, and then was captured by the base station tower from three days earlier—and from there forwarded onto Cheng ngxue’s phone from three days earlier.”
Jiang Ran nodded.
That part of the logic was about the sa as what he’d already imagined.
Of course, whether the guess was correct would still have to wait for the experint in a few days.
If the experint succeeded, then every assumption and conjecture would be correct.
If the experint failed…
then all theory and practice would have to be torn down and rebuilt from scratch.
“As for the second question, I’ve got nothing.”
Qin Feng lowered his head again and fiddled with the Positron Cannon.
“Your problem is on you. You’re the only one who can find the cause.”
“Yeah, but where am I supposed to look?”
Jiang Ran sighed. How could he not be completely at a loss? Who knew why he was this special?
He’d thought before—maybe whoever sent the text would keep their mories from before the temporal shift… but he’d quickly rejected it in his own mind.
There was nothing scientific about it.
Still, he couldn’t be completely absolute about it. Later, having Cheng ngxue and Qin Feng try sending texts too would tell them.
…
Three days later, Qin Feng announced that the Positron Cannon was fully repaired.
“It’s completely fixed. Absolutely no problems.”
Jiang Ran opened his eyes and sat up from the sofa.
Finally.
Finally…
At last, they were about to run the experint closest to success!
“Wow! I’m so excited!”
Cheng ngxue hugged her Rhine Cat plush.
“At a mont this important, President, aren’t you going to say a few words?”
“What is there to say?”
Jiang Ran refused.
“It might not even work. Who knows whether we’ll end up getting happy over nothing again.”
“Say a few words.”
Qin Feng also smiled and fanned the flas.
“It’s because you brought us along that we got to this step. Just say sothing to boost morale.”
Jiang Ran didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but he didn’t want to dampen the mood.
“Alright.”
He copied the gesture, clapping his hands a couple of tis, straightening up, and looking at the calendar.
“March 25, 2025—this is a crucial day in human history, a day worth rembering, and a day worth commorating.”
Jiang Ran’s deliberate posing made Cheng ngxue cover her mouth and giggle.
“On this day, inside the Film Cara Club of Donghai University, the best three-person team in the world will conduct the first controllable spaceti traversal experint in human history.”
“We’ll use the Positron Cannon, the transforr distribution box, and an ordinary phone…”
He lifted his head, his pupils reflecting the flicker of the incandescent light overhead.
“[To the world of the past… we will deliver a letter!]”
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