The Evolution of Genius: Every Night, I Get Smarter!-Chapter 120: Layer Six

As I filled a glass of water in the kitchen, I glanced at the TV where my parents and the girls were engrossed in the morning news.

Sensing a somber atmosphere, I walked out of the kitchen and asked, "What’s up?"

My father responded, "We are watching news."

"That I see. Anything happened?" I asked, noticing the seriousness on their faces.

Veronica, with a troubled expression, said, "A whole city in Texas has been infected by chemicals. There are hundreds of casualties."

I quizzed, "Was there anyone that you knew?"

The room fell silent for a moment, and everyone looked at me strangely.

I was oblivious to their reactions and asked, "What?"

My mother, concerned, remarked, "What are you talking about? Just because there were no relatives, should we ignore it?"

I retorted, "Yes. Why would you care? It only makes you depressed."

Oliv, puzzled, questioned, "What happened to you, Max? You never thought like that."

I shrugged and replied, "Perhaps I have changed since then."

My father chimed in, "You certainly did. Is everything really okay with you?"

I assured them, "I’m fine. Anyway, I need to go to a class with one of the smartest people in the Universe. So let me excuse myself."

Turning around, I remembered something and looked at Veronica, asking, "Are you going back to Germany?"

She smiled and replied, "No. I will stay for a day or two. There are no concerts."

I nodded and said, "Alright," then gave Oliv and Veronica final hugs.

My parents looked at me strangely, clearly not supportive of me having two girlfriends.

Ignoring their judgmental gazes, I headed for the wardrobe.

As I stepped out of the wardrobe into Coelus and made my way toward the Coelus University of Excellence, I noticed that while there was still a slight air of panic, things seemed much calmer now.

I reached the familiar University Building. Exiting the protective bubble, I walked through the corridor, waiting in front of the class where I usually attended lectures.

Before long, Scholar Emanuel, draped in a yellow cloak, appeared at the spot.

He greeted me, "Hello Maximillian. Please, follow me. We are going to have the class in my office here."

I asked, "You have your own office? Also, you can call me Max."

Scholar Emanuel responded, "Yes Max. They gave me an office when I started teaching you the fifth layer."

Following him, I entered his office. It was a modest space. A large desk dominated the room, cluttered with data tablets, and a holographic display.

We both took our seats at the desk, preparing for the in-depth session ahead. Scholar Emanuel initiated the conversation with a sense of anticipation.

"I want this to be a true 1-on-1 eye-to-eye session. I really look forward to working with you on the barrier, and The Lord has been pushing me to make it quick, so I hope that you have the time to spend here," Scholar Emanuel expressed.

I reassured him, "No problem. I knew that this would take a lot of time."

Emanuel nodded and then said, "That is subject to your skill. From now on, just call me Emanuel. After you learn the sixth layer and begin research in the seventh layer, you will get the title of a Scholar too, so it’s only natural."

He then added, "Supposedly, you are the only living being with a higher Synaptic Luminance than mine. I say we put that claim to the test."

I pondered Emanuel’s question, considering the nature of dreams and branes. "A new brane is created when we sleep and we are transported into it. The more times a person finds themselves at the Spot of Separation within their dream, the more engraved that brane becomes," I explained.

Emanuel nodded in agreement and said, "Yes. We say it becomes more real. However, when we wake up, we arrive back here. In this 3-brane we call the real world. Somehow, we all arrive in the same one. Not different ones. Why do you think that is?"

I answered, "I would think that we are somehow programmed to do so. We are assigned to this brane."

Emanuel smiled, "Alright and do you know what makes us programmed to do so?"

I said, "Quasars."

Emanuel said, "Exactly, Quasars. Someone probably told you about this before. The frequency of the Quasars is what makes the assignment possible. But this is not all that Quasars are. They have a much more broad role. Do you know anything else about them?"

I thought for a while before remembering about something, "Replicas. I heard that after death, if the brain is attacked with Quasars, the functioning of the body can be restored, and some of the Synaptic Connections as well."

Emanuel nodded and said, "Replicas is one of the technologies that emerged as we explored the behavior of the brain during sleep. The frequencies of the Quasars changed rapidly during sleep, so we experimented with them."

Emanuel continued his explanaion. Simply bombarding the brain with Quasars during the waking state didn’t yield significant changes. There was no notable influence on dreams or alterations in neural connections.

However, someone had the audacity to test this on a deceased individual, and that’s when one of the most profound discoveries of the 6th Layer occurred.

He gestured towards a holographic representation of the experiment, showcasing the remarkable results. "The dead body, when subjected to Quasars, exhibited a restoration of normal bodily functions. Vital organs began functioning again, and synaptic connections showed signs of renewal. Quasars reversed the effects of death on the physical body."

He then looked at me and said seriously, "However, what could not be restored was personal identity, consciousness, goals, or free will."

I pondered the implications. "So, in essence, they became robots."

Emanuel affirmed my understanding. "Yes, precisely. This is the theory. The Quasars act as a form of programming language, dictating almost all aspects of existence except consciousness."

He continued with a serious tone, "As the experiments progressed, a machine was developed that could control the Quasars’ frequency. As they manipulated these frequencies to resonate with the Quasars within the person, they observed changes in the Dreamland. They altered the 3-brane itself"

Emanuel shared the historical progression of this technology. "Over hundreds of years, humans refined and improved this technology. Now, they can establish contact with individuals in their dreams. In connection with The Observers, we can contact a person in their dreams from any distance."

I asked, "You said that Quasars don’t have any influence on consciousness. Then how does Jumping work? Isn’t it consciousness that get’s transported?"

Emanuel did not want to talk about the details of Jumping yet. He changed the subject to the theory of simulation. Of the universe not being a physical thing at all.

Which, of course, doesn’t make much sense to consider, as it would not make any difference if the cluster was real or not.

Well, that question turned out to be important in the later times of the 6th layer.

Humans questioned that if the universe were a simulation, then wouldn’t there be more simulations like these?

And who was running those simulations?

Of course, at that point, everyone knew that the universe was created from the vibration of strings, but were the vibrations somehow programmed?

Were the vibrations predetermined from the start to the very end?

I asked, "And then they crossed the barrier between clusters using the Quasars?"

Emanuel was a bit surprised that I was following quite well. "We did cross the barrier with the Quasars and that wasn’t that long ago. 286 years ago, the first Quasar passed through the barrier. At first, we didn’t know that it did, because as soon as it passed, it came back to our cluster, as if it came from the other side."

I was slightly surprised, so did it bounce or not? What was this about?

Emanuel continued, "The cluster on the other side was the Zytherian cluster. Simultaneously, they had dispatched their own Quasar to our side. The returned particle wasn’t identical to the one we had sent through—it was a distinct counterpart."

Over the next century, humans worked hard on creating an Observer capable of transporting Quasars through the barrier. Great care had to be taken to make sure that only the Quasars were sent.

After extensive efforts, they achieved success by establishing a perfect vacuum within the Observer and introducing the Quasars inside, effectively transporting them to the Zytherian cluster.

Emanuel said, "We could now contact people from the other Clusters through their dreams and find out about them. We built connections with the governments, and everything was going well. There was no worry about war, as no one could travel between the clusters."

"We also learned that there was no intelligent life in the 4th Cluster, or at least we couldn’t contact anyone." he added.

I wondered and asked, "So what changed? Who Jumped first?"

Emanuel sighed. "The Lord wishes to believe it was the Zytherians, but in reality, we were the first to Jump. A new Nyctallum device was developed. I believe you’re familiar with that device. For the first time, we were able to extract all the Quasars from a person’s brain."