Death's End

In this cosmic arena, Luo Ji faced not the fancy moves of Chinese sword fighting, resembling dance more than war; nor the flourishes of Western sword fighting, designed to show off the wielder’s skill; but the fatal blows of Japanese kenjutsu. Real Japanese sword fights often ended after a very brief struggle lasting no more than half a second to two seconds. By the time the swords had clashed but once, one side had already fallen in a pool of blood. But before this moment, the opponents stared at each other like statues, sometimes for as long as ten minutes. During this contest, the swordsman’s weapon wasn’t held by the hands, but by his heart. The heart-sword, transformed through the eyes into the gaze, stabbed into the depths of the enemy’s soul. The real winner was determined during this process: In the silence suspended between the two swordsmen, the blades of their spirits parried and stabbed as soundless claps of thunder. Before a single blow was struck, victory, defeat, life, and death had already been decided.

Luo Ji stared at the white wall with just such an intense glare, aimed at a world four light-years away. He knew that the sophons could show his gaze to the enemy, and his gaze was endowed with the chill of the underworld and the heaviness of the rocks above him, endowed with the determination to sacrifice everything. The gaze made the enemy’s heart palpitate and forced them to give up any ill-considered impulse.

There was always an end to the gaze of the swordsmen, a final moment of truth in the contest. For Luo Ji, one participant in this universal contest, the moment when the sword was swung for the first and last time might never arrive.

But it could also happen in the next second.

In this manner, Luo Ji and Trisolaris stared at each other for fifty-four years. Luo Ji had changed from a carefree, irresponsible man into a true Wallfacer, who faced his wall for more than half a century; the protector of Earth civilization who, for five decades, was ready to deal the fatal blow at a moment’s notice.

Throughout this time, Luo Ji had remained silent, not uttering a single word. As a matter of fact, after a person ceased to speak for ten or fifteen years, he lost his powers of speech. He might still be able to understand language, but he would not be able to speak. Luo Ji certainly could no longer speak; everything he had to say, he put into his gaze against the wall. He had turned himself into a deterrence machine, a mine ready to explode on contact at each and every moment during the long years of the past half century, maintaining the precarious balance of terror between two worlds.

“It is time to hand over the final authority for the gravitational wave universal broadcast system.” The PDC chair broke the silence solemnly.

Luo Ji did not move from his pose. The fleet chief of staff walked over, intending to help him get up, but Luo lifted a hand to stop him. Cheng Xin noticed that the motion of his arm was strong, energetic, without a hint of the hesitation one might expect in a centenarian. Then, Luo Ji stood up by himself, his posture steady. Cheng Xin was surprised to see that Luo Ji did not push against the ground with his hands as he uncrossed his legs and stood up. Even most young men couldn’t perform such a motion effortlessly.

“Mr. Luo, this is Cheng Xin, your successor. Please pass the switch to her.”

Luo Ji stood tall and straight. He looked at the white wall, which he had stared at for more than half a century, for a few more seconds. Then he bowed slightly.

He was paying his respects to his enemy. To have stared at each other across an abyss of four light-years for half a century had bonded them by a link of destiny.

Then he turned to face Cheng Xin. The old and new Swordholders stood apart, silently. Their eyes met for only a moment, but in that moment, Cheng Xin felt a sharp ray of light sweeping across the dark night of her soul. In that gaze, she felt as light and thin as a sheet of paper, even transparent. She could not imagine what kind of enlightenment the old man in front of her had achieved after fifty-four years of facing the wall. She imagined his thoughts precipitating, becoming as dense and heavy as the crust above them or as ethereal as the blue sky above that. She had no way to know, not until and unless she herself had walked the same path. Other than a bottomless profundity, she could not read his gaze.

With both hands, Luo Ji handed over the switch. With both hands, Cheng Xin accepted this heaviest object in the history of the Earth. And so, the fulcrum upon which two worlds rested moved from a 101-year-old man to a 29-year-old woman.

The switch retained the warmth from Luo Ji’s hand. It really did resemble the hilt of a sword. It had four buttons, three on the side and one at the end. To prevent accidental activation, the buttons required some strength to press, and they had to be pressed in a certain order.