1,000 meters beneath Mars, Liu A'dou and Ada almost missed the massive hidden ruins buried deep underground. Just as they were about to leave, their little princess Nono suddenly cried out loud, forcing them to stop—and that's when they discovered the enormous cavern lying a full 1,000 meters below.
Nono was their lucky star.
In the dim surroundings, Liu A'dou raised his right hand and formed a small glowing orb in his palm, lighting up everything around them. What appeared before them was a grand and majestic underground ruin.
"Can't believe there's such a massive man-made structure beneath this barren Martian surface," Ada said as she looked at the ancient decorative patterns on the walls. "It looks kind of like Mayan civilization."
Liu A'dou noticed it too. The place didn't feel like high-tech as we know it. It was more like the root of the Mayan culture on Earth. The dizzying array of carved patterns painted pictures everywhere—on the walls, the ceiling, the floor.
And at the center of this massive space was an Aldnoah power sphere. But this place wasn't armed. It looked more like an altar. Yeah, not a weapons factory—an altar.
"Should we activate it?" Ada looked at Liu A'dou.
He hesitated. He had a bad feeling about turning it on. "Let's hold off and take a look first."
But besides the murals, the place was completely empty. It was really just a hollow space. Still, after staring at the murals long enough, Liu A'dou started piecing things together. "Ada-jie, don't these murals look like they're telling a story?"
Ada nodded. "Yeah. Seems like it's about the ancient Martians—from their rise to their fall. This must be the place where they ended their civilization."
So, not activating it was definitely the right call. Liu A'dou and Ada read through the whole thing and finally got a rough idea of what happened to the Martians.
The story began when the ancient Martians first discovered Aldnoah tech. That tech brought them incredible progress. Without damaging their environment, they gained enormous energy reserves, allowing them to freely explore space. It seemed like the perfect energy source. The ancient Martians became deeply reliant on it.
But the tech wasn't without flaws. Over the course of tens of thousands of years, as they lived with Aldnoah, it gave them endless brilliance—but slowly, they noticed something terrifying. Their bodies and minds were being eroded by long-term exposure. The two fell out of sync. Cases of out-of-body souls became common and deadly. Unlike cultivators, Martians couldn't survive soul separation—death was certain.
"Could that be why the Martians went extinct?" Liu A'dou wondered. But as they kept reading, it turned out things weren't that simple.
The highly advanced Martians eventually realized that the soul-body split was caused by prolonged exposure to Aldnoah's energy. To survive, the solution was simple: get away from the tech. Without Aldnoah, their bodies wouldn't just die on their own.
But not everyone agreed to abandon the technology. For some, giving up Aldnoah meant abandoning their entire civilization. The ancient Martians split into two groups. One group decided to leave the solar system to find a new planet and start over. The other group chose to evolve.
Right here, in this altar that recorded Martian history, they chose to evolve into an entirely new kind of existence.
"Ascension?!" Liu A'dou blurted out as he looked at the mural showing their evolution. The style suddenly became ethereal, and that word came out without thinking. Yeah, the Martians had basically ascended. They became spiritual entities that transcended physical form. They gave up their bodies and turned into higher beings.
This altar was the place of ascension. After that, time kept turning, the Martian environment got worse and worse, and the ancient Martian civilization was swallowed up by the river of time, leaving behind only endless sand. Until humans appeared in the solar system and eventually came to Mars, discovering the leftover Aldnoah tech.
"Sigh." Ada let out a long breath after reading everything.
"What is it?" Liu A'dou asked.
"Every civilization eventually declines. I'm just feeling a bit emotional. Look at how powerful the ancient Martians were—traversing the entire solar system—and even they still faded away. Thinking about how destructive we humans are… maybe we'll fall before ever reaching our peak. Suddenly, the future feels a little bleak," Ada said, a bit downcast.
"..." Liu A'dou didn't know what to say. Because she was right. It wasn't just the ancient Martians—look at Superman's home planet, Krypton. It also thrived once, only to end with its own explosion. No matter how powerful a civilization is, in the vastness of the universe and the stretch of time, it's barely a blip. Right now, maybe countless civilizations are meeting their ends across the cosmos. Humans are so small, like ants unaware of dusk or dawn, always living on the edge.
"But you know what, Ada-jie? Even if humans are doomed in the end, what's it got to do with us? We just need to live our lives well, don't you think? Yesterday's gone. Today only brings us more stress. Tomorrow's too far and out of reach. What we have is just today, so let's do today right. Those big questions? At least they won't show up today. We already have enough worries—why borrow more from tomorrow?"
"You heartless man." Ada laughed and scolded him. She wasn't falling into despair—just got caught up in the epic tale of the ancient Martians and felt a bit sentimental. She was a realist too. She knew how important it was to seize the present.
"I call it optimism. That's the kind of spirit that lasts forever. And the Martians didn't go extinct—they just chose different paths. Some went deep into space to keep exploring. Some ascended. Who knows—maybe those who ascended are up there watching us right now?"
"Then do you think the humans of Earth-9 will follow the same path as the ancient Martians?"
"I don't know," Liu A'dou said. "I'm not Dr. Manhattan. But I don't think so. Every species is unique. Nothing ever plays out the same way."
The couple stood inside the ancient ruins, chatting about civilizations and the universe. In Ada's arms, little Nono blinked her big black pearl eyes, curiously staring at her mother's flawless jawline and pale neck. Nono couldn't think yet, but as a reincarnated soul, her brain was already recording everything. She was just waiting to grow older and learn to think on her own.
"In the future, we could travel to more universes. Maybe we'll see humanity evolve in totally different ways," Liu A'dou said. It felt kind of like keeping a journal. But for him, it wasn't just observation—he wanted to take part. Because his "today" stretched on for who knew how long. His endless lifespan gave him thoughts like that.