4.6 Billion Year Symphony of Evolution Volume One Chapter One “The Beginning Cell”

4.6 Billion Year Symphony of Evolution

Author: Xiang Wei Xing Zhe (Phase Walker)

A cell that was born at the beginning of the life of a planet will see the rise and decline of countless civilizations, the speciation and extinction of organisms. Under the endless calamities of the world, nothing remains unchanging. Only by continuously changing oneself and evolving in the face of adversity could one achieve perfect victory.

The story starts from a little cell … …

Translator review: Another ongoing story … … if it isn’t complete, I don’t want to make a commitment to finish it because it is likely that I may not like the story later on or if the author suddenly disappears.

Some have remarked on how similar the title of this story in Chinese is similar to Evo: The Journey to Eden’s Japanese name. I’m not sure how similar the story is to the game but it is an “evolution” story. But this is more scifi and fantasy. Do not expect super accurate science and just a reminder, this will NOT be set on Earth. Things may be similar, but not Earth.

What I like about the novel is that one, it has an asexual main character. A cell does not have gender … … It is also a soothing read because the beginning is about a cell exploring and it is an “exploratory” story. So not a lot of other characters or dialogue, more descriptions and stream of consciousness of the main character cell.

Chapter One The Beginning Cells

A small figure flashed past a blue and flat ocean surface at high speed.

“Haha~ This planet doesn’t have many multi-cellular organisms but it has an ocean? So rare. I’ve spent so long search for a place like this. This time, I can enjoy being the “Creator” once ~ Even though I’m just throwing in some primitive cells native to Earth in here… …”

This figure had short golden hair and an adorable face. She looked like a young Loli. Stopping above the ocean surface, she lightly waved her hand and a large spray of what appeared to be water droplets fell into the ocean.

“And then … … adding on a bit of my knowledge to one of these cells ~ and … … consciousness~”

“Ah, right, and this. If they do not have eyes, aren’t they unable to see? Won’t that be so pitiful~ With this, even a simple cell can have normal vision.”

She then threw some powder into the ocean.

“Catherine, let’s go~”

A voice suddenly came from the sky that caused the loli’s body to still.

“I know, coming!”

She replied and then looked at the sea. “I’m going now, I will come back to see you in the future.”

“I really wonder what you will become … …?”

As she spoke, the little loli’s body slowly floated up. She then turned into a streak of light and vanished into the sky.

…………………………………………

“Where is this? Who am I?”

This was the first thoughts it had. It had a consciousness, and the sense of touch, but it did not have vision or smell. Through its only sense, it knew it was in a liquid.

This liquid seemed to be called water.

“I … … am called a cell?”

It did not have any brains but it knew what shape its body was. There was a thin spherical layer and the center of the sphere had a complex densely packed construct that was called the nucleus. It was due to the existence of this nucleus that it could think, move, be alive … …

However, this was the limit of its thinking. Such a small nucleus could not let it think further.

“Move … … search … …”

It controlled the think outer layer, and the layer started to ripple like waves. This movement caused it to slowly move in the water, and it searched for its own target in the endless darkness … …

Food.

Food was equivalent to energy. With energy, it could have more knowledge, and a bigger body that could allow it to think more.

Swimming forward, it suddenly felt its outer membrane come into contact with something.

Food?

It tried to figure out what this object was, but other than “soft,” there was not anything else. Then what could it to do figure out more about what this object was.

Consume it!

It used the thin membrane to surround this object and then engulfed it.

It felt this object slowly shrink inside its body and then disappear. It also felt that its body was slowly changing. The fragile and almost intangible membrane around its body was slowly being strengthened, and grew.

This activity disappeared after a short while, but this feeling of fullness caused it to know … …

That just now was food. It had to get more … … food!

It rapidly rippled its outer membrane and quickly encountered something else like the object just now. It hurriedly engulfed it.

It was a feeling just like before. The object that it engulfed slowly shrank … … this time, it thought of a term.

This was … … digestion.

After swallowing two piece of food, its body mass grew slightly larger and it had more energy. Its speed increased. This meant that it could find more food, and obtain more energy.

Engulf, engulf, engulf.

It almost swallowed all the “soft” things around it. Its body grew a whole size larger.

Yet it still wasn’t satisfied. It still swam in the water and tried to engulf more food.

When it engulfed the next piece of food, its body seemed to expand to a maximum size. When it finished digesting its food, its body did not continue to expand. It slowly tore apart staring with the nucleus as the center and then it completely divided.

In the end, it became two parts that were completely the same. They had the same spherical outer membrane, the same nucleus, it had completely divided into two.

However, its consciousness had not divided into two.

Even though it had divided into two cells, it still felt the two were a part of it. It could control both of these parts just as easily as it could control its two hands.

“What are hands?”

Its thoughts seemed to have become more varied. The doubled nucleus gave it more power to think but there were even more questions.

“Speaking of this, who am I?”

“I should have a name … …”

“And this name is … …”

“Lin.”

For some reason, it only had this thought in its mind.

“Then I will be called this. Lin … … it feels pretty good.”

Lin continued to swim. The two cells slowly moved in the water and continued to gather food.

This meant higher intelligence, more cells meant more energy.

Because Lin was now two cells, it found food faster. One of its cells quickly consumed enough and entered the stage of division.

When this cell finished dividing, Lin had three cells. These three identical cells represented the existence of “Lin.”

Lin had absolute control of them. Even though the three cells were not connected together, controlling them was not harder than controlling one. It felt even easier.

Right after, Lin produced many more questions. It could think about many things and found the biggest problem of the present.

Darkness.

Yes, it was unable to detect the state of the surroundings. Even though it felt that the surroundings were liquid, it was unable anything more detailed … … because everything in the surroundings, to Lin, was endless darkness.

“Eyes … …”

This term popped out of Lin’s thoughts yet it was unable to understand the term.

In order to understand this term, Lin tried to consume more food. But it seemed as though it had eaten up most of the soft food around it. It planned on swimming further away.

The three cells, the three little cells that had the same consciousness, stepped onto its journey … …

“?”

Suddenly, Lin felt the cell at the front seemed to come into contact with something. This was different than the soft food, it felt very hard, but it was smaller than the food before.

It was unable to analyze what this was. Lin had one of the cells engulf it.

“… … it seems indigestible.”

The hard object did not show any signs of shrinking inside one of Lin’s cells. It silently floated in the cell.

It seemed to be a useless object?

Lin did not care and continued to search for other food.

In the nearby surroundings, it found many of the soft things that it encountered before but nothing that was hard.

It still continued on its mission of eating. One of Lin’s cells once again reached its energy storage limit and divided.

This time, Lin had four cells. But it still felt that it wasn’t enough and continued … …

When the number of cells reached five, the thought that Lin had before rose up again.

It wanted to see … …

Wanted to see everything outside! I don’t want darkness!

When its thoughts reached a certain level of fierceness, the nucleus inside the cell which had consumed the hard object suddenly trembled slightly.

Something like a tentacle reached out of the nucleus and lightly touched the hard object. The tentacle slowly pushed it towards the surface of the cell membrane.

When the hard object was slightly exposed out of the cell membrane, bright light broke through the darkness and entered Lin’s consciousness.

Translator Ramblings: Someone should take my internet away. As a side-effect of being a translator, my first thoughts when I read something turns into how can I translate this into English … … Anyways, in further procrastination on my own part for World of Cultivation, more stuff from a work that is ongoing.

 

Table of Contents | Chapter 2

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18 thoughts on “4.6 Billion Year Symphony of Evolution Volume One Chapter One “The Beginning Cell””

  1. Jack likes this story. For now.
    Idk how it can develop…
    Dear Friends, many thanks to the Author, Translator(s), (Editors), (Donors) for the awesome chapter! With lots of love, Jack

  2. Wow! A new story translated by wychwe! Going to follow this story. By the way, what does wychwe mean?

  3. Missing something.
      这个身影有着金色的短发和可爱的脸孔,看上去就像是一只小萝莉,她停在了海面上,她轻轻挥手,大片像是水滴一样的物体滴落在海水中。
      
      “然后……在这里面的一粒细胞之中加上一点我的知识~还有……意识~”
      
      →“啊,对了,还有这个,如果只有眼点的话,那不就等于什么都看不见么?那样感觉太可怜了呢~有这个的话,就能发挥通常人眼的视力哦,即使是单细胞。”
      
      她再将一些粉末状的物体洒进了海水中。←(Here is the Missing part.)
      
      “莎琳,走了哦~”

      1. Errors remind:

        You missed paragraph 6, it is a description of Loli’s action.

        Original:  她再将一些粉末状的物体洒进了海水中。

  4. Well the fact that you listed asexual as a positive almost made me turn away from the novel. Not that being an asexual character matters so much as what kind persons thinks that matters? Who focuses on something like that? If you hadn’t pointed it out I certainly wouldn’t have noticed. Which in turn made me question the story but it is interesting to say the least.

    1. Does genderless work better? I put asexual because I wanted to make it clear that there is no romance (as far as I have read) in this story.

      1. …虽然你可能平时没有注意到,但是性别这个东西其实是能够主宰一个角色的一部分行为与思考的。

        就比如说,某个男性角色因为得罪了其他人,被别人下药,精虫上脑,强奸了某女性,从而进了监狱……

        有时候,性别这种东西甚至能够干涉到整个剧情的走向,举个例子:就说Re0(从零开始的异世界生活)吧,假设一开始的时候,主角菜月昴是个无性恋者,他对男性女性都完全提不起性趣…那么,他还会和女主角艾米莉亚走得那么近吗?他还会去帮助她吗?或许他会,但绝对不会那么热心……至少遇到致命危险也不会像原作那样发誓去保护她,而是选择立刻逃跑,毕竟他没有了原作里那种强烈的动机,而后续的故事剧情也会完全偏离原作……

        至于主角是无性会不会更好,这一点我不能给出一个确定的答案,但至少这不会让它因为性的欲望而做出一些傻事……更何况,这本书的主角根本不需要性别,琳的生命结构注定了它不需要性别这种繁衍形式,因为琳细胞内的基因根本不需要通过(剧透屏蔽!)……到故事的后期,你会发现,一群思绪互相隔空(重音)链接,基因传递(剧透屏蔽!)的细胞们是多么的恐怖。

        顺便一说,在重奏(“进化的四十六亿重奏”的缩写)里,确实没有浪漫这种东西(男女之间的浪漫)。(笑)

        I’m very sorry for used non-English, but my English skill isn’t good enough to describe my thoughts, however I still want to reply you…Well, it doesn’t matter if you don’t understand, I just want to reply…(´・ω・`)

    2. Genderless/asexual protags are nice when you want to avoid romance or, in my case, when I need a break from sexist settings (aka virtually all cultivation novels).

  5. No procrastination of WoC! Lol But I’ll read anything you translate, so I’m no better. Cute/Interesting first chapter. How many chapters does this story have?

  6. That’s some creepy ocean, with “eyes” floating around waiting to be picked 😛
    Then again, MC has a magic-based contiousness, so maybe it’s algae and it just detects the light it picks up for photosynthesis? I’m probably better off not expecting anything fancy *puts bio knowledge under lock&key*

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