This is a science-fiction epic exploring the fate of civilizations, the reality of memory, and the nature of connection. Its central metaphor, "the Shore of Guixu," symbolizes the boundary where all things end and begin, asking whether, on a cosmic scale, sacrifice and dialogue can offer hope to lonely civilizations.
When humanity across the globe becomes trapped in a "Shared Dream" that connects everyone, cracks appear in the foundations of reality. The young "Listener" Xiao Rui, an antique restorer who can passively sense the patterns of emotions, meets a boy named Ani. Ani is not human, but a "vessel" carrying the memories of 119 generations of civilization. The spots of light flickering across his eyelashes at half speed are a mark of his nonhuman nature. The truth he reveals overturns everything: human civilization is a prolonged experiment conducted on the edge of Guixu, centered on a cosmic anchor called the "Origin Point." The experiment is about to end, and civilization faces the desperate prospect of being reset.
At this critical moment, when all life hangs in the balance, three ideological factions enter a final contest: Zhulong, which believes in destiny and advocates returning to nothingness through "purification"; Kuitian, which reveres absolute rationality and seeks to upload human consciousness as eternal data; and the Wallbreakers, who still believe dialogue is possible even in despair. Xiao Rui and Ani are swept into the maelstrom. They venture deep into the ancient city of Luosha, where time and space are nonlinear, seeking a third path beyond destruction and control amid the double helix of history's echoes stretching back tens of thousands of years and the global catastrophe unfolding in the present.
The answer they find is to build a "bridge": a dynamic, balanced connection that allows consciousness to flow between two worlds and pain to coexist, while keeping the worlds independent of one another. The price is devastating: Ani transforms himself into the eternal jade core of the bridge, and his consciousness falls into an endless sleep to maintain the passage.
