The Wound of Returning to Zero

Zero Era Prologue: The frozen soil whispers In 2147, three kilometers beneath the Greenland ice sheet, a scientific research drill shattered an ice core that had been sealed for 420 million years. There are no prehistoric creatures, no mineral crystals, just a mass of filamentous structures invisible to the naked eye that remain active at ultra-low temperatures. Seventy-two hours after researcher Lin Ye put the sample into the culture chamber, the global synchronized early warning system issued the highest level of red alert in the history of human civilization - an unknown pathogen that uses air as a medium and feeds on cell telomeres. It has an incubation period of three days and a 100% fatality rate. It had no name, and humans later called it "Zero".