Vitalik's Sci-Fi Novel "Snow Moon" Chapter 20

Chapter 20

Merdan, Viridia · 3724 Fogtime 10

Sera woke up to the alarm on her watch. Her watch was flashing bright red—a message from Jade, whom she had never met.

She immediately sat up, opened her handheld device, and began reading through the news in detail.

When she saw the top headline, her heart nearly stopped.

Arctic Empire Invades Northwood

Northwood. Febrick and Hreda were there too. No...

She kept reading.

At 5250 this morning, Arctic soldiers, aircraft, and drones descended on the Northshore Province from all directions. The Viridian military offered almost no resistance; within two long-hours, their soldiers and drones were stationed throughout Northwood.

The entire region is now fully under Arctic control, with one exception. Great Plum Harbor in Northwood remains untouched by the Arctics and currently appears to be treated as some kind of neutral zone. Hundreds of refugees flooded into Great Plum Harbor before the Arctics set up barricades to prevent more people from entering. More refugees attempted to enter via private aircraft; about half succeeded, especially those who arrived within the first long-hour, while the rest were shot down.

Except for Great Plum Harbor, internet communications between Northwood and the rest of Viridia have been cut off. Long-distance transmissions between Great Plum Harbor and the rest of Northwood circumvent the jamming mechanisms and have now become the primary channel for two-way communication with the Northshore Province.

Local Northshore politicians and Arctic officials have made no public comment so far. To our knowledge, Viridia's Arctic consul, Lord Efeli Ang, was in Northwood at the time of the invasion. We await further information.

She scrolled down on her handheld device and saw that Jade was highlighting five other pieces of information that were very important to her.

From the message timestamps

Febrick → Hreda and I made it safely into Great Plum Harbor. We will do our best to survive. We love you.   19867

Hreda → Northwood was invaded this morning.  20045

Hreda → It looks like almost no fighting took place, as if our politicians and military completely agreed to let this happen. 20060

Hreda → Febrick and I have safely entered Great Plum Harbor. The Arctics seem to be treating it as some kind of neutral zone, at least for now. 20071

Hreda → I'm scared. I hope everything will be okay. Love you.   20077

Sera began composing a reply, confirming to Febrick and Hreda that she had received their messages, and that she, Vel, and Daea would do everything they could to bring them home. Before she finished typing, she was crying.

A long-hour later, she heard a knock at the door. She walked to the entrance and saw through the screen a man outside wearing a privacy robe.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"I'm Mof. Gladias knows me well."

"Why should I trust you?"

The man whispered a few words into his neckband, then held his handheld device against the green circle beside the door. Sera's watch chimed.

Gladias's frequent contact

Proof verified. ✓

Sera cautiously opened the door and let the man in.

Mof took off his shoes and immediately headed to the basement, clearly knowing where it was in the house. Sera followed behind him.

The two of them sat down.

"I'm really worried about what's happening in Viridia."

Sera stared at him blankly, surprised that he could state something so obviously useless.

"I don't mean the invasion of Northwood. That really was shocking, terrible. And I'm truly sorry that Febrick and Hreda are there. I hope they're safe."

"They're safe. The Arctics haven't touched Great Plum Harbor for some reason, and Febrick and Hreda made it there in time."

"Then what do you mean?"

"I mean the things that made the invasion possible, and that allowed it to succeed with almost no resistance. All those same factors exist elsewhere in Viridia too."

"Gladias is the person I'd normally talk to about this, but he's been busy meeting with some Zhego secret government people these past few days, and he's been sleeping for the past several long-hours. So I wanted to talk to you."

"What do you think I know? Our politicians are obviously bought off, or blackmailed, or apathetic, or something like that. Gladias rarely talks to me about the Order—after all, he's not supposed to."

"Maybe I'll tell you what I know. I've been tracking Delvort, the mysterious gentleman who's been meeting with Gladias over the past few months. He's not just talking to Gladias—he's been talking to various other Guardians, and he seems to have a fairly extensive network."

"Once, before I lost track of him, I found him meeting with someone from Silver Tongue. Then Gladias told me he confronted Delvort, and Delvort admitted he had been working for Silver Tongue."

"Silver Tongue? What kind of big operation are they running, discrediting the Order? But why? I would have thought Blue Whale would do something like this, but Silver Tongue has always been the good guys! What does this have to do with the Arctics?"

"I think our society has become very complacent. Everyone is focused on maintaining their own happy life, gaining whatever advantages they can, and people don't value what actually keeps Viridia running. Even Silver Tongue. Worse, the Guardians don't seem to be paying attention to this."

"The Order seems to be performing better than any other part of our institutions. The military completely failed to establish defenses for the Northshore. As far as I know, the Guardians have done what they can—the tax rating standards have even become more supportive of open-source defense hardware, Gladias told me. He's very proud of that, and so am I."

"True, though it was a close call. Whoever split the Guardians into three groups that can't talk to each other is a genius—otherwise Delvort might have gotten to them all."

"Something is off about this. Silver Tongue... they don't seem like the type to do this."

"I know you've liked them since you were young, just like Gladias. Me too. But sometimes... your heroes aren't actually heroes. Or maybe Silver Tongue doesn't care about that particular label, and it's just that Delvort himself is an extreme dove."

"Do you know any of the other Guardians who talked to Delvort? Can we talk to any of them?"

"I actually planted trackers on two of them. I could totally leak them to the crypto network and collect a big bounty, but... I think keeping the option to track them further is better."

"Can we talk to them?"

"I think so."

"Let's go visit them. Right now."

"Don't you want to focus on seeing what you can do for Febrick and Hreda today?"

"Of course I'm worried—though technically I'm their aunt, not their mother—but I also know there's not much I can do. I've already talked to them; they're staying put, and so am I. Over a hundred people who tried to fly into Great Plum Harbor were shot down. I don't think we'd be any better at planning some grand Northwood escape than they would. So the current plan is to stay put on both sides—there's nothing more to do today. But figuring out what's actually happening with the Order—that's something I can do today."

She sighed.

"I suppose I feel like I have to do something, and this is something I can do."

Mof nodded.

"Just don't take a solo aircraft. You might think it's faster and that even the higher noise tax is worth paying this time, but that would only draw attention."

"Don't worry, I wasn't planning to."

A taxi arrived. Sera put on one of Gladias's privacy robes. She and Mof, who had already put on his privacy robe, rushed to the taxi. Sera reached the door first; she tapped her watch against the green circle beside the taxi door while opening the door and approving payment cryptographically. They got in.

The taxi began moving, heading to a location just a short bus ride from another Guardian's home. Twenty minutes later, they arrived in front of an apartment building. It was a new building. The exterior walls were wrapped in some kind of faux stone. On the ground floor, they could see restaurants and shops selling various goods. On the upper floors, from the outside, only the evenly spaced but ornately decorated windows of people's apartments were visible.

They saw another person walking toward the entrance, about to go in. They immediately slowed down, making it look natural to follow the man to the door.

The man walked to the door, held his watch against the green circle beside it, and the door opened. He walked through. Before the door closed, Sera and Mof also slipped in.

"He's in room 515," Mof said. "Let's just take the stairs."

"How do you know?"

"The tracker I put on him."

They walked up the stairs and eventually reached the door of room 515. They knocked.

Inside, they heard footsteps. Mof pulled back the hood of his privacy cloak, making himself look less threatening. He wasn't supposed to know this person, so he couldn't prove he was worth talking to—unless he burned a hundred Zip coins at the man's doorstep. Sera also removed her hood.

The man simply opened the door.

"Hello?"

"Hi, I'm Sera. I know this is awkward, but we'd like to talk about the Order and Delvort."

The man's eyes went wide.

"Nice to meet you, Sera."

"I'm Mof."

"I'm Telroy. But... if you know I'm in the Order and you know about Delvort, maybe you already know that."

At that moment, Mof realized that in a sense, he had already burned over a hundred Zip coins at Telroy's doorstep—clearly, he already had enough information to sell his role to the Order's crypto network for a huge bounty, but he chose not to.

Mof and Sera walked in. Telroy gestured for them to sit on the couch and began preparing tea for the three of them.

"So what do you know about me and Delvort?"

"You're a Guardian, in the cybersecurity rating standards group. One of the provisions under discussion involves data retention for environmental sensors. You've met Delvort at least once, though I wasn't able to hear what you talked about."

"Well, you certainly know a lot. Delvort kept insisting in our conversations that recent efforts to minimize data collection are actually pointless—some kind of paranoid threat against an enemy that doesn't really exist. Though maybe now, he'd change his tune. He told me the more important information threat is preventing insider trading."

"He also said that local environmental and public safety agencies need broad access so they can quickly adapt to changing situations without having to ask for permission every time—and that the main privacy protection we really need is to delay their access to non-disease-related data by five to ten days, so they can't use that data for trading."

"That... doesn't sound like the Delvort Gladias told me about at all."

"Did he say anything else?"

"As I mentioned, he's generally anti-war—that's how he described himself. Beyond that, not much—his main point was that he thinks people trying to throw all this cryptographic technology at everything is overcomplicating things, and we should trust people more."

"Okay, now I'm curious—what's the Delvort you know like?"

"He's anti-war. He values people's freedom to live their own lives, and he wants the Order to do less—even tax nudges are too much for him. But in particular, he's really opposed to this change in the tax rating standards—"

Mof paused. He realized that Sera had already voluntarily provided Gladias's name, and if he continued, he might give Telroy information through which Telroy could figure out Gladias's name and collect a bounty by selling him out. But then he thought—Telroy trusted him and Sera, and the least they could do was return some of that trust.

"Open-source hardware rating standards. He thinks anything military-related shouldn't get tax benefits, because military is a zero-sum game, and our participation in it doesn't bring anything good to the world."

Telroy nodded. "I guess he really is anti-war."

"But then I tracked him more, and Gladias confronted him after the Red County invasion, and... it turned out he had been working for Silver Tongue."

Telroy's eyes widened in shock. "Silver Tongue?"

"That's really... surprising."

Sera and Mof got out of the taxi and walked along a forest path through Kalima. A slightly cool breeze blew against their backs, making them unconsciously walk faster. A few hundred meters later, they left the path and turned right. Thirty meters after that, they saw a stone house, mostly underground, with only about a meter above ground. From a few meters away, the entire structure was almost invisible.

She thought this was a way to score high on aesthetics, public access, and emergency shelter functionality all at once. That house probably barely paid any land tax.

Sera and Mof walked down the stairs and knocked on the door. They removed the hoods of their privacy robes.

They heard footsteps.

"Who is it?" they heard a woman's voice ask.

Sera quietly stepped on Mof's toe, signaling him to stay quiet. Mof took the hint and stepped back.

"Hi, I'm Sera. I know this is awkward, but we'd like to talk about the Order and Delvort."

The door opened immediately.

"Hi, I'm Balme. Please come in."

"Can my friend Mof come in too?"

Sera felt a bit uncomfortable about Balme—it was now a two-on-one interaction, and Mof was larger and more imposing—but by this point she had already opened the door, and closing it again would be awkward.

"Of course," she replied softly.

Sera and Mof both entered.

"I apologize for barging in so rudely and for surveilling you to find out where you were going. But I hope you can forgive me; as you know, our country is in a very terrifying situation."

Balme nodded.

"What do you know about Delvort?"

"I've met him a few times. Our first conversation was within a long-hour after a Guardians' meeting, when he sent me an anonymous message. Somehow, he was able to find me. I'm in the private school rating standards group. He talked a lot about his own views on education, and how he thinks we shouldn't put our thumb on the scale, using tax rating standards to encourage what he considers biased civic education—talking about how beautiful Viridia is, encouraging students to cherish and love it. He thinks schools should only teach people knowledge, and that they should learn to love Viridia by seeing for themselves how great it is."

"Did he have any other views?"

"He seems generally pro-freedom. He thinks people should evolve on their own, and that in general, when things happen spontaneously and naturally, the results are best. The Order shouldn't put its thumb on the scale."

"Anything about international politics?"

"No, he never mentioned it, and didn't seem to care about it."

"He once asked me what I thought about fear nodes. I replied that I don't particularly like them. He didn't respond and changed the subject."

Sera nodded.

"The Delvort I know also cares about freedom and also thinks the Order should do less. But... he also has strong views on international politics. He basically thinks any military domain is a zero-sum game, that you can't know what will lead to good or bad outcomes, and that Viridia should stay completely out of it."

"Although... his views on freedom are clearly more complicated. He seems to agree with public security agencies collecting more information, rather than using cryptography to try to limit data collection and guarantee how data is used."

Balme's eyes widened in surprise.

"Wait, I'm curious—how can you use cryptography to do that?"

"I have a friend from Zhego, Zey, who told me about this once. Basically, there's a language model inside the camera that can detect whether violence is occurring. Only when that happens does it transmit information. Each time that