Chapter 4 — The Ship That Never Looks Back

Nose Hall

The Nose Hall at the Root Level was filled with people before the artificial dawn, the smell of sweat and the fabric of formal gowns rarely worn more than once a year permeating the rare large space of this area - the only place on the Root Level with a ceiling three times higher than normal corridors, enough to accommodate nearly two thousand people standing shoulder to shoulder in the largest ceremony since Khe Lam could remember.

She stood between Trinh Yen My and her grandmother, the sleeves of her ash-gray formal gown — the color prescribed for Root Layer residents in official ceremonies — were a bit stiff because they hadn't been taken out of the closet for a long time. In front, away from a large yard kept clear by streamlining, was a raised podium, behind the podium was a giant curved wall projecting a simulated image of outside space - not a real window, Khe Lam knew that clearly, just a screen built from sensor data outside the ship's hull, but realistic enough that every time she looked at it, she still felt a chill run down her spine as if she were standing in front of real space.

"Two hundred and forty-seven years." Grandma whispered in her ear, her voice mixed with pride and fatigue. "You still remember the bicentennial celebration, back then you were only in your twenties. Now you're standing here again."

The gong rang three times, the deep sound echoed throughout the hall, signaling the start of the ceremony. The crowd fell silent almost immediately, a trained silence, the kind of silence of those who had attended this ceremony enough times to know exactly when to bow, when to join in, when to just listen.

From the side door, a group of people walked out — not a large number, maybe only about fifteen people, but their appearance made the entire hall hold its breath. Their vestments were dark blue, embroidered with silver thread along the sleeves, completely different from the ashen gray of the crowd below. This was the first time in Khe Lam's life that he had seen Dom people in flesh and blood, not through a screen.

"The one in the middle, with white hair, is the Council Elder." Trinh Yen My leaned close to her ear, his voice so low that it was almost just a breath. "Chuong Khac Dinh. My brother who works at the textile factory said he has been in power for nearly thirty years."

Chuong Khac Dinh stepped onto the podium, his figure straight and slow, carrying a majesty that without needing to raise his voice still made people automatically take a step back in their minds. He stood still for a moment, looking down at the crowd below, his eyes scanning as if he were weighing something no one in the crowd understood, then spoke, his voice echoing far away thanks to the sound amplification system installed throughout the hall.

"Two hundred and forty-seven years ago, our ancestors left a dying home to find a new one." He spoke, each word slowly, as if he had repeated this sentence enough times that it had become part of his own breathing. "They brought no gold or silver, no old power, only ourselves — the seeds of humanity, sent into the darkness, trusting in a promise."

The crowd responded in unison with a line they had memorized since childhood, the most familiar opening line in the Haikyuu Sutra: "We carry that promise with us, without looking back." The voices of thousands of people mixed together to create a deep, even echo that filled the entire hall, making Khe Lam's chest vibrate, even though she was never completely sure that she believed every word she had just read.

"Star Hope is waiting for us." Chuong Khac Dinh continued, his voice now carrying an almost gentle tone, completely different from his original majesty. "None of us, standing here today, will live long enough to set foot on that land. But our children and grandchildren will. And when that day comes, they will be grateful to every person who kept this ship alive — every person who filtered every drop of water, planted every vegetable patch, repaired every pipe, guided the way through every dark year among the stars."

Khe Lam looked up at the simulated screen behind the podium, where the image of motionless light dots stretched endlessly, no different from the scene she was still looking through the old glass pane at the abandoned observation station, only here it was magnified a hundred times, covering the entire giant curved wall. She tried to find an image in her mind of Tinh Vong - a blue planet with water and sky, things she only knew through pictures and descriptions in textbooks - but instead, her thoughts drifted back to the old gray cable bundle, to Bui Dac Sinh's unfinished sentence, to the vague feeling that there was something inconsistent between what she was hearing and what she had seen.

She glanced at her grandmother. Doan Bich Thu was looking at the podium with a calm expression, her lips mechanically moving along with each verse of the Hai Trinh Sutra, but there was a moment — just a very short moment — Khe Lam caught her eyes slightly softening when Chuong Khac Dinh mentioned the phrase "keep this ship alive", as if that sentence touched a memory she did not want to touch in the crowd.

A younger archivist, standing next to Chuong Khac Dinh, stepped forward to read the most famous excerpt in the entire Sea Trip Sutra - the last words of Vu Thua Nguyen, the first captain of Khoi Nguyen, recorded in the last hours of his life, when the ship had left Earth less than a year ago.

"I will not see where you stop." The archivist read, his voice low to match the solemnity of the words. "But I know one thing for sure: this ship was not built to turn around. It only has one direction to go. So if one day you doubt the path you're on, don't try to find a way to return to the lost place — find a way to really go forward, with your own eyes open, not with your eyes closed, believing what others say."

That last sentence always made Khe Lam pause every time she heard it, even though she had heard it countless times in her life. It sounded like advice to be skeptical, to find out for yourself — but ironically, it was the people who read it, year after year, who hold all the power to decide what was allowed to know and what was not. She had thought about that paradox when she was young, then forgot it because everyday life swept her away, but today, standing in the middle of a sea of people in stiff suits, it came back more clearly than ever.

She remembered her father, the last night sitting by the bed telling stories about the stars, his voice was slow, not unlike the voice of an archivist reciting prayers on the podium. "Do you know why people call this ship Origin?" He once asked, stroking her hair. "Because for each person born on the ship, this is not a journey. This is their entire world. Origin means the starting point — to you, this ship is the starting point of everything, not a means to get somewhere else." At that time, she was too young to fully understand what he meant, only remembering the warm feeling of his hand on her hair. Now, standing in the middle of the large hall, that sentence suddenly took on a different meaning, almost like a warning that he did not have time to say more clearly before his death.

The ceremony lasted nearly two hours, interspersed with chants, ancient communal songs passed down through the generations, and a symbolic candle-lighting ceremony — each family brought a small lamp powered by a reusable battery, which lit up in unison when the gong rang for the third time, creating a sea of sparkling light throughout the hall, reflecting on a simulated screen behind it so that the stars seemed to sparkle as well.

When the ceremony ended, the Dome group left the platform through a side door, closely escorted by a group wearing dark gray uniforms—different from the ashen gray of the Root Layer, which had small metal insignia on the shoulders—. Khe Lam realized that it was the Council Guard, a force she had only heard of but had never seen with her own eyes in such large numbers. The gaze of the head of the escort group, a broad-shouldered man with a determined gait, scanned the crowd one last time before disappearing behind the door, as if checking one last time that everything had gone as planned.

"Let's go home." Grandma pulled her sleeve, her voice returned to normal. "Your legs are tired after standing for a long time."

On the way home, a stream of people crowded through each hallway, everyone talking about the ceremony, about the image of the Council Elder, and about the fact that for the first time in many years, people from the Dome Floor were willing to go down to the Root Floor. Trinh Yen My walked beside her, her eyes still shining with emotions that had not yet completely dissipated.

"I still feel teary every time I hear that last words, no matter how many times I hear it." Yen My said in a small voice. "It felt like I was talking directly to him, even though he died before my great-grandmother was born."

"Have you ever wondered," Khe Lam chose her words carefully, "why the advice to learn for yourself, not to believe what others say, is always read out to everyone by the same people who have the power to make decisions, year after year, exactly the same?"

Yen My paused for a second, looking at her as if the question was a bit strange to ask right after a solemn ceremony. "You're thinking too much. It's just a verse in the sutra."

Khe Lam did not respond, just smiled to pass it off, but in her heart she knew that it was not simply a sentence in the sutra. She walked quietly among those people, Chuong Khac Dinh's words still echoing in her head — none of us will live long enough to set foot on that land — and for the first time, she wondered if, because no one lived long enough to verify it, what they were taught could easily be kept the same for two hundred and forty-seven years, without being questioned once. Returning home, she took off her ash gray suit and hung it back in the closet, carefully smoothing out each fold as if she was taking away not only a set of clothes, but also a part of her faith that she wasn't sure she could still keep intact.