Zaitsev Alexander - "Source"

Humanity has developed rapidly in recent years. However, if we take a closer look at history, the major development took place over the last few thousand years, while the history of mankind goes back tens of thousands of years. In the Stone Age and earlier, development was so slow that any progress required a change of hundreds of generations.

In a science fiction story, the hero finds himself in a distant past where civilization was just starting out and consisted of only a few thousand individuals. His task is to push humanity's development forward as much as possible so that they can gain an advantage over an impending cataclysm in the future. The hero is just an average person from the early 21st century who is lucky enough to end up in the body of one of the strongest people. He quickly finds a tribe and helps them to survive. However, he soon realizes that the primitive system did not encourage development. The tribe's thinking was simple - if there is food, good, if there is no food, then you have to look for it. The idea of development simply does not fit into the primitive brain.

The hero is able to make a weapon and teaches his tribe to use it, but it doesn't make sense to make any tools for those who can already find food for themselves. Unfortunately, the hero is mortal, and after his death, his efforts are quickly forgotten. It will take tens of thousands of years before someone reinvents the same bow or sling. The hero is not fighting wild nature or hostile tribes, but with the inertia of thinking and passivity of his fellow tribesmen who have only recently evolved from monkeys.

This is truly original science fiction set in an unheard-of time. Typically, the person who travels back in time is thrown into the Middle Ages or the era of slavery, at most the Stone Age. However, in this story, the hero is sent back to a time before the invention of the simplest stone ax, hundreds and thousands of years ago.

Original surroundings of the world before the Stone Age

The fight is not with external enemies but with inertia of thinking and lack of desire to develop

Apart from the very fact of the appearance of the hero, everything fits into the traditional laws of the history of the ancient world