The Record of Unusual Creatures - Chapter 238

Chapter 238: Not Suitable for Survival

If a civilization wanted to keep developing for a long time, it was a necessary path to secede from its own mother planet. The resources of a planet were limited, and it was also a great security hazard to gather all civilized members on a single planet. Therefore, every intelligent race with normal thinking ability must step into space after completing the technology accumulation of the mother planet phase–or some other realms. In short, they must leave their cradle.

However, the Aerym elves face a desperate dilemma: from their cradle to the nearest recharge point, there was a distance that could deter any primary space civilization. It was impossible for them to arrive at another planet with their initial space technology. They could not find any springboard and resource areas in their own stellar systems like other civilizations which allowed them to slowly study various space technologies with sufficient material and energy support. They could not find a neighbor station that they could reach in their lifetime as well.

For a normal civilization to step into space, unless they were smart enough to develop the deep space navigation technology and hyperdrive directly on the mother planet without making a mistake in 100%, or else, they would need to look for a springboard within their primitive galaxy, and carry out a series of studies on another planet of proper distance where they took it as their foothold. The initial technological build-up of the hyperdrive is accompanied by great danger, and many of the experimental facilities that contained powerful forces could not be built directly on the mother planet. Moreover, the most primitive hyperdrive fuel was often mined only in gas giant planets that were unfit for life. Even without these two conditions, there should be at least another sun around the proto-stellar system. And the distance could not be too far, which at least ensured that the pioneers could arrive within a generation.

However, the elves of Aerym had nothing. They had just rushed out of the circle of gravity to face an insurmountable chasm. Unless they have the means to develop the deep space navigational facilities directly in the event of skipping various transition technologies, they would be trapped in the barren land of tens of millions of light-years.

It was not impossible to create a deep space starship directly in the case of a single mother planet. But they needed not just a gift but also a great good luck. And the elves of Aerym had no such good luck. They failed to find the right path and depleted all the non-renewable resources on the planet. And then, they could only slowly die in the barren land of tens of millions of light-years.

The planet began to dry up, the astral resources were extracted, and even the planet itself was reshaped into an energy-efficient space floating island, and then the space floating island was slowly reorganized into other forms. The elves trapped in the cradle could only use their own limited resources to constantly transform to continue their civilization carefully as far as possible. Their home was unrecognizable, more and more unbearable. The elves of Aerym who once thought they were at the pinnacle of civilization were weaker every day. In the end, they could only struggle to survive in a space floating island that had been rebuilt countless times and could barely recognize its original form with a lone sun, and the population has begun to slump under brutal resource constraints.

“When I was born, Aerym had reached the tipping point,” said Hilda quietly, “and no matter how much we cherish our homes, resources are being consumed constantly. There is no sustainable resource circulation system in a solitary planet environment. In the last hundreds of years we have had to find ways to extract energy and material from the sun, so we built a lot of corona stations. It’s a very dangerous facility, expensive and unstable, and every corona station has to pay a huge human and material price. Sometimes it takes a lot of excellent magic-expert life, and that’s just a stopgap. ”

Hao Ren looked curiously at Hilda and asked, “So you decided to make a teleportation portal when you found out that you couldn’t build a deep space starship?”

“Yes, this is the grand plan my husband made when he was still alive. Unfortunately, until he died in a corona station explosion accident, we were not able to create a truly stable super teleportation portal that could lead to the depths of the space,” Hilda sighed and continued, “and after his death, I spent 30 years building a huge space-time accelerator with national power. That thing almost ran out of all the energy that the three corona stations had accumulated over 100 years. However, when it was launched for the first time, a huge accident happened, and I was at the observation tower with the ministers to witness the launching ceremony… And then everything exploded. I don’t know what the consequences would be, so now I have to go back as soon as possible. My people must have been in a mess. They need me to be there with them.”

Vivian could feel the pain and secretly glanced at Hilda and said, “I don’t know why I can feel those elves of Aerym…”

Lily understood and nodded and said, “Because all of you are very poor.”

Everybody stared at the ignorant husky: Is this the right time to say such a thing in this kind of serious occasion?

Y’zaks smiled and looked around and said, “Now you guys know what the words I said that to those demon hunters mean? Resources are valuable and cannot withstand internal depletion. When I was on the immigration boat, I heard an old man said that every civilization has a ‘fault-tolerant value’ in the development process. This fault-tolerant value is determined by factors such as their home resource reserves, their ability to develop their own races and their homeland environment. The higher the resource reserves, the better the environment around the homeland and the stronger the development ability, the higher the fault-tolerant value will be, and vice versa. If a civilization wants to develop, it must be moved to another area before its resources are depleted. For this, they learn to protect the environment to reduce wastage, plan routes to prevent them from going astray, and, most importantly, try to avoid waste by avoiding internal depletion. The resources of the homeland and the surrounding environment are fixed, and the only thing the people can decide is only themselves. Many races are born in fertile places where the planet itself is rich in resources and is surrounded by abundant resources and springboard. So they waste their resources wantonly, use them in the civil war, and finally wake up to realize that they can’t even build the last ship to the neighbor planet. However, some races are born in desolate and barren places, they must carefully calculate every single step, and they don’t know whether they will be able to leave the cradle alive. There is a lot of injustice in the world, and nothing is more unfair than this kind of ‘racial predestination’. Honestly, I think the people on Earth are a little bit like prodigal sons squandering the family fortune. Your solar system has various springboards like Mars and the moon, there are giant resource stations such as Saturn and Jupiter, every planet around the Earth is filled with fuel and outer casings of spaceships, and the planets are close enough to arrive even with the spaceship using the most primitive chemical fuel. But humans are too busy throwing more bombs at your own people. This is stupid, as stupid as the idiots in my hometown. Look at those elves of Aerym, their fault tolerance value is even negative…”

Hao Ren looked at Y’zaks with astonishment. He rarely saw the great demon to speak so many words. The seemingly vicious tall man was usually very polite and amiable, and he never talked much. Hao Ren was vaguely aware of one thing: the story of Hilda touched a sensitive point in the heart of the great demon, which perhaps related to his past.

After Y’zaks found the people around him looked a bit weird, he waved his hand and apologized, “I was too serious, hope you guys don’t mind.”

Vivian’s lips slightly curled up and said, “No… I thought you said it very well, so well that it shouldn’t come from a demon’s mouth.”

Y’zaks smiled awkwardly, spread out his hands and said, “You are not the first to say so.”

“I thought a lot after I came to the Otherworld,” Hilda said after kept silent for a long time, “for the first time that I confirmed the existence of other races and even other worlds and confirmed the many speculations of our scholars. During the two days on Earth, I happened to see the science program on Earth and got to know what your stellar system is, and how far the Earth is from the nearest planet. It’s incredible. We were curious about whether our surroundings were normal, but we couldn’t find a reference, so we are not sure if it’s because the elves of Aerym are too stupid or too unfortunate to end up this way. Now I’m relieved. Maybe I shouldn’t blame the scholars.”

“Other than the exceptions, only a few of the intelligent races are really stupid,” the data terminal suddenly said, “As long as there is an initiative, they should be praised. For the others, even if they’re misguided and eventually trapped in the mother planet, they should not be blamed, because entering the space is indeed a very difficult task, and many times they have to rely on luck. Sometimes a race has tried their best but still can’t find a way out of gravity, not that they didn’t work hard enough or not smart enough. They are simply not lucky enough.”

A slight hum came from somewhere in the spaceship.

The virtual images around the bridge became brighter again. A dazzling sun appeared at the corner of the image.

“We’ve reached Aerym,” the Mobile Data Terminal said.

Chapter 239: Aerym

A brilliant star appeared in the corner of the view, and the sun was weakened and filtered to prevent hurting the eyes of the people on the bridge. Hao Ren let the Mobile Data Terminal adjusted the lens of the external monitor, allowing them to see the condition around the star.

The ‘Aerym Planet’ was long gone. The planet was gradually dismantled into fragments thousands of years ago. Now, it was a stretch of space floating islands orbiting in the same planetary orbit, like a string of fragmentary and roughly sized spikes of stone floating in line in the space. In order to extract the last resources from the bottom of the planet, and to replenish the planet’s depleted energy cycle, the elves had resolutely decomposed their entire planet into a fragmented state which allowed them to maximize the amount of solar energy and accommodate more people. They could only get the valuable living space and something more valuable, the experimental field, after the strata in the deep mantle had been dismantled and reshaped into such floating pieces.

Those space floating islands had obvious artificial traces. Their main body was the rock of the planet itself, but there was a huge man-made ring hoop around the floating islands. The artificial structures that were already somewhat dim and which material was between the rock and the metal not only maintained the form of floating islands, but also produced an energy shield to protect the land below, and the energy shield itself could be used to filter the sun. One side of the floating island was flat and the other side was a huge, ugly rock foundation. The old and huge mechanical structures could be seen between the rugged mountains that were hanging upside down. They were the power plants, gravity generators, energy stations, and material recycling plants of the floating islands. Those mechanical structures were probably over thousands of years old and were quite damaged, but it was clear that their makers had no more energy and resources to repair them.

“Those are our homes.” Hilda now calmed down, she stood up and pointing to the holographic projection and explained, “Some of the floating islands away from the main residential area are the test fields, where we used to test the space-time core and ultra-high power magic accelerator. If we didn’t dismantle the planet like this, we couldn’t even find a suitable test field. The magic accelerator needed to be built on a solid and huge foundation, and the conventional space station was unable to carry it, and it may even tear half the planet in the event of an explosion, and therefore, it could not be placed on the mother planet. There used to be a generation of scholars built a huge space platform to try to carry out this kind of dangerous experiment, but a fusion furnace exploded, causing the platform to crash. It almost destroyed the entire northern hemisphere ecology. The experimental projects were suspended until the planetary remodeling was completed. But that’s a thing of the past, now the experiments of space-time core and the magic accelerator have been stopped. We really have no more resources.”

“The floating islands with bright energy shields are eco-islands, with an ecological dome under the shields. We try to preserve the planet’s ecosystems as much as possible and transplant them into a huge artificial recycling system. These ecological domes provide us with valuable and complex organics, and… is also the only luxury enjoyed by my people. Every elf of Aerym can rest in the dome for 15 days a year, but no more. Those domes have limited carrying capacity, and as some critical systems age, they are actually going to stop soon. If they shut down, I’m afraid we’ll have to rely entirely on plant synthetics to survive, and this will kill a lot of people. The elf of Aerym is a slow-evolving race, and healthy individuals have a lifespan of 1000 years. The deterioration of the environment is much faster than we can adapt. Whenever an old facility is shut down, there will be a large number of old elves… even the prime elves died.”

“The floating islands that have bright beams connected to each other are residential areas, and most elves live on those islands. They are specially designed, have the lowest energy consumption, the most stable circulation system, and the more reasonable construction planning, in other words… can delay for a longer time. Most of the synthetic plants are on those floating islands, and even if other floating islands, such as testing sites, are accidentally damaged, the habitations can continue to survive as much as possible. ”

The spacecraft gradually approached the space islands in slow cruising mode. Hao Ren found that there were also a group of special islands among the floating islands: they lingered on the edge of the island chain, were dim and dark, and some of the island borders’‘hoops’ had even been damaged and gone. The remnants of man-made buildings were vaguely visible on those floating islands, but the energy shields above the land were apparently extinguished. The floating islands without any light were lifeless, just like dried up space rocks.

“What is that?”

“The Land of Death,” Hilda sighed, “we have created these seemingly magnificent space entities, but that doesn’t mean that we have great skill. These floating islands were built in a desperate way, and the technology was not mature enough, even the theory was not perfect enough. The architecture of those islands is different because the original designers did not know what kind of island could hold on longer. Also, many floating islands were flawed at the beginning of the construction which couldn’t be repaired at the later stage. So, those floating islands kept destroying, extinguishing, and then became that way.”

And now even Lily was quiet. She was afraid of the eerie sight before her eyes. She tucked her tail between her legs but pricked up her ears and asked, “What about the people up there?”

“Most of the time they could be rescued and being transferred to other islands,” Hilda nodded and explained, “This would increase the ecological pressure on other islands, so each time after such a rescue transfer will be followed by a period of resource restriction legislation, mainly to limit the newborn and reduce the supply of per capita, and a part of the elderly will take the initiative to enter ‘The World of Prayers’ which means accepting euthanasia to make room for other adults. We have no choice. We need to let the entire race to survive as much as possible.”

“This place…” Hao Ren opened his mouth and was stunned by the scene. “…is more serious than I imagined,” he continued.

As a human, an inexperienced agent who had not yet experienced too many events, Hao Ren could not imagine how many unbelievable things are happening in the vast void. The disasters and dooms that he learned from all kinds of stories could not be compared to the chain of space islands before his eyes. Before he came here, he had imagined how to help Hilda and her people, such as borrowing the World Gate system of the empire and his connections at the Kuiper Station to see if he could deliver some supplies here, or buy some technology or spacecraft that did not exceed the provisions of the ‘Non-interference of Civilization Act’ for the elves of Aerym from the merchants of the Fairy Void Consortium. As an agent, he had a certain amount of ‘Empire ration points’ every month, but he had not used them yet, he just heard that these rationing points could be exchanged for exceptionally abundant supplies in various civilizations of the Macro World, and that was why so he got the idea above.

But now it seemed that he had to revise all his plans.

But these elves of Aerym needed more than just a little bit of goods and material or a little technology.

“Your creativity and resilience are indeed commendable,” Mobile Data Terminal could not help but say something, “it’s just that you didn’t find the secret of FTL–sometimes a little mistake in the tech would destroy a civilization, especially for a race with insufficient innate conditions like you, so long as there’s a technology failed to develop in time, there is no second chance. I can see that you’ve worked very hard, just… in the end, it didn’t work.”

Hilda sighed, “Yes, and the last teleportation experiment was also failed.”

When the Petrachelys Patrol Frigate was close to the island chain, it obviously got the attention of the elves. Hao Ren noticed that the communicator suddenly reported a large number of unknown contact signals. Some bright light-spots quickly moved from the back of several inhabited floating islands and quickly approached the spacecraft, and after the lens had pulled over, Hao Ren saw those triangular aircraft with think, blunt edges and gleaming silvery metallic sheen. Bright runes are flashing on each of the aircraft’s shells, apparently not quite the same as the spacecraft in the general impression. Those must be the spacecraft of Aerym. It was a pity they could not cross the long distance of tens of millions of light-years.

These silvery triangular aircraft quickly came to the vicinity of the Petrachelys Patrol Frigate. Hao Ren slowed down the spacecraft to almost static, so the ‘little spacecraft’ that were dozens of meters long then stopped and did not make a hasty detour or other rash moves. Their pilots must be in a state of great shock and tension. Everybody on the bridge could even feel the emotion coming through the icy space and several layers of armor of the starship.

Chapter 240: That’s Her Son!

The communicator soon read the unfamiliar contact signals from one of the floating islands. Hao Ren turned on the communicator, a man’s voice who tried to keep calm but the tone of the voice was visibly shaking spoke, “Alien spacecraft, please state your identity, please state your identity…”

This was the first time that the elves of Aerym had seen a strange space traveler appeared above their ‘mother planet’, their surprise and excitement was self-evident. For a civilization that had been struggling for thousands of years, no matter who the outsider was or what it held, any change was a great encouragement for them. Hao Ren wanted to experience what it was like to speak to a strange civilization, but after thinking for a moment, he pushed Hilda to the front and said, “I’ll let you speak.”

Hilda nodded gratefully, opened her mouth in front of the communicator and took her quite a while to calm down and asked, “Vimm, is it you?”

The communicator plunged into an extreme silence. The silence revealed a huge shock of someone at the other end of the communicator, and half a minute later a trembling voice asked, “Mother? Is it you? You’re back?!”

This time Hao Ren and his companions were shocked.

Hilda did not notice the changes in the surrounding atmosphere. She was happy and answered quickly, “It’s me, I was sent to another world, but fortunately, I got the help of the locals to return to Aerym. Now we’re going to land on the Dawnbreak Island…”

Hilda quickly negotiated with someone at the other end of the communicator and said to Hao Ren, “Please follow those triangular cruisers. They’re taking us to the landing site.”

Hao Ren hurriedly let data terminal to follow the instruction. When the spaceship slowly moved closer to the floating island, he really could not hold it and asked, “That’s your son?”

“Yes, Vimm is my only child. It seems that he has been a leader for the time being,” Hilda was proud of it. “And it seems that the order of Aerym has not broken down. The situation is better than I thought.”

Hao Ren laughed awkwardly and thought that he really could not speculate on these super long-life creatures using common sense. Hilda looked almost as young as him, and her son was already a prince regent. These two days he treated Hilda as a girl of his age, and at this moment he felt like as if he was punched in the face.

Vivian noticed the strange expression on Hao Ren’s face, and of course, she could guess what this guy was thinking. She moved closer to him, poked his arm and said, “So I said you have to get used to longevity species. Now there’s an Exhibition in the Archaeological Museum and there are two pearls in the stone tools of the caveman which I’ve worn before… I’ve been thinking about it but I don’t know how to take it back. What a pity.”

Hao Ren could not stop sweating. He sat on the chair, trembling and kept muttering, “You’re the best, you’ll live for generation after generation… Oh no, you already did…”

At this point, the spacecraft had arrived at the floating island in the middle of the space island chain, under the guidance of several ‘cruisers’. The details of the island gradually appeared in front of them. It was about the same size as the other islands. There was also a ring of man-made ‘hoop’ at its outer rim, which was about half a kilometer above the surface. The upper end of the hoop was shrouded in a hazy halo, covering the entire floating island with a layer of near-transparent shields, and a cloud of vapor condensation could be seen at the top of the dome-shaped shield. Obviously, the elves of Aerym had simulated the effect of an approximate natural atmosphere in this magnificent creation. At the same time, they saw a different part that was different from the rest of the islands: There were many very large buildings in the middle of the island, and there was a circle of walls around those buildings, which you did not see on other islands.

After asking Hilda, they knew that it was the ‘imperial court’ of the elves of Aerym and also Hilda’s Palace. However, the huge buildings were not luxurious, and there was no special royal pleasure. Its vast footprint was designed to accommodate functions such as parliaments, Assembly of Resource Management, Assembly of Technology and Assembly of the Isle Guardians. The place where the queen lived was only one of the towers in the great building.

However, the spacecraft could not land directly in the imperial court, and there was no platform for this big guy to landing. The Petrachelys Petrol Frigate, guided by the navigational signals, came to a prominent point on the edge of the floating island. A series of semi-circular platforms were supported by huge alloy skeletons, where the elves used it for take-off and landing. Because the entire facility was outside the floating shield, it was covered with an extra layer of translucent barrier to prevent air loss. The Petrachelys Petrol Frigate had found a larger platform for landing under the guidance. When the spacecraft was slowly descending, Hao Ren noticed that it had passed through a layer of rippling ‘membrane’, which should be the same thing as the shield over the floating island.

There were many elves waiting on the landing platform, men and women, there were hundreds of them. This should be the representative of the elves of Aerym. The ‘welcome group’ was obviously formed in a hasty. Some of them even with a puzzled face, and there were elves rushing in. Other than these elves, there was no guard of honor at the scene and no other welcome groups with bouquets of flowers and piles of brocades. Obviously, the elves of Aerym had abandoned this habit for a long time. The gate of the Petrachelys Petrol Frigate was slowly opened under the watchful eye of this group of elves. Hao Ren pushed Hilda to the front, letting her get off the ship first.

He then led the others to appear in front of the crowd one by one.

There was no other noble reason. It was just that these guys were a little nervous except Y’zaks…

As soon as Hilda appeared, the elves were obviously stirring up, and a tall blond young man, who looked almost as old as Hilda, stepped out of the crowd. He seemed to want to give Hilda a hug, but he hesitated due to the occasion, but Hilda offered him a hug and said, “Vimm, it’s great to see you again.”

“Mother, I am so glad to see you safe and sound.” The young man whom Hilda embraced was indeed the Prince of Aerym, and the only son of the incredibly young-looking Queen, Vimm.

Lily whispered beside Hao Ren, “They really look like brother and sister.”

At this time Hilda turned around and introduced to Vimm a group of friends from a different world. “It was they who helped me. These people are very strong, from an incredible organization. This is Hao Ren. He is…”

Hilda finished introducing all of them, but because the concept of Space Administration was time-consuming to explain, she did not go into detail. Vimm quickly came to Hao Ren, bowing to him with the unique courtesy of the elf of Aerym and said, “Thank you for helping my mother.”

Hao Ren reached out his hand and said, “Nice to meet you.”

Vimm looked curiously at Hao Ren’s hand. Just like his mother, he was holding Hao Ren’s wrist and shaking up and down.

They walked along the broad trail toward the exit of the landing platform, Vimm and Hilda walked in front of them, and Vimm asked, “Mother, did you say you are in another world these days?”

“Yes, the other world, not the universe we now know, it’s truly another world.”

“Is the space-time accelerator successful? Or… More successful than expected?”

“No, it failed. I time-travel into another world. It’s just a by-product of the accident, with very low probability and no duplication. The design of the accelerator itself is problematic, and the project has to stop. What about the situation? What happened after the explosion? How’s the Isle of Stars? And the Isle of Rainbow?”

“We’ll talk about it on the way.” Vimm paused unnaturally. The pause implied disturbing news. At the moment there were several rounded, flat-ellipsoidal vehicles parked at the exit. He took his mother to one of them and at the same time pointing to the other car and said, “The guests please get on this floating car.”

“No, there’s a lot of space in the floating car, and I want to ride with them,” Hilda said and nodding to Hao Ren, “There are no secrets to hide from them. They don’t care about the secrets of a common civilization.”

“Wait a minute.” Before Hao Ren get on the car along with others, he suddenly remembered something and then turned to the Petrachelys Petrol Frigate and press the button. Beep, beep. “Okay.”

Vivian was in the car. She looked at Hao Ren with a strange look and asked, “You use a motorcycle anti-theft lock to lock the ship?”

“Raven 12345 installed it… I must accept it, or the ship won’t be locked,” said Hao Ren awkwardly.

Vivian, “…”

Chapter 241: Status Quo

The levitating, magic-guided vehicle, manufactured by Aerymian elves carried everyone towards the floating Dawnbreak Island. The levitating vehicle was gliding through the air several hundred metres above ground. Although it was a premium item in Aerym and was of a higher technology than anything on Earth, it was bland. It had no designs in and out, unlike private vehicles on Earth. It was built with a type of greyish-white synthetic material, pretty much monotoned in coloured. The vehicle had no ornamental patterns, no soft upholstery, and no special covering on its handles or window frames.

It was like a mass-produced, mold-injected product. While it was technologically advanced, anyone who had experienced it could tell that it was made to meet the minimum requirements to function.

Aerymian elves were slender and taller thans human but the difference was not big—at least, they were closer in height to humans than Y’zaks was. For this reason, Hao Ren and the like felt relatively comfortable inside the vehicle. Even though Y’zaks felt a bit cramped in there, it was still bearable. On both sides of the vehicle were narrow rows of window, which stretched below the seats. From them, one could see the city scenery moving past below.

At first glance, the city’s buildings looked beautiful; they had long arched lines, and were of simple but elegant structure, mimicking trees and buds in design. The architecture in Aerym was dominated by towers and various oval-shaped buildings with sleek lines, making Aerym look like a city of a thousand towers—though it was just an impression. At the same time, these elegant-looking architecture had also revealed the fact of the depletion of resources. All buildings were built from a greyish-white synthetic material—from the walls to the roofs, and even the spaces as well as roads in between these buildings were all of the same colour and dullness. They must have exhausted all their natural construction materials many years ago. Additionally, it was also not possible to mine natural materials from the foundation of the floating isle. So, Aerymian elves could only recycle materials from rubble and use it to build their homes. However, a grey city looked very depressing. To work around the problem, plants were planted in the spaces between the elven buildings, but not in large quantity. Apparently, most plants were in the eco-dome or some similar special location in order to maintain an efficient urban function. Apart from that, not much could be seen in the city.

No monuments, no street sculptures, no parks, and no other wasteful objects that were unrelated to basic survival. The whole city was built using low grade materials, and landscape details were omittted, like they were trying to lower the graphic resolution to reduce the load on their graphics card. No matter where one looked, there were only monochromatic buildings as well as straight and simple streets. The elves were living in this lifeless city like a faded slideshow.

Y’zaks stared down at the city’s landscape, in deep thought. “They’re still maintaining an orderly state of living. No matter how bad things are, they’re working hard to ensure social order, and… at least, things looks ‘normal’ from the outside.”

Hilda’s attention was not on the city below her instead, she had noticed the unconcealable anxiety in her son. “How bad is it? Is it unsustainable?”

“To live, it is still sustainable.” Vimm was a young man but his voice was deep. He fully inherited—probably every elf did—his mom’s perfect look. He was handsome yet manly. “Astrologers and magic-guidance scholars at the scene suffered serious casualty, but the test site was pretty remote, away from the major island chain. Material damage is still within an acceptable level, and supplies for the major residential zone and eco-dome are fine. We can still maintain the same living standard for quite a long period.”

“So, the problem is about faith… is it not?” Hilda knew the situation of Aerym well and that was why she had figured out the crux of the problem pretty quick. “At least you have restored social order for now. Anyway, I can still sense the lifelessness in the atmosphere.”

“The incident hit the public’s faith pretty hard, including some of the members of the assembly,” Vimm said, nodding. “The space-time accelerator is the last large-scale project of its kind that we could afford, which even with the constraint of resources, would have enabled us to find a way to travel to the deep space. But the explosion ripped the faith of many people into pieces. We still have supplies left, but they are only good for survival needs.”

While Vimm was talking, he glanced at the otherworldly visitors sitting at the back of the vehicle. His report was about the social status quo before Hilda returned. However, the appearance of these incredible visitors from outside their planet… or rather, outside their universe had totally messed with his worldview, and also his grasp on the current state of affairs. His first thought was of a new dawn, after the Aerymian elves had suffered thousands of years of embarassment. The arrival of visitors from a highly advanced civilisation, who could do interstellar travel may just be a game-changer. But at the same time, he was worried about another problem.

Would it be in time? Would they agree to help? Would they be of help at all?

Hilda’s eyes glanced at them, but she said nothing. She then turned her eyes back to Vimm. “Firstly, announce that there are otherworldly visitors, and that we have mastered the key to interstellar travel. Although the space-time accelerator failed, it is still a success in terms of our technological progression. Make the announcement; our priority is to inspire the people and restore their faith.”

Hao Ren nodded slightly but he did not make himself clear; he was still pondering about the best option and did not want to make any hasty promises. Nevertheless, he knew what Hilda said was totally within his ability. Hao Ren’s nod gave Vimm a confidence boost, and Vimm’s face began to soften up.

“The Isle of Rainbow… how much is left?” Hilda asked about the situation in other places.

The Isle of Rainbow was a floating island, the last space test site with comprehensive facilities and a high-capacity energy system, where the space-time accelerator was tested. All this while, the elves had only one planet—a lonely planet. There was no other places for them to set foot on and many large-scale tests could not be conducted. It was not until the planet was broken up and formed a space island chain that they could start conducting some dangerous tests, which could not have been carried out safely on the mother planet. During the few thousand years of technological trial and error, they had lost one test site after another, and the aftermath of most incidents was enough to pollute the entire planet. The lost of a floating island was the best case scenario. But even then, there were only a limited number of floating islands available. Thousand of years had passed and the numbers were dwindling.

The Isle of Rainbow was their last hope.

“The Isle of Rainbow is gone.” Vimm was silent for a few seconds before saying in a deep voice, “Mother, I bet you have seen the far end of the island chain while you were in space; the area with new debris—that is the Isle of Rainbow. After the explosion, part of the fragments were thrown towards the sun while some towards deep space. We only managed to recover two-fifths of the materials. These materials were temporarily placed together with the debris of the island chain. Alhough the test site is gone, the resources mined from the wreck will allow everyone years of good life.”

“I saw fragments. I just did not expect…” Hilda frowned. “What about the Isle of Stars?”

The Isle of Stars was another space floating island, an important industrial centre and energy furnace, which stored energy received from the coronal station. During the test of the space-time accelerator, the Isle of Rainbow was moved to the far end of the island chain to avoid it from becoming a hazard to the residential zone. However, the Isle of Stars was moved along to supply energy to the test site. Its close proximity to the test site had Hilda worried about its fate.

While in space, she did not carefully observe the situation across the island chain, so she was unsure if she had seen the Isle of Stars.

“The Isle of Stars survived with some damage. Some of the shrapnel punctured the air-defence fire network, and damaged part of the gravity generator and propulsion unit. Some almost hit the energy hub—missing it by a small margin. The situation is under control. The technical elder committee is trying to restore its functions while the magic technicians managed to recover some equipment from the death zone—the equipment are probably still working. That is better than nothing.”

“Very well. At least, things are better than expected.” Hilda breathed a sigh of relief. “When we land, have Cardillon meet me. We and our otherworldly friends have lots of things to discuss.”

“Elder Cardillon…” Vimm suddenly became evasive of Hilda’s stare. “Elder Cardillon has gone to the World of Prayers.”

“What?” Hilda suddenly raised her voice. “Who allowed that?”

“He went of his own accord. Some problems arose in the World of Prayers. The 200-year-old Lotto Group are becoming active again… and part of the assembly—”

“So the current social order is merely superficial?” Hilda’s face turned dead straight. “When we land, immediately call for an elder assembly. I am going to restore the order!”

Chapter 242: Living Conditions

Everyone at the back of the vehicle was a little confused about what Vimm and Hilda were talking about. Nonetheless, they could basically grasp the meaning of it: the space-time accelerator accident had shaken the foundation of the fragile society, and there were many problems within the elven society itself. However, as outsiders, none of these problems were of their concern. They were not in a position to ask questions.

The levitating vehicle was fast, and it arrived in Dawnbreak Island in no time. As the vehicle passed through an energy shield and went over the wall, the towering steeples in the Aerym Royal District materialised up ahead. The vehicle proceeded to fly towards one of the homogenous steeples and landed on a semi-circle platform extending out from the steeple. Hilda opened the vehicle door and said to them, “This is my home.”

Lily glanced curiously at the huge steeple, chuckling. “Whoa, it looks huge.”

Hilda smiled haplessly. “At least, we are not short of living space.”

Meanwhile, a few Aerymian elves that looked like servants were darting towards them. The servants looked excited when they saw the queen, who had gone missing for the past couple of days. The heartfelt joy and repose on their faces spoke of the prestige Hilda was accorded there. Hilda and Vimm proceeded to brief the servants, then introduced Hao Ren and his company to them. “They are our VIP guests, please arrange their accommodation and take good care of them.”

“I have to call for an assembly of the elders.” Hilda wheeled. “I would like to apologise to you all for I have to attend to some emergencies in the Kingdom.”

Lily replied noisily. “That’s okay. We can help ourselves. By the way, can I look around?”

“You may.” Hilda nodded with a smile. Then Vimm and Hilda got back into the levitating vehicle and left in a hurry.

A young, slim female elf came up and signalled Hao Ren to follow her. “Allow me to bring you to the guest rooms.”

Everyone followed. As they entered the steeple, they passed through a long and dull-looking corridor with a series of simple yet elegant arches to the guest area. They received quite a lot of curious stares along the way; wherever they went, the palace staff would pause and look at the new guests in strange costumes. Rebuked by the leading young elf, the curious onlookers quickly dispersed.

“I apologise for the indecency, they were just curious.” The young elf bowed slightly in apology.

A lift carried them to the mid section of the steeple. Then they were led to an oval-shaped hall with rooms on every side—this was the VIP guest area. The rooms were specially catered to VIP guests. Before leaving, in front of the lift, the young elf said, “Have some rest here. Food is available in the cabinet at the end of the hall. Dinner will be served separately. If you need assistance, please press the green button in the room, or look for the Royal Guard in the lift.”

Hao Ren nodded back in acknowledgement. Lily was suffocated by the formal and solemn atmosphere of the Royal Palace. Just as the young elf left, she howled happily, ran in circles, then scampered in and out of the rooms. Vivian had a stretch. “Truly a queen. Look at this place, it’s huge!”

“Although they’re short in resources, they can still maintain a normal life,” said Hao Ren. He then sauntered around the place, checking out the rooms. The VIP guest room was simple. Nothing fancy, only functional furniture, which were clearly mass-produced products. The lack of style and design showed that they were churned out from the production line with cost-effectiveness in mind—a distinctive characteristic of a living, resource-constrained society. While the ruler may have gotten more material quota, they were using the same things as the ordinary people—cost-effective products from the production line, which totally forwent craftsmanship.

However, being a queen had its privilege: there were ornamental plants in every corner of the hall and rooms. These green bonsai plants added life to the otherwise dull atmosphere. Aerymian elves were originally from the forest, so they had a natural instinct for plants. Wherever possible, they would strive to decorate their living space with green despite the fact that they had to live in a efficiency-obsessed industrial machine for survival. Earlier, Hilda’s treeguard had mentioned that Aerymian traditional artistry and plants were inseparable. However, this kind of artistry was considered a luxury now. It was only maintained among royalty and the elites while what the eco-dome had was limited.

There was a lift at one end of the oval hall, and a round, floor-to-ceiling window at the other end, through which one could have a bird’s-eye view of the city. Hao Ren was standing right there, looking out at the exotic scenery. The filtered sunlight shone through the dome, and the greyish-white city was slowly coated in a golden light from the sunset. There were also small aircrafts traversing in the golden sunset. Suddenly, Vivian, who had come up to him without him realising, was heard saying, “Disregarding the dire situation they’re experiencing, this is a beautiful place.”

Hoa Ren just nodded without saying a word. He was recalling what he had learned from the employee handbook, trying to look at the whole picture from the viewpoint of an inspector. Since he landed on the floating island, he had been carefully observing every detail of the Aerymian society. He tried to understand the culture and status quo from the characteristics of the city, the words and deeds of everyone there. But, as a foreigner whose worldview and race was totally different from the Aerymians, reaching a proper conclusion was difficult. Nevertheless, observational skills were something every inspector had to have. He continued looking out of the window and remained silent for a moment before poking the MDT in his pocket. “Give me some suggestions.”

“No comment. From now on, you have to deal with things according to the SOP,” the MDT replied. “Anyway, the hint is: Madam Raven said you’re fully in-charge—I hope you get what she meant. I do hope you can solve things using your given ability. Don’t simply ask for help from the goddess or other higher forces. Build your influence and connections, then solve problems independently, befitting an inspector. The only limit you must always observe is that you cannot disturb other civilisations; under no circumstances should you help one civilisation you like at the expense of another civilisation. You cannot be partial.”

Hao Ren laughed. “Then worry not. I don’t know anyone yet for me to be biased against.”

Lily had made her rounds around the rooms when her biological clock sounded its hungry alarm on the dot. She remembered the female servant elf telling them that there was food in the cabinet, so she ran looking for it. She found a rectangular box in a metal cabinet. “Is this edible at all? It looks weird…”

She put the box on the table. Hao Ren saw it—the food was like some sort of synthetic stuff. It was mostly yellow or green sticks, the length of a finger, and crispy to the touch. Lily took one and put it into her mouth, chewing noisily. Then she frowned. “It tastes bland! A little salty like a chalk!”

“You ever tasted chalk?” Vivian gave her a sideways glance.

Lily was not embarrassed at all. “I have. The first time I saw a chalk, I took a bite out of curiosity. That taste is still fresh in my mouth just like yesterday.”

The maiden probably inherited the “fine tradition” of her race from her parents, that was to take a bite of everything just to taste them out…

The chalk-like synthetic food could not even appeal to a non-picky eater like Lily. So, she found another: a kind of paste in a cylinder. It was cream-like and sweet smelling. With high expectations, Lily gouged a little out with her finger and put that in her mouth. The moment the paste reached her tastebuds, her tail puffed up instantly. ” It tastes of engine oil!”

The MDT got out from Hao Ren’s pocket and examined the paste. “It’s a product of chemistry. Although it’s able to provide energy for carbon-based living things, don’t expect much in terms of taste. The addition of special flavour and some texture require a complicated production method, which is wasteful.”