The Record of Unusual Creatures - Chapter 606

Chapter 606: Destination: Io

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

A blast of bright light pierced through the darkness as the Petrachelys completed its hyperspace warp jump and entered a whole new galaxy.

The holographic display showed the scene captured by the surveillance optics outside the ship and created a star map via circular hologram on the bridge. Hao Ren saw the system before him. It was slightly greyish, meaning that the system was being surrounded by a massive cluster of Oort cloud. The star map showed a straight continuous bright belt with countless individual lights, as if thousands upon thousands of stars had congregated there. It seemed like the place was a cradle of stars, and it was churning out new stars every moment, launching them towards the galaxy.

“Such a… magnificent place,” Y’zaks said as he momentarily turned away from his papers as soon as they arrived. He looked around. “Looks like the siren’s home galaxy is still young.”

“Io is just right in front of us. Apporaching destination,” the MDT’s voice was broadcasted through the communication system. “Just a little bit more… Alright, you can see it now.”

Before the holographic display, a dim-looking planet quickly expanded into view. It was totally covered by a mass of ocean and a perpetual blue hue. Only a few white clusters appeared on the northern hemisphere of the planet; they were floating glaciers. The southern hemisphere was canvassed by a massive layer of clouds and based on Nasaton’s records, the clouds were an atmopsheric phenomenon, which cycled year by year across the face of the planet. The sirens of yore called it the “Sky Curtain”.

The sun was facing the side of the Petrachelys and Io, shining across the planet’s surface. It gave it a glistening sheen.

“So this is the siren’s home planet…” Lily said as she lay back in the bridge seat. Turning around, she looked at the siren queen. “That’s your old home.”

Shaqira and Sorma stared unblinkingly at the holographic display. The sea-covered planet was the only thing in their eyes now. It took a while before Hao Ren asked them, “So… how do you feel now?”

“I… don’t know…” Shaqira looked rather confused. “I thought I would be very excited, but I don’t find anything special about the planet when I see it… Almost as if I can’t even fathom this was my birthplace.”

Nangong Sanba stood up as he tidied up his long, black coat. He struck a pose as if he was about to give a motivational speech. “That’s because you’re in space. A homeland is grass and water, it’s the streets, the cacophony of activities in the streets. If you’ve never experienced these things here, it’s not truly a homecoming. Besides, seeing a 3D model of your planet is hardly a way for you to experience—”

Wuyue raised her head and glanced at her brother. “Can you stop acting cool, brother? That motivation speech is just so drab… and if I remember correctly, you used it 20 years ago with some old Chinese folks. You even got two white jade rings from them.”

“…And why did you conveninently leave out the fact that I caught three evil spirits for the old man?!”

Seeing the two siblings bicker was definitely much more fun than seeing Wuyue prod the floor panel with her tail.

The Petrachelys soon arrived on Io as it turned towards the sun-facing side of the planet. As the planet had no landmass, there were no proper landing points and Hao Ren decided to park the ship on a piece of floating glacier. Just as the ship finally approached it, a flicker of light blinked on the holographic display. Hao Ren looked at the light and noted that there was something floating on the northern hemisphere of Io and he immediately changed course towards it.

“What’s that?” Lily’s ears perked up as she entered her curious husky mode. “Looks like a space station?”

The Petrachelys was closing in on a space station, which emitted the flickering strobes, and a curved outline started to form. It was almost like a massive city that looked like it had layers upon layers of shells on it. Around the place were a circle of crystal-encrusted high walls, but there were nothing above the city. It seems like it was supposed to be a energy barrier of sorts but its gone now.

Hao Ren felt that it looked very familiar and was immediately reminded, “Doesn’t this look almost the same as the Nasaton?”

“I almost couldn’t recognize it from above!” Vivian was surprised. “So… this is the other migrant ship? Why didn’t it launched?”

“Approach it slowly. MDT, run through the database we had previously copied from Nasaton’s data vault. See if there’s any sister ships for Nasaton or something.”

Hao Ren’s previous attention were all drawn on Io and the Siren’s fragmented history and he overlooked many items that were taken from Nasaton’s datavault. Now that he had seen another migrant ship, he realized that he needed to check if the Sirens had built any other escape vessels and their subsequent fate.”

The Petrachelys was closing in on the spaceship that looked like Nasaton and the MDT’s voice rang. “Scanning through the datavault… There are three sister ships for Nasaton, The Zalazarn, The Antwern and the Palasion. The Antwern had undergone special modification, and has a signature alloy core tower. The other ships are similar to the Nasaton, seems like they were built from the same blueprint.

“So that should be one of the mass-produced designs then.” Hao Ren’s interest was immediately piqued. “Any signs of threats?”

“The initial scans shows that there are no signs of life onboard, but cannot discount the possiblity of any difficult to recognize alien life forms.

The Petrachelys may be a very advanced spacecraft, but it was only a few hundred meters long. Beside the massive hulk it was like a speck of dust. Hao Ren let the ship slowly maneuver its way above the derelict as he paid full attention is checking out the ship’s status. The derelict had clearly inert and now floated aimlessly on Io’s orbit, rotating slowly as it went. The Siren Queen looked on for a moment before saying. “It doesn’t have a water dome.”

“Forget the water dome, it’s dry as a husk,” Lily mumbled as she shook her head.

The ship’s barrier had deactivated and there were many signs of damage on the outer walls. The water that once flow through the spacecraft had long evaporated. Many of the internal structures and facilites were exposed to the dry vacuum as it was mercilessly degraded by the scorching sun and cosmic radiation.

Hao Ren saw a series of post-explosion rents on the rear of the ship and this was undoubtedly the main reason why the ship had lost all functions. But who was the culprit?

Was it the brain monster, or the First Born?

Hao ren looked towards the control dias, “Eh, brick, have you detected the teleportation gate?”

“No. It could be located deep in the ocean, or it is also hidden within a dimensional gap like Nasaton. I need to run a thorough planetary scan. And let me remind you that I’m a MDT, you cannot just come up with a nickname…”

“Any signs of the brain monster?”

“Will need to run a scan to determine that too. I’m not done yet, you need to respect the worth of a PDA…”

“Go on then. Place a few more scouting drones. The brain monster might already be waiting for us down there.” Hao Ren said as he headed towards the bridge door. “I’ll lead a party to check on the derelict. To confirm the cause of explosion. I’ll be back in a jiffy.”

“Oh. Sure. But I still want to stress the fact that I’m an MDT…”

Hao Ren had totally ignored the MDT and marched towards the teleporter. As he walked he asked. “So who’s coming? Bring your lifehoop with you.”

Lily immediately leapt up to follow, “Mr Landlord wait! I’ll come. Say, I’ve put a bell on the collar, is it cute….”

Vivian sighed as she too followed. “I’ll go, just the two of you alone worry me to death.”

The trio then left the Petrachelys as they were teleported towards the outer wall of the derelict. After letting out a few signal flares the Petrachelys had disappeared swiftly into the horizon. It was going to do a full scan on Io.

The derelict had no power, and it was without question it did not had artificial gravity as well. Exploring the place would need some measure of skill. Hao Ren demurred as he tried to plan the best path towards the explosion area as he reminded the two ladies through the comms. “Be careful out there. Don’t run into the pillars, neither of you are still used to movement in space.”

Just as he finished his sentence Lily had already darted ahead excitedly and crashed headlong into one of the thick alloy pillars, her head was stuck in it for a good while…

“Well… crashing into one isn’t a problem then.”

Chapter 607: The Zalazarn Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

Hao Ren led the two ladies carefully as they navigated through the derelict space. They passed by a massive white spire and a wall encrusted with crystals. These structures had been at the mercy of the cosmic rays for over 10,000 years, yet they still looked pristine as ever. Perhaps it was a testament of the technological level that the sirens of yore possessed.

“This seems to be a water world of its own right.” Vivian looked at the structure in awe. There was supposed to be a water dome over the structure, but as the engines shut down, so did the dome. The water-filled deck had since dried up as a result. “If there’s no water at all, the sirens can’t resurrect themselves.”

“There’s so much wonder in the world,” Lily said as she grabbed on to one of the support rails to push herself past Hao Ren. “Human ships need oxygen, while the sirens’ need water… What’s that in front?”

The three soon came before a damaged alloy wall. There was a massive outward gash on it, clearly the result of a destructive shockwave. Hao Ren immediately rushed ahead. “Found it. Looks like this is the point of explosion.”

The inside of the gash was pitch black, and without air to refract light, the internal structure could not be illuminated by the sunlight. They could just vaguely see some complicated tubes and grid structures. Hao Ren threw a few luminence orbs into the rent, and only with the floating orbs could they see what was inside: a ruined tunnel with a massive pile of twisted metal, which lay mangled along the wall. Along the tunnel you could see web-like impact marks, meaning that there was a massive explosion in the area.

Hao Ren led the way as he went through the rent, hoping to find the reason for the starship’s destruction from the ruins. Lily and Vivian followed closely.

“Doesn’t seem like an internal explosion.” Hao Ren pointed at the torn tubes. “I remember that Nasaton has similar water tubes. These are low-pressure circulation tubes, and having this many tubes means that this place was also low in pressure. Even if the pump had busted, the explosion would not have been at such a scale. The thick, protective walls here were literally blown apart.”

Vivian followed Hao Ren slowly and a small piece of metal flew past her eyes. On it was a series of curved siren writings, “Zalazarn: Sixth Low-Pressure Pump”.

Hao Ren saw the small metal plate too. He shook his head as he sighed. “The Zalazarn. It blew up in orbit. Not sure what happened to the sister ships. Hopefully they managed to take off.”

Vivian looked at the dark tunnel that extended endlessly before her and decided to fling out a few bat familiars to scout ahead. She conjured a few of them out of thin air and the little bats flapped their wings in position. Hao Ren could not stand the scene and quipped, “Didn’t I tell you before? Your bats are useless in space. You sure are forgetful aren’t you…”

“I know, so I’ve improvised,” Vivian said as she pulled out a sling from her pocket and placed one of the bats on it before shooting it ahead. The bat flew towards the dark tunnel like a projectile. “See, it does fly!”

Hao Ren gawked as he looked at Vivian shooting her bats one by one into various corners of the tunnel. He felt that everything he knew was crumbling before him. “You-You’re actually willing to do that to your doppelgangers?”

“There’s just a minor dizziness to deal with at the start, but I’m used to it now!” Vivian proudly crossed her arms across her chest. “I’ve been following you to all sorts of weird places, how can I survive if I don’t learn new skills.”

Hao Ren was instantly reminded of Lily’s five-year-long brick throwing practice. So, this bat was pretty much no different than the husky. Both of them were unusual creatures who had lived through almost every facet of human history and they could now focus on things that were just outrageously useless. Do not be fooled by Vivian’s usual calm and measured demeanor. The only reason she was such was because she had done almost every foolish thing one could do in a lifetime!

Now that she had stepped into space, the vampire had opened the gates to a different frontier… She had started to use her brains again.

Well regardless, Vivian’s little bats were at least more useful than Lily’s bricks. Very soon, streams of blood started to come back towards Vivian. The latter frowned as she pointed in a direction. “Something’s over there. It doesn’t seem like it belongs in a tunnel.”

Vivian was pointing at a mangled mess in the shape of a web. That was supposed to be a location where the tubes intersected and they were covered by a layer of alloy mesh. The explosion had blown the mesh into a shape akin to a fish net. Lily was intrigued by it and she dashed forward. “I’ll go have a look!”

“Be careful!” Hao Ren yelled as he saw the husky running towards the mess clumsily.

Lily waved her hand in response before crashing headlong into the alloy mesh. Almost half her body sank into the mesh pile and her legs were thrashing about as she tried to extricate herself out of her predicament. Hao Ren and Vivian immediately went ahead to pull her out as he lectured her. “Didn’t I tell you to be careful?”

Vivian even had the time to sneer ar Lily. “Well, that’s what you get for being doggone stubborn…”

“…You sure have picked up some weird speaking habits,” Hao Ren quipped.

“I managed to get hold of something.” Lily seemingly ignored Vivian as she sheepishly tidied herself before looking back at the mangled mesh. She then pulled out a piece of black metal. “Ah, here it is!”

Hao Ren took the metal block from the husky. “What is this?”

It was a black tube about half a meter long. There were unknown marks on the surface. Hao Ren could not tell what its use was at first glance. After looking at it for a good while, he could only form the conclusion that it was not siren-made based on the style and material. He then knocked the tube against the pipe beside him. “Feels a bit hard… Hmm?”

As the tube struck the pipe, one end of the tube started to glow red, and the next second, the whole tube started to light up. An immenent sense of danger ovewhelmed him!

“F*ck!” Hao Ren screamed as he threw the now scorching hot tube towards the far end of the tunnel. He deployed his shield as he pushed Vivian and Lily into the nearest corner, using his body as cover to protect the ladies. At that very moment, a sudden flash of light burst from behind them.

The next second, a storm of metal fragments smashed against him and Hao Ren could even hear the rhythm of the onslaught. The Steel Membrane Shield blocked all of the fragments but could not dissipate all of the blast force, and Hao Ren was in a daze as the blast hit him in the head. Thankfully, it barely lasted a moment and due to the fact that they were in a vacuum, no follow-up shockwave came. It was nothing but silence after the storm died off.

It took Lily a while to react before she looked down and started to scream. “Awoooouch! Ouch! Mr. Landlord, you’re stepping on my tail! Awooouch!”

“Uh…” Vivian checked herself before giving Hao Ren a rather bashful look. “Never thought I’d be protected by… Can you shut up, Doggie?!”

Lily hugged her tail as she licked it rather dejectedly. “Oh…”

“What was that?” Vivian looked at the other end of the tunnel in a slightly fearful manner. A giant spherical hole had been torn on the wall as molten metal floated around. The bomb was very powerful for its size. “A bomb?”

“No… A shell. A dud from 10,000 years ago.” Hao Ren’s face was grim. “Perhaps part of a cluster shell. It doesn’t look like your standard warhead.”

Lily immediately realized the gravity of things. “So that means…”

“The Zalazarn was blown apart by cannon fire.” Vivian’s eyes widened. “Io’s destruction wasn’t caused by the First Born.”

Lily scratched her head. “Don’t tell me it’s those brain monsters? Can they actually manufacture cannons?”

Even Hao Ren could not answer the question. As he was about to further investigate the starship, which had been blow apart, the MDT’s voice came from the communicator. “Boss, the scan’s complete. There’s an energy focal point deep in the ocean. When are you coming back?”

Hao Ren motioned. “Let’s solve the teleportation gate issue first.”

Chapter 608: The Aquatic Planet Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

Hao Ren led Lily as well as Vivian back to the Petrachelys, and as the frigate slowly descended into Io’s orbit, Y’zaks asked about their findings in the derelict spaceship.

The siren queen immediately came forward to listen too.

“It’s the Zalazarn. She couldn’t escape and was destroyed in orbit.” Hao Ren shook his head. “The starship’s rear wing and the lower pipe intersection area had massive penetrating rents. They were about a few kilometers long. These were from cannon fire. We even found one of the duds inside the ship, and that bloody thing almost ruined my hairstyle.”

“Cannon fire?” Y’zaks never considered such a possibility. “So the one that destroyed the siren’s civilization wasn’t the First Born or the brain monsters, but a… mortal race that uses cannon fire?”

“Both the First Borns and brain monsters are mortal races too. They’re strong for sure, but technically, they’re still ‘mortal’.” Hao Ren had to first correct Y’zaks in line with his position as the “First Pope recognized by a real god cum traffic officer cum police”. “Of course, I understand what you mean… The cannon fire means that the race isn’t a First Born, and it certainly isn’t the brain monster. Those monsters don’t even bother putting on clothes, I doubt they’d use any form of transport.”

“Whether they destroyed Io or not, at the very least, we now know that the Zalazarn was taken down by cannon fire,” Vivian quipped. “Haih… this is not good news, and things are getting more and more complicated. We’re already deep in the mire with the First Born and the brain monster. Now there’s another unknown advanced, space-faring race? Who knows if they have anything to do with the First Born.”

Hao Ren shrugged. “As the very leastm we have more information to work with now. Think about it this way, the more confused we are, the closer we are to the truth. The Plane of Dreams is that big. If everything was clear cut, I’d actually suspect we’re going in the wrong direction.”

Lily turned her head to the right as she looked at Hao Ren and Vivian. Appearing heartbroken, she tapped Hao Ren on the back with her tail. “I don’t care about the rest… Mr. Landlord you stepped on my tail…”

Hao Ren was speechless.

The Petrachelys broke through the atmosphere as it went full speed towards the ocean. It did not stop at the clear upper level of the atmosphere and charged straight into the storm clouds. The surveillence cameras outside the frigate displayed a rainstorm that was outright scary. The volume of heavy rain made it seem as though the sea and sky had turned upside down. Vision was very poor as the rain rendered whatever visibility they had into a gray veil while massive lightning bolts criss-crossed among the clouds. This was followed by ear-ringing thunder, which split through the clouds, giving everyone an impression that the sky itself was connected to another aquatic world. Now that many gaps had formed, it looked like it was threatening to fall directly into Io.

“Uh… the weather is sure unlike your gentle nature.” Nangong Sanba gasped as he looked at the rainstorm outside and started to mumble to Sorma, who was beside him. “This rain doesn’t seem like it’s going to stop at all.”

“It never has.” Hao Ren turned back to look at Nangong Sanba. “Io is being encompassed by a seemingly eternal rainfall. There are rainstorms at times, snowstorms during others; it all depends on the sun’s position. The closer it is towards the equator, there won’t be winter, so there will only be rainstorms. This rain has been ongoing for millions of years since the planet cooled, and it will continue to fall. The whole planet has less than 10 times of clear weather, and that’s only limited to a few areas.”

Nangong Sanba gawked before he made some weird gestures with his hand. “Ugh… so, how does the water circulate then?”

“Storms.” Hao Ren pointed at one of the holographic displays. “Giant tornados, waves that are thousands of meters tall; these are as common as rain, and they’ve been ongoing for years on end.”

On the holographic display, a massive water spout extended all the way into the clouds. This was a hurricane of sea water, which had been sucked into the air. It was a hundred times more massive and awe-inspiring than the ones people saw on Earth. Millions of gallons of water were sucked into the clouds by a shapeless straw and that was how Io’s massive rainstorm had been maintained for eons.

With such a storm buffeting the surface, it was any wonder that one would find any form of life on the planet’s surface. The only possible cradle of life was deep within the ocean as it was the only place unaffected by the storms.

“Any signs of hostiles during your scans?” Hoa Ren looked at the control dais.

“I swear by the six points of my shells, negative.” the MDT said as a “clack” followed after it sprang out from the dock. “Switching to auto pilot… Of course, scans can only tell us so much. If one or two brain monsters are hiding out there, there’s no way to locate them. But you don’t have to worry about any brain monster army. There are no large hostile signatures or any signs of the First Born. So, we don’t need to rain hell on this planet, although it sounds like a cool idea.”

The frigate slowly approached the sea’s surface and the planet bared its fangs towards the new visitor with churning waves as well as crackling storms. The entire world was shrouded in gray due to the rain and waves. Amid the rainstorm, Hao Ren noticed something odd in the distance. “Over there. Something’s sticking out.”

A silver-greyish metal platform stood out in the middle of the ocean as several massive alloy frames held it firmly hundreds of meters above sea level. Such a small level of waves could barely do anything to the upper part of the platform (in Io, waves around one hundred meters tall were considered small). The platform was enormous and could allow at least 10 other Petrachelyses to land. There were many other sealed buildings on the platform and there were pipes between each of them. The buildings seemed to be ancient. Nasaton was still pristine even after 10,000 years under water, but this platform was so badly worn out it looked like had been abandoned long, long ago.

“This is a…” Hao Ren immediately flipped through Nasaton’s database for information, but to his dismay, he found that the database they copied did not include the data on the civilization there. There was nothing mentioned about the platform in the data vault they had. “…Can’t find anything. Probably a landing platform?”

“No, it’s a sea-borne observatory. Used to monitor the ‘world in the skies’. Vivian pointed at a few large characters on one of the pillars supporting the platform. “Don’t just bury your face in the books, it’s written right here.”

Hao Ren was at a lost for words.

“Sure isn’t easy for the sirens to build such an enormous observatory. This thing had to go through at least dozens of kilometers of water to reach the surface. The foundation’s rooted deep in the seabed,” the MDT’s voice had a tone of amazement. “And this seabed is already on the shallower part of the sea. The depth of Io’s ocean is much more considerable than the one’s on Earth.”

The ship circled the platform and when it got to the other end of the platform, everyone saw a gigantic metal frame, which resembled a plaque. The words on it were clear as ever. It chronicled the history of the platform.

“Ewenna Observatory. Built in the year 13086 in memory of the Stargazer Ewenna, in memory of the sirens’ first sighting of the stars. Our eternal thanks for her efforts in persevering for 700 years, and welcoming the first clear sky in our history.”

“This was the place the sirens first saw the stars.” Hao Ren immediately realized as he looked at the thick clouds above Io’s sky. “They waited for hundreds of years before seeing the stars for the first time.”

Lily wrapped her arms around herself as she said, “I think they must have been surprised to see the stars, perhaps fearful as well. That Ewenna person must have been describing the clouds before they cleared, and the stars appeared. That led them to realize that there were many other things beyond the clouds. Before that, they never thought what was beyond their ‘world’.”

The siren queen looked at the solitary platform in the middle of the storm and sighed softly. “This is an important part of our history… but I can’t even read the words…”

Hao Ren smiled. “No worries, we’ll help you rediscover the writings when the time comes.”

Nangong Wuyue looked down at the platform, which had stood the test of time. “So, the energy source is beneath the platform?”

“Right underneath,” the MDT replied as the Petrachelys submerged into the water. “I’ll put the weapon systems on standby. While there are no signs of hostiles here, it’s hard to say if the sirens had left any defensive fortifications online.”

Chapter 609: Under the Deep Sea Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

The Petrachelys descended silently and quickly into the water, leaving the storm behind. The footage from the external monitor was converted to several large holographic projections, which formed an immersive scene. It was as though the heavy armor around the bridge had disappeared, and they could directly experience the feeling of being in the deep sea.

The waves above them faded away and soon they could only see some light flickering from above, the endless lightning thunderstorm of Io illuminating the stars. The first new energy that the sirens of the planet came into contact with the ‘Air World’ was lightning. And it was more than 1000 years after Ewenna discovered the starry sky when the sirens experienced the ‘sunlight’ for the first time.

Too bad, these historical details had been submerged in the surging waves of Io. Maybe no one would ever know again.

As they were getting deeper into the deep sea, the turbulence of the currents began to calm down and those violent waves seemed to be isolated to another world. The darkness grew more and more heavily from all directions, but there was a wonderful sense of relief as the darkness poured in. Lily hugged her shoulder, jumping around Hao Ren and said, “Aww aww… It triggers my deep sea phobia…”

Vivian pushed her aside and said, “Stop acting, your simple brain can’t get that complicated problem.”

“The deeper the sea the calmer it is…” Shaqira sat at the front end of the bridge, gazing into the deep darkness. “When was the first time our ancestors swam up from the deep sea? Why would they think of leaving a safe and peaceful deep sea? How did it feel to see the storm on the surface of the sea for the first time? Is it a new surprise? Or terrified?”

“Races with history can touch the path of the ancestors through their own history books, but even when we get back to our hometown, we can only guess how we used to live here,” the Siren Queen said and shook her head, “When I returned here, there’s no surprise, only emptiness.”

“Maybe you’ll feel better when you see the remains in the deep sea. I think those relics should be similar to the scenery of Nasaton,” said Vivian while looking at the Siren Queen, “Actually, sirens are better than those living on the land. At least you’re trying to keep your culture and think about where you come from. Those living on the land don’t care about that anymore. For more than 10000 of years, everyone has lived like wild animals.”

Hao Ren looked at Vivian oddly and asked, “Vivian, are you sure it’s ok to keep criticizing them like this?”

Vivian crossed her arms and said, “As someone who is older and elder than them, can’t I be disappointed in them?”

Hao Ren was speechless. He could only turn to the data terminal and said, “Leave a detector for every kilometer as we go deeper. We can’t waste this chance. Have to do ecological research on this planet or something.”

A passage was opened at the top of the Petrachelys and a small detector rushed out of it, leaving a tiny light in the dark deep sea. At this moment, the spacecraft (maybe it’s more suitable to call it a submarine?) had submerged into complete darkness, and there was no slightest source of light except for the light on the spacecraft. However, the spacecraft’s external monitor was not built based on the optical basis, so the darkness here did not affect them observing outside. After the spacecraft submerging deeper, some animals of odd shapes began to appear in the water. Some of them were slender as fish, and some were like some kind of triangular crustaceans. These creatures had lived peacefully here for many years, but now they were suddenly disturbed by a silvery white monster from somewhere far, far away, they were frightened and immediately scattered in all directions. However, there were also some small, daring aquatic animals moving closer to the Petrachelys, probably they thought that this huge thing was edible?

Nangong Wuyue looked at the scenery outside with eager eyes, moving her tail unconsciously and said, “I wish to… Go out for a swim.”

The Siren Queen and the other sirens were immediately intrigued by this idea. Sorma raised her tail happily and said, “Oh, that’s a good idea! Perhaps swimming in the water of our hometown for a while will give us a different feeling!”

Hao Ren tested the water quality here, confirming that there were no more toxic substances in it, and then agreed to their request. Petrachelys then opened the door, and four slender figures quickly rushed out from it.

Nangong Wuyue was swimming merrily in the water, dragging her long tail circling around the spacecraft. The other three sirens were curiously chasing the grotesque deep-water creatures in the water. The faint glow of Petrachelys shone upon the graceful shape of the sirens as if it were a wonderful scene that only existed in a fairy tale. Hao Ren turned on the communicator and heard Nangong Wuyue’s cheerful voice. “Eh! Landlord, these crustaceans are chewing on the spacecraft’s numbers…”

“Don’t swim too far, be careful don’t get lost.” Hao Ren smiled then asked, “Katreina, how do you feel now?”

“This water… Incredible. I can feel that there’s a wonderful intimacy in it. I don’t know how to describe it to you, but only the siren can feel the magic here. It’s really good!”

Shaqira sped down a, and then turned to the spacecraft and waved. “Light! There’s light down there! We seem to be arriving at the bottom of the sea!”

Petrachelys hummed and began to go deeper quickly. A faint halo soon appeared beneath the ship.

What appeared in the halo was a vast expanse of man-made ruins.

On the flat expanse of the deep sea, the endless buildings of sirens were extending to the end of sight. The buildings were of high and low, distributed orderly, and constructed in a white and light green man-made material, with shapes like they were piling up with a variety of shells and corals. They looked elegant, exquisite, and full of inexplicable mysterious atmosphere. And the things that were shining between the buildings were a large number of glowing algae. These algae grew luxuriantly in the crevice of buildings that have been abandoned for more than ten thousand years, emitting a soft, mysterious pale blue, pale pink glow. The entire city of sirens, and even the entire seabed was thus far from darkness.

Today, more than 10000 years after the artificial lights of the sirens had been extinguished, the primitive light from nature had again illuminated the deep sea.

This was an ancient kingdom hidden in the deep sea. Its endless stretches of land covered almost the outer rock layers of the entire planet. Over the kingdom, it was a thick sea with an average thickness of more than 10 kilometers. The kingdom in the deep sea was far beyond the description you read on many fairy tales and myths that for a moment Hao Ren did not know how to describe the place.

All he knew was that when looking at this planet from the sky, no one would have expected such a lost kingdom to be hidden beneath the endless storms and the grayish-blue ocean.

“According to the database records of Nasaton, here should be the capital of sirens,” data terminal said while matching the information, “Evadurant. It looks like the teleportation portal was opened in this place.”

“The energy environment here is very chaotic.” Hao Ren turned on the radar and found that there was a large energy vortex in the vicinity, but all the details were interfered by a strong background noise. “The two worlds should have already interfered with each other. The radar is very confusing here. It’s like sleepwalking between two worlds.”

The data terminal was operating other devices. “It should be around here. Start the conventional wave radar with optical observation. The whirlpool is so big. It’s not too hard to find.”

“Let us help you.” The voice of the Queen came from the communicator. “Don’t worry, if we encounter any dangerous situation, we will return immediately.”

The four sirens were swimming in four directions to the depths of Evadurant (the ancient capital in the deep sea). At the same time, Petrachelys also began to search slowly. The teleportation portal seriously interfered with the nature of this place. The distortion involved the origin of the world, so even if Hao Ren was navigating a super advanced spacecraft, he would not dare to act recklessly.

“Actually I can also help to explore the…” Vivian muttered to herself.

Lily looked at her in surprise. “Oh battie, your little bats can swim as well?”

“Can’t you two just sit quietly for a while?”

Suddenly, Nangong Sanba saw something on the holographic projection and shouted, “Look! What’s that?!”

The holographic projection immediately magnified the picture, and a huge, dark, strange object appeared before them.

Hao Ren was shocked when he saw the clearer picture. “This is… a spacecraft?”

Chapter 610: A Mysterious Spaceship

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

A huge black wreckage lay ahead, and the lush, glowing deep-sea plants surrounding it revealed the details of the wreckage. It was about 10-km long and it had a slender body as well as a large number of crystalline sheet metal distributed around it. The crystalline sheets of metal were of different sizes, ranging from about dozens of meters to even hundreds of meters wide. They were spread like petals or sails along the axis of the wreckage and in all directions. On the back of the wreckage, there were some strange metallic structures, which had swelled up. Something like radiator grids were arranged neatly on it.

The wreckage lay on the seabed, supported by a large number of buildings so it did not completely collapse. Some of its crystalline sheet metals were probably smashed in the process of falling, ended up falling apart and scattered around. They did not see any interpretable sign on the wreckage, except for a large, sun-like abstract symbol on one of the black crystalline sheet, but they did not know what it meant.

Hao Ren knew that it was a spacecraft the moment he saw it. This was the result of him taking some time to study those learning manuals diligently. The data terminal, after a further scan, came to a more precise conclusion, “It’s a spacecraft, but its materials were completely different from that of the spacecraft of sirens.”

“Well, it’s obvious. The style is not the same as well,” Hao Ren said while slowly navigating Petrachelys closer to the wreckage. As they were getting closer to the wreckage, the steel monster of more than 10-kilometer-long also gave them a greater impact. Its bizarre ‘petal’ structure and black painting were impressive. “This thing is really big… Is it a battleship or a common spaceship?”

“I assure you that it’s not a coincidence that a common spacecraft crashed in this place. And judging by its structure, it’s more like a battleship.” The data terminal said while circling Hao Ren’s head, “Well, you’re not bad. I didn’t expect that you’re already so skilled at navigating a spacecraft. I thought I’ll have to assist you all my life.”

Hao Ren waved his hand to push data terminal aside and said, “Of course, I’ve studied the instructions, too. I can’t operate it in a battle, but I can still do something simple, like moving it.”

The gigantic black wreckage was obviously not built by sirens, which made Hao Ren think of the Zalazarn, which was blown up in orbit, and he doubted whether the spaceship was the alien warship that attacked Io. But there is one more question that cannot be explained: Why did it crash here?

The small and light Petrachelys quickly traveled through the crystalline sheet metals. Several small detectors were released to look for the entrance to the wreckage. And suddenly, Nangong Wuyue’s voice appeared in the communicator. “Landlord! We found something!”

“Found the teleportation portal?”

“No, I found another fugitive ship,” Nangong Wuyue said quickly, “and it was blown up and torn apart. There’s another strange thing here… also very huge!”

Hao Ren immediately navigated the spacecraft and said, “Stay there, don’t move. I’m tracking your position.”

The siren’s speed was staggeringly fast in the water. In just one or two hours they had already swum for hundreds of kilometers respectively. Hao Ren found Nangong Wuyue on the edge of Evadurant. She waved to the spacecraft, raised her hand and pointed to a huge relic outside the city.

That was another immigrant starship. It lay still there, close to the city of Evadurant. Because of its large size, it looked like another city lying on the seabed. This ‘city’ had been torn apart, more miserable than the Zalazarn on the orbital station. A huge tear stretched across the entire starship, almost blowing it out in half. And countless shattered wreckage was scattered radially around there.

“This is the Palasion.” Hao Ren concluded when he found the wreckage to be the same model as the wreckage of the orbital station, “We’ve found the ship… It didn’t escape. It was blown up directly on the launch pad. ”

If there was no interference of the “Wall of Reality” that caused the entire region in the cloudy state and the poor ‘visibility’, Hao Ren could confirm the structure of the seabed from high altitude. He would see the Evadurant in the middle of a plain, and the four large platforms comparable to the size of the city distributed symmetrically around the capital of sirens. It was the launch pad that launched the ark.

There used to be four starships stayed there. And now, Nasaton has settled down on earth, Zalazarn was floating alone in the high orbit of Io, and the Palasion was lying here miserably, torn apart by some powerful force, and the huge starship was left with only broken walls.

And the Antwern, which was said to be specially designed… Its launch pad was empty, and no one knew where it had gone.

“The whereabouts of the three exiled spacecraft, including Nasaton, have been confirmed,” Y’zaks counted silently and said. “And the last one, Antwern, right? Haven’t found it yet.”

“Maybe it had been blown up somewhere, too, but I sincerely hope that it was successfully launched, and had landed safely somewhere, just like Nasaton,” Vivian said, shaking her head and sighed, “From the wreckage, we can see that how hard those sirens had tried… Too bad.”

“That’s the ‘strange thing’ that Wuyue mentioned?” Nangong Sanba pointed to a dark shadow near the wreckage, “It looks like… another black spacecraft.”

“Well, yes, it’s the same model as the unidentified spacecraft we just found,” Hao Ren turned the external monitor and magnified the shadow, and found that it was also a black giant spacecraft. It was more than 10 kilometers long, with distinctive, sail-like crystal sheet metals arranged neatly on it. It lay still beside the ruins of the Palasion and pointed a series of gun muzzle-like structures towards the ruins as if it was still firing at the last minute before it crashed, perished together. “I think… We need to take the spaceship back as a sample.”

“I agree,” The data terminal said, “This unidentified spacecraft is closely related to the destruction of Io, and should be sampled and analyzed.”

“How many gravity regulators do we have?” Hao Ren knocked on the data terminal and asked. “I remember we left a lot of gravity regulators with us when we helped Wang to move home, should be enough to lift this thing from the sea to outer space.”

The data terminal did a simple calculation and said, “The quantity is sufficient, but we need a towing ship. Petrachelys can do it.”

“Ok, let’s get it out of the water now.” Hao Ren decided immediately. “I don’t want any accident to happen and damage the sample later.”

Suddenly, the voice of the Queen came from the communicator. “Hello? Hello? Can you hear me?”

“Katreina?”

“Yes. I found the teleportation portal… It’s very messy. I can’t get closer.”

“The main course is coming.” Hao Ren looked at the people around him, and then glanced at the wreckage of the huge black battleship on the holographic projection. He weighed then nodded, and said, “Data Terminal, you’ll handle the spacecraft. Get it out of the water. Now give me an integrated engineering machine. I send the explosives to the teleportation portal.”

Lily jumped excitedly and asked, “Landlord, can I go with you?”

Hao Ren pinned her down and said, “You’re too slow, just stay on the spacecraft. Vivian, you stay here as well. I’m just going to place a bomb. I’m familiar with this, shouldn’t have any problem.”

Then he beckoned to Y’zaks and said, “You come and give me a hand. Help me to cope with any accidents. And the rest, including Wuyue, stay on the spacecraft until I detonate the bomb.”

“Oh…” Lily said bitterly. Everyone agreed but Lily. All Huskies had the similar reaction when they were left at home. She glanced at the control desk and asked, “Then can I…”

“Cannot,” Hao Ren pinned her back to her chair. “Don’t press anything. Data terminal, lock the operating system. Limit the access to everything except for movie player and Super Mario.”

After distributing the tasks, Hao Ren and Y’zaks left the bridge together.

Petrachelys began to approach the black spacecraft lying on the bottom of the sea. Many doors were opened on one side of it and lots of autonomous robots coming out and pushing the anti-gravity devices and swimming to the wreckage, preparing for related installation and operation. Meanwhile, the second half of the Petrachelys opened another gate, and a small probe of 10-meter-long flying out of it.

A silver shiny cube was pushed in front of the probe — it was the fiery gift that Hao Ren prepared for the teleportation portal.