The Record of Unusual Creatures - Chapter 675

Chapter 675: The Black Battleship

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

After their fierce battle, the main forces finally broke through the layers of gates and the sea of chimeras. Their jaws dropped to the ground when they saw the massive cavern.

Their prior speculation was correct after all; the main peak of Sacred Mountain was hollow and it had been turned into an underground base.

This huge cavern was conical in shape, and the opening where everyone entered into earlier was an alloy platform halfway up the cavern. There were more alloy structures of a similar nature on the walls of the cavern. A large number of mechanical tracks and conduits were intertwined on the cave walls, connecting the platforms together to form a traffic route. A large number of unmanned mechanical devices were running around carrying out work on these tracks. Meanwhile in the centre of the cavern, a towering battleship stood before their eyes. The battleship was covered in black paint and it was adorned with a series of sail-like black crystal flaps as well as odd rings with red light in the middle. Many mechanical devices were busily working on the metal scaffolding that criss-crossed around the black battleship. They appeared to be conducting checks and final repair works.

Hao Ren suspected that the scaffolding may have already stood there for thousands of years.

This battleship was smaller than the black battleship seen on Planet Io. However, this giant-made battleship was still incredibly large, perhaps was occupying one-third of the total volume of Sacred Mountain.

Right now, the battleship seemed to be undergoing a series of take-off preparations. The red halo of on the outside was pulsating, and the engine nozzles and anti-gravity generators were firing up in sequence. Each engine warm-up cycle would cause a thunderous noise, and each anti-gravity activation would lead to the gravity imbalance in the cavern, causing millions of tonnes of rock rubbing against each other, and producing an earthquake-like phenomenon.

Apparently, this was the source of loud noises and vibrations earlier.

“No wonder the reaction of the brain-monster was so strange,” said Y’zaks, squinting. “It seems that it has been focusing all its energy on this.”

“What the hell is this…?” Ophra could not believe what she saw. She was at a loss seeing this thing that looked even more incredible than Hodeceus. “What does it want to do?”

“I think it’s planning to fly,” said Nangong Sanba, swallowing his saliva as he looked up at the complicated mechanical installation on the ceiling of the cavern. It was a silo cover, no doubt about it. “This thing may be flying out through that hatch…”

Before Nangong Sanba’s voice trailed off, a loud rumbling noise filled the cavern; the spacecraft’s engine had fired up. As if standing inside a giant bell, the noise kept reverberating in the cavern. Lily covered her ears with both hands. Her hair was puffing up. “Argh…”

Now the husky regretted having four-channel ears—with only two hands, she could manage to cover two.

Immediately they felt a sense of weightlessness. Some unwary soldiers began to float up in the air. Lights were blinking on the black spaceship. Everything in the cavern seemed to be weightless as they all began to float around slowly. Nangong Wuyue clutched the railing using her tail immediately. “What’s going on? What’s going on?”

Rollie began to float. She was panic. Hao Ren grabbed her tail, just in case she drifted out and away from the platform. He tried to explain amid the noise. “The gravity engine has started. It’s taking off!”

The black spaceship shuddered, smoke rose from the bottom of the steel scaffolding. The battleship would be taking off in no time. There was mechanical grinding sound at the top of the cavern. Rocks began to fall like it was raining, but all rocks were suspended halfway in the air by the anti-gravity field.

While this happened, they heard the gates opened in the corridor behind them. Hordes of chimeras and bizarrely deformed creatures came out from the corridors. Those monsters began to pin down the knights and monks at the rear. The sound of fighting was getting closer and closer: the brain-monster had started the battleship in desperation; it would not allow anyone to stop it.

Outside Sacred Mountain, in the Hodeceus fortress above the crystal pit, soldiers who were monitoring the situation of Sacred Mountain also panicked. They saw the mountain shaking violently amid a muffled booming sound. A moment later, avalanche happened as snow crushing down the peak like a collapsing sand castle. A cavalier officer looked at the bishop beside him, helplessly. “What is this situation there? Have they started fighting with the evil spirit?”

The bishop called out to the Goddess in his mind. How much revelation could he possibly get from a dead goddess? The bishop could only say a few comforting words to the others as he grabbed the sacred ornament on his chest. “Don’t worry. The power of the goddess will defeat the heretics. The greater the shake in Sacred Mountain, the more powerful the Goddess is in there—”

But before he could finished saying, soldiers in the vicinity shouted. “The mountain top is opening up! The mountain top is opening up!”

An incredible change was taking place amid the shaking and rumbling on the Sacred Mountain. The peak had cracked open like petals. Rocks that used to disguise the shells for thousands of years or even tens of thousands of years began to crumble down the hillside. In the centre of the petal, rocks were floating in the air, neither dropping nor rising, as if there was some kind of gravity anomaly.

The massive machine gradually emerged from under the ‘blooming’ peak. As the glorious sun shone through the launching port, the interior of Sacred Mountain began to receive sunlight for the first time. Looking down from above, a black spacecraft was slowly rising from the cavern.

A chimera had sneaked up from behind. Lily quickly cut it up into several pieces, and kicked the disgusting thing away from her. She then called out loudly to Hao Ren. “Mr. Landlord, quickly think of something!”

Big Beardy the ascetic was leading a team of men emerging from another platform one hundred meters away. He looked at the scene and shouted at Hao Ren. “Mr. Landlord! Shoot that damn thing down with your spaceship!”

Honestly, Hao Ren had long thought of that. But it was definitely not a good idea this time. The black battleship would fight back. What would happen when the two interstellar battleships fought in the atmosphere? Probably everyone in the western part of the kingdom would be wipe out.

The situation was not the same as when he struck the First Born back them; the First Born was stationary at that time. Back then, what was more important was that the First Born had just woke up from deep sleep; it was still in stupor. In contrast, this black battleship had been hiding away on the planet for thousands of years. It was combat ready and manoeuvrable, and the pilots must have witnessed first-hand the killing of the First Born by an outer-space fire. Under this condition, Hao Ren would not be able to ensure that he could take down the battleship in just one shot.

“We can’t fight it here in the atmosphere!” Hao Ren exclaimed. “Wait till it goes into space, I will meet it there!”

As the black battleship rose higher, it could no longer rely on the thrust of the conventional engine to help it escape the planet’s gravity. Instead, it must use its gravity control. The brain-monster (or the giant race) obviously had infused their own ‘giant’ style in battleship building—rough and powerful. The anti-gravity field of the spacecraft could cover a very large range of space and brought up large quantity of boulders into the air. Hao Ren and his team were at a distance from the battleship, they still had a weak gravity under their feet. As long as they kept their guard up, they would not end up being ‘sucked’ into space. Something suddenly crossed Hao Ren’s mind as he watched the rising battleship. He quickly hurried everyone into the corridors. “Get out of here! Get out of here!” he shouted.

Sure enough, when the black spacecraft reached a certain height, it lowered the output of anti-gravity field. Then…

Huge stones started raining down from the air.

Chapter 676: Hollettan Counter-Attack

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Whether it was Hao Ren’s quick wit or his acumen as an inspector, whereby he could foresee circumstances that other laymen could not, everybody was safe thanks to him. When several dozen tons of rocks fell from the sky like a rainstorm, everyone including the soldiers who had just emerged on the other platforms managed to retreat into the corridor safely. Rocks were either raining down into the bottom of the cavern or rolling down the mountain. The young and brave werewolves used to carry the rocks down the peak by hand for thousands of years, however witnessing the rocks crumbling down the mountain in such a manner was totally beyond their imagination. Uruk watched on and there was a flash in his eyes. No one knew what was in his mind. Becky was next to him and she thought he was worried about his tribe, who was living around the Sacred Mountain. She consoled him by saying, “Don’t worry, the werewolves are very alert and strong. I’m sure they must have evacuated safely.”

“I’m not worried about that.” Uruk shook his head. “The main peak of the Sacred Mountain has no tribal settlement. We all live on the two side peaks and in the mountains west of the Sacred Mountain. I just can’t believe the Sacred Mountain is collapsing… You probably don’t understand the significance of this mountain to us.”

Y’zaks looked up at the ceiling of the corridor. As the mountain shook, sand fell through the gaps of the metal panels on the corridor’s ceiling. However, the shaking was gradually reducing. Clearly, the greatest wave of falling rock had ended. The machinery inside the Sacred Mountain had also stopped running. Y’zaks turned to look at Uruk and said, “It’s over. Don’t worry. The mountain will not collapse entirely. It may have just changed its shape.”

Uruk could only trust what he said.

At this time, Hao Ren’s MDT suddenly vibrated. A panic-stricken voice was heard over the radio. “Hey, hello—Hard Man? Hard Man, can you hear me? Anyone there?”

Then, it crossed Hao Ren’s mind that the alpha and other battle wolves were still on the slopes of the main peak of the Sacred Mountain. He quickly replied, “I hear you. What’s the situation on your side? Is anyone hurt?”

“It scared me to death,” the alpha wolf’s voice sounded loud and clear, although a bit panicky. “What just happened? Rocks were floating around and raining down all at once… Thanks to our exceptional hearing ability, when we heard some strange noises, we quickly ran down the mountain and hid in a col. Oh, there was a hapless guy who got his leg broken by a falling rock. He’s wailing in pain. He needs medical attention.”

Knowing the alpha wolf was all right, Hao Ren and Uruk breathed a sigh of relief. The alpha wolf continued, “What’s that flying thing? That thing’s getting brighter; I feel a tickling sensation…”

“Getting brighter?” Hao Ren’s heart missed a beat. Suddenly, the scenes in Eva’s memory came to mind. He ran out of the corridor with his Steel Membrane Shield turned on, ignoring the still falling rocks. The platform that they were on before was half smashed. Hao Ren could only balance himself on a shaky steel beam. He looked up and saw that the black battleship hovering in the sky had seemingly stopped its ascension. An electric glow slowly appeared on the black crystal plates that were stacked on top of each other at the rear section of the battleship. It made it look like a weirdly huge firefly.

However, this “firefly” possessed a kind of destructive power. As the light lit up the sky, a strange energy, which almost felt like a static charge filled the Sacred Mountain and even the entirety of the Beinz Diocese. Everyone was feeling an itching sensation on their skin. The crystal ore in the crystal pit gradually emanated a fluorescent glow. Lily grabbed her tail, trying to rub down her fluffy fur. Rollie was stroking her tail frantically just like Lily. Nangong Wuyue and Ayesha looked at each other as an inexplicable fear rose from their cores, rendering them helpless.

Hao Ren had also felt the same fear, but this fear was not his, but a leftover memory from Eva. Ten thousand years ago, a black battleship realized its EMP energy and destroyed Io. The last scene of that memory was strikingly similar to the black battleship before them now.

Obviously, the brain monster had no intention to get away. It wanted to destroy the planet’s ecosystem. It had been planning it for so long. Its ultimate goal remained unchanged: it wanted to reset the planet’s ecosystem.

“Damn it! It’s going to use its EMP weapon!” Hao Ren’s blood ran cold as the situation suddenly got out of his control. “MDT, move the Petrachelys into orbit and get ready to strike.”

“Are you sure you want to do that? Even if we can destroy that thing with one shot, the explosion could destroy the entire western part of the continent.”

“That’s better than a global destruction!” Blood veins almost burst out of his skin. He called Ophra. “Inform everyone to evacuate. Don’t be stingy—use the portal! Run as far and as fast as you can. This thing—”

Before Hao Ren’s voice trailed off, a sudden high-altitude explosion interrupted him.

Light was bursting out from the black battleship as an uncountable number of colorful flares and insect-like dots were shot from the eastern sky, hitting the black battleship. The explosions seemed to slow down the black battleship’s energy charging. Hao Ren had no idea what was happening, but it did not take him long to figure it out—Hodeceus was firing at the monster.

Hollettans in the floating fortress were in shock. They had never seen such things before. They did not even know if that thing was a creation of the devil or a miracle from the goddess sent to destroy the devil. Only when they received intelligence from the frontline that they realized an evil weapon was threatening the existence of their world. So, they launched the attack without hesitation.

The master mages of Hodeceus were not worried about hitting the Sacred Mountain. They were training all their magic cannons on the black battleship, which was still in the midst of charging, thus unlikely to dodge their attacks. Thousands of magic cannons and fixed siege guns radiating in magical glow fired colorful magic bullets as well as specially crafted wind-magic arrowheads. They were tipped with the most powerful explosives Holletta had ever produced. Although these explosives looked like child’s play in the eyes of the highly-advanced alien battleship, the indigenous people of this planet were not about to give up.

“Will that even work?” Ophra mumbled as she looked up at the light bursting on the black spaceship.

“It won’t work, but they’re brave enough,” said Hao Ren, before he, the MDT and all his tenants disappeared in flash of light, leaving behind a voice still echoing in the air. “We’ll solve this in space.”

Uruk looked around. “Where are they? Have they fled?”

“No, they’re solving the problem,” said Ophra, turning to leave. “Everybody, evacuate! Quick!”

Hao Ren was prepping his main cannon and trying to draw the black spacecraft into space. He released some engineering drones to harass the enemy, and provocatively trained all radars on it. It was hard to say if these actions worked at all. He may have been a good diversion target as a person but clearly, his spacecraft was not. The radar trick just did not seem to work.

Meanwhile, Hodeceus had not stopped its attack. Though the Hollettans knew their firepower was no match for the monstrous battleship, they held on to their faith. Perhaps it was purely fanatical faith, but no soldier flinched. The main magic circle of Hodeceus was running at full power. The entire floating fortress was glowing in a golden light as the loud firing sounds of the magical cannons seemed to tear the sky apart. The black spaceship seemingly noticed the annoying piece of floating rock. An auxiliary cannon on its upper deck returned fire at Hodeceus. Flames erupted above Hodeceus as enemy fire hit its shield. The shield was on the verge of collapse.

“Keep firing!” said a magician who was commanding a giant gun. “Our mission is to shoot. Don’t worry about anything else!”

Amid the explosion and rumbling, a beam of light suddenly rose from the center of Hodeceus.

Some monks turned their eyes on the light pillar in unison as if they shared the same mind. What they saw surprised them; the pope was in the pillar of light.

The pope, whose body was slightly stooped, squinted at the black battleship because the bright light from the battleship almost blinded his vision. A protective divine shield shrouded him while he clutched a scripture tightly in his hands. He whispered something and made a move that caught everyone by surprise.

He was stepping out and walking towards the black battleship.

Chapter 677: Cannons

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Seeing the Pope’s actions, Huffman, who was inside the command centre was shocked. “What does the Pope intend to do?”

“I don’t know…” A high-ranking bishop was just as clueless. “The Pope has been studying the changes in the iconography; he should be in the sacred chamber…”

The Pope had already stepped out of the light pillar at this point. He looked calm and peaceful as he walked step by step towards the light in the distance. It was like an old man coming out for a walk after dinner. The charge of the Black Battleship and the light from Hodeceus’ shield cast a glorious glow on him. His coarse robes fluttered in the turbulent wind of the explosions. As he looked down at the Sacred Scripture in his hand, he sighed. “Oh, that’s why!”

He then faded into a light beam and flew straight towards the black spacecraft.

Screams of disbelief and awe erupted from Hodeceus.

Although the incoming object was only a tiny human, the black spacecraft sensed the threat. The black spacecraft immediately activated layers of electric glows to stop the old man’s advances. The divine shield of the pope disintegrated and restored itself again under the powerful beating of the electric glow. The light barrier had only managed to slow the pope down. The Pope charged on. At last, he almost was almost within reach of the black spacecraft, but he was inching now.

Despite of that, the old man remained steady and calm as he inched very slowly in the lightning storm. When the pope was about to touch the black spacecraft, he heard a loud voice in his head; a strong and angry mind had broken into his spiritual world. Although he could not hear it clearly, he knew the voice was angrily questioning his intention.

The Pope raised his head, the wrinkles on his face increased rapidly. He became as old as a dying man did. He asked, “I come to confess my sin.”

Thunders and lightning struck from all direction, as if the world was going to end. The Pope had sensed a thousand-year fury in the lightning. He stood silently, doing his best to negotiate with the voice in his mind. He then let off and spread out his hands, as if a prophet was welcoming the end day. “Then take me.”

A super bright glow appeared on the surface of the black spaceship. The charging light on the rear section of the spacecraft dimmed rapidly. When all the lights had dissipated, the pope was gone.

A high-ranking bishop stood on the tall tower of Hodeceus had seen everything that had happened. He shouted in horror. “The Pope has died!”

The soldiers in the Hodeceus fortress were silent for a few seconds, in shock. They then fired the artillery; endless magic shells and bolts hit the black battleships. But the latter had shown no intention of retaliation. The battleship just hovered quietly in the sky for a moment before it suddenly accelerated into the space.

Hodeceus was just a rudimentary flying craft. In the face of an interstellar spacecraft, it could only watch in awe as the alien spacecraft flew away.

The patrol frigate, Petrachelys, was quietly waiting for the black battleship in orbit. Everyone on the flight deck knew exactly what was happening on the surface of the planet. However, Hao Ren did not know how the pope convinced the black battleship to have its global electromagnetic storm aborted. He guessed the pope might have learned some secrets relative to the goddess before his death. But now the pope was dead, the only way to find out the secret was to look for the owner of the black battleship.

After the black battleship left the atmosphere, it immediately bumped into the Petrachelys that was waiting in space. The two spaceships was facing off each other across a distance of tens of thousands of kilometres. The small silver-white Petrachelys looked so tiny compared to the kilometres-long black battleship. However, the frigate’ threat level and firepower were hard to ignore.

The black battleship hesitated before a warped vortex suddenly appeared in front of it. Looks like it intended to flee the scene via the portal. However, the portal collapsed less than a second after it appeared.

The gravitational trap generator had signalled that the interference was successful. Hao Ren switched on the radio trying to talk to the black battleship on the open channel. “Please be informed that the gravitational trap generators around this region of space have been activated, any super-light navigation modes are being blocked. We are now—”

Before he finished speaking, light burst out of the black spacecraft. Hundreds of cannon and submachine guns were firing at the Petrachelys.

The artillery of the Black Battleship bombarded the shield of the Petrachelys, agitating a series of ripple on the surface. The Petrachelys shook albeit slightly. The MDT whistled and said, “Oh, that thing is more powerful than I have expected. Looks like it has a first-class combat strength.”

“I have given out warnings in line with the protocol.” Hao Ren frowned, and threw the captain’s handbook on the console. “Activate high-speed manoeuvrability and interference devices. Counterattack with the subconnons. Don’t let that thing get away!”

As the MDT entered the commands, it asked, “Do you want to finish it off completely or half dead?”

“Don’t kill it, of course!” Hao Ren put his hands on the console. “I want it alive, if possible.”

“Roger that!”

A blurry glow was shrouding the Petrachelys before it faded into an elusive ghost-like shadow. The frigate was performing a series of warp jump to avoid being locked by the black spaceship’s radar, and at the same time, several subcannons extended out from the belly of the Petrachelys. It wanted to retaliate.

The Black Battleship was a piece of high-tech machine of this universe. It was capable of bringing total destruction to a planet. Even civilisation such as Io that had a developed space technology was merely a sitting duck. Though the black battleship was posing a certain level of threat to the civilian-grade inspector frigate, the Petrachelys had psionic energy. Each attack it made could cause destructive impact on everything, including materials, energy, space, physical law, and every other thing. Even the biggest black battleship was no match for this kind of absolute advantage.

The black spacecraft had nowhere to hide before the psionic weapons. The shield of the black battleship flashed in light. The psionic shelling had overloaded the black crystal plates as smaller explosions had spread across the outer shell of the black battleship. The most badly damaged parts were identified as the engines and warp installations. A string of dazzling light burst out in the middle of the black battleship, cutting off more than half of the spacecraft’s power supply while blowing two sets of warp drive off. Despite of that, the black battleship had never stopped its attack until all its systems went dead.

Hao Ren pressed his hands on the console. He stared at the enemy ship on the holographic projection. “I might not be able to do anything about you on the planet but not here in space…”

The MDT chimed in loudly. “This’ my territory!”

The intense shelling lasted for a short few minutes before the black spacecraft quickly went silent. The MDT played it well this time. It had accurately found the weakness that they could exploit to render the enemy defenceless but not completely blow it up. After the shelling stopped, the black battleship floated silently in space. Half of the black crystal plates shattered by overload. Burned holes with occasional sparks and electric arcs dotted the battleships.

The MDT used the shipborne radar to assess the energy response inside enemy ship. This was to determine whether the enemy was faking its ‘death’. However, repeated scans had confirmed that the black battleship was indeed ‘dead’. “Target has lost mobility. Life is detected inside.”

Lily was rooted to the spot and speechless for a moment before she said, “That’s exciting!”

Most of them on the flight deck appeared to having the same expression. These guys were experiencing this kind of battle for the first time in their life.

Like everyone else, Hao Ren was still immersed in the intense excitement of his first space battle with a hostile spacecraft. However, he had no time to wonder. He immediately checked the condition of the Petrachelys, which to his relief had only suffered minor damages. He immediately ordered to approach the black battleship of the brain-monster.

A sense of anticipation filled them as if they were about to unveil the long-awaited secret.