While everyone is busy paying attention to the home world and when the ancestral relics can be solved, there is one person who is still focusing on other matters at the same time—Tavier, the glasses sister whose thread count is unscientific, she is transporting The Ancestral Ark (this is the name we gave to the wreck, Sandora thinks it should be an immigrant ark) suddenly reported on the second day that traces of the fallen emperor Harlan were found.
Of course, as a scientist, she didn't find Harlan's fleet that mysteriously disappeared in the depths of the void. In fact, the trace she found came from a broken metal plate: it was picked up by the little crow Medivon on our way here. That piece of armor.
Sandora and I hurried to the analysis room where the armor fragments were stored, and saw that three Tavels were busy here, and more than a dozen assistant technicians were helping. The sky above the gravity platform has been divided into dozens of regular small pieces, floating around in circles in the beam of light on the platform.
One of the Tavels greeted us, while the other two went to activate the equipment and direct her hordes of assistants.
"Is this thing left by the Harlan fleet?" Sandora frowned, staring at the fragmentary armor fragments.
It has been some days since Harlan and his remnant troops mysteriously disappeared in the depths of the void. The spy team sent to the border of the Fallen Apostles to spy on intelligence has never seen the trace of the fleet. We also used the void scanning function of the Garden of the Dead to scan Harlan The direction where the remnants disappeared has been irradiated for 72 hours, but the troops moved quickly when they evacuated, and they were very good at hiding themselves. It can be said that after the last border defense battle, we completely lost this powerful enemy traces.
Now they have appeared in the most unlikely place: Far Frontier, which is as far as the entire empire from the battlefield at that time!
"It is still impossible to explain how this fleet came to this place, but the sample fragments do have the mark of Harlan's fleet." Tavel opened the data terminal in her hand, forming a clear holographic image in front of our eyes, The image showed the fine structure of that piece of armor fragment, and in this fine structure I saw the mark of Harlan's fleet. This mark must have been processed. Perhaps Tavel restored and strengthened it with information reconstruction and other technologies, because Sandora also checked it when the bird brought it back, and she didn't see it. This imprint, with Sandora's scanning accuracy, would not have missed such important information.
"So small?" Qian Qian squatted in front of the holographic image and studied it for a while, then said in surprise, "Who is this small for? Ding Dong is bigger than it."
"It's not for anyone to see," Sandora explained. "It's a customary practice to leave small marks on the armor of the spaceships of the Royal Fleet. It was the ancient times when imperial spaceships still needed to be built with secular materials. Because the spaceships of the Royal Fleet have basically been independently designed and modified, their materials and specifications are often different from those of the commissioned spaceships. In order to prevent assembly errors, the technicians at that time considered leaving these marks and scanning them for the assembly robot. Later, with the passage of time, this clumsy identification method was eliminated, coupled with the application of information materialization technology, the production process of 'mining-smelting-prefabricated parts-assembly' was replaced by field filling technology in one step, These marks become a memorial, it has no practical purpose, but it will not cause any trouble to keep it: for the special workflow of the builder, a few more patterns on the material will not affect the work efficiency at all, so we will Keep those things."
Qianqian let out an oh, and then continued to climb in front of the weightless platform to study whether the sizes of the pieces were the same: she had OCD.
"If this is left by Harlan's fleet, it can explain the disintegration of this spaceship," I nodded, expressing that I figured it out, "His fleet at that time was basically destroyed by our doomsday. Running in the void for so long without supplies or repairs, there are bound to be some who can't support and fall behind."
Sandora was thoughtful: "I was thinking why he ran this way. From the battlefield that day to here, almost spanning the entire empire, the Harlan fleet must have made a considerable circle outside the far border of the empire. Arrived here. This piece of armor shows that his spaceship has already seen stragglers after this long voyage, and it also shows that he did not find a world to rest and recuperate first: I don't believe he even has the equipment for repairing the spaceship on hand. None. Risking such a big loss, he has to rush here non-stop, what does he want to do?"
There are many possibilities, perhaps Harlan is just running aimlessly, there is no reason for him to flee in this direction, and the place where we found the armor fragment is just a stopover on his escape journey-but in many cases, things are not. It's as simple as that, and over the years I've gotten used to facing the most fucked-up of possibilities, which are far more common than normal:
The most likely scenario is this: Harlan's remnants are not dead-hearted, and they want to make trouble again.
"Could it be for the relics of the ancestors?" Tavier suddenly guessed, "There is no valuable world nearby, only the relics of the ancestors of this universe, which have special meaning to the Apostles of Xiling."
"If that's the case, we need to prepare early," Sandora nodded immediately, "This possibility is very high."
I also agree with Tavel's guess: the fallen apostles are always ahead of the New Empire in terms of intelligence, and Harlan is the first to know the relics of the ancestors. Although he did not capture the Fiali, he may have known this through other means The approximate location of the universe. Now that the remnants of Harlan appear around here, they are probably looking for the specific coordinates of the ancestor's relics.
The only good thing now is that the fallen apostle fleet has not yet appeared, indicating that they have not found this place, and are still doing useless work in a far away place (if they are really looking for the relics of their ancestors), leaving the reaction of the imperial army There's plenty of time—it's been a long time since we've had such a good time in the face of the great threat of the Fallen Apostle.
Sandora immediately connected to Shadow City and ordered Sivis to prepare a fleet to support any possible large-scale conflicts in the far border—we believe that Harlan's remaining troops are still quite effective, because he sent a dozen The warships of King's Lander were successfully evacuated, and took away his entire Royal Fleet—afterwards, Tavel ordered the entire engineering team to speed up the collection of ancestor relics: Once a war really breaks out, no one can guarantee that this small star will be destroyed. The system can be safe and sound, there is one less relic of the ancestors here, and the loss destroyed by the war is a pity for us.
After assigning all kinds of work, Sandora was bored in her room for a long time, and then came to me suddenly: "We can't start a war in this universe, and we can't even let Harlan know the existence of this world!"
I was discussing with Phyllis the route of her fleet that day in the Fiali rest area, hoping to find out more about the movement rules of the Harran army and the way they respond to the relics of their ancestors. I saw Sandora running in a hurry When I came over and said such a sentence, I was a little surprised: "What's wrong?"
"There are hidden dangers," Sandra sat next to me, and picked up my water glass—she ate the glass after finding that there was no water in it. "High-dimensional wars will destroy the information balance of the universe, and the competition for the barriers of the world The war will destroy the weak reaction left by the space flash. No matter what the situation is, once we start a war with Harlan in this universe, it may destroy the information left by the world of our hometown. At that time, we will look for the last clue of our hometown. It will also cease to exist. So war must be kept out of this world, and if possible, it is best that Harlan does not know the existence of this universe until it is wiped out - what Mad Dog will do is unpredictable, I dare not Make sure that the Fallen Apostles have feelings for their home world, and if Harlan is cornered by us, he would rather destroy this universe and cause trouble for the new empire..."
I thought about the group of fallen apostles who destroyed the world as quickly as swatting flies, and felt that it was really possible for Haran to do such insane things: the entire group of fallen apostles came from the insanity professional class.
"Then what..." Phyllis saw that Sandora and I had such a serious exchange for a long time, and finally came out with a rather slow reaction, "Could it be that you are going to war again? Or with those lunatics?"
I glanced at Phyllis and nodded heavily: "Let's start fighting at any time. A few days ago we found the fleet of the fallen apostles. They seem to be looking for this world too—well, just like what you were worried about..."
Phyllis suddenly jumped up to a height of more than one meter, stepped on the sofa and made a wolf-proof gesture to me: "Actually, you are joking, right? You have been asking me since just now that you were killed by those lunatics. Couldn't the tracking process be because another war is about to start?"
I continued to nod heavily to her, thinking that one of the reasons why Phyllis was unwilling to follow out was because I was afraid of meeting those lunatics again, but now I am really afraid of something, and Phyllis is keeping with me. After half a minute of anti-wolf gestures, I jumped down decisively to pack my things. I looked at her curiously: "What are you doing?"
"Run softly," Phyllis said without raising her head, "the risk factor is too high with you guys."
I knew she was joking, because she still had those things in her hands after packing for a long time, but she still smiled and said, "How are you going to go back? There is a void between here and the capital of the empire. You can go back by the drum washing machine in the house." Is it?"
Sandora spread her hand to Phyllis helplessly. The guy in front of her who also has the name of a queen but does not act like a queen makes it difficult for Sandora to look directly at her: "Facing the fallen apostles should be brave. …”
"Fiyali people are not afraid of fighting," before Sandora finished speaking, Phyllis suddenly changed her expression and said very seriously. Her sudden change made me and Sandora stunned, "In our In the home world, the Fiali people have suffered from wars. We have never flinched in the face of an enemy ten times the number of our own. When we decided to jump out of the world, none of us flinched. Don't worry about the Fiali people being afraid of fighting. .”
Phyllis's sudden change of attitude surprised Sandora and me, and at the same time, I was a little awed. I reckoned that as long as Phyllis could maintain her expression for more than ten seconds, myself and Sandora would be more respectful to the hawker queen. But she didn’t hold on for a few seconds before venting her whole body, looking at me and Sandora with a bitter face: “But you think we are against the fallen apostle, then Is it still fighting? Besides, I go out to do business, and I'm not mentally prepared... "
I:"… "
I know that Phyllis is in a state of detachment most of the time. The lady adjutant once vowed to declare that Her Majesty the Queen is a dutiful and worthy ruler—maybe she really has these advantages Well, I'm determined to believe that right now she's just trying to lighten the mood.
And Sandora turned to me after Phyllis calmed down: "What Phyllis said makes sense, we really need to move as soon as possible, even from a security point of view, we should do this. Now there are only a group of people who have almost no combat effectiveness. The engineering troops, scientists, and escort troops are also scarce in combat power. Once Harlan finds out in advance and blocks them in this universe, let alone protecting the heritage of our ancestors, even we may be damaged in this place. And since we want to avoid war in this universe It is also necessary to transfer the engineering team away as soon as possible.”
I think so too, although the eldest lady told me that the trip was safe when I set off, but she only said that the way here was safe, but she didn't say that it was safe here all the time—as long as you have anything to do with the fallen apostles, you should do your best. It’s enough to associate in a fatal direction, it’s definitely not an exaggeration…
"Originally I planned to drag this universe into the empire," Sandora suddenly frowned and muttered, "but now we can't do that, and we can't do any big moves. If Harlan is really looking for This world, then he must be very vigilant, we can't take the risk of exposing this place."
"In short, pack and take away all the relics of the ancestors that can be found during this period," I connected to the communication with Tavel, "Tavier, let your engineering team speed up, we have to clean up everything here. Pack it up and take it away, and if there is no time for on-site analysis, it will be transported back to Shadow City."
Then Sandora ordered the staff who were on the world barrier to withdraw, and dismantled the various scanning devices they had deployed at the critical point of order—these devices were originally used to find clues to the home world, but they are obviously not doing it now. At the time of this incident, any activities of the Imperial Army in this universe will increase the chances of Harlan discovering this place. Before we solve this hidden danger, Sandora does not allow the slightest risk of damage to the hometown relics.
Now the Imperial Army and the remnants of Harlan are actually two groups of people looking for the night pearl in the dark. The Imperial Army has already found the target first, and Harlan is still leading his men around the corners: for the time being, they are too far away to see clearly. The light here is bright, so we have to quickly turn off the light to hide the figure, and then sneak around to find a chance to kill the person on the opposite side. In order to increase the success rate, I think it is not enough to just turn off the light—we have to find a way to hide the night pearl.
"Hiding this world?" Sandora nodded sympathetically, "The Garden of Death can make a world unlocatable for a period of time, just like 'hiding' in the void, but it is too far away from the empire's interior Now, the power of the Death Garden will also weaken in the void, and relay base stations are needed to enhance the power of that system, and these relay base stations cannot be found... This is too troublesome, we should think of a simpler solution."
When we were frowning and thinking, I suddenly heard a lazy and naughty female voice coming from the direction of the door: "Are you thinking a little too complicated?"
As soon as I looked up, I saw Bingtis leaning against the door with her arms folded. What was amazing was that there was a little doll sitting on her shoulders... The little Gothic girl who was more than ninety centimeters tall was holding Bingtis' head, With a bored face, he put his silver hair and Bingtis' hair together, and then picked them out one by one: I can't understand the child's interest at all.
My first thought at the time was that this female hooligan was finally brainwashed by her father subtly, and she really thought she was the godmother of the little puppet... But I didn't dare to say this, because it might cause Sandora to die on the spot. I ate it without the sauce.
But having said that, Bingtis and this little puppet are put together like this, and there are all kinds of mother and daughter! If you say that the former is the adult version of the latter, there is absolutely nothing wrong with it, Bingtis's father's eyes are shining brightly.
"Oh, I saw this little girl wandering around when I came here, so I brought it here for you." Bingtis noticed that Sandora and I were looking at the little doll, she didn't think much about it, but I hugged the little girl on my shoulders and put it in my arms, as if I picked up a lost animal on the road. The little doll crawled on me twice, and found her "throne", safe and sound. I sat down and hugged my head and fell asleep, while Bingtis sat down next to Sandora: "Squeeze, squeeze—I heard, you found out about that Harlan? Is he around here?"
"The probability is more than 98%, he must have a purpose in coming here," Sandora was used to Bingtis' carefree style, with a calm expression on her face, "We are going to withdraw everyone now. , all the relics of the ancestors are packed away, so that even if a war starts, the loss can be minimized. Then... we also want to keep this world as much as possible. There may be residual information of the home world here. Before the entire universe is turned upside down, I don't allow any fallen apostles to get involved here."
"Let me think about it, let me think about it—I always feel that you guys are thinking too much," Bingtis shook his head and clapped his palms suddenly, "Hey, hiding this universe is just a negative way, why don't you think about it haha Lan lures him to another world, throwing a trap or something to make him think that is the Xiling ancestor's tomb? Then you all act quickly, clean up his defeated soldiers, and don't do the same thing as last time If you stay alive, the world will naturally be safe."
Sandora thought for a while: "This is a good way, but where does the bait come from? If you use the relics of the ancestors—not to mention whether it is suitable, the simple relics of the ancestors are dead things after all, and they may not be eye-catching enough. I’m worried that Harlan will see the Imperial Army’s actions—he knows too much about the Apostles of Xiling, and the traps and truths are obvious to that kind of enemy.”
"Striking? Isn't there a super striking one here?" Bingtis said, turning to look at Phyllis.
"Apart from the ancestral graves of your ancestors, these Fiali people are the most eye-catching..."
(The comic version of Xiling Empire has already started to be serialized in Manwang Magazine. The magazine in front of it has been released nationwide, and it will be available at major newsstands in about two or three days.) RS