Chapter 657: Luo Thinking of Home

In the end, Mo Mo still signed.

She had more than one reason for signing—of course, part of it was due to Luo's persuasive talk, and the other part was that she really didn't have many options to choose from right now. Besides, she still remembered the scene where Yu Sheng and his people had rescued her and her friends. To be fair, although these people in front of her were a bit strange... maybe more than a bit, she could feel their sincerity and friendliness.

Of course, there was another reason: after Yu Sheng conjured up that blood sphere, the little puppet immediately "flew" up to gnaw at Yu Sheng's head, and the two of them fought quite fiercely. Mo Mo watched this scene from the side and thought that a villainous faction probably wouldn't act this way...

"Alright, you can rest and recuperate here at Moran's place for now, and report to Blackstone Station only after you're fully recovered," Luo said, rising from across the table and extending a hand to Mo Mo. "Afterwards, we'll teach you how to use the teleportation portals in the station and how things are at the hub. In short, since you've signed on with Blackstone Station, starting today, I'm your boss."

Mo Mo looked at the extended hand across from her, hesitated for a moment, then raised her right hand to reach out, but stopped halfway, as if she wanted to pull back and switch to her left hand.

Luo directly grabbed that metallic-luster palm and gave it a firm shake.

Her smile was exceptionally bright. Yu Sheng felt he had never seen this elf smile so radiantly since he had known her...

...

Half a day later, Silent Orbit High Orbit, Blackstone Space Station.

Thanks to its powerful "self-repair" capabilities, this massive space station, once damaged to the brink of disintegration, had now almost fully restored its functionality, and its exterior had completely returned to its original state.

At a certain edge of the station's disc-shaped hull, Luo brought Eileen, Luna, and Huli to an observation deck extending into space. The vast platform was covered by an invisible protective force field and artificial gravity environment, extending dozens of meters out from the station body, bathed in starlight without reservation. Standing on it felt like stepping directly into the cosmos.

This was Luo's favorite place.

Eileen tilted her head back, looking at the vast, infinite universe. The distant starlight reflected in her crimson eyes, and the little puppet became happy, for the first time sincerely praising the blonde elf beside her: "Wow... feels like I'm about to fall in. You really put some thought into this, Luo."

"Algerians love the stars," Luo said, narrowing her eyes, a calm and serene smile on her face. "Although my ability to 'hear' the stars is now almost gone... I think I'm still an Algelad at heart."

Eileen blinked, thinking that while Luo might still be an Algelad at heart, her backbone had been sucked out.

Saying that might get her hit—even with her solid little puppet head, she managed to suppress the urge to be a smartass at this moment.

So after serious thought, she decided to comfort her friend in a different way. She walked over and patted Luo on the leg: "It's okay, you already got your backbone back."

Luo looked down at Eileen with a dazed expression, stunned for the first few seconds—her overly high level of quality and cultural literacy prevented her from keeping up with this little thing's train of thought. By the time she finally caught on, Eileen had already slipped away behind Huli as if nothing happened.

And just then, a flash in distant space interrupted her train of thought.

"Hey hey, here it comes!"

Eileen immediately ran excitedly to the edge of the observation deck, then smacked headfirst into the invisible safety barrier. She bounced back entirely, but the next second she flipped over and continued waving her hand carefreely at the flash—

A huge spatial rift was unfolding in space, flickering with unstable light and shadow. The next moment, those lights and shadows began to "flip," just like when the Dimensional Traveler did its "teleportation." A massive real entity began to cross the vast distance and arrive at this location. Almost instantly, the rift began to take on the silhouette of Deeprock Fortress.

Eileen's eyes sparkled. The curling, flipping spatial ripples reflected in her scarlet irises.

_The dimensional bridge is really beautiful._

She thought happily—then the sentiment faded away in her not-so-bright head.

The next thing that popped into her head was Yu Sheng's voice: "...Ah man, that really wore me out. Teleporting this thing is way harder than teleporting the Traveler. I almost lost half my life."

Eileen was a bit curious: "Hey, didn't Luo say this thing was a mobile fortress? And that its hyperlight core could help reduce your burden?"

"The problem is, the damn hyperlight core has got to be usable! Huli did a rocket-assisted headbutt from the core area all the way to the launch corridor. I went down just now to check—there's a several-meter-tall fox-shaped hole in the hyperlight core, and the navigation equipment bay was completely blown off by her shot. When I entered, only two cooling fans were still spinning on the floor," Yu Sheng's voice sounded utterly miserable. "So I dragged this powerless piece of junk from the Dark Meteor Starfield to Silent Orbit. At least Blackstone Station had some power back then... Ah, forget it. I need to rest a bit more in the fortress control room and reinforce the structure here. Some places collapsed during the teleport."

He paused, then added: "I gotta remind Huli to control herself a little when she's drilling holes in buildings next time. You never know which part we might end up scavenging. Everything she breaks is our own property..."

Eileen: "...Wow! You sure are brazen about it!"

Yu Sheng didn't respond—probably really exhausted.

After a while, Yu Sheng finally completed the emergency reinforcement and core restart of Deeprock Fortress. After the fortress's orbital stabilization system came online and stabilized, he opened the door and stepped onto the observation deck.

By then Huli was so bored she was lying on the ground dozing off. Seeing Yu Sheng push the door open, she jolted up, immediately padded over with great enthusiasm, her tail wagging into a blur—but her ears drooped on both sides of her head, a silly, awkward smile on her face.

What that expression looked like, well—it was like leaving a Samoyed home alone to watch the house, then coming back half a day later to find the sofa torn up, the walls scratched, water gushing out of the sink, flour sacks trailing from the kitchen all the way to the toilet seat, a pile of shredded pillows in the corner. The Samoyed hears the commotion, comes running, wagging its tail while trying to nuzzle up to you, but also squinting its eyes and drooping its ears, wanting to dodge out of the way. The Yes and the No states were locked in a heavenly battle in there—basically Huli's expression at the moment.

Yu Sheng looked at the fox girl's expression and felt both amused and exasperated. He knew Eileen hadn't held back and had told her what he'd been muttering earlier.

"Just hold back a bit next time," he said, casually rubbing the fur behind her ears. "Every time you smash such big holes, it's a real pain to fix."

Huli nodded foxily, suddenly turning all Yes again.

But Luo beside him suddenly slapped her palm, staring wide-eyed at the great fox demon in front of her: "Ah! So those string of holes on Blackstone Station were all smashed out by you!"

Yu Sheng and Eileen both looked at Luo in surprise, speaking in unison: "You just realized that?!"

Luo: "..."

It turned out scientists had good brains, but scientists weren't necessarily quick on the uptake.

"Ahem," Yu Sheng coughed dryly, breaking the awkwardness while changing the subject. "Anyway, I brought Deeprock Fortress over for you. But I control this thing entirely by instinct, so you'll have to debug the operating system and such later. The technical stuff is beyond me. Also, if you need any help with personnel or supplies, just talk to Moran... Oh, and I left a door in the fortress control room that leads to the valley portal hub, making it convenient for you to go back and forth."

Luo quickly nodded, temporarily setting aside the fact that Blackstone Station had been pierced through by one of Huli's headbutts.

Yu Sheng then briefed Luo on the situation with Deeprock Fortress, as well as the arrangements for Blackstone Station and the Borderlands in the coming period, plus some operations against the Holy Sanctuary Order. After everything was settled, he directly pulled open a door on the observation deck—on the other side was the living room of 66 Wutong Road.

Luo suddenly seemed to want to say something. She took half a step toward Yu Sheng, revealing an expression of wanting to speak but hesitating.

Yu Sheng stopped curiously: "What's wrong? Something else?"

Luo thought for a moment, then shook her head: "...No, it's nothing major. Let's talk after the Holy Sanctuary Order business is over."

Eileen, who had already climbed onto Yu Sheng's shoulder to go home with him, suddenly turned her head. The little puppet's rather scary eyes stared directly at the blonde elf across from her.

Luo was unnerved by this red-eyed evil dwarf's gaze and instinctively asked: "Wh-what?"

"If this were a TV drama, you'd be dead, I tell you," the little puppet jumped off Yu Sheng's shoulder, stood in front of Luo, and looked up at her. "Just because of that sentence you just said, you'd die in a slow-motion shot in the penultimate episode."

Luo still didn't understand: "Wh-why?"

"Raising flags!" Eileen said, hands on her hips. "Whatever you want to say, just say it directly. But never say something like 'After I finish XXX, I'll go home and get married.' If that's the case, just keep it in your gut. I'll pretend I didn't hear it."

"What the hell... I just wanted to ask for leave! Ask for leave to go home and visit!" Luo looked exasperated. "It's just been too busy recently, and the Sanctuary Order's huge matter can't be delayed. I still have to focus on cracking Old Joe's communication logs. So I said I'd bring it up after this busy period is over."

"Then just say it directly!" Eileen jumped up and kicked Luo in the shin. "You scared me into thinking you were about to face a bloody disaster too... Ow! Damn, is your leg made of iron?"

The little puppet hopped around holding her foot, cursing and muttering.

Luo lifted her skirt, revealing legs covered in silvery-white alloy: "Not iron, a harder alloy."

But Yu Sheng didn't pay attention to Eileen's noisy commotion. He just silently watched Luo for a while, then suddenly spoke: "Because you saw Mo Mo?"

Luo fell silent. After a moment, she nodded slightly.

"She said she wanted to try to contact her family first—she hasn't been home in ten years. Her family must be very worried about her," Luo spoke slowly. "And I... haven't been home in two hundred years."

Yu Sheng was filled with curiosity, but looking at Luo's expression, he ended up asking nothing.

"Alright, I approve it ahead of time—once the Sanctuary Order business is done."

"Thanks, boss!"

(Shameless self-promotion time: This time it's Su Bucai's "Crossed Over and Buried Alive, I Dialed the Emergency Call." Although it's a newcomer's new book with some rough edges, the concept is pretty good. Everyone can go and support it~)

(End of chapter)