Chapter 303: Caught Up Now!
After seeing the unfamiliar starfield outside the porthole, everyone in the control room fell into an eerie, uneasy silence.
A Secret Society member in slightly better condition climbed up from his seat and staggered toward the tall, thin old man in white robes. His steps were difficult, not only because of the impact from the Order Pillar aborting the jump, but also because the tower's gravity system had malfunctioned, causing the direction of gravity in the hall to become chaotic.
"Sage, where are we now?"
The old man in white robes, addressed as "Sage," had a dark expression. One hand gripped the armrest tightly. After a long silence, he spoke in a low voice: "...The jump process was disrupted. Navigator, report the situation."
"Y-yes!" Another Secret Society member answered hastily. "Our preset jump point should be a gravitational collapse point near the Bright River Nebula, an easily identifiable bright dust cloud. But none of the external monitors can see it within visual range. Star chart comparison... the entire navigation system is offline. Manual comparison will take a long time."
"First, check the damage to the Order Pillar. Confirm whether the inner hull has any leaks. Then work on repairing the subsystems," the Sage said. "Prioritize repairing navigation and engines. Figure out where the hell we are—and then fix this damned gravity system!"
"Yes, yes!"
The Sage slowly took a breath to calm his voice again. "How are the space calibrator and the Sacred Coffin chamber?"
"We just made contact with the core module. The space calibrator is undamaged. The Sacred Coffin chamber has some damage, but the Saintess was not affected and is still recovering."
The Sage lowered his eyelids so that those around him couldn't see his expression. He tapped the armrest irritably with his fingers and muttered in a voice too low for others to hear: "...That useless piece of trash..."
After an unbearably tense moment, he raised his head and said coldly, "Speed up the repairs. Get the Artificial Saint out of that iron coffin as soon as possible."
"B-but the Saintess's damage this time is severe, especially the mental barrier. Forcing acceleration might cause problems later..."
"As long as she doesn't melt down today, we'll deal with future problems later," the Sage interrupted immediately. "I need her back at her combat station now... I have a very bad feeling. Our troubles aren't over."
"Yes!"
The Sage nodded, his expression finally relaxing a little.
Seeing this, a Secret Society member beside him finally dared to ask, "Sage, what do you think attacked us? Could it be some kind of jump interference technology from the Special Affairs Bureau?"
The Sage slowly shook his head. "The Order Pillar is equipped with the most powerful phase engine and core protection system. To interfere with it, you'd need a large fixed disruption device set up near a star gate or on a fortress installation. The Special Affairs Bureau only recently became aware of the existence of the Deep . They haven't had time, nor do they have any reason to build such a thing there."
Then he was silent for a few seconds before slowly speaking. "In the combat data transmitted back by the Artificial Saint, those suspicious individuals who broke through the thick fog... everything started to spiral out of control after they appeared. The collapse of the concealment shield was also because of them. But the key is, who are those people, and how did they..."
He suddenly stopped, looked up, and stared blankly at the porthole.
An unprecedented look of shock, even terror, appeared on the old white-robed man's face. His eyes widened as he stared in that direction, as if witnessing the most absurd, bizarre, and horrifying sight in the world.
Then, one by one, other gazes also turned in the same direction as the Sage.
A person—one of the "them" the Sage had just mentioned—was pressed against the porthole, studying the Secret Society members in the hall.
He was wearing an ordinary casual jacket that looked like it came from a street stall. One arm was holding a furry thing that looked like a tail. He was exposed to outer space without any protection, staring at everyone in the hall like a curious observer.
Then, he realized he had been spotted. He noticed the frightened faces in the control hall, so this "humanoid creature" broke into a smile—a cheerful, sunny smile. Still smiling, he raised his hand and made a "V" sign at the Secret Society members.
Panicked shouts filled the control hall, followed by the Sage and several minor leaders yelling to restore order.
"Quiet! Everyone calm down! Send out the Knights to deal with that monster!" the white-robed old man shouted.
The figure outside the porthole began grabbing protrusions on the tower's hull and crawling away.
"He's moving!" someone else in the hall shouted. "He's heading toward the radar array!"
"External monitors! Switch to the external monitors... Damn it! More than half of the external monitors were destroyed in the earlier impact! That area is a surveillance blind spot!"
"Send out the hull-cleaning drones! They have cameras too!"
"The Knights have entered the passage. They'll depart in three minutes!"
The hall was in chaos. Having just survived a deadly crisis, with the entire Order Pillar adrift in a dangerous unknown space, a "person" pressed against the porthole staring at everyone seemed like the last straw that broke many people's sanity. Some were panicking while others desperately tried to maintain order, wanting to eliminate that thing that looked human but couldn't possibly be human.
The Sage sat among the crowd, silent, his face pale as he stared at the now-empty porthole.
That "person" had completely moved to a place invisible from this side—in the blind spot of the Order Pillar's hull. What was he doing? What did he plan to do? How did he "follow" them when the tower's jump failed? Who was he? What... was he?
Yu Sheng crawled carefully along the hull of this bizarre tower, still holding Hu Li's large tail in one arm.
It reminded him of Ai Lin's habit of crawling darkly in every corner of the house—under the table, under the coffee table, under the sofa. That little puppet was always squeezing into those places.
But he felt he was different from Ai Lin. That little puppet crawled in the dark; he was doing bright, healthy, moderate crawling.
Even the purpose of his crawling was full of positive energy—he wanted to find an entrance, get inside, and deliver surprise and joy to the cultists hiding in this "flying tower."
It didn't matter if they weren't happy. He was happy enough right now.
He stopped on a relatively flat section of the hull to rest briefly. Then he looked up at the dark, boundless space and the beautiful stars quietly dotting the deep blackness.
"So beautiful..."
Yu Sheng muttered to himself.
He couldn't say it out loud because he couldn't breathe here.
At first, it was very uncomfortable. He even mentally prepared himself to return in half an hour and exchange awkward stares with Ai Lin and the others—after all, after a blackout and then opening his eyes, he was in outer space. He figured he wouldn't survive this time.
But after a while, Yu Sheng discovered that breathing wasn't actually necessary for him.
It was just a clinical characteristic attached to the state of "being alive."
At least, that was how he understood it.
Looking at the vast, abyss-like depths of space before him, Yu Sheng felt as though his thoughts, too, were being amplified by the boundless expanse.
It was said that powerful cultivators from Thousand Peaks Spirit Mountain could also survive in space. He wondered how they did it... Did they also "optimize" away their breathing?
He wondered if Ai Lin could also move around in space like this. After all, she didn't seem to have any lungs or a heart.
What about Hu Li? She was powerful... Probably could too?
Yu Sheng was lost in these random thoughts when a voice suddenly sounded in his mind: "Hey hey, Yu Sheng! You still alive? Dead? If you're dying, come back!"
That annoying way of talking was, of course, Ai Lin.
"I'm alive, drifting in space," Yu Sheng replied grumpily. "I'll tell you, this tower that those cultists built... is actually a freaking spaceship, you know? But when this thing started its teleport, I kinda 'nudged' it, and now it seems like I broke it. It's just drifting around... I'm hanging on its hull, trying to find a way in, but I haven't found a good spot yet."
There was silence from Ai Lin's end for several seconds, as if she was stunned.
Then she let out a surprised cry: "Holy crap! You can do that too?!"
"I'm pretty surprised myself," Yu Sheng responded through their mental link. "Oh, and also, tell Fox that her tail went quiet after I got here. I don't know if I broke it."
After a while, Ai Lin replied: "I told her. She said it's just disconnected because of the distance. The tail is useless now. Find a place to toss it, or just open a door and throw it home. She'll turn it into a scarf for you later..."
Yu Sheng thought for a moment, casually pulled open a door next to him leading to 66 Wutong Road, and threw the tail inside.
"I tossed it home. What's going on over there?"
"The Special Affairs Bureau people are here. Xuan Che is explaining the situation to them. That deep-dive team commander just came looking for me, asking where you went. I told him Hu Li shot you out with her tail. He gave himself an injection on the spot..."
Yu Sheng: "..."
"Hey, when are you coming back?" the little puppet asked again.
"I'll try to see if I can get inside this 'tower'—without blowing it up, because this thing seems pretty fragile," Yu Sheng said. "If possible, I'll try to bring back some local specialties. I've chased this far; it would be awkward to go back empty-handed."
"Alright then. Don't die too fast."
"Got it, got it."