Chapter 595: Return
Ye Chong looked this strange planet sending nostalgia to him. He was having mixed feelings.
Trash Planet-12. The planet where he grew up. He recognized every piece of trash on this planet. The abandoned spaceships, the commander's throne with a broken cushion, the pile of rusty cogs giving one the sharp stench even by just looking at it.
It had been 10 years since he departed from Trash Planet-12 and this filthy home of his remained filthy as ever.
Ever since the Big Bang, the planet had lost its life. Those overwhelming monsters Ye Chong once terrified of, had all been vanquished, annihilated, wiped, as if Judgment Day. He strolled through the pile of debris which looked as if before. Leading Rui Bing, they got home, Ye Chong's home in the past.
"Where is this?" asked Rui Bing.
"Home. I grew up here." The indifferent reply from Ye Chong made Rui Bing grab her man tightly. She could not imagine her beloved living on this trashy place alone as a child before.
Ye Chong's home remained the way when he departed back then. Nothing was touched. No footprint of the notorious Engulfer was even discerned around his home. The Engulfers once always outnumbered the other species with their reproduction, and now they stayed as history, a faint flavor wafting in the palate of Ye Chong. It was a shame to be no longer able to taste some lovely roasted Engulfer.
Well, at least, as conveniently as a lazily written Sci-fi, the daring gamble of the crew plunging into the dimensional window led them to Trash Planet-12. Ye Chong did not notice the window at all, as it was cleverly hidden behind a few space rocks.
Aried was talented after all, since he picked the right blueprint that produced a window expander. The Darkniss eventually passed through the distortion seamlessly. Nevertheless, the window disintegrated not too long after they had landed on Trash Planet-12. Aried's hypothesis was, the disappearance of the dimensional window could be due to the intensive energy stimulation produced by the machines, which led to destabilization.
Well, assuming that was a dimensional window created by nature, a new one should be coming, though the catch was, no one would know how long it would take, and no one would ever know if it still led to the same place.
Trash Planet-12 was dead, not surprisingly to the denizen. It was meant to be a giant space rubbish dump. The residents around the planet had already been migrated to other planets. The red-tailed beasts might have devoured the entire galaxy as attracted by the metals in it, yet they were never interested in the metallic junks on Trash Planet-12. The junks were substandard after all. They remained on the same spot as ever, quietly.
Ye Chong knew Fal galaxy well. He had the necessary information of the entire galaxy the moment he left Trash Planet, thanks to Mu/Shang.
There was no signal to transmit anything. Apparently the connection had been cut away from the main transmitter a few lightyears away. Well, it made sense. Who would transmit things from a rubbish dump anyway?
Ye Chong, as his instinct told, decided to head to Blue Ocean first. It was the planet where he first met Rui Bing, in her loving white garb and Grandpa Qian, at his little noodle shop. All was fine till a strike came to the Five Galaxies and everyone on Blue Ocean was forced to migrate. Rui Bing and the people he cared moved to Csebesini galaxy and no one knew what had happened to this blueish planet after that.
They got back to the ship and led the ship to the coordinate of Blue Ocean.
It was a shocking scene when they got there.
It almost felt like a blue Trash Planet-12 when they hopped off the planet. The same ruins, the same silence, the similar stench, the same dead atmosphere. The buildings had fallen. The streets were scattered with yellowish wallpapers. Mechs rested the ground with broken arms. The city was completely destroyed as they saw the puddles of brownish water tainting the street.
They tried shouting but only echoes returned. There was nobody but the packs of red-tailed beasts which just marched before Ye Chong fearlessly. They were the survivors to this chaotic place. Their adaptability gave the citizenship here.
It was expected by Ye Chong, well he was the one who witnessed the higher ranked, 8-toed red-tailed beasts after all.
"No one survived," reported Sang Kan grimly, who saw the destruction by the terrifying beasts the first time. He was utterly blown. He could see how developed the city was in its former glory and now... But, fortunately, he did not discovered dead bodies around, not a large number of them, probably everyone managed to escape before chaos ensued completely.
The production line was probably the area that suffered the most damage due to its abundant supply of batteries. Well, a production line was there... which now only the scraps remained. It was a fact universally acknowledged, that a red-tailed beast in possession of an actual berserk must be in want of immense energy. Ye Chong could verify this fact, throughout all his encounters with the red-tailed beasts, it had and only had always been a snatch of energy. And unfortunately, it had always been the wealthy, authoritative groups that possessed excellent sources of mineral energy, while they, despite their colossal amount of currencies, might not be able to have the security that would protect them from the strike of red-tailed beasts, though they were great runners when it happened. Nonetheless, Darkniss had far greater rare mineral inventory than these big shots in the Five Galaxies.
It was the nature of red-tailed beasts to compete for resources, but it was apparently not their nature to utilize these energy resources for evolution. Well, if such ability was inborn for them, the galaxies would be a goner by then. Extracting energy from minerals by humanity was seemingly an art, a hardly understood magic in the eyes of these beasts. Red-tailed beasts, in spite of their intelligence, lacked the actual capability of creation. To get energy they only knew how to steal. Certainly, they would steal candies from only babies, they would never pick anything of their own size. If they did, it would only be destruction for them. However, humans, while being possibly the right baby to steal candies from, turned out to be rather resilient to the beasts.
The production line was obviously destroyed. Nothing was left for Ye Chong. He needed information, regarding the current situation in Five Galaxies, on the warfare between red-tailed beasts and humanity.
That would be the only signpost for their discretion.
They were blind at the situation for the moment.
How many "clans" were there accommodating these red-tailed beasts?
Where were these clans?
What could Ye Chong do now?
Eventually, perhaps driven by nostalgia, they headed to Csebesini. While Rui Bing was kidnapped away to He Yue galaxy, Grandpa Qian and the others resided there. Moreover, judging by the intergalactic layout, Csebesini might hold the greatest likelihood of survivals. Well, geographically saying, it should.
Csebesini was not practically the largest among all Five Galaxies, yet it was the transition area interconnected with the other 4 galaxies. Csebesini had always been the neutral member of the party, with an open, welcoming policy that attracted flocks of talents from all over the universe. There was an influx of population during the chaos, making Csebesini no longer the overlooked galaxy among the five as rapid development ensued.
"That was valid till... well, I got knocked out and brought to He Yue," said Rui Bing.
"Sir, we detected threats." Right after Ye Chong got back to Darkniss, the alert came.
There was a small team of red-tailed beasts detected on the visual. Ye Chong, after a careful observation, deduced that these red-tailed beasts were of a far higher rank than those they encountered on Darkniss before. Yup, even higher than those he fought on Planet Yi Ju. The toes were clearly more than 3 on each. The leader was 5-toed. From Ye Chong's experience, a 5-toed red-tailed beast could have been a supreme leader of a smaller clan in Darkniss, yet this 5-toed beast he was seeing merely came from a small team.
One could already imagine the difference in levels now.
They had evolved?
At least the beasts would not evolve all at once out of sudden. In order to initiate evolution, which was to gain that extra toe, to go up in rank, they would need a certain amount of minerals and energy which would increase tremendously each stage of evolution.
The red-tailed beasts seemed to be unaware of Darkniss, probably because of the distance as well as the layer of colloid fungus extract the crew applied at the body of Darkniss.
Ye Chong remained cautious as ever nonetheless.
He sent 100 mechs off to fight. Appilok who was the supreme commander of the mech military unit of the entire crew led the army, showing the extreme careful measures Ye Chong took.
Appilok did not find this an overkill. He, like the other members of the crew, was fully aware of the ranking system among the red-tailed beasts.
100 mechs went into a curvy formation, inching towards the 28 red-tailed beasts. Like Darkniss, the mechs were also coated with colloid fungus extract so they were invisible to the red-tailed beasts. Appilok was not noticed immediately, even though the leading red-tailed beast seemed to be able to feel his existence as it glanced at the place where Appilok stood. The captain remained undiscovered, even though it was a terrifying scene to behold on the visual in the ship.
Appilok was calm, unshaken by the threat. Fire was held despite seeing the beasts being completely inside their range of weaponry.
Timing and range were the prime factor to determine a successful assassination.
It was not the speed or the strength of the beast that threatened the crew. It was the extrasensory that could assist the beasts in dodging all attacks while making one.
The best way to eliminate the pack would be to fire at close range, densely.
The laser guns were initiated, charging.
And it was that quick charging of mech weaponry that alarmed the red-tailed beasts.
They began scattering!
"Fire." Appilok commanded calmly.
The 100 beams flew over the air and struck upon the 28 beasts.
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