Chapter 968 Shadow of the Exploration Era
The dynasty’s exploration method was to steadily expand their exploration scope. The exploration fleet had just entered both Star Clusters and was currently starting their exploration from the borders.
At the border Star System of the Dust Light Star Cluster, an exploration fleet had arrived on a green planet. The insignia of a Star System Civilization was inscribed on the armor of the spaceships, and they were in charge of exploring this region.
“Exiting hyperdrive, arriving at our destination. Cooling down the hyperdrive engine.”
“The planetary probe has been released. Examining the environment and resources on the planet.”
“Activating the life force scanner and checking for signs of life.”
In the main control room of the flagship, the staff of the exploration fleet were busy operating various equipment, and the commander was pacing around to wait for the test results.
Swoosh!
The door suddenly opened, and a man clad in heavy armor walked in.
The commander of the ship then turned around and said with respect, “Captain Kreb, do you need something?”
“I am only here to take a look,” the guy called Kreb said impatiently.
He was one of the Calamity Grade Supers in this subsidiary civilization and was in charge of their safety.
However, there would obviously be far too few opportunities for him to take action, and Kreb was only there as insurance. As such, he was not too happy to take on such a job and felt that it was a waste of his training time.
After waiting for a while, the test results were out and displayed on the screen of the main control room.
“Commander, the data has been analyzed. This is a habitable planet, and the resources on the planet are also rich. We also discovered traces of life on the planet, and we have already discovered 730,000 different species. There is one intelligent species on the planet, and they are currently in the tribal era. The degree of their intelligence is still unknown, and their population is about 120,000.”
The appearance of this intelligent species was then displayed on the screen. It looked like a goblin with plenty of creases on its white skin.
“An intelligent species. That isn’t too bad.” The commander nodded. “Make contact with them according to the rules.”
The dynasty had rules about the procedures of coming into contact with the native civilizations. They would take a different approach depending on the situation. For such natives that did not pose any threat, they would usually approach them with peace and education as the main focus. This was the method that Han Xiao had adopted when he came into contact with the natives on Planet Pangurus.
The fleet then landed in the forest, and the ground troops started to make contact with the native tribes. These natives were both afraid and shocked but extremely curious about these unknown beings at the same time.
Under the aid of the translation tool, this exploration fleet successfully set up a communication bridge with the natives. They explained their intentions to the natives and used various diagrams to explain the situation of the explored universe. They also introduced the Crimson Dynasty to the natives and explained the situation to them.
The accompanying doctor also began conducting tests on the natives to check for any unknown viruses on the body of the natives. There were far too many of such examples, and they began to check the biological structure of the natives.
Everything looked as though it was progressing orderly, and Kreb took a stroll in the camp.
He then suddenly saw a native leaving the line and suspiciously heading toward the house of another native.
Kreb didn’t think too much about the matter and wanted to continue walking but suddenly felt a sense of danger.
He immediately froze in place. Most Calamity Grade Supers had extremely astute senses and would be able to detect threats. Most powerful Supers trusted their instincts.
“Something seems wrong...” Kreb frowned and followed the suspicious looking native. He then pushed open the room door and walked into the native’s room.
This native had his back toward the door and turned around upon hearing something. It was as though he was shocked by someone appearing behind him.
“What are you doing?” The sense of danger grew even more intense.
The next moment, the expression of that native turned malevolent, and he took out a bone dagger to stab it toward Kreb’s neck.
Whoosh!
A gust of wind blew past, and Kreb instantly appeared before the other party. He then knocked the dagger away lightly and held the native by the neck.
He did not know the intentions of this native, but it would not be wrong for him to stop the attack.
But before he could even interrogate the other party, the native suddenly trembled with foam coming out from his mouth, and he died.
“He committed suicide?” Kreb was shocked.
Right at this moment, a gasp could be heard by the door, and Kreb ran out while holding onto the corpse. He then realized that a commotion was going on around the doctors. A large group of doctors were crowded around a medical instrument as though they had discovered something.
Kreb then went forward and looked at the individual in charge of the doctors.
“What are all of you doing?”
“Your Excellency, look at this gene report!” one of the doctors said with a strange look on his face. “We realized a huge flaw in the genes of this race. Furthermore, there are traces of their genes being modified, which resulted in at least eighty percent of their mental capacity being suppressed! In simple words, someone is trying to suppress their intelligence!”
“You mean to say that they are a being reared like animals?” Kreb asked.
Right at this moment, something happened!
Boom!
Everyone suddenly felt the ground beneath them tremble.
The next moment, an alarm went off in all the spaceships.
“Alert! Alert! Detecting high energy reaction, comparing energy reaction to the database... comparison complete. [Primordial Psionic Energy Explosion] has a 99.8% match. Evacuate immediately! Evacuate immediately!”
“Primordial Psionic Energy‽”
Everyone’s expression changed greatly.
Kreb suddenly seemed to have thought about something and smashed the head of the strange corpse in his arms. He then poured out all the contents of the head, and a small mechanical chip flowed out.
The instant he saw this mechanical chip, Kreb’s eyes narrowed, and he understood what was going on.
This was a life force detector. In simple terms, the detector would send out a signal when the life force of its host was lost, and it would trigger a switch or equipment on the other side. The Primordial Psionic Energy Explosion was probably related to this life force detector!
Boom!
The surface of the planet immediately collapsed, and a psionic blue energy erupted from underground.
Following which, the entire planet became contaminated.
The mountains, rivers, forests, land, ocean, sky... everything was swallowed by the blue psionic energy and became part of the Primordial Psionic Energy!
It expanded without end!
Everything was swallowed and disintegrated by the blue light. The exploration fleet was not able to escape from the rapid expansion of the energy and was swallowed up by the energy.
Kreb charged out from the spaceship and wanted to escape for his life. However, the endless blue light swallowed his figure up. In the face of the Primordial Psionic Energy, a Calamity Grade Super was no more than an ordinary living being.
The same scene occurred on a few planets in the Dust Light Star Cluster.
...
It had not been too long since the last meeting, but all the organizations participating in the exploration were gathered in Planet Lighthouse’s conference room once again.
This was an emergency meeting, and Han Xiao and the other Beyond Grade As were urgently summoned to attend the meeting.
Looking at the casualties on the screen, the atmosphere in the room was heavy.
“Our exploration fleet met with an accident in the Dust Light Star Cluster,” Tarrokov said with a grave voice. “More than six thousand battleships were destroyed with more than seven million casualties, including two Calamity Grade Supers.”
A small commotion was immediately created.
“Just what did they meet? Did they meet a powerful civilization?”
“How can there be such powerful natives in the Dust Light Star Cluster‽”
Han Xiao’s eyes narrowed. He only knew that this native civilization created trouble for the dynasty but was not clear about the details. After all, this matter happened during the version update period, and the players did not experience it personally. They only understood what had happened from the background information.
Tarrokov raised his arms to get everyone to remain silent before saying, “The strength of this native civilization is far more powerful than your imagination. They have grasped psionic energy, and these fleets that were lost met with a Primordial Psionic Energy Explosion. We have reason to believe that it is a trap set by this unknown civilization.”
The moment these words were said, everyone present could not help but take in a deep breath.
They could accept a native civilization having a powerful army. With the dynasty’s battleship technology, suppressing a native civilization would not be a problem. Regardless of how powerful an ordinary army was, they would not be able to threaten their exploration fleet.
However, things were completely different if the native civilization had grasped psionic energy!
Under the rule of the three Universal Civilizations, the explored universe prohibited the use of Primordial Psionic Energy for weapons. Its strength was terrifying, and the pollution that it caused was even more severe.
To think that these natives actually grasped psionic energy!
Just how did they climb up the technological skill tree?
Could it be that they have other technology that we do not‽
Everyone present was filled with wariness and caution.
The feeling of facing such a native civilization was completely different. In the Galactic Society, even if one could not grasp some form of technology, one would know of the existence of the technology. But when facing a powerful native civilization that they had yet to see before, who knew what kind of strange technology they would suddenly bring out?
Many of the civilizations had experienced the exploration warring era and felt a sense of deja vu. None of them knew the trump cards that the other civilizations had, such as the Federation of Light’s Multi-Dimensional Sky Opening Transportation Device, the Arcane Church’s Ten Thousand Deity Scepter, and the Evolutionary Civilization’s transformation.
This native civilization naturally would not be restricted by the rules of the Galactic Society and would not be bothered about casually throwing psionic energy around. It was like giving a child a pistol. Everyone present had a feeling that the death rate this time would be high.
“What is the dynasty’s plan?” someone asked.
Tarrokov said coldly, “The situation is still unknown, and this native civilization isn’t friendly to us and poses a high threat to us. According to the ‘Exploration Rules: Rules of Contact’, we will be adopting method twenty-four.”
Many of them could not help but gasp in shock upon hearing that.
This was the final method. Compared to the other methods, this method was extremely simple. They would use war to achieve their motive and stop when the opposing civilization was enslaved or wiped out.
A civilization capable of walking out from the exploration era and becoming the tyrant of the universe definitely was not kind.
The exploration of the Flickering World was a little similar to the exploration era, and the difference was that the three Universal Civilizations were already tyrants. They were confident of employing more gentle means, and this gave weak civilizations the chance to protect themselves.
The more powerful the natives, the stricter the attitudes of the three Universal Civilizations.
A native civilization that had grasped psionic energy was already a threat, and the Crimson Dynasty would not mind killing them in their infancy to reduce their Star Cluster level enemies by one. This would be beneficial to the Galactic Society.
Tarrokov then said coldly with his gaze sweeping past everyone present, “We are completely clueless about them. We aren’t aware of their location or their species. However, the other party has already launched accurate attacks, which means that they have some intelligence in their hands. Before this, we have not come into contact with this civilization. Thus, it is likely that someone is pulling strings from the dark, and the most suspicious individuals are the stowaways.”
The looks of the representatives present all turned strange.
This was not too difficult to guess. It was difficult for a single civilization to form a complete technological skill tree. The benefit of the Galactic Society was the exchange of technological skills. The stowaways must have thrown a bag of technological skills to the native civilizations, including psionic energy skills.
These Super Star Cluster Civilizations also had sufficient motives. First, they wanted to wound the armed forces of the dynasty. Second, they wanted to delay the exploration. Third, they wanted to kill with a borrowed knife and get rid of the powerful native civilizations to free up more space in the Flickering World.
Of course, they would not just throw the technological skills to anyone. Only a native civilization that had sufficient production capabilities would be their target.
“I announce that the exploration plan of the Dust Light Star Cluster shall come to an end. The dynasty’s exploration fleet will be going to war,” Tarrokov said with a deep voice.
Everyone nodded solemnly.
Before taking care of the enemy, they would not continue with their exploration. The dynasty had plenty of war experience and had many different plans to employ.
The enemy had the advantage in terms of intelligence, but this advantage would not last long. The Oracles in the dynasty’s fleet would come into use soon, and the Mechanics were not there for show either.
With the dynasty gathering their troops, the Black Star Army was also summoned. However, Han Xiao was not planning to take action personally. He wanted to let Nero and his subordinates join the battle. He only needed to send his mechanical army to protect Nero secretly.
He knew that the Kunde Race did not have any Supers. Their greatest threat came from the explosion of the psionic energy. As long as they avoided these battlefields, the number of casualties can be reduced.
My advantage of being familiar with the map can be put to use here, Han Xiao thought to himself.
...
At the same time, in the Dust Light Star Cluster, countless spaceships that were holding numerous civilians disappeared into space. Looking at this scene, the Kunde Race soldiers all had strange feelings in their hearts.
“Report, the migration fleet of every colonial planet has set off. The local civilians are all on board, and they are going to search for a new homeland together with all the races that they’ve discovered.”
Upon listening to his subordinate’s report, the Kunde Race leader nodded silently, and the other upper echelons fell silent.
The information on the spaceship wreckage did not lie to them. They had arranged for some enslaved subsidiary civilizations to come into contact with the other party, and the other party was indeed called the Crimson Dynasty. They were just as powerful as stated in the information.
Although the other party seemed extremely friendly, in the eyes of the Kunde Race, their ambitions were hidden under their friendly facade.
Originally, the resources of the entire Star Cluster would be theirs for development and evolution. However, the Crimson Dynasty had arrived and wanted to snatch these resources away from them. Their way out had been blocked, and they could no longer develop normally.
In this regard, the Super Star Cluster Civilizations did not lie.
The Kunde Race was not willing to become a vassal. The universe was a vast place, and they still had routes of retreat.
From the moment they decided to resist, they had planned for the worst. They sent most of their civilians into the depths of the space and left behind the seed for the civilization. Regardless of their victory or defeat, they would no longer have a chance to develop normally in this place. As such, they might as well send their race over to a new hometown where they would not be disturbed.
Only the Kunde Race’s army was left behind to defend their land.
War was something that could not be avoided for peace.