Star Odyssey

Chapter 4197: Leave It To Destiny

The Gate of Laws had been left near the Nine Odysseys Megaverse by Qi Xu, so was the technological civilization on the other side of the gate the one that she had intended to use against humanity, or was there another?

Was it possible that the civilization that Lan Meng had intended to use was actually the Seven-Treasure Anuras?

Both of those were incredibly powerful civilizations. To make use of such civilizations, one needed to possess a certain level of strength themselves.

“Next, I will assign you a mission. If you accept it and complete it, you will officially become a member of Obscura. Should you fail, Obscura will send at least two powerful civilizations to destroy your human civilization. You may choose now.”

“What if I refuse?” Lu Yin asked.

“Refusal will be treated the same as failure,” Ba Se replied.

“Hehe, child, so long as you fail, Lan Meng will be one, while I will be the other. We will definitely destroy your human civilization. The civilization that I can send likes to eat, hehehehe.”

Lu Yin sneered. “Furball, stop howling like a ghost. I accept my mission.”

There would not be any difference whether he accepted or not.

“Good. You are to destroy the Thorn Civilization...” Ba Se gave a brief introduction to the Thorn Civilization. This civilization only had a single Immortal, who was not particularly strong. Even if Lu Yin did not attack the civilization himself, the mission should be possible to complete so long as he asked Greater Sancte Awe Gate and the others to help.

“I will warn you of one thing: there are other beings who wish to join Obscura who have been given this same mission to complete. Whoever completes the mission first will join.”

Lu Yin arched a brow. “Kuang?”

“You do not need to know,” Ba Se said, “I will not give you a gate that will lead you directly to the Thorn Civilization. You may leave at any time now.”

Lu Yin was curious. “Can I know what the reward for success is?”

“You can only learn that after you formally join Obscura.”

Lu Yin shrugged. “Fine. In that case, I’m off. Lan Meng, Furball, see you later.”

With that, he vanished.

Along the cliff, one creature burst out laughing. “Furball, hahahaha!”

“Hehe, Furball... Sounds pretty good.”

“Lan Meng, he sure seems to be familiar with you.”

Lan Meng completely ignored everyone.

The creature that Lu Yin had dubbed Furball was still furious, and they shouted, “Lan Meng, do not allow that brat to succeed! I will support whatever candidate you suggested to join. That human civilization needs to be annihilated.”

Lan Meng’s claws curled as it stared down at the ground with cold eyes. He will not complete this mission.

...

Elsewhere, Lu Yin pushed the lid off of the coffin. At some unknown point in time, Master Qing Cao had left.

Lu Yin sat where he was for a moment, staring out into outer space. After a bit, he teleported back with the coffin. He soon took Mister Mu, Greater Sancte Awe Gate, and Greater Sancte Blood Tower to the Sea of Karma, where he shared everything that had transpired.

“This is Obscura’s method, using civilizations to attack other civilizations while remaining untouched. It’s truly disgusting,” Greater Sancte Blood Tower spat in disgust.

Greater Sancte Awe Gate said, “Since you’ve accepted the mission, you must complete it. Otherwise we will be forced to deal with the power of two Obscura members. Even if we aren’t afraid of them destroying us, our losses won’t be small.”

Mister Mu agreed. “Especially since we have no idea what kind of civilizations the Obscura members might send against us.”

Lu Yin met Greater Sancte Green Lotus’s eyes. “Senior, do you remember that technological civilization we found?”

Greater Sancte Green Lotus nodded. “Do you believe that that civilization is the one Qi Xu sought to use against us?”

Lu Yin grunted in agreement, his expression grave. “That’s very likely. What other civilization did we find near the other side of the Gate of Laws that could pose a threat to us? We searched everywhere yet found nothing else. There was only that technological civilization.”

“For a technological civilization to become a fishing civilization, they must be truly powerful. If Qi Xu was able to use that civilization, there is no telling what sort of civilizations the other members of Obscura might be able to use,” Greater Sancte Blood Tower cautioned.

All of them were reminded of the Seven-Treasure Anuras. Lan Meng had tried to use the toads against humanity, but the tree-like Immortal had overestimated itself. The Seven-Treasure Anuras had never actually been used.

At the time, when Lan Meng had forced the Tricolor Skybornes to move next to the human megaverses in an attempt to lure the toads towards humanity, the human civilization had been put under tremendous pressure. If they had not schemed against Lan Meng and gravely wounded it, they might not have been able to frighten Old Fourth and Old Fifth away quite so easily. Additionally, there was no doubt that Lan Meng definitely had other means to push the Seven-Treasure Anuras into waging war against humanity.

Fortunately, Astral Anura had been living in their megaverse, which had provided the human civilization with a channel with which to communicate with the toads. Without that, humanity would not have ended up in such a favorable position.

Lan Meng alone had been enough to send the human civilization scrambling to deal with their schemes. If another member of Obscura joined in, no one could guess what kind of civilization might appear.

If a fishing civilization appeared, it would be a huge problem.

Lu Yin knew that, if he failed his mission, Furball would join with Lan Meng to destroy the human civilization, but Lu Yin did not know what kind of creature Furball was, nor what civilization would be used.

Still, none of that really mattered. Even if Lu Yin had not offended Furball, some other member of Obscura would eventually join Lan Meng to attack humanity. In a way, Furball was a better option. At least Furball was short-tempered, which made them much easier to handle than the wily creature who had questioned Lu Yin about his ability to teleport.

That one had given Lu Yin the impression of being an old fox. He would much rather deal with Furball.

First, they needed to ensure that Lu Yin completed his mission.

Since he was not allowed to take action himself, the implication was that he could use human civilization.

“This Thorn Civilization only has one Immortal. I will go,” Greater Sancte Blood Tower announced, a cold glint flashing in his eyes. “I wasn’t able to fight during the last civilizational war, so let me have this battle.”

Lu Yin frowned. “Senior, if you make a move, it means that humanity will become one of the civilizations that Obscura can use as a tool. This time, it’s the Thorn Civilization, but what about next time? What if I’m tasked with destroying a powerful fishing civilization? And even if that doesn’t happen, no one can guarantee that every mission will go perfectly. There is no need for us to sacrifice ourselves for Obscura. Even if we don’t sacrifice anyone, increasing your karmic chains is still a loss.”

Greater Sancte Green Lotus agreed. “Exactly. Obscura may have invited Lu Yin to join precisely because they want to lash our human civilization to their ship and use us to deal with other civilizations.”

“We’ll only act this once. Just the Thorn Civilization shouldn’t be any issue. At worst, we won’t be the ones to complete future missions. Qi Xu was dead for so many years, and yet Obscura never even asked about her,” Greater Sancte Blood Tower argued.

His arguments made a certain amount of sense, and Lu Yin was reminded of what Lan Meng had said, so he repeated those words.

Greater Sancte Awe Gate was furious. “So that’s what happened! If it wasn’t for Lan Meng’s greed for some reward and pushing to test us, who knows how many more years it would have taken for Obscura to learn of Qi Xu’s death. Despicable! That bastard forced us out into the open!”

Lan Meng’s actions had been no different from the scavengers who sold the coordinates of megaverses. The human powerhouses inexplicably felt as though they had been betrayed.

While Obscura was their human civilization’s nemesis, humanity should not have been pushed to the forefront in such a manner. They clearly could have enjoyed peace for much longer.

“One day, sooner or later, I will butcher Lan Meng!” Greater Sancte Blood Tower growled between clenched teeth.

Mister Mu turned to Lu Yin. “If our human civilization is not the one to act, how do you intend to complete your mission? You just told us that there is another creature competing with you, and they are one of Lan Meng’s people. Since that is the case, the creature may have learned about the target civilization long ago and have already prepared a civilization to be used. We need to hurry. If we are too slow, they will beat us to the punch.”

Lu Yin was fully aware of that, which was precisely why he had immediately gathered everyone to discuss the situation.

His goal in joining Obscura was to give humanity a bit of peace. If their human civilization ended up bound to Obscura’s great ship to be used as their knife or sword, he would prefer refusing to join. Being used by Obscura to their deaths would be far too foolish.

Greater Sancte Green Lotus pondered. “The civilizations we currently know of are the Seven-Treasure Anuras, the Nest civilization, and the Tricolor Skybornes. Of them, neither the Tricolor Skybornes nor the Seven-Treasure Anuras can be used. As for the Nest civilization, their Immortal Lord has already fled. Even if the bugs are nearby, we cannot use them unless the Nest civilization returns to its former peak.

“No, that is not completely accurate. The Nest civilization also has knowledge of Obscura and cannot be used by them. All of this means that our only option is...” He looked at Lu Yin. “That technological civilization.”

Lu Yin had been thinking the same thing. “Senior, it’s been almost 300 years since we first encountered that technological civilization. We should go and check on them again.”

Greater Sancte Green Lotus nodded.

“I will accompany you,” Mister Mu interjected.

Greater Sancte Green Lotus said, “You must protect the Tianyuan. In the past, there was no choice but to leave it unprotected, but now that you have broken through to the Immortal realm, you can erase all of those concerns. Allow me to accompany Lu Yin on this trip.”

Lu Yin nodded to Mister Mu.

The man felt helpless. “In that case, Senior, I must thank you.”

As Lu Yin’s master, there were many things that Mister Mu should take responsibility for, but with Greater Sancte Green Lotus’s argument, protecting the Tianyuan would put Lu Yin at ease.

A very short time later, Lu Yin escorted Mister Mu back to the Tianyuan. He then passed through the Gate of Laws with Greater Sancte Green Lotus. They offered Ku Deng a greeting in passing before leaving.

Their destination was the megaverse whose Mother Tree had been destroyed and whose coordinates had been sold by One-Eye. That megaverse was where they had first encountered the technological civilization.

After all these many years, no one had any idea what had happened to that megaverse, but it was the only place where they might be able to find any clues regarding the technological civilization.

Nearly 300 years after their last visit, Lu Yin and Green Lotus saw a megaverse that looked completely different from when they had last laid eyes on it. It had not been reset, but instead looked as if it was being mined.

While Lu Yin and Green Lotus were not able to fully understand the purpose of the beams of light that they saw crisscrossing the megaverse, it was clear that it was being excavated. The resources of the entire megaverse were being harvested and taken away.

It was hard to fathom the spectacle of an entire megaverse being harvested like a mine. Even though the Nine Odysseys Megaverse had pillaged the Spirit Nidus for cultivation resources, they had never done anything this excessive.

There were ovoid lights everywhere, some large and others small. The largest one was billions of times larger than the ovoid light that had been present when Lu Yin had previously seen the technological civilization. This light was monstrous, and it took up a massive part of the Aevum Inch.

As Lu Yin and Greater Sancte Green Lotus stared at the megaverse, a conversation took place within the largest ovoid light.

“Foreign matter detected. Should it be removed?”

“Analyze.”

“Beep. Analyzing... Beep. Analyzing... Beep. Analysis complete. Biological imagery reveals a match for the data received from the Third Detachment. Energy level cannot be determined. Height... volume... degree of material fusion...”

“Is this the same kind of lifeform that destroyed the Third Fleet’s support ship before? An imperial analysis determined it to be an Immortal. Initiate absolute analysis.”

“Beep. Absolute analysis in progress... Beep. Absolute analysis in progress... Beep. Absolute analysis complete. Energy level cannot be determined. Treat as an Immortal. Recommendation: unlock the current final armory.”

“It is indeed an Immortal, or else a mainship’s absolute analysis would not fail. Unlock the current final armory.”

“Beep. Final armory successfully unlocked.”

“Activate the anti-radiance weapons and simultaneously deploy Crystal Fall. Prepare law-based weapons. Order the third mainship to provide support.”

“Activating anti-radiance weapons. Deploying crystal fall. Preparing law-based weapons... Preparing law-based weapons...”

From the distance, Lu Yin and Greater Sancte Green Lotus watched as lights approached them. The familiar feeling clearly indicated that the technological civilization was attacking them again, though the intensity of this attack was far greater than the previous one.

“Should we leave?”

“Toss the gate out.”

“Leave it to fate?”

“There is no other choice.”

“All right.” With that, Lu Yin removed the lid of the red coffin behind him and drew a gate on it with the red line.

As he did that, Greater Sancte Green Lotus moved to block the incoming attacks.