The magnetic field around Silin suddenly grew stronger and stronger. Moreover, the space around Silin's body had already started to distort.
Silin finally understood why he was feeling so strange.
The curly leaf pattern on his finger was reacting to the opened spacetime vortex. An enormous suction force pulled Cillin towards him. To be more precise, the suction force was directed towards the Leaf Curl Pattern. However, Cillin, who was stuck to the Leaf Curl Pattern, had become the one receiving the suction force.
A green light appeared from the curly leaf pattern and enveloped Silin entirely.
Silin was standing at the back of the group. After all, the front was reserved for people like Gadar and Ji Feng, so Silin stood at the back of the group on his own accord. Right now, everyone was looking at the spacetime vortex in space, and no one was paying attention to Silin. That was why no one had noticed the anomaly at the beginning.
When Huimao turned his head to look, the light had just come out from the curly leaf pattern. The light gave Huimao a very frightening feeling. Huimao often acted on instinct, so when he saw the light, a thought appeared in his mind: Silin is going to the other side of the spacetime vortex!
That was why Huimao jumped over and hugged Silin's arm with his claws. His tail was also tightly wrapped around Silin's arm.
Huimao had appeared in this world for many years, and Silin was the only person he truly trusted. Everyone else, even the people of the Sixth Division, Huimao's trust was still a little leeway. But what if something happened to Silin or he suddenly disappeared? Would he be captured by those strange scientists and dissected? Also, he wouldn't starve as long as Silin was around. If he was left alone, wouldn't he return to his original standard of living?
Absolutely not!
In fact, Huimao's actions were faster than his thoughts. The latter thoughts only came to his mind after he grabbed Silin.
Czedow was a beat too slow. By the time he arrived, the light had already enveloped both Silin and Huimao, and he was directly knocked away.
Even Ji Feng and the rest couldn't get close to Silin. Moreover, the magnetic field around Silin was getting stronger and stronger. Silin and Huimao's silhouettes were starting to fade, so no one dared to force their way closer.
Huimao spat out the ring from his mouth as he watched Czedow get bounced away. If he and Silin weren't here, would Czedow be lonely? Would he be harassed by the other members of Vanguard? Would he starve? Would he … no matter what, the items inside the ring were enough to support Czedow's independence.
It must've been hard for the cat to think of such things for Czedow during such an emergency. Truth be told, Huimao thought that Silin was an absolute meal ticket, and that he would definitely live a better life than Czedow. That was why Huimao took care of his "own people".
At first, Huimao wanted to say something to Czedow, but he didn't get the chance to do so.
The light grew brighter and brighter, and Silin and Huimao's silhouettes grew more and more blurry. Finally, a ray of light flashed and shot straight into the spatial vortex above them.
After the light entered the spatial vortex, it slowly weakened until it disappeared completely.
Everything returned to its original state. However, the surroundings were dead silent. There was no communication. Everyone stared blankly at the vanishing space-time vortex.
Did the "shortcut" they'd been waiting for disappear just like that?
Ignoring everyone else's thoughts, Czedow reached out and caught the ring Huimao had spat at him. Then, he closed his fingers around the ring and held it firmly in his palm. This was the ring he stripped from Oskulos. Huimao had always treated it like a treasure, and Silin had even planned to use it as a "granary" for Huimao and Czedow. But now, Czedow was the only one left.
Czedow tried to contact Huimao and Silin, but he couldn't get a single life signal from them. Neither Silin nor Huimao could be reached through their communicators. It was as if the two of them had vanished into thin air.
Both of them had vanished just like that.
Although he was just a robot, Czedow was experiencing a feeling he'd never felt before. He couldn't put his finger on it because it was too complicated. If he had to describe it in one word, it would be painful. Very, very painful.
Sigma would express its thoughts completely, but Czedow was a lot more reserved. He still wore the same expressionless face he'd used all year round, but his eyes were starting to show a lot of emotions. It was just that Czedow didn't let anyone see it because he was staring at the ring on his finger.
"Eh? Eh!!!! "Sigma let out a confused cry as the blue bars on its face turned into several big vertical lines.
Sigma's cry snapped Gadar and the others back to reality.
"Did they … go in?" Xin Zhao asked.
Gadar and the others didn't say anything.
"This shouldn't be happening! This shouldn't be happening!" Sigma yelled and charged into the passageway to check on the machine.
Ji Feng and the others followed him into the passageway. They wanted to know what the fuck was going on.
Sigma covered his head with both hands after he entered the passageway. The blue bars on his face were flashing irregularly. It was clear how chaotic his emotions were right now.
All of the machine's energy had been used up, and the connection node's programming was messed up. Some of the instruments were suffering from major or minor problems, and it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that their programming was messed up or damaged. It would take a lot of time to fix them.
Huimao had created a kind of "machine language" radiation before he was sucked into the spacetime vortex. Even Czedow and Sigma were affected for a moment, but they were special enough to survive it. The same couldn't be said for the other instruments. Be it the spaceplanes parked not far away or the instruments inside the planet, everything was affected and their programming was messed up.
Even Death's starship, which had retreated relatively far away because of the spacetime vortex, was affected and lost control for a while.
Sigma "sobbed" as he stared at the instruments. Then, he looked at Czedow and asked, "What do we do? We can't use the 'shortcut' for now. "
"How long will it take before we can use the 'shortcut' again?" Czedow asked. Ji Feng and the others were also listening attentively.
"Probably three to five years. I can't say for sure. But … "Sigma stared at the string of characters and a flashing icon on the central screen. In the end, he let out a sigh and didn't finish his sentence.
Both Gadar and Ji Feng asked Sigma some questions, but the answer they got was ridiculous.
"Silin and Wheeze might've been sent to the other side of the spacetime vortex. I don't know why," Sigma said with a frustrated and aggrieved expression. Its trip home was ruined, and both Silin and Huimao were gone. It was going to be lonely.
Silin didn't know what the others would think after he left. He felt like he was isolated after the green light enveloped him, and he lost consciousness the moment the green light shot toward the spacetime vortex.
A long time later, he finally regained consciousness. Right now, Silin felt like his entire body had been torn apart and pieced back together. It was so painful that he couldn't even begin to describe it.
There was a lot of noise, the sound of thrusters and flying cars, the sound of people shouting something, the sound of metal falling to the ground...
Everything slowly quieted down.
A while later, Silin opened his eyes.
The scene in front of him reminded Silin of the small room he used to live in on Planet Brown Earth.
The room was simple and crude. One could even call it shabby.
There was an old robot sitting in the corner with its wiring exposed. It looked like it had been there for a long time because a layer of dust had covered its body.
Celine moved his fingers. He felt fine.
He felt fine, but sitting up took a lot of Silin's strength. His muscles hurt like they were branded with iron. He hadn't recovered from the injuries he had suffered from Oskulo, and he had experienced a painful trip to the spacetime vortex. Silin was in so much pain that he had to suck in a deep breath.
He finally recovered. Exhaling, Silin saw Huimao hugging his arm like an octopus.
But now, Huimao didn't move. He was frozen in place and wasn't breathing.
Silin could feel Huimao's life force. Although the guy didn't breathe or have a heartbeat, he was still alive.
Silin flicked Huimao's ear.
He didn't move.
He poked his belly.
Still didn't move.
Silin frowned. Did it crash?
Silin was still wearing the same clothes, but the protective suit was left on a shelf next to him. It was torn in many places.
Suddenly sensing something, Silin turned to look. The peeper shrank back, but not long after.
One head, two heads, three heads.
Three very similar round heads popped out from the door. They didn't look very big. They were looking at Silin with wide eyes. Their eyes were full of curiosity, but they were also a little scared.
They were really kids. They showed their thoughts on their faces.
Silin smiled at them but didn't say anything. He wasn't sure what was going on and was afraid of saying something wrong. A smile could show kindness, especially to kids. They could get encouragement from a smile.
Seeing Silin smile at them, the three were encouraged and smiled back at Silin.
Although the decorations in the room were shabby, which meant the owner wasn't well off, the three had chubby faces. They didn't look malnourished. It was obvious that the owner cared a lot about the children's growth.
One of the little kids shrank his head and ran away, shouting something. Silin couldn't understand.
It was a strange place indeed. Silin knew the regional languages of all the Sectors in the League of Stars, but Silin didn't understand what the kid was shouting.
After one little bean left, one of the remaining two little beans was a little braver. He slowly walked over, crouched beside the bed and looked at Celine. He said something, but Celine couldn't understand him.
The kid said something again. Silin made a puzzled expression to show that he didn't understand. But he was a kid after all, so he didn't think about whether Silin could understand the language. He turned and said something to the kid who was still peeking out from the door.
As they were talking, footsteps came from outside the door. It was obviously an adult.
An old man was pulled in by the little kid who ran away just now. He walked in with a loving smile on his face. He looked old with a hunched back, but he was in good spirits and could be considered healthy. His hands were rough and full of calluses.
When he saw Silin sitting up, he said something. Silin looked at the old man in puzzlement, showing that he didn't understand what they were saying.
Even the other little kid pounced on the old man, pointing at Silin and saying something.
Old Chang was repairing the machine when his grandson ran over to say that the person they brought back was awake. He was sitting on the bed and smiling at the three of them. Old Chang put down the work in his hands and was pulled by his grandson by the finger.
Because it was the triplets' birthday, Old Chang promised to take them for a trip outside the planet. A few days ago, he took a trip outside the planet in his broken little spaceplane.
But on their planet, they couldn't afford the energy consumption of the spaceplane, not to mention the quality of the spaceplane, and not to mention whether it could perform long-distance navigation and warp speed flight. It was already good enough for a family like theirs to barely maintain the maintenance costs of an old spaceplane. To solve the problem of energy, Old Chang had saved up for a long time to make this trip. And with the condition of their spaceplane, they couldn't leave the planet at all. They could only fly around symbolically. Fortunately, his grandson had sharp eyes and saw the person floating in space.
Because Silin was wearing a protective suit at the time, Old Chang automatically classified Silin as an engineer working in space. Space missions were dangerous. One careless mistake and one would be thrown into space and then abandoned. Old Chang knew many situations like this. Many engineers died in space like this. The rich would use maintenance robots, but the poor could only rely on manpower. They couldn't afford that kind of maintenance robot, and they didn't trust the cheap maintenance robots. So, more people who couldn't afford it tended to hire maintenance engineers to complete the work in space.
The money they earned was earned with their lives on the line. When Old Chang was young, he also did such things. But now that he was old, he couldn't let go of the little ones at home. He didn't come into contact with such things anymore and just focused on his current job.
Old Chang also saw Huimao wrapped around Silin's arm. Old Chang sighed. It wasn't easy to have such a loyal pet. Unfortunately, when they found this person, Huimao was already stiff. It must have been dead for a long time.
If Huimao knew what Old Chang was thinking, he would definitely be furious.
Old Chang had never seen the type of protective suit Silin was wearing before. Old Chang guessed that this person might not be from this planet. But Old Chang was someone who had done space maintenance work, after all. He had a good impression of Silin. When he saw Silin's age, he felt even more sorry for him. Such a young man actually took on such a dangerous job. If he hadn't met them or if his protective suit hadn't been torn, he would have been dead.
Silin's protective suit was only torn after Old Chang rescued Silin. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to save Silin. He wouldn't even have been able to feed him the pills.
According to his grandson, this person seemed a little slow, but Old Chang felt that this young man didn't understand what they were saying. After thinking about it, Old Chang switched to a different language. He spoke in the Imperial Capital's language with a strong accent, which was also the common language of the Empire.
"Can you understand me?"
Silin really did understand these words. At the same time, Silin was shocked. This was very similar to the language that Genya taught him when he was young. Genya said that it was the language of his hometown, but Silin hadn't found such a language in the League of Stars. He didn't expect to be able to hear it here.
"Yes, I can understand some of it," Silin said tentatively.
Hearing Silin's words, Old Chang's eyes lit up. "So you're from the Imperial Capital Star Region!"
Silin scratched his head, looking embarrassed. In fact, he had no idea what the "Imperial Capital Star Region" meant.
Seeing that Silin didn't deny it, Old Chang classified Silin as a young man who grew up in the Imperial Capital Star Region but came from a poor family. For some reason, he had to carry out a dangerous job.
Usually, only people from the Imperial Capital Star Region would have such a standard pronunciation. In other star regions, there were very few people with such a standard pronunciation. This was very difficult to fake. At least, in all these years, Old Chang had never heard of anyone on this planet who could speak such a standard Imperial Capital language.
"You're a mechanical engineer, right?"
"You can say that."
Old Chang looked at Silin with a pitiful expression. It wasn't easy to make a living in the Imperial Capital. Since he had come to such a small place, he must have been forced to do so. Sigh, poor child.
Cillin maintained his most superficial smile, but when he saw Old Man Chang's expression, which was seventy percent pity and thirty percent affection, the corner of his mouth twitched again and again.
"My surname is Chang. You can call me Grandpa Chang like the kids around here," Old Chang said as he handed Silin a glass of water and a few pills.
Celine took the pill and ate it immediately. Then, she thanked Old Man Chang.
Old Chang smiled happily when he saw Silin eat the pills so readily. If it were anyone else, they would have studied the pills for a long time with suspicion.
Old Chang didn't know that when Silin took the pills, he immediately analyzed the ingredients of the pills. They were all basic tonics, which was why he ate them so readily. If Old Chang knew the truth, would the hearts of all the old people on the ground be broken?
"My name is Silin." Silin didn't say much. He only said that he was alone.
Old Chang chatted with Silin, and Silin got a brief understanding of the family's situation.
The three little kids that Silin met were five-year-old triplets. They were six, seven, and eight. Old Chang directly called them Little Six, Little Seven, and Little Eight. There were no other names.
The situation here wasn't good. The survival rate of a child in a family was too low, so every family would save a lot of children. Because of the high mortality rate, people here usually didn't give their children official names. They would only give them other names when they grew up or under special circumstances.
Old Chang's wife passed away early. They finally had a capable son, but he left them because of an accident. His daughter-in-law had been working hard to give birth. After his son passed away, she became thinner and thinner. After giving birth to the triplets, she passed away. Old Chang and six children were left behind.
Why did he say six children? Both the eldest and second children didn't survive.
However, the 11-year-old twins, Chang Little Three and Chang Little Four, lived up to expectations. They got into a good school and left this area to study.
As for Chang Little Five, he was born with a poor body because of the setbacks he experienced in his mother's womb. He often fell sick and grew up on medication.
Old Chang now earned some basic living expenses in his small repair shop to support himself and his children. This area of the planet was densely packed with families similar to Old Chang's family. They opened a small repair shop in their own homes to support their families.
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