Outside the main control room, it was still quiet. Bright lights illuminated the long corridor, and the steadily running mechanical devices hummed softly in the old walls and floor. It was as if the inside and outside of the door were two different worlds. Standing outside, it felt as if the flashing lights and incessant sirens in the main control room were fake.
The spaceship was still running 'smoothly' and 'normally', even though its core control area had completely collapsed, and even though its main control system had not issued any commands at all. It was like a hollow body of steel, and every part in its body was running on its own without any orders from above. Countless self-operating components worked together to keep the steel body afloat, but the reason for their operation was a mystery.
Gwen and the rest returned to the brightly lit corridor of the spaceship. They did not feel anything when they were walking in the corridor, but now, facing the bright lights and the steady mechanical humming, they felt an inexplicable chill rising from all directions. It was the chill that came after accidentally uncovering the truth. They realized that they were walking in a strange body, and every part in this body was running under the control of a mysterious force.
These parts might even have 'eyes'.
"I'm a little nervous … I'm a little nervous again …" Amber muttered, her eyes darting around. "I feel that this spaceship can 'feel' us …"
"Don't scare yourself." Gwen turned to look at the nervous half-elf. He calmly stepped forward. "Let's go back outside."
They quickened their pace in the corridor. They quickly passed through the connecting passageway and the wide open doors. It took them a very short time to cross the interior area of the spaceship. Amber was worried that something unexpected would happen, such as a bunch of automatic weapons suddenly popping up in the corridor. Fortunately, such an accident did not happen. They soon saw the door leading to Steel Earth. The dark and chaotic 'sky' outside the door was more reassuring than the brightly lit interior of the spaceship.
Everyone returned to Steel Earth. Victoria immediately found the photographic crystal that she had set on a platform nearby. She carefully put away the crystal that might contain important information and then looked at the leader of the team. "Your Majesty, what are we going to do next?"
After the operation in the Tide-Defying Tower, she knew that His Majesty, who had legendary experiences and knew a lot of mysterious knowledge, could recognize the words of the voyagers and even know the many uses of the ancient "heritage". Of course, she was curious about it, but her loyalty and trust made her forget the doubts in her mind and treat it as an established fact.
Gwen looked up and recalled the malfunctioning terminal (could it be a navigator?). He saw a blurry image on the screen as he stepped into the distance. "This way, I suspect that this is the docking area when the spaceship docks."
The group immediately followed Gawain's footsteps. At this moment, another tremor came from the depths of the giant spaceship, but this time, everyone was much calmer than before.
The ship was decelerating, and at the same time, it was probably adjusting its attitude. The ship seemed to have an independent gravity generator, so they could not feel the changes in the hull. But one thing was for sure, it was preparing for a 'berthing'.
At this moment, a glimmer suddenly appeared in the darkness outside the shield. Mary, who was walking at the outermost of the team, looked up instinctively and exclaimed, "Ah! Something is coming out from there! "
Gawain immediately looked up and followed Mary's gaze. In the hazy darkness, a massive structure was slowly emerging. It was a polygonal structure with uneven edges. Its general outline was a bit like a snowflake. Due to the distance and the darkness, Gawain could not see the details. However, the style that was vaguely revealed was undoubtedly of the same origin as the giant ship they were standing on. On the surface of the giant structure, uneven lights could be seen. Those lights illuminated part of the land, while the rest of the area was completely shrouded in darkness.
The next second, the steel structure that emerged in the darkness began to slowly 'sink' towards the edge of the spaceship. Gwen then realized: the spaceship was adjusting its attitude. It was heading towards the massive facility, which was its' home port '.
Melita ran a distance to the side, and at the same time, her body was shrouded in a light curtain. She quickly turned into the body of the Giant Dragon, and a deep and majestic voice came from her mouth. "Everyone, come up. We'd better hurry. The spaceship may be docking soon. It can only stay for a limited time, and so is the time we can explore."
Gwen and the rest quickly climbed up the broad back of the Giant Dragon. Melita flapped her wings and flew directly on the surface of the ancient spaceship. She carefully adjusted her attitude in the space formed by the shield of the spaceship, and quickly swept over the many facilities and platforms on the deck at a breathtaking altitude. The edge of the spaceship was soon vaguely visible.
Amber, who was lying behind Melita's neck, looked down and seemed to have found something. "What is that?"
Gwen immediately went over and looked at the direction Amber was pointing. He immediately saw the situation below and frowned slightly.
It was an area that they had not explored before. It was at the edge of the ancient spaceship's polygonal, interface, and on the silver-gray alloy deck … Gwen saw something that looked like plant remains.
Huge branches, dried and coiled vines, huge leaves scattered on the deck, and some small shrubs and flowers that grew tenaciously between the plant remains. The huge plant remains had obviously been dead for a long time, but the things that came out of the wreckage were obviously still alive. They were green and grew freely under the illumination of the spaceship's lighting system.
"… It looks like a very, very, very large … plant." Melita's voice came from the front. The Giant Dragon's voice was a little shocked. "And it looks like those things are just a part of the plant … My incubator, look at those thinnest branches, every one of them is as big as a beam … I don't think even the Solin Tree is that big!"
"It does look like the remains of a giant plant, and there are some small plants growing out of the wreckage …" Gwen was equally shocked. He muttered to himself, and suddenly remembered something. He turned to Kamel. "I remember you mentioned before that when you first saw this' steel earth 'and looked at it from afar, you saw something' hanging 'on the edge of it, right?"
"Yes." Kamel also saw the huge vines and dried leaves that were gradually approaching. After a brief recollection, he nodded slightly. "What I saw at that time should be these things. It's just that I was so far away that I didn't realize that they were actually … a bunch of dead plants?"
"Those vines and root-like structures seem to have been torn off, or twisted off forcefully." Amber looked over her head for a long time before pointing at the broken parts of the plants on the edge of the spaceship. "Look, there are obvious signs of tearing. And those branches and leaves are obviously dried up and fallen from a bigger body."
Gawain nodded thoughtfully. At this moment, Daniel, who was on the dragon's back, raised his head and looked into the distance. The old mage's expression became serious. "Everyone, I think … we have seen that 'bigger entity'."
"Huh? What did you say... "Hu Po muttered subconsciously. Then, she raised her head to look at the dark space beside her. In the next second, her expression froze and her eyes widened." What the hell is that?!!! "
The massive ancient spaceship had finally completed its final attitude adjustment and deceleration. And in front of it, the 'mother port' had finally revealed itself to the uninvited guests. Gwen and Amber saw a man-made object that was far larger than the spaceship below them floating in the dark. Compared to the spaceship below them, that thing could really be called 'Steel Earth'. But how big could it be? The human eye could not tell. Even the Extraordinary with the best eyesight could only see that its iron-gray alloy surface extended infinitely in the dark, engulfed by the sparse lights and mysterious light in the distance. And at the edge of this real 'Steel Earth' was the 'port' that connected to the spaceship. It was an irregular polygon that fitted the spaceship's edge perfectly.
What made Hu Po cry out in surprise wasn't the "ancient structure" floating in the darkness, but the thing on the "port."
It was a tree, a giant tree that had been dead for god knows how many years. Its massive canopy covered the entire port area and even many roads and facilities near the port. The leaves and branches on the canopy had long withered away, but the remaining structure was still magnificent, even reminiscent of a layered giant city. Most of its roots had been broken. Because they could not penetrate the solid alloy of the spaceship, they turned into debris that covered the entire ground. The giant tree leaned at the end of the port without the support of its roots, and a small part of its canopy extended beyond the 'giant structure', which corresponded to the plant wreckage on the edge of the spaceship below them.
And in the middle of this astonishingly huge ancient wreckage, there was a lot of greenery. It was a plant that had grown from the nutrients of the wreckage, or perhaps … it was just the "echo" of the behemoth's death.
Melita let out a low growl. Even though she was a dragon that had lived for a long time, she could not help but sigh at the sight. "I have never seen such a thing before... Even the Great Tree of Thorin seems to be smaller than it."
"This thing was definitely not here from the beginning. It doesn't look right." Amber quickly made a judgment. "It looks like it 'fell' here from somewhere else. I don't know if it was still alive when it fell. Anyway, it's obviously dead now. And the spaceship under our feet happened to dock at the place where the giant tree died, so it 'carried' part of the wreckage on the deck … To be honest, I think I know what this thing is. "
"It's not hard to guess. Amoun has described to us more than once what his' little courtyard 'looked like," Gwen said in a low voice. "In the center of his divine kingdom, there was a giant tree called' Reincarnation '. There was a city on top of the tree called' Life '. The roots of the tree were coiled like vines, and in the middle of the vines was a big tomb called' Death '. In fact, the Thorin Giant Tree was influenced by this mythological description and grew into what you see. And what we see now —"
Before he could finish his sentence, Hu Po, who was beside him, automatically finished the latter half of his sentence. "It's most likely the original."
Amber paused for a moment before continuing. "This time, we can go back and have a good chat with the two in the Disobedience Courtyard. First, we found Mirmina's house, and now we see Amoun's Reincarnation Tree withered in the Voyager's ruins. And judging from the traces at the scene, the tree almost crashed into us."
"That's not the point. The point is why this tree is here. As the wreckage of the divine kingdom, how did it fall in the Voyager's ruins and drift here? Or was it brought here by the spaceship? " Gwen frowned and whispered. "Theoretically, this kind of collision should not have happened … Wait, collision?"
He suddenly stopped, and the scene he saw in the surveillance log of Firmament Station came to mind.
The giant deer, wrapped in powerful energy and holy light, rushed into space from the surface of the planet and resolutely crashed into the space station left behind by the Voyager.
If the giant steel structure floating in the dark and chaos corresponded to the Firmament Station in space, and if Amoun corresponded to his divine kingdom, it seemed to make sense.
When the god chose to crash into the space station left behind by the Voyager, the divine kingdom left behind by the Voyager also crashed into the "mother port" left behind by the Voyager in the deep sea. This coincided with the conclusion of a study of the gods by Typhon's technical experts: the gods and their divine kingdoms were essentially two sides of the same coin.
The more Gawain thought about it, the more he felt that it was possible. At the same time, he couldn't get rid of the strange feeling in his heart. Ah Mo 'en probably didn't know all of this. He didn't know what happened to the Kingdom of God behind him when he crashed into the Firmament Station.
He did not even know about the existence of the spaceship cruising in the divine kingdom and the mother port of the spaceship.
As they spoke, the ancient spaceship had gradually approached the port in front of them. The "Giant Reincarnation Tree" on the port was like a huge dark cloud pressing down on them. Everyone could not help but hold their breath. Melita quietly lowered her altitude and carefully looked for a suitable landing spot on the edge of the spaceship. Gwen came out of his meditation and looked up in the direction of the giant steel structure.
Like the ancient spaceship, the giant steel structure did not respond to the Voyager's identification signal.
That thing … was an even larger "empty shell".
The Giant Dragon slowly landed on the edge of the spaceship. Almost at the same time, a moderate vibration came from under Melita's feet. In the empty "heaven and earth," there was the sound of a giant locking device being activated.
The spaceship docked at the "mother port."
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