Before the council could finish her sentence, she disappeared before Sandora and me again. This time, she only reappeared after a few seconds. Her body was flickering non-stop. I could not help but worry. "Are you alright?"
"I'm fine," the council said calmly. "My main body is on the planet. The interference from the network won't affect the main body. The amount of data in the Enad Aggregate is too large, and we don't have your advanced mass projection technology. If I want to appear at the remote node of the network and be able to interact with the material world, I can only use the bandwidth and environment … "The council flickered, disappeared, and reappeared."... Extension technology. "
Coco Kina looked at her old partner whom she had not seen for a long time. "Actually, you didn't have to use the extension to come over. If you used a conventional projection, you would still be able to see what's going on."
"But I want to personally 'touch' that thing. I want to know what kind of thing has brought such a great disaster to all of you." The Parliament smiled and looked at Cocokina's fluctuating face. "Coming into contact with the material world is the only joy I have …"
Three seconds later, the council appeared before us again. She looked at Lin Xue sincerely. "Can you turn off the little device in your hand? Although you may not think much of it, it has a huge impact on our fragile network. "
I glanced at Miss Lin. She was using the MDT to play intergalactic, and she was connected to the Bubble. At that moment, I knew what was going on with the abnormal interference. At the same time, I felt deeply apologetic to the council.
At that moment, the rail car, which relied on the tractor beam to transport people between the space station and the spaceship, arrived at the destination. We felt a slight tremor beneath us. Then, the porthole beside us opened, and we could see the interior of the spaceship.
When we came out, there were already many staff waiting for us. Most of them had their eyes on Sandora and me. How should I put it? Although the communication between the Empire and the exiles was getting more and more normal, it did not change the fact that the people of the Empire were rare creatures in the eyes of the exiles. Our appearance in front of them was indeed very curious.
"Oh, it looks … like an ancient spaceship." Lin Xue looked around and couldn't help but mumble. According to the history of the exiles, this giant colonial ship should have been built when the exiles set sail. It is an antique that has existed for tens of thousands of years. We have to admit that it is a very magnificent giant spaceship. If the people on earth saw it, they would be shocked to see it as a divine object, but it is undeniable that it is old and broken. Severe traces of wear and tear could be seen on the alloy floor of the ship's docking port. Even though this type of special metal would never rust, the long years of erosion still left them in a state of desolation. The light in the spacious docking port was uneven, and many places were even dark. The local artificial gravity was at least five degrees off, which was very uncomfortable. The atmospheric circulation seemed to have completely stopped, and the air pressure was so low that it did not look like an environment prepared for living creatures. Most of the staff on the site were wearing special fully enclosed work clothes. A small number of them were probably of a special race that could survive in a low pressure and oxygen-free environment.
"The Ancach series is the oldest giant colonial ship model. There was no experience when it was first built. It has a lot of design flaws. No one would have thought that its ecosystem would need to be maintained for so many years," Cocokina said as he floated in front of us to lead the way. Although this spirit creature had human-like limbs, he didn't seem to be used to walking. He was more like a floating spirit. "In addition, we are not proficient in psionic technology. Ancach 5 has had a few accidents, and its ecosystem is the worst among all the giant ships. When we escaped here, only one-sixth of the ship's survival chamber was left. But compared to Ancach 6, which was lost in the void when the psionic furnace went berserk hundreds of years ago, it is actually considered lucky. "
How should I put it? My biggest problem when communicating with the exiles was that I would always fall into awkward situations from time to time. Even though the other party didn't mean to do it on purpose, and I didn't have to take all the responsibility, I would still feel awkward when I needed to. This could only be attributed to my personality. Just like a real artistic youth, they couldn't help but use parallelism when cursing on the street …
The long axis of Ancach 5 was more than a hundred kilometers long, and the corridors inside the ship were, of course, even more complicated. The target warehouse was in the middle of the giant ship, so it was impossible to walk there. But due to the malfunction of the teleportation device in the spaceship, we could only take a small shuttle. To pass through the gate of the surface area, we needed to cross a large plain attached to the isolation bulkhead (this plain was originally a residential and ecological area, but now it had become a dead land due to toxic gas and pollution. Through the porthole, we could only see abandoned city buildings, charred land, and some twisted plant remains). Then, we flew through a large gap in the secondary blockade wall that didn't look like a normal design, directly into the complex network of the giant ship. Finally, we passed through a small town built near the cooling core that still had a faint light. Only then did we arrive at the warehouse where 'that thing' was stored.
Along the way, I saw a spaceship that was not so much a colony ship, but more of a spaceship wreckage that was still steaming hot. The layered ecological area, transmission network, and concentrated residential area were so dilapidated that I couldn't imagine how they survived in such an ecological environment in the last few hundred years of exile. The most depressing thing was the big hole in the middle of the secondary blockade wall. It was said that it was torn apart by a psionic energy leak. At that time, two material synthesis factories and a small residential area near the hole were instantly irradiated into powdery crystalline matter. The remaining pollution had not been cleaned up until now. At that time, the residents near the polluted area had nowhere to go, so they could only risk their lives to live in a shelter that was only a wall away from the deadly dust. These were all narrated by Cocokina on the way. He knew all the accidents that had happened to every colony ship of the Fifth Fleet like the back of his hand.
I didn't know if it was the dilapidated scene that she saw along the way that moved Sandora. Her expression didn't look too good. When the shuttle arrived at the destination, she whispered, "Ah Jun, I feel a little uneasy."
"Indeed, the situation of the Fifth Fleet is really …"
"No, I don't mean that," Sandora's voice sounded in the spiritual connection. "It's something else that makes me feel very … uncomfortable. Maybe it's my intuition that something is going to happen."
I looked at Sandora strangely, and then I suddenly thought: As someone who had witnessed tens of millions of years (or even longer?) of history, she had been exposed to more touching events than the refugees. In the history of the Empire, Shadora had been exposed to events that touched people's hearts more than the exiles. Her calmness was almost limitless. How could she lose her composure after seeing an abandoned boat? Obviously not.
Just as I was about to ask further about what was going on, Cocokina suddenly said, "That's the one in front."
Sandora gently waved her hand, indicating that I didn't need to worry about her. Then, she pulled me off the shuttle.
In front of everyone was a large metal structure that had been severely deformed and damaged. Its material and function were completely unidentifiable. It was roughly square in shape, about ten meters long on each side. It stood in front of us like a small building. Its surface was covered with twisted metal plates, and jagged fragments of parts poked out from under the broken metal plates. All of its parts were pitch-black, but I couldn't tell if it was originally this color or if it had become like this later on. I couldn't feel any noteworthy energy reaction from its interior. Although there was a trace of radiation and secondary energy, it couldn't reach the level of "living". It looked like a piece of scrap metal that was salvaged from the battlefield. If I had to point out something that caught my attention, it would be that this alloy lump was really ugly.
"Err, you're saying … it's because you accidentally found this thing, and then the Merovans attacked?"
I looked at Cocokina suspiciously, suddenly feeling that things were a little funny. I originally thought that I would see some kind of treasure, like a humming piece of high-tech non-combustible garbage from the Empire, but what appeared in front of me was just a ten-meter square piece of metal, and it didn't even have any high-energy reaction from its interior. Moreover, I observed the mechanical structure that was exposed under the damaged alloy shell and found that its design was unusually crude. Not to mention comparing it with the technology of the Empire, it wasn't even from the same era as the spaceships of the Fifth Fleet. Even though my own professional knowledge wasn't very exquisite … Fine, I admit that my professional knowledge was a mess, but because I had seen too many high-tech gadgets that I didn't understand, I still had some ability to distinguish the relevant fields. No matter how I looked at it, the square wreckage in front of me was a rather ancient and backward product. More than half of its internal wiring was actually connected with a mechanical lock!
"History … Damn, it's so old that it's impossible to distinguish it." The missy reached out to touch the outer shell of the thing and immediately became speechless. "God knows when this was created. According to the normal course of history, I'm afraid that this is something that should have disappeared long ago."
"It's just a guess now." Cocokina seemed to shrug her shoulders, or maybe she was just waving her hand. "A statistician discovered this matter by accident. This unknown object was first discovered outside the World Barrier. When we were repairing a malfunctioning node, we found it stuck in the base of the guard station. Later, the maintenance team sent it to the research department to try to analyze its origin. In the end, a few days later … those Merovans appeared. This unknown object was packed and sent on the spaceship along with the research materials. "
"It's hard to prove that the Merovans were attracted by this thing." I frowned.
"But they chased after the Ancach 5 ferociously, using almost half of their forces to try and stop the ship. But at the crucial moment, they seemed to be afraid of damaging something," Cocokina's three eyes lit up at the same time, showing his agitation. "So, we have been suspecting that something on the Ancach 5 had attracted their attention. So, we began to organize people to check all the goods registered on the Ancach 5. We didn't even miss a single nail. In the end, we found this only thing of unknown origin … the cube."
Cocokina's description finally made Sandora and me pay attention. In that case, the Merovans' intentions were too obvious. There was no doubt that they were after the goods on the Ancach 5. But just for this cube?
"You didn't find any other suspicious items?" I looked at Cocokina's blurry figure worriedly.
Cocokina spread his hands. "All the goods that the Ancach 5 transported have a list. Other than this cube of unknown origin, the rest are resources that we produced from our home planet in the past two hundred years. Those things are even less likely to be the culprit that attracted the Merovans. And even though this cube looks ordinary, it has a secret that we can't explain at all: it appeared outside the world barrier. In other words, before we discovered it, it had already crossed the Void. "
"But it doesn't have the structure to travel through the Void." Sandora frowned. Her gaze fell on the distorted and broken outer shell of the cube, as well as the complicated mechanical structure that was exposed under the outer shell. "There is no engine, no Order field shield generator, and the energy level is insufficient … In that case, it was either thrown into your world by a larger carrier, and then attracted the Merovans, or it is a part of a large spaceship that crashed in the Void, and it arrived at your world by coincidence …"
Then, it also attracted the Merovans. No matter how I looked at it, the Fifth Fleet was seriously injured this time. Now, there was one last question: what did the Merovans see in this cube?
I reached out and knocked on the metal outer shell of the cube. In the end, I used too much force, and a small metal fragment that was severely corroded fell off. I picked up the fragment and squeezed it. I realized that its strength might be the weakest interstellar alloy I had ever seen. I mean, if I were to compare it to the high-strength alloys made by other cross-world civilizations, if I were to compare it to those ordinary civilizations that were still trapped in their own universe, the technological content of this cube might be considered superb. After a simple analysis, I came to a conclusion: the material of the target was just ordinary material. The technological level was hard to say, but it definitely couldn't be compared to the Empire, and it definitely couldn't surpass the Merovans who had practically learned all their skills from the Empire. There was no special energy reaction inside, so the possibility that there was a treasure hidden in the metal shell was preliminarily ruled out. I turned to look at Sandora. "Should we get someone to open it up and take a look? It's already so broken, I don't think we need to think about how to protect it. The interior is probably a mess. "
"I …" Sandora's reaction was strange. She had been staring at the cube thoughtfully since the beginning, as if she was thinking about something else when she spoke. "I'm not sure … but looking at it, I have an inexplicable sense of familiarity …"
"Be careful when you open it." Just as I was about to ask Sandora further, Lin Xue suddenly spoke. "There seems to be something inside … let me see."
As the missy spoke, she leaned forward and pressed her hand on the surface of the cube. Her eyes emitted a faint white light as she entered prophetic mode. I was a little worried as I squeezed Sandora's hand, but I suddenly noticed that Alleria's reaction on the other side was also a little strange. She was staring at the cube in a daze like Sandora, and the wings behind her were unconsciously fluttering slightly. She was completely lost in thought.
"Kite? Kite? "I called out to Alleria." What's wrong with you? "
"Your Majesty …" She came back to her senses, and her wings trembled slightly. "Ah, sorry, I was lost in thought."
"Both you and Sandora are acting strange." I frowned. "Are you okay?"
"I don't know." Alleria let out a long breath and regained her usual calm demeanor. "I might have the same feeling as Her Majesty Sandora. Looking at this cube, I suddenly felt an inexplicable sense of familiarity … Your Majesty, please don't be fooled by the appearance of this cube. Maybe we need to be careful with this thing. It seems that it can attract the Merovans for a reason."
At this time, the missy had finished her scanning work. She leaned over with a strange expression. "Blockhead, this is a coffin."
"Ah!" Both Sandora and I exclaimed at the same time. Lin Xue said again, "A coffin, or a tomb. I can't see anything else. You know, I'm a prophet, not an X-ray machine. Let the people from the research center come. Bring the most sophisticated disassembly equipment they can find. Don't damage the 'thing' inside. There is a damaged energy junction at the core of this cube. We need to pay special attention to it. In the other history lines, there have been more than a dozen disassembly failures caused by this energy junction alone. "
I immediately contacted the City of Shadows and asked the research center to organize a group of the best technicians to rush over immediately. According to Lin Xue's suggestion, we decided to disassemble this mysterious cube on the spot to increase the success rate.
The Parliament and Cocokina knew that there was progress and that we needed a quiet environment. Hence, they ordered all unrelated personnel to leave the scene. Only the two of them stayed with Sandora's consent. Very soon, a team of experts from the City of Shadows arrived at Ancach 5 with a full set of equipment. The leader was an acquaintance: Victor or Tocqueville or Tocqueville or Tocqueville.
Oh yeah, he was leading the disassembly of the black shuttle. Currently, all the disassembly experts in the City of Shadows were in his hands.
"Your Majesties, Mistress, Tocqueville is here to report!" The dark-skinned senior technician bowed to me, Sandora and Lin Xue. Then, his gaze fell on the unknown cube. As expected, his reaction was the same as Sandora and Alleria's earlier reaction: he was lost in thought.
"Your Majesty, this is?" The senior technician was confused. "It feels strangely familiar. I feel like I've seen it somewhere before."
"This is a coffin." I exhaled and quickly pointed at Lin Xue. "Oh yeah, she said it."
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