In the spring of the year 2187 of the Yeming Star Calendar, the location was in the outer orbit of an uninhabited planet designated x-9 at the edge of the Milky Way.

The cargo ship "Star Snail VI" glided slowly along its predetermined route, like a sluggish metal beetle trailing its taillights through the dark, silent universe. The medium-sized transport ship's exterior was weathered, with three distinct scratches on its port engine compartment, supposedly remnants of a collision in the asteroid belt. Inside the cockpit, the lights were dim, and the air was thick with the mixed smells of stale instant noodles and heated plastic.

Chen Hao sat in the driver's seat, his belly pressed against the edge of the dashboard, his cheeks puffed out like a hamster's, as he vigorously chewed on a dark blue energy bar. He was twenty-six years old, on the heavier side, with a round face like a squashed bun, and so sparse that you could count the strands of hair on it. He always wore that wrinkled blue work uniform, the cuffs still stained with sauce from yesterday's lunch.

He was a low-level driver at Interstellar Freight Company, barely getting the job thanks to his uncle's connections in the HR department. He barely passed the theory test on his seventh attempt, and his practical training was all shoddy work. His favorite thing to do on weekdays was to lower the alarm threshold during cruising, then lean back in his seat and doze off, muttering, "It'll all pass."

The same goes for today.

His left hand rested on the autopilot switch lever, his right hand busy stuffing a second energy bar into his mouth, his eyes staring blankly at the starry sky ahead. The previously steady navigation line on the screen suddenly jerked, but he didn't notice. Until a sharp beep rang out, and red light instantly filled the entire control panel.

"Warning! Unknown gravitational source intervened! Course deviation 37 degrees! Repeat, course deviation 37 degrees!"

Chen Hao almost spat out the energy bar in his mouth. He sat up abruptly, and the back of his head hit the headrest of the chair with a "thud".

"What the hell? Who messed with my system?" he muttered as he reached for the main control panel, trying to restart the signal receiving module. But in his panic, his finger slipped and accidentally pressed the red button in the corner that was never recommended to be pressed lightly—Emergency Boost Mode activated.

The entire ship jolted violently, as if it had been kicked. The right engine roared to life, its output instantly soaring to 120%, while the left engine remained at 80%. With a 40% difference in thruster output, the ship immediately began to tilt and spin to the left.

"Ouch!" Chen Hao was thrown against the side wall, the seatbelt making it hard for him to breathe. Warning lights flashed on the dashboard: attitude imbalance, dynamic turbulence, excessive structural stress. The main screen displayed a line of text: [Space anomaly detected ahead—suspected wormhole forming].

In the scene, the once tranquil starry sky twists into a vortex, with ripples spreading out from the void, as if someone had twisted a knot in the paper of the universe with a pen. A dark and deep entrance is slowly opening, its edges glowing with a ghostly blue light, like the open mouth of some behemoth.

Chen Hao swallowed hard and hurriedly deactivated the emergency mode. A system notification sounded: "Emergency propulsion has been disconnected. Resuming the semi-automatic calibration program." He quickly pressed the attitude reset button and waited for the gyroscope to re-capture the balance point.

A few seconds later, the rocking subsided slightly, but the ship continued to rotate slowly. He breathed a sigh of relief, then immediately tensed up again—the black hole-like thing was still there, and getting closer and closer.

“There’s some kind of big black hole in front of me, sucking me in.” He opened his voice log, his tone like he was complaining to a friend. “I was trying to restart the system, but I accidentally turned on the high speed setting. Now the ship is tilted, and the radar is all static… This voyage is definitely not enough to cover the losses.”

He tried to bring up the detour path planning interface and entered a set of detour coordinates. The system immediately popped up a warning: "[A gravitational singularity exists in the current region. The degree of spacetime wrinkling exceeds the prediction model. The path is unpredictable.]"

"I don't understand this." Chen Hao stared at the terminology and shook his head. "What does 'wrinkle' mean? Clothes only get wrinkled after being washed a lot, right?" He gave up on manual planning and instead tried to fine-tune the course, hoping to break free from the influence of gravity with minimal thrust.

However, this area of ​​space near the X-9 orbit is firmly locked in place by the wormhole's gravitational field. The cargo ship is like a drop of water falling into a funnel; no matter how slight the pull, it will eventually slide towards the center.

He knew he couldn't delay any longer. Slowing down was the only way to buy time.

“Shut down the right engine first,” he decided through gritted teeth. He pressed the power off switch with his right hand, the hum of the starboard thruster gradually weakened, and the drag on the hull decreased accordingly. Immediately afterward, he activated the auxiliary nozzles, thrusting in the opposite direction of travel to try and create drag.

The braking effect was limited, but it did have some effect. The speed, which had been approaching 600 meters per second, decreased to 520 meters per second, and the ship's tilt angle reduced from 37 degrees to 21 degrees. Monitoring showed that it was only 800 meters away from the boundary of the wormhole's horizon.

"Luckily, they didn't rush over at full speed." He wiped the sweat from his forehead and found his palms were wet. "Otherwise, we would have been inside by now."

As soon as the words were spoken, the main screen flickered a few times, and the image shook violently. Spatial disturbances intensified, and even the communication channel was filled with static. Worse still, the attitude control system alarmed again: "[Gyroscope reading abnormal, attitude correction failed]".

The ship began to rock erratically again, and the control stick became extremely sensitive, causing violent deflection with the slightest force. Chen Hao gripped the control stick tightly with both hands, his knuckles turning slightly white from the force, his body swaying back and forth with each jolt.

"Don't let me down now..." he pleaded softly, "I just received my monthly allowance and haven't had time to get a new mattress yet."

He tried to restart the navigation core, but the system responded slowly, with a response time more than five times the normal value. The data flow in the external environment was chaotic, making it impossible to build a valid model. He didn't even know where the wormhole led, nor why it had suddenly appeared.

We can only wait.

Waiting for the system to recover, waiting for the ship to stabilize, waiting for a miracle to happen.

But he knew in his heart that this level of spatial anomaly was far beyond the capabilities of a pilot of his rank. Theoretically, in such a situation, he should immediately report to the dispatch center and request remote takeover or activation of the emergency plan. But now, the signal was completely cut off, and even the most basic pulse beacon could not be sent.

He became an isolated island.

The cargo ship continued to be dragged along by an invisible force, slowly sliding towards the abyss. The countdown on the screen had disappeared, replaced by constantly flashing error codes. Alarms blared incessantly, and red light flickered on his round face.

"Why can't this thing be turned off!" he finally couldn't help but shout, his voice echoing in the cramped cockpit. "I'm just a deliveryman! Not a space hero!"

The instant those words were uttered, the entire ship shuddered violently, as if it had crashed into an invisible wall. All the lights went out for a second, then suddenly came back on. The main screen went completely black, leaving only a scrolling string of characters: [System synchronization lost, entering unknown space protocol].

Immediately afterwards, the starry sky outside the window completely distorted, transforming into a flowing tunnel of light and shadow. The cargo ship was swept into it like a falling leaf, tumbling and plummeting into an unknown dimension.

The violent jolt left Chen Hao glued to his seat, unable to move, his ears ringing and his vision blurring. But he remained firmly in the driver's seat, his hands still on the control lever.

Consciousness remains.

The location remains unchanged.

The cockpit is intact.

Inside a sealed compartment at the stern of the cargo ship, a subtle electrical current quietly activated a dormant device. A silver-white humanoid robot stood silently on a support frame, its eye sensors flashing a faint purple light.

But at this moment, none of this has happened yet.

At this moment, the universe is left with only an out-of-control cargo ship and a fat, lazy, academically challenged but still persistent pilot, struggling desperately in the torrent of fate.