The blue light in the Alliance flagship's teleportation pod suddenly faded. Lin Yi landed with a slight sway, and Su Qing's fingertips were still tightly gripping his sleeve, the sweat on her palm seeping through the fabric.
Long Wu was shielded by him, the residual heat of the flame barrier still burning his skin. Old Zhou's mechanical arm emitted burnt blue smoke as he used his other hand to tear off his broken goggles.
"Chu Yao!" As Lin Yi turned around, the star map glowed faintly, catching the data body that was about to dissipate—the girl's projection was 30% lighter than usual, and the ends of her hair looked like crushed electronic snowflakes. "Status report."
"Time-space warehouse...locked." Chu Yao's voice was crackling with static, and the data stream in her pupils spun rapidly. "Night Owl's residual consciousness...has been isolated by Skynet."
"But...but I need to restart the cooling." Her fingertips lightly touched Lin Yi's hand, like a snowflake about to melt. "Thirty minutes...it will be restored." Before she finished speaking, the data body collapsed into points of light with a "sizzle," and the last ripple before dissipating swept across Lin Yi's wrist—her unique communication code.
"This girl." Lin Yi rubbed his temples, glancing out of the corner of his eye at Su Qing holding the Key to the Star Orbit.
The star trail patterns on the surface of the bronze key were still flowing, but the finest black mist in the deepest part was now wriggling slightly with Su Qing's breathing—like a parasite lurking in the blood vessels of its prey.
"Alarm over." Old Zhou's gruff voice boomed from the communicator, "All evacuees have returned to their posts, Faith Link... damn it, it's automatically recharging!"
Lin Yi walked quickly to the porthole of the bridge.
Below, on the wasteland, countless golden ribbons of light rose from above the heads of each job changer, like countless golden threads stringing together scattered pearls, eventually converging into a pillar of light that stretched straight to the sky.
A warrior in leather armor suddenly leaped up, his pupils glowing with amber light. The action of drawing his sword, which normally takes three seconds, was now so fast that it was just a blur – it was the "Eye of Speed".
The mage in the adjacent formation formed hand seals, and the fire element leaping from his fingertips intertwined and merged with the water element ten meters away, splashing ice crystals with scorching heat—"Elemental Resonance" had awakened.
"Look, boss!" Long Wu grinned, revealing his white teeth, as Xia, nestled in his arms, sat up rubbing her eyes. The black curse mark on her forehead was so faint it was almost invisible. "That kid just said he could only withstand three hits, but now he's been fully healed by a healing spell and is charging to the front lines with his shield up!"
A metallic scraping sound suddenly came from the bridge.
A dark figure emerged from the shadows, shrouded in black mist. Red eyes beneath the hood swept across the golden sea below, a low chuckle escaping his throat: "Interesting." His voice was no longer as cold and mechanical as before. "You wove a net with your faith, stringing together scattered sparks into a galaxy."
"So?" Lin Yi turned around, the star map unfolding behind him into a silver vortex. "The enforcers of an advanced civilization, are now going to call us 'allies'?"
"The boundary between a chess piece and a chess player has never been strength, but will." The shadowy figure raised his hand, and the phantom of half a floating city emerged from the black mist. "You have proven that you are qualified to hold the chessboard."
But remember—"His red pupils suddenly contracted into vertical lines, "The floating city is not the end."
Those floating islands are... dimensional springboards left by an advanced civilization for its inheritors.
Lin Yi's breathing became slightly sluggish.
He recalled Night Owl's words before the collapse of the Mother Nest: "Can you protect the present, and can you protect the past?" Now, looking at the information provided by the shadowy figure, a vague guess in his heart gradually became clear—the floating city, the dimensional springboard, Night Owl's threat to the past... these fragments were converging towards a truth he had not yet touched.
"Mr. Lin." Xuan Mingzi's Taoist robe fluttered without wind. He was already standing before the Key of Star Orbit, his withered fingers hovering half an inch above the key. "This key is resonating."
Lin Yi walked closer and indeed heard a very faint buzzing sound.
The sound was like the lingering echo of an ancient bell, or like some kind of extremely high-frequency sound wave, drilling straight into the depths of one's consciousness.
"The third one." Xuan Mingzi's eyes suddenly sharpened like swords, and the Tai Chi pattern on his Taoist robe lit up with a blue light. "The Key of Star Orbit is responding to its brother."
The fluctuation frequency...is not in the game, not in another dimension. He looked up at Lin Yi, "On the boundary of reality."
The bridge suddenly went dark for a moment.
Su Qing gently placed her hand on Lin Yi's hand. Suddenly, the Star Track Key in her palm burst out with dazzling golden light, and the dormant black mist was scorched and curled into a ball, emitting a sharp screech.
At the top of the pillar of faith outside the window, the shadow that did not belong to this dimension pressed closer, like a giant eagle retracting its claws.
"Chu Yao." Lin Yi called softly to the air. Although he knew she was in hibernation, he still took out his communicator and pressed a button. "When you wake up, we need to check all the abnormal coordinates at the boundary of reality." He turned to look at the still boiling golden ocean below, a cold, hard smile curling at the corner of his mouth. "Night Owl wants to play a time game?"
Let's see... who will ultimately play the game.
The buzzing of the Key of Star Orbit grew clearer and clearer, rippling through everyone's consciousness.
At the boundary between reality and the game, at a forgotten coordinate, a rusty bronze key is slowly opening its eyes from the dust of time.
Before Xuan Mingzi finished speaking, the bridge's warning lights suddenly turned orange-red, and the bronze patterns on the surface of the Star Track Key, like a group of snakes that came to life, crawled up Su Qing's wrist and onto her forearm.
Lin Yin could clearly feel the tremor coming from her fingertips—it wasn't fear, but more like a burning resonance.
"Reality boundary..." As Lin Yi repeated these four words, the coordinate map that Chu Yao had previously compiled automatically appeared in his mind.
The gray areas marked "unresolvable" suddenly shimmered, as if sprinkled with stardust. "Is that the seam between the game and reality?"
"More dangerous than sutures." Xuanmingzi's withered fingers pressed on the Star Orbit Key, and pale blue veins appeared on the skin beneath his Daoist robe. "It's the bone seam of a parallel world." When he looked up, fine beads of sweat seeped from the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. "I used the 'Primordial Calculation Scripture' to deduce for three days, and I thought the third key was sunk in the mother nest of another dimension."
Who would have thought it was hidden in an even more...ancient place.
The black mist surrounding the shadowy figure suddenly surged like boiling water, and the red pupils beneath the hood reflected the pillar of faith shining through the window: "There is no light within the parallel bone seams." His voice was like two blocks of ice colliding, "Advanced civilizations forbid any being from venturing there, because..." The red pupils suddenly contracted to pinpoints, "...there lies a sealed 'Primordial Consciousness.'"
Su Qing's data body exploded at that moment.
The projection, which was originally so faint as to be almost transparent, suddenly solidified, while the ends of the hair grew in the opposite direction—from the chestnut color of a young girl to the light gold of a baby's lanugo, and then faded to gray-white in the blink of an eye.
Her lips parted several times before she finally grasped Lin Yi's wrist, her nails almost digging into his skin: "Be careful... don't believe any sound." Her pupils simultaneously reflected countless versions of herself—some in school uniforms, some in armor, even some with silver hair reaching the ground. "They will... they will appear in the form you most desire."
"Su Qing!" Lin Yi grabbed her wrist with his other hand, but felt a blinding coldness.
The outline of the data body began to crumble, like dandelion seeds scattered by the wind. "Chu Yao is still cooling down; you can't hold on!"
"This is not my true form." Su Qing's voice suddenly became ethereal, as if it came from a very distant place. "It is...it is me from another time and space, who used the power of faith...to tear open the dimensional membrane." Her fingertips pressed against Lin Yi's chest, where the star map suddenly burst forth with a galaxy-like light. "Remember, the original consciousness is not the enemy."
It's waiting...waiting for someone who can understand it.
As the last word dissipated, Su Qing's projection shattered completely into specks of light. One of these specks drifted into Lin Yi's star map, leaving a pale golden mark at the location of the "space-time rift".
"Damn it!" Long Wu slammed his fist on the control panel, making the teacup jump. "This girl always speaks like she's talking in riddles!"
Old Zhou, can your crappy mechanical brain analyze that fluctuation just now?
Old Zhou's robotic arm was emitting blue smoke. He pulled off his goggles and wiped them, his metal prosthetic eye gleaming coldly: "The resonance intensity of the faith link has increased tenfold." He pointed out the window—the golden light bands were now coiled into a giant cocoon, enveloping all the job changers within. "Their spiritual energy is surging towards the boundary of reality, like...like they're charging something."
The bells rang at that moment.
It wasn't an alarm inside the ship; it was a vibration coming from the depths of space.
The sound was so deep it was like the universe coughing, each snort causing ripples to spread across the ship's alloy armor.
Long Wu's shield clattered to the ground, and Xia woke up with a start from his arms, hugging his neck and screaming; Lao Zhou's mechanical prosthetic eye suddenly went black, emitting a burnt smell; even the black mist of the shadowy figure was shaken into pieces, revealing half a pale face—a face that bore a seven-tenths resemblance to Lin Yi.
"The 'End Bell' of the advanced civilization's central hub." The shadowy figure tugged at his hood, concealing his face again, his voice unusually tense. "They detected a tear in the dimensional membrane at the boundary of reality." He looked up at the churning nebula outside the porthole. "This is an ultimatum."
Within three hours... they will initiate the dimensional cleanup process.
Lin Yi's star map spun wildly behind him, with tiny fragments of spacetime overflowing from the silver vortex.
He could hear his own heart pounding like a drum—not out of fear, but out of excitement.
From the day he awakened to be the master of space and time, he had been waiting for such a showdown: with advanced civilizations, with primordial consciousness, and with all beings that attempted to define the rules.
"Old Zhou." As he turned around, the light from the star map illuminated every wrinkle. "Activate the overload mode of the faith link."
"Long Wu, hand Xia over to the medical team. Take your Shield Guard battalion to the energy bay and stand by." He looked at Xuan Mingzi, "Senior, please use the *Primordial Calculation Scripture* to locate the coordinates of the third key." Finally, his gaze fell on the shadowy figure's face, "Enforcer, the advanced civilization's cleanup procedures... do they have any loopholes?"
A flicker of approval crossed the shadowy figure's crimson eyes: "A rift in the dimensional membrane." He raised a hand, and a string of golden code emerged from the black mist. "Reinforce that area with the power of faith, and their cleansing beam will be deflected." He paused. "But someone needs to... stand in the rift as an anchor point."
"I'll go."
All four people spoke at the same time.
Lin Yi turned his head and saw that Su Qing's afterimage had somehow reappeared in the corner, her hair still changing color; Long Wu's shield was already clasped in his arm, and he grinned, revealing white teeth; Lao Zhou's mechanical arm lit up with blue light again, and his prosthetic eye resumed functioning; even Xuan Mingzi was holding abacus beads, his fingers trembling slightly under his Taoist robe.
"Shut up, all of you." Lin Yi's voice was like a sword tempered with ice, but softened as it swept over the crowd. "Chu Yao will scold me when she wakes up." He pulled out his communicator, which displayed the message, "Chu Yao has recovered 23%." "But there's not enough time."
He walked toward the porthole, where a giant golden cocoon below was releasing streams of light. The light passed through the ship's hull and converged at his feet to form star trails.
The coordinates of the boundary of reality suddenly became clear in her sea of consciousness—it was a place without up, down, left, or right, where all matter was melting into a data stream, and the third Star Orbit Key was floating in the center of the data stream, the patterns under the rust exactly the same as the key in Su Qing's hand.
"Initiate teleportation in thirty minutes." As Lin Yi turned around, the light from the star map made everyone's pupils glow. "Bring enough Faith Crystals." He looked at the shadowy figure, "Enforcer, use your floating city as a springboard." He then looked at Xuan Mingzi, "Senior, calculate the coordinates." Finally, his gaze lingered on the remaining light from Su Qing, "Su Qing... whatever's there, I'll take you home."
The alarm on the bridge suddenly turned into a piercing shriek, displaying "Reality boundary dimension membrane fluctuation +300%".
Lin Yi touched the golden mark on his chest, and the rotation speed of the star map increased threefold.
He could hear the key calling, clearer than before, like a mother calling her child home late.
In the gap between reality and the game, the rust on the third Star Rail Key is peeling away.
When the last piece of rust fell off, an ancient script appeared on the key's surface—the language of primordial consciousness that Lin Yi had seen in the space-time rift.
"Welcome home."
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