The Queen of Scrolls never admits defeat

"Crack!" A short, sharp cracking sound immediately rang out.

Upon receiving the instruction, Sen Tai immediately mobilized a tree root closest to Zhi Zhi and, through several rapid and specific swings, transmitted the information that "rare material has been discovered" to it.

Squeaky, who was dozing on the mossy grass, immediately woke up. With a nod of her little head, she used her teleportation ability to appear in Moran's study.

Moran was engrossed in a book about the ecology of the Void Whale when Zizi appeared and reported in the most concise Valen language: "Master, rare materials have been discovered, but they are not on the flight path. Should we capture them?"

Moran finally looked up from the book, a hint of interest flashing in his eyes. Just by glancing at the control room, he knew it was meteorite iron: "Of course, there's no reason to let go of materials delivered to our door! Tell Kaba to change course and prepare the capture net."

Zizi nodded to the tree roots on the windowsill of the study, and almost a second later, Kaba received the command.

The fire of its soul burned excitedly within its skull, and its finger bones rapidly inputted new coordinates.

A few minutes later, the {space card} containing the meteorite iron appeared on Moran's table.

The roots of the moss tree picked up the quill pen again and added a new line to the log: "A meteorite rich in meteorite iron was unexpectedly discovered and captured successfully."

With the help of Kaba, Zizi, and Sentai, even though the Starship had entered an unknown star field, Moran didn't have to stay in the control room and stare at the control screen all the time.

Time slipped away quietly amidst the daily exploration, evasion, and short-distance leaps.

The calendars hanging in the living room have been changed several times, and in the control room, the world detector, which had been dormant for many years, suddenly lit up with its familiar dark blue light again.

After Zhizhi notified Moran, she instantly appeared in the control room.

Gazing at the image projected on the screen, Moran frowned in confusion.

Before me was a peculiar dimensional world, its boundary membrane intact, and its energy fluctuations were quite strong, almost reaching the level of a third-level world.

However, strangely enough, not a single fluctuation of world consciousness could be sensed on the boundary membrane.

This is extremely unusual.

Even in a world on the verge of extinction, the world's consciousness is like the breath of a dying person—faint yet still discernible.

Unless... all intelligent life in this world has become extinct.

If that were the case, the world would be devoid of intelligent life and should have quickly degraded into a "dead plane," making it impossible for the boundary membrane's energy level to remain at that level.

Moreover, a jet-gold energy pillar, like a giant spear piercing from the depths of the star field, forcefully pierced through the boundary membrane of this world!

The energy pillar itself emitted a clear fluctuation of world consciousness, which felt to Moran like a pillar-shaped boundary membrane.

She observed carefully and discovered that the boundary membrane of this world was weakening at a visible rate, and the area near the dark gold energy pillar was losing energy the fastest.

The energy fluctuations of the boundary membrane are closely related to the fundamental forces of the world.

The scene before my eyes was as if the very essence of this world was being continuously drawn away and absorbed by that dark golden pillar of light that led to an unknown destination!
“Absorb the origin of the world…” Moran murmured to himself, his eyes slightly solemn.

Aside from Star Refining Technique, she had never heard of any other ability that could directly absorb the origin of the world. Moreover, this dark golden energy pillar did not seem like Star Refining Technique; rather, it resembled the boundary membrane of a world of a higher level.

What world's boundary can cross the void, reach the boundary of other worlds, and absorb their essence? Such a situation is unheard of.

Instead of rashly approaching the plane from which the world's essence was being extracted, she decisively gave the order:

"Click! Adjust course and follow this dark gold energy pillar in the direction it came from!"

She went to the source to see what exactly this being was that was devouring the origin of the world!
Kaba obeyed, his finger bones rapidly inputting a series of commands on the control screen, locking onto the trajectory of the dark gold beam extending from the void, and setting new coordinates for the jump landing point.

The Starry Ark once again entered a warp state, traveling upstream along the dark gold energy pillar.

After several jumps, the probe issued another warning, having discovered another "target world".

However, as the images became clearer, the atmosphere in the control room grew even more somber.

Another world was pierced by the same dark golden beam of light, the boundary energy was continuously draining away, and the world consciousness was silent, just like the previous world.

These two jet-gold beams of light, one thick and one thin, both came from the same direction.

Moran remained calm, simply giving the order again: "Continue forward."

As they ventured deeper, chilling sights began to appear one after another.

Similar worlds are becoming more and more numerous, like pearls strung on countless golden threads. In some places, the dark golden beams of light even connect two adjacent worlds at the same time.

At the moment the Ark emerged from the warp state after a warp, the detector captured a highly precise local image because the landing point was unusually close to a dark gold beam of light.

"Crack!" Suddenly, a sharp cracking sound rang out.

Moran kept the strange black pillar of light on his mind and stayed in the control room during this time.

Upon hearing the unusual warning from the clapper, she stood up abruptly and instantly teleported to the main control screen.

"You mean... there was someone in there just now?" Her voice was full of disbelief.

After understanding the urgent message that Kaba had conveyed through the Soul Fire, Moran personally retrieved all the footage captured by the detector in the previous three minutes and replayed it frame by frame at an extremely slow speed.

Her gaze was fixed on the image on the screen. As the surging torrent of dark golden energy grew larger on the screen, a blurry human figure actually flashed by!

"Stop!" Moran immediately paused the playback, locked the image to this frame, and kept zooming in.

The figure was extremely blurry, enveloped and washed by the violent flow of primal energy within the black gold pillar of light, making it difficult to discern details. However, the overall outline, including the head, torso, and limbs, was indeed remarkably similar to that of a human!

The fact that the dark golden pillar of light devoured the world's origin was already terrifying enough, but within this life-plundering passage, there were beings that appeared to be human?
Moran's doubts deepened, but the mysterious figure only appeared for a moment before disappearing completely into the surging torrent of dark golden energy. No matter how she replayed or magnified the image, she could not capture any more clues.

She knew perfectly well that there was no point in lingering there any longer.

"Continue forward." Moran suppressed his deep-seated doubts and ordered Kaba, "Proceed to the original plan, head straight for the source of this pillar of light." (End of Chapter)