Alien Hotel.

Chapter 683 The Shadow of Radiance
After the five-speed electric fan was removed from his arm, Yu Sheng did not hide the illusion he had seen in the chaos of the "border of death." He sat down and told the whole story of what he had just seen.

When Eileen was halfway through the conversation, she climbed over from her chair, sat cross-legged on the control panel in front of Yu Sheng, and listened with a serious expression, arms crossed.

The moment the little thing crawled over, Yu Sheng blocked the control panel signal—mainly because he was afraid that Eileen might slip and turn off the spaceship's stealth field.

Those who own cats should have experience in this area—those who don't own cats but have raised human children under four years old are probably similar.

“It does sound…very likely to be an illusion of the Gate of Eden,” the little puppet shook its head at the control panel. “That thing was modified using Boundary Bridge technology. You swallowed the original Boundary Bridge, so it’s not surprising that you saw that thing. The key is that Lightforged Giant…”

Eileen paused suddenly, her eyes sparkling as she looked at Yu Sheng: "Hey, is it a man or a woman?"

Yu Sheng, who was deep in thought with a serious expression, almost lost his composure when he heard the little puppet's question: "Wait, why are you concerned about this?"

"Just curious!" Eileen scooted forward. "We've encountered several Dark Angels that barely resembled humans, and this is the first one that actually looks human..."

Yu Sheng looked at the little doll in front of him with a subtle expression. He was about to remind her that she was still half-represented by the Goddess of Omens, but then he remembered the Goddess of Omens' eight long legs and the words he was about to say got stuck in his bronchus—well, she was right, none of the dark angels he had encountered actually looked human...

That is, excluding Hu Li, this special "visitor from another world".

"I can't tell its gender, it's just a ball of light, even its face is a thick layer of pixels, the resolution is terrible, similar to that living saint I met before," Yu Sheng said thoughtfully, stroking his chin, then added cautiously, "Well, actually, we can't really be sure what kind of origin that Lightforged Giant is..."

“Do you even need to think about it? There’s a 99% chance it’s the real form of that ‘Shadowless Skeleton,’ or at least its spirit form,” Eileen waved her hand. “They’ve already been tied to the Gate of Eden and had their blood drawn. Unless those charlatans can pull out a second Dark Angel from the oil paper package next to the Gate of Eden… well, that would be amazing.”

After a moment's thought, Yu Sheng nodded: "That's true."

At this moment, Luo, who had been hanging up on the communicator for a long time, looked up at Yu Sheng, then at Eileen, and finally couldn't help but speak up: "Um, boss, although I don't quite understand what you mean by 'Death Border,' you just mentioned... the 'Living Saint' guarding the star gate looks a lot like the giant you saw in the illusion?"

“Hmm,” Yu Sheng nodded, “The features are very obvious. I now suspect that the Hermitage’s ‘living saint’ was probably ‘manufactured’ in the shape of that giant… I had my suspicions when I first encountered that ‘living saint.’ No matter how I looked at it, it didn’t seem like something a normal creature could evolve. Moreover, it had that stiff, pseudo-human feel, similar to an artificial saintess. The more I looked at it, the more it seemed artificial…”

At this point, he quickly looked up and waved to Luna beside him, saying, "I wasn't talking about you."

“Yes, I know,” Luna smiled—though it was still that “saintly smile,” her expression was now as gentle as a living person’s. “I’m different now.”

“The Secret Order has always been keen on creating ‘perfect beings.’ Knights and saintesses are products of this idea, but no matter what, at least both of them are transformed from ‘humans,’” Luo said with a frown and a serious expression. “But to create a ‘living saint’ based on the ‘dark angel’ as a blueprint… is that really something that a mortal order could produce?”

Upon hearing this, Yu Sheng gradually realized what was going on, and his brows furrowed slightly: "You mean..."

“I’m not looking down on their technology—those charlatans may be obsessed, but I still acknowledge their 'synthetic human' technology,” Luo said, turning to the side in the projection, seemingly operating something on some device off-screen. “But using the 'corpse' of a Dark Angel to create this stable and controllable 'warrior' is a completely different concept from ordinary synthetic human technology. The first problem is—how can they ensure that they understand the 'knowledge' carried by the Dark Angel without going insane themselves?”

Yu Sheng didn't speak, but his brows furrowed more and more tightly.

Luo continued unhurriedly, "The charlatans of the Secret Order are still human at heart. They can be corrupted by angels, and their sanity can be damaged, leading to madness. And people who are mad cannot conduct precise research—overloaded 'knowledge' will not be transformed into controllable technology. It will only tear people's minds apart repeatedly in the cognitive confusion between the two worlds until they are destroyed. And from what we know so far, they have not made any more breakthroughs in this regard than I have."

"The technology they used to build the Gate of Eden was even stolen from me—and now the gate is about to go out of control. They have no other way but to steal the 'angelic catalyst' from the borderlands. What does that mean?"
"This shows that they have no ability to control the real 'angelic legacy'—even a 'corpse' like the Shadowless Skeleton. They are just using the simplest and most brutal method to extract energy from Him to maintain the gate."

Luo turned around, leaning slightly forward towards the projection. "That 'Living Saint' has a problem with his origins, a very serious problem," she said, her expression unusually grave. "Based on what you saw in the 'illusion,' Boss, the Living Saint is clearly closely related to the 'Shadowless Skeleton,' and they are also among the top combat forces of the Hidden Order… I sense something amiss here. You must be extremely careful after you reach the Holy Realm, especially be wary of that 'Shadowless Skeleton.' I suspect…"

Eileen stood up from the control panel: "Don't leave things unsaid, okay? What do you suspect?"

“…I suspect that the ‘Shadowless Skeleton’ is not just alive, but may have been ‘awake’ in some form from the very beginning,” Lo said slowly. “The Hermitage thought it was dead because it was lying motionless in the Adal Pit, but what if… ‘death’ is the normal operating mode of this angel?”
"To take it a step further, perhaps those 'living saints' are the result of the constant operation of the Shadowless Skeleton. The Hermitage believes that they found the giant's bone in the Adar Pit, but what if the truth is the opposite? That the Shadowless Skeleton actually found them—if that's the case, the Hermitage probably came into contact with the Skeleton's power long before the time they thought it was and was corrupted by the Dark Angels."

"After all, dark angels are all different—they can possess all sorts of characteristics and abilities."

The hall fell silent. Yu Sheng and the others exchanged glances, then Hu Li suddenly twitched his ears: "Wait, something's not right. If that's really the case, why is the Shadowless Skeleton tied to the gate by the Hermitage as fuel? Shouldn't He be the real one here..."

She stopped abruptly halfway through her sentence, as if she had suddenly thought of something.

Yu Sheng and Luo on the communicator said in unison, "What if this is what He wants?"

Even Eileen realized what was happening, and the little doll slowly widened its eyes: "My god, the ancestor of all dolls..."

“In short, things have become complicated,” Yu Sheng said as he slowly turned the Otherworld Hotel around. He activated the micro-warp engine in the concealment field and gradually accelerated into the dark depths of space. “Let’s leave here first. I’ll then notify the fleet on the border to prepare. Once that Dark Star Cruiser arrives at the Holy Land, we’ll begin the next step of our operation—and I also need to remind Baili Qing to be careful of that ‘living saint.’”

……

The Hermitage's home planet, a sacred realm.

A holy radiance surged within the cavity of the "Holy Furnace." This astonishingly large underground structure resembled a giant well capable of penetrating the earth's core, its depths unfathomable. Only a few faint, dark red molten lava lights slowly rippled in the darkness. Above it was a massive dome supported by a crisscrossing network of structural elements, with countless tiny "spirits of light" hovering and dancing near the dome, like a myriad of sparks.

At the center of the giant well, a massive anti-gravity field formed a faintly glowing "cage." A mysterious skeleton, hundreds of meters tall, was suspended upside down inside the cage, constantly emitting a faint glow that spread outwards like smoke and mist. Countless huge chains were wrapped around the skeleton, with the other end connecting to one hundred and twenty "energy-absorbing nodes" around the vertical well.

The light flowed around the skeleton, and from time to time, a hymn-like sound would appear out of nowhere. In the dim light, there always seemed to be some shadowy things that would slowly drift toward the well wall, but these "light and shadow" would be blocked by the light walls formed between the energy-absorbing nodes in the next second, and slowly decompose into blind light spirits, which would gradually rise to the dome and drift aimlessly before dissipating.

Grendel, in his wheelchair, drove along the ramp at the edge of the shaft with a mixture of tension and awe, trying to avoid looking directly at the "skeleton" hanging in the center of the shaft.

But his reverence was not for the upside-down angel, but for the Holy Throne that went before him.

“Gorendel, look at this magnificent scene,” the Holy See stopped and turned slightly to the person behind him, “Such a powerful being will also become the kindling for us to open the Gate of Eden—this glory belongs to each and every one of us.”

Grendel hurriedly lowered his head, his expression filled with joy and conviction: "Just as you said."

The Holy See laughed, seemingly just chatting casually with his followers behind him, before his gaze fell upon the angel hanging upside down in the well.

He stared directly at the skeleton, his smile as gentle as the surrounding light.

Two "living saints," brimming with energy, stood silently behind him as always, their holy wings fluttering slightly in the air, subtly echoing the radiance emanating from the upside-down angel.

(End of this chapter)