Those who face the wall, but are in the Nascent Soul stage.

Chapter 218 A Day Trip to the Giant Ring
Day 15 of the expeditionary fleet's voyage.

The fleet has arrived in Neptune's orbit.

Luo Qing, aboard the Paradox Engine, announced a temporary seclusion, politely declining the 'chatting-style harassment' from the fleet commander and Ding Yi, among others.

"It's already before the war, how could he still stay in seclusion?" Qian Mengjian asked.

“For cultivators, seclusion might be a good excuse. I suspect he simply doesn’t want to talk to us,” Ding Yi said confidently.

"Old Ding, you really understand the psychology of those who face the wall perfectly." Qian Mengjian gave Ding Yi a thumbs up.

Ding Yi shook his head and asked, "Has the advance fleet set sail yet?"

"After several days of discussions, the twelve advance warships have all been finalized, and they will soon enter the full-power propulsion state of [Advance 3]."

Shortly after Qian Mengjian finished speaking, among the originally neatly arranged 2500 gold and silver interwoven light spots, the 12 silver light spots located on both sides of the fleet suddenly became bright, and their brightness quickly reached several times that of the ordinary silver light spots. That was because these 12 star-class warships were accelerating.

About two hours after the silvery lights shone brightly, it was clearly visible on the fleet's overall radar map that the 12 lights had completely broken away from the original fleet formation. These 12 star-class warships formed a 3×4 flat formation and flew ahead towards the direction of the giant engulfing ring at 2% of the speed of light.

Natural Selection Star-class Warship, Wanhu Star-class Warship, Stardust Star-class Warship, Infinite Frontier Star-class Warship

USS Lexington (a star-class warship), USS Antarctica (a star-class warship), USS Faraway (a star-class warship), USS Einstein (a star-class warship)

The Misthorn-class stellar warship, the Aristotle-class stellar warship, the Greek-class stellar warship, and the Venus-class stellar warship
These three fleets, comprising a total of 12 star-class warships from Asia, the Americas, and Europe, form the vanguard of the fleet. They will clear away the obstacles set up by the Devouring Empire and pave the way for subsequent fleets.

However, these 12 star-class warships were unaware that a figure had already arrived near the Devouring Ring ahead of them.

"It's more like a gear than a tire."

Shanqing was completely hidden in the darkness, almost blending into the night. Looking at the giant spaceship in front of him, which was 5 kilometers in diameter and several times larger than the Earth, he couldn't help but sigh once again.

At this moment, Shan Qing is about 100 million kilometers away from the giant ring, which is three times the distance between the Earth and the Moon. When he looks at the giant ring, he feels a bit like he is looking at the Earth from the Moon. This is the first time he has seen such a giant creation of an unnatural celestial body up close.

Shanqing admired the mechanical giant wheel for a while, then transformed into an extremely faint blue light and continued to flee towards the giant ring at 10% of the speed of light.

IUD insertion!

Up to this point, none of the Devouring Empire's observation systems had detected Shan Qing's presence.

During the flight, Shan Qing had already passed the Devouring Ship Group. The massive Devouring Ship Group was starting to 'vibrate' from its earlier relative stillness. This uniform vibration quickly made Shan Qing realize a fact.

The dinosaurs' warships are also being mobilized.

Within his field of vision, he could already discern the specific shapes of those dinosaur warships and identify their corresponding models.

Those iron lumps that look like triangular blocks are Triangle Barrier-class defensive ships, those that look like coffins are Brachiosaurus-class motherships, and those that look like a Tyrannosaurus Rex head are Tyrant-class combat ships.

To Shan Qing's surprise, the movement of these warships was not limited to his vicinity. Under the influence of his divine sense, it seemed that the entire fleet system of the Devouring Empire had come to life.

This large-scale fleet mobilization made Shan Qing feel uneasy.

What are the dinosaurs up to? Humans only sent 2500 warships to harass them; how many fleets are the dinosaurs preparing to retaliate? Ten thousand? One hundred thousand? They couldn't possibly send out nearly a million ships, could they?

Is this how wars are fought?
In terms of fleet size alone, even if the human side's 2500 advance fleet used up all their star-type hydrogen bombs and electromagnetic kinetic energy cannons, they could only cause very minor damage to the massive dinosaur fleet.

Shan Qing was somewhat worried. He flipped his right hand, and a dark metal longsword appeared in his hand. It was a high-grade spiritual weapon, but among the current spiritual swords, it was considered to be the one with the worst aptitude.

The biggest advantage of this sword is that its attack effect doesn't have any fancy light effects, making it more suitable for the dark background of the universe.

Carrying the dark sword, Shan Qing concealed himself and continued flying towards the giant ring.

Along the way, he even crashed into a triangular fortress-class defensive ship. Shan Qing flashed away with his sword, completely piercing through the solid, pyramid-sized iron triangle, instantly turning the pilot, Dinosaur, into dust as well.

Having lost its pilot, the dinosaur, the Triangle Barrier-class defensive ship flew along its predetermined trajectory toward the sparse universe. Although the dinosaurs had a large number of warships, they were still not many in this sparse space. It would be good if there was one dinosaur warship per 10 cubic kilometers.

As for the Devouring Empire, they naturally didn't pay much attention to the out-of-control triangular ship. While the dinosaur warships were gathering, Shan Qing spent half an hour reducing the distance between himself and the Devouring Giant Ring from 100 million kilometers to 1000 kilometers. When he solidified back into a physical form from the escape light, the scene that came into view made his pupils shrink slightly.

1000 kilometers is really too short.

He got so close that he could no longer see the entire giant ring.

Although he was mentally prepared for the world created by dinosaurs, he was still deeply shocked when he saw the giant ring that stretched across the universe, which was neither star nor sea, neither celestial body nor sky.

"I admit, these lizards are really... amazing."

Looking at the giant ring before him, which could not be described as a "mountain range" or a "continent," Shan Qing sighed. His previously contracted divine sense surged forth again like a tide. There was no energy shield on the surface of the giant ring as Shan Qing had anticipated, but there was indeed a ring-shaped atmosphere at a height of about 100 kilometers above the surface of the giant ring.

According to the analysis of the basic particles by divine sense, the main composition of these atmospheres is quite similar to that of Earth's atmosphere, except that the oxygen content is higher.

"Let's see if we can kidnap the emperor of the Devouring Empire. This giant ring, even if we bombed it with all the stellar-level hydrogen bombs, we probably wouldn't be able to destroy it." Shan Qing made a hand seal, and a hazy blue aura rose around his body. This aura completely distorted the surrounding light, creating a completely invisible effect.

Soon, 1000 kilometers passed in the blink of an eye.

From the outer side to the inner side of the giant ring, there are also similar mountain ranges. The width of these mountain ranges is comparable to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau on Earth. Based on the rotation speed of the giant ring, Shan Qing also calculated that the linear velocity of the giant ring's rotation is much faster than the linear velocity of the Earth's equator. According to the feedback from his divine sense, dinosaurs mainly lived in the inner ring. The centrifugal force generated when the inner ring rotates can also simulate the effect of gravity, which is approximately equivalent to one G.

The Devouring Empire is, after all, a civilization that originated on Earth, and its customs in all aspects have been preserved from the Earth era, unchanged even after 6500 million years.

However, the mountains and rivers before him were not purely natural. The thickness of the strata of these mountains and rivers would not exceed 1 meters. Below that 1 meters, there was still the essential structure of the giant ring, which was entirely composed of metal. Divine senses could vaguely see countless energy-generating points of nuclear fusion flowing within the inner ring walls.

Through the gaps in the walls, he saw... a dinosaur city.

The area of ​​a dinosaur city is almost equivalent to that of a human provincial-level administrative region.

Even a modified stellar-type hydrogen bomb wouldn't be able to penetrate the 10,000-meter-long simulated natural soil layer of the inner ring. It could probably destroy the dinosaur city, but that would only be enough to destroy the city. A hydrogen bomb alone wouldn't be able to cause devastating damage to the giant ring.

This is similar to bombing the Earth with nuclear bombs. Unless all 50 of humanity's stellar hydrogen bombs are focused on a single connection point in the giant ring, it would be possible to consider breaking the ring at its weakest point—after all, the giant ring's structure is hollow and cannot be as strong as a planet.

But it only breaks through; it cannot be completely destroyed.

Shanqing began to think about humanity's backup strategy—using the moon as a last resort.

Indeed, at this stage, only celestial bodies of similar size could effectively damage the giant ring.

At least Shan Qing couldn't imagine how he would destroy the giant ring; it was just too big.

But the moon is indeed quite precious. Are there any cheap alternatives? Like, what about throwing Pluto at it?

However, the lack of planetary engines on Pluto presents another problem.

You can't exactly swing it with your bare hands, can you?

That won't do. I am a sword cultivator, a refined cultivator. I cannot do such a crude thing.

While Shan Qing was thinking, he deactivated his invisibility spell and gently landed in the inner ring. He landed on a grassland, which was almost indistinguishable from the surface of a planet. The sky was azure. If there was any difference, it was that one could vaguely see the undulating curve of the earth when looking up.

Unlike the convex shape of the earth, the ground here gradually rises upwards, forming a concave shape. The surface extends to both sides, gradually curving in the field of vision, disappearing into the clouds due to atmospheric refraction. If you continue to look up, at the edge of the azure sky, you can vaguely see a broad ring.

Because the diameter of the giant ring far exceeds the sensory experience of ordinary humans, such a sight is unheard of even in the cultivation world. This curvature gives Shan Qing an illusion of "heaven and earth being upside down"—looking up, the "sky" on the other side is not nothingness, but rather the inner surface of another part of the giant ring, also covered with buildings and natural mountains and rivers, forming a ring-shaped universe that connects end to end. The mountains, cities, and rivers hanging overhead are faintly visible under the blue sky.

This world is so interesting! Shanqing suddenly had the idea of ​​taking the entire giant ring for himself.

If this were crafted into a magical artifact, cultivators could simply throw the entire giant ring out during combat.

How cool.

Yes, an unclaimed treasure belongs to the virtuous; this item rightfully belongs to me.

(End of this chapter)