Transform into a human

Xia Du tossed his hair and said casually:

"Is that the White Streak in the Waves? The effect shouldn't be this strong. I've never heard of anyone's White Streak in the Waves being able to mask even sound."

Yue Lai straightened his collar, pretending nothing had happened.

"The prodigal son's methods all come from the siren, and I have obtained a bit of the siren queen's divine power."

Xia Du thought he had misheard, and his eyes widened:

"What did you say? God, divine authority!?"

Yue Lai slightly raised his chin: "It's just a little bit of divine authority. An old acquaintance was overjoyed to see me and insisted on giving it to me, so I couldn't refuse."

"From now on, on the path of the prodigal son, I can not only ignore the 60% weakening, but I will also be a step stronger than the average prodigal son."

Xia Du glanced over:

"The buttons are on wrong."

Yue Lai calmly unfastened and refastened it, but his mind was a complete mess.

How can someone resort to sneak attacks!

Little did they know that Xia Du was also feigning composure and could only change the subject:

"By the way, how did you get here?"

At this moment, the police have discovered that Xia Du has disappeared. A large number of police officers have entered "Blue Broom" and begun a carpet search. They are visibly furious.

"A random piece that landed earlier happens to be nearby, hidden on a small asteroid not far away."

The "idle" that Yue Lai mentioned is none other than the Golden Flying Thief!

Downton was also unlucky. After escaping from Prison Fourteen, he and Kerr wanted to go far away, but they underestimated the security of the Federation. The police patrols on all routes were around the clock, forcing them to hide in the asteroid belt near the police headquarters.

Unlike Ji Yungui's Homecoming Ship, the Golden Thief was designed specifically for war.

To their utter surprise, even in their current state of destitution, they were still being targeted. After receiving Xia Du's distress signal, Yue Lai discovered that she was also fleeing towards the asteroid belt, and immediately moved to the Golden Thief.

Downton was still pondering that "pre-made face" when it suddenly turned into a living person, almost scaring him to death.

After a brief explanation, Yue Lai, still somewhat shaken, said with lingering fear:

"Fortunately, that wisp of divine authority enhanced my spatial abilities in all my disciplines; otherwise, at such a great distance, I could only sense and locate, and it would have been impossible for me to swap positions."

"Don't take such risks again, Xia Du."

Xia Du felt a sweet warmth inside, but she curled her lips in disgust on her face:

"None of your business..."

"So what's the point of your black and white murder scheme? It said it would let me do whatever I wanted, but after all that effort, it hasn't helped the case at all."

"That's exactly what I was going to say," Yue Lai shook his head, "Since fate has arranged for us to meet, it must mean that you have already made a breakthrough, and we now need to cooperate to advance the game."

"How come he's even more of a charlatan than me..." Xia Du complained while recalling his experiences over the past few days.

"There aren't any clues either. Lately, all I've been doing is fighting with my old nemesis..." The voice trailed off.

"You've figured it out?"

Xia Du fumbled around in front of his chest for a while and pulled out a black staff. Yue Lai's gaze sharpened.

"I guess even Principal Tang himself didn't expect that he would actually find this lost evil relic just by mentioning it casually."

"An evil relic!"

Xia Du was startled and quickly threw the staff into Yue Lai's hands.

"Don't worry, the necklace I gave you can protect you from most evil artifacts. Otherwise, how could you still be perfectly fine?"

Yue Lai carefully examined the staff. The staff's shaft resembled a dark spine, covered with fine, reversed scales. At the staff's head, a Qilin lowered its head and closed its eyes, its entire body a deep, somber black, with only a faint light flowing between its teeth, as if a living creature were dormant.

He felt a deep sense of joy.

Not every evil relic is qualified to be displayed in a history museum. They must represent a specific historical period, such as this Qilin Staff from the Dark Ages.

The Dark Ages refer to the approximately one thousand years before humanity entered the Star Sea. Although human society had entered the information age, it was extremely chaotic. Prolonged internal strife caused humanity to fall into a population trap on three home planets almost simultaneously, and many tragedies that occurred during this period are still difficult to recall today.

The root of all this lies in the fact that the original technology suddenly entered a dead end, turning into a series of dead-end roads, as if an invisible hand was forcing humanity to switch to a different technology tree.

It wasn't until the breakthrough in tear stone technology ushered in a new era that humanity finally emerged from that period of decline.

This Dark Age Kirin Staff comes from that period and is a relic extracted from one of the earliest human beings. Its effect is simple and brutal: it causes the opponent to explode from the inside out through a medium similar to blood, which can be said to perfectly match Malfoy's death.

But why has it fallen into his hands now?

Just as he was pondering, Xia Du asked curiously:

What are its side effects?

These things are all documented in the museum, so Yue Lai naturally knows them:

"After use, it will pull the holder into an illusion, which is based on random events from the Dark Ages. If you die in the illusion, you are truly dead."

Xia Du, however, did not continue discussing the characteristics of the relics, but instead changed the subject:

"Instead of wondering why the staff ended up in your hands, you should go back to the source and ask how it ended up in the hands of its previous owner."

"It seems you already have the answer, Ms. Xia Du."

Xia Du slightly raised his chin:

"It was a message sent secretly by Angelo's former colleague... Don't worry about who Angelo is, the source must be very reliable."

"This evil relic was obtained from a regional bishop of the Papacy named Sheva. The police just found some letters in his home that corresponded with the Dark Cloud District. The staff may have come from those pirates."

Although the Uranus system, or central system, is just a small star system with fourteen planets, it is still about 300 billion kilometers from the Sun to the outermost Eisfriable planet. If we calculate its gravitational range, it reaches an astonishing 60 trillion kilometers or more, which is close to 7 light-years.

How exaggerated is this scale? Based on this, for every centimeter increase in radius, the volume of the central galaxy would increase by approximately 5000 billion times that of the Sigmund galaxy.

Clearly, even the federal military could not completely control this area, so Esfri also had another name—the frontier of civilization.

Further out of Esfri, the areas outside of federal control are what Xia Du calls the "Dark Cloud Zone," filled with various gas clouds, water, and cosmic dust. This is why the Celestial Stable appears "dimly lit" when observed from neighboring galaxies.

Naturally, these places became the bases where pirates had long been based, or the final destinations for heroes to flee to. One of the most important tasks of the Central Fleet stationed on the outskirts of the star system was to regularly wipe them out.

Dark Cloud District, Taoyuan Fortress.

Since receiving the commission from "Mysterious Constellation", Zara's life has become rather aimless. The crew often sees her standing alone on the bridge, sometimes for a whole day, and she always asks the crew one question: "What do you want to do?"

The major must be possessed!

In the military, these strange symptoms mostly stem from failing to follow standard containment procedures during clearance missions and illegally coming into contact with a certain evil relic, which is literally "possessed by an evil spirit."

When Captain Keating arrived at the bridge and saw Zara with a blank stare, he shuddered. Heaven knows how many times he had been asked "What do you want to do most?" these past few days!

He had initially admired Zara, and when he was first asked a question, he naively thought that the captain had noticed his feelings and was hinting that he should confess.

As the number of questions he received increased, his suspicions gradually shifted to "Is Zara pondering some philosophical question?" and "The captain must have a deeper meaning in asking this question." In the end, his suspicions became "We haven't contained any evil relics recently?" and "The major must be possessed!"

Little did she know, Zara was simply pondering Yue Lai's words, "Go to the police headquarters and do what you want to do." If a friend asked her what she most wanted to do, Zara would answer without hesitation that she most wanted a promotion. Once she became a colonel, she could finally put her boots on the face of the commander of the Taoyuan Operations Group!

But how could that being who seems to be a star spirit give such a casual task? There must be something she hasn't figured out!

When she was a child, she read a myth outside her department. There was a monkey who became an apprentice. His master gently tapped him on the head three times, and the monkey understood that it meant "go find him in the middle of the night." Only then did he learn all sorts of incredible supernatural powers.

In her view, she is currently experiencing such a moment!

As long as you can understand the profound meaning of that important figure, you can cling to his coattails and your path of cultivation will be smooth sailing.

She had replayed the scene from that day countless times in her mind, hoping to gain some inspiration from it. The vast chessboard, the chessboard's layout like rivers, the chess box standing like a towering mountain...

But I still had no clue.

Under the captain's chilling gaze, Keating nervously took the file bag. Fortunately, Zara didn't intend to give him a "death interrogation" this time, because she had received some extremely shocking news.

"The Great Calamity of the Warning Hub: Half the planet briefly fell? Even Chi Xin didn't have time to act!"

"In less than a month, the Siren God's Authority, which was being held captive by the Police Headquarters, has escaped twice. This is abnormal, extremely abnormal!"

Since that important figure could easily pull out a secret document from the Prodigal Son to "cultivate" his juniors, he is most likely a star of the Prodigal Son's lineage. Thinking about it this way... could the turmoil in the police headquarters be related to him?

Thinking about it more deeply, could the upheaval in divine authority be the result of someone's intention to ascend to the divine throne, thus stirring up a storm?

Thinking of this, Zara felt a surge of excitement, as if she were standing on the crest of a wave of the times, and she actually had the opportunity to participate in such a world-changing event!

"Damn it, if only I could head to the police headquarters right now!"

Unfortunately, Lieutenant Colonel Jin Ci, the commander of the Taoyuan combat group, has been delaying in approving her leave!

This is why she has become increasingly anxious recently, and her subordinates treat her like a snake... If that important person hadn't made any "urging" moves on the Chain Crystal Network, she would have wanted to command the "Silver Guardian" to blast Jin Ci's head to smithereens!

Just then, she received an emergency combat order.

"Clearing out the pirates in Sector 56?" Zara frowned. "Wasn't this area just cleared out last month...?"

"Is this a joint operation by the entire Taoyuan combat group? Is such a large-scale operation really necessary?"

……

……

"Found them, that group of pirates is in sector 56."

Xia Du and Yue Lai have returned to the Golden Flying Thief. The former is very satisfied with the luxurious racing airship, and it has been a while since she has raced through the stars.

As for the original owners of the spaceship, Downton and Kerr... they were still drooling over it!

"The ship is a good ship, but have you considered how we're going to get to the Dark Cloud District? This ship's code should be on the blacklist by now."

"I'll put in a word with Principal Tang; it's no big deal for the Imperial Department."

"Tsk tsk tsk, Imperial faction..." Xia Du really didn't expect that he would be associated with such a behemoth one day. What is this, an Imperial lackey?

"If only the Homecoming train were still around, Mo said it's really fun to drive."

Mentioning Yue Lai inevitably brings to mind the old man who built the ship for him, and his promise to Li.

His voice lowered slightly: "There will be an opportunity."

……

……

Several days later, in the Dark Cloud District, Sector Fifty-Six.

The "Bastard Fortress" was pieced together from the debris of three asteroids and countless pieces of ship scrap, and its structure was marked with the word "awkward" everywhere. Various spaceships were densely docked on the pier, each bearing obvious signs of illegal modification.

The building's surface is covered with exposed metal plates of various materials, the seams gleaming with rough welding marks. The gas valves open and close intermittently, the leaking gas condensing briefly into white mist in the vacuum.

The bartender, his mechanical eye scanning the room, fled in panic. Two engineers argued over ownership of an energy conduit, tools strewn across the floor. In the shadows, a figure clad in old-fashioned steam armor quietly repaired his left arm, synthetic fluid dripping at a steady rhythm onto the joint.

"Pfft—"

The airtight door slowly opened, and three men and one woman walked into the bar.

The two leading figures were naturally Yue Lai and Xia Du, followed by Tang Dun with his clear eyes and the curious Ke Er. Although Tang Dun was an unreasonablely strong barbarian disciple, he was only a third-level disciple after all. Yue Lai, on the other hand, possessed an evil heart and a trace of sea monster divine power, so beating him could only be described as "bullying".

Downton at least had some training in the university's hobby club, while Kerr had absolutely no combat experience; in a fight, he would be nothing more than a plaything for Xia Du.

You can't blame him for that; before this, the most frequent use of his scumbag skills was to amuse Downton Abbey...

Ultimately, the two decided to temporarily submit to the despicable couple. Of course, the most important reason was that Yue Lai had connections to leave the central star system, and the two of them alone could not escape to the Dark Cloud Zone.

The price they paid was that they each had to taste Yue Lai's saliva.

A true man can bend and stretch; today's grudge will be repaid a hundredfold in the future...

"Oh, a new customer." The one-eyed bartender didn't smile, not even a hint of a smile—because his face was entirely made of mechanical structures.

Yue Lai sat down at the bar: "Boss, the name of your bar is quite unique."

"You mean run away with your tail between your legs?"

He pointed slightly at Kerr, who had somehow turned into a large rat.

"It's just the literal meaning."