Chapter 411 - 374: Indescribable

Chapter 411: Chapter 374: Indescribable

Aboard Dream Ship One.

Wei Xuan watched Robert, who sat with his back to him at the end of the corridor. An irrepressible panic began to spread through him.

The man was dripping blood, and it clearly wasn’t his own—the number "22" floating above his head, indicating his score, was particularly jarring.

Wei Xuan remembered it clearly. There were two manned rockets. The Soloma Empire had a crew of fourteen. All fourteen had later entered a state of acute distress after being exposed to an unknown stimulus and were transferred to Dream Ship One.

Dream Ship One originally had a crew of fifteen. Six of them, including Wei Xuan, chose to stay and continue the mission. The other nine were returning home with the fourteen crew members in distress. Nine plus fourteen made exactly twenty-three people.

Now, Robert had twenty-two points. Wei Xuan didn’t have to think twice about what that meant.

"You killed them all!"

Wei Xuan roared in fury, his hand reaching for his waist.

Ground control had informed him earlier that a malicious incident might have occurred on Dream Ship One. Since he had chosen to come alone, he had naturally brought a lethal weapon.

SHICK!

Wei Xuan drew a special-issue, high-powered pistol and aimed it at Robert’s back.

"What the hell happened? Robert! Why did you— Don’t you dare move, or I’ll shoot you dead on the spot!"

As he verbally warned Robert, he tried to use his personal communication device to contact the Imperial Pioneers and ground command.

But no matter how many times he tried to call, the only response from the communicator was a heart-chilling static.

"It’s no use," Robert’s voice rang out. "Your signal can’t get through."

"Damn it! What the hell is going on?!"

The moment the words left Wei Xuan’s mouth, he saw Robert stand up.

He tensed instantly. "Don’t move! Get on the ground!"

"Don’t you understand yet, Wei Xuan?"

Robert turned around. The moment Wei Xuan saw his face, he froze, the blood in his veins seeming to turn to ice.

He couldn’t even describe what had become of Robert’s face. It wasn’t a human face at all, but a layered stack of misplaced facial features, like a monster from a child’s drawing, sketched with an unsteady hand.

On that face, he could even see the features of his own crewmates. It made him wonder if the thing before him was really Robert, if he was hallucinating, or if this was all just an illusory nightmare.

’Could the reality be that I already died on Terra Star, or was lost in space?’

"You’re being too optimistic."

Robert’s stiff voice broke Wei Xuan out of his trance.

"At a time like this, death would be a gift from the heavens."

"AHHH—!"

BANG BANG BANG! BANG BANG BANG!

Snapping back to his senses, Wei Xuan completely lost control. Screaming, he repeatedly pulled the trigger, frantically firing at Robert at the end of the corridor.

The special, high-powered bullets tore through Robert’s body, yet he didn’t fall. Instead, he started walking forward, one step at a time.

"Wei Xuan, you should come and see it too."

"What are you say—?"

While Wei Xuan was still reeling in shock that Robert hadn’t fallen after being shot multiple times, the man lunged at him. The several pairs of eyes on his face met Wei Xuan’s gaze.

In that instant, countless unnamable, terrifying images flooded Wei Xuan’s mind. He saw things that were utterly indescribable. All his deepest fears surged forth at once, piling on top of each other, as if mocking his ignorance and frailty.

On the verge of a total mental collapse, he finally understood why the astronauts of the Imperial Pioneers had worn those expressions, why they had been so frenzied in the video... This was something the fragile human mind was never meant to bear.

In that moment, he knew Robert was right. He shouldn’t have come here; he regretted everything. Compared to this agony, death truly was a gift from the heavens.

Robert looked at Wei Xuan—eyes wide, mouth agape, completely lost in a catatonic state of shock. A flicker of pity unexpectedly crossed one of the eyes on his face.

He clutched his head and fell to his knees in agony. "No... No, no! I can’t listen to you anymore... If I send a distress signal, even more people will die! Why did you choose me? I’m begging you... kill me!"

...

"...We deeply mourn the passing of twenty-three outstanding astronauts. They were heroes who made a great contribution to humanity. Mankind will not forget them, nor will we abandon our exploration of Terra Star and our efforts toward space colonization because of this setback."

That evening, at a joint press conference held by North Star and Soloma, everyone wore exceptionally grim expressions.

"...As for the five remaining astronauts, we will ensure their safe return. A follow-up investigation into this tragic loss will be launched as soon as possible, and the results will be announced to the public once they are available."

The spokesperson’s words were not only difficult for many in the audience to accept, but they also felt like a stunning blow to every viewer watching the live broadcast, leaving them with a bitter taste.

Guan Tong was one of them.

He was watching the live broadcast. Of the twenty-eight astronauts on the two manned rockets, twenty-three had died in just a few days, leaving only five survivors. It was simply outrageous.

But what was even more outrageous was that the space agencies of both nations claimed to not know how the astronauts had died, and they were vague about what had happened on Terra Star.

’Is it that they can’t say, or that they don’t know?’

As someone who had been following the plan to establish a survival base on Terra closely, Guan Tong was just as confused as everyone else.

In the live stream’s chat, many comments expressed their disbelief.

"Is Terra Star really that dangerous?!"

"Didn’t humans land on Terra Star a long time ago? How come nothing happened that time?"

"I remember the space agency has sent so many probes to that moon of Tianshui. If it was dangerous, why was nothing ever detected?"

"Don’t tell me the Fire Thief was behind this..."

"I think it’s the Fire Thief too! That bastard definitely doesn’t want humanity’s space colonization to succeed, or there’d be no one left to play by the rules it set!"

Many viewers pointed the finger at the Fire Thief, and Guan Tong also felt it might be related. If this incident wasn’t thoroughly investigated, the consequences would be immense. Humanity’s two parallel development strategies, "space colonization" and "digital life," would have to be cut down to one.

Even without the Fire Thief or the Apocalypse Rules, humanity would never be content to be trapped on a single planet forever.

’They’ll probably launch more rockets later... but after such a tragic loss of life, future crews might consist mainly of Intelligent Robots.’

Guan Tong mused, wondering if Soloma’s advanced Intelligent Robots could handle the complex environment of space.

He glanced out the window. The sky had grown dim.

’Time to get something to eat, and then I need to get to work.’

He closed the live stream and was about to put his phone away when a message came in.

Shi Jingyi: "I have some important news. I’ll send it to you on Ascender’s Home."

Seeing the message from Shi Jingyi, Guan Tong immediately grew serious.

Ascender’s Home was considered unhackable, so it served as a secure communication channel. Many people who didn’t have—or didn’t want to use—a [Communication Secret Scroll] used the site’s private messaging as an alternative.

For Shi Jingyi to have news that she couldn’t relay via text or a phone call, and had to be sent through an encrypted channel, meant it must be extremely important.

He immediately replied, "Okay, got it."

He logged into his account on Ascender’s Home and waited. A moment later, a message from Shi Jingyi arrived.

Guan Tong’s pupils contracted violently as he read the contents. He was shaken to his core.

"To think... it’s like this..."