Chapter 1087: 575: Starry Sky's Intestine

Chapter 1087: Chapter 575: Starry Sky’s Intestine

The large-scale long-distance teleportation stargate base station in the Golden Disk River System, similar to those in the Sky Plate River System and Silver Disk River System, is located not far from the first floating land of the river system under the starry sky.

Three warships—one large and two smaller ones—flew directly toward the first floating land of the Golden Disk River System, also known as Golden Disk Floating Land, right after exiting the stargate base station.

Golden Disk Floating Land spans a diameter of more than twenty thousand light-years. Though there’s still some distance to reach the level of seventh-level peak floating lands, it is far superior to floating lands like Robber Star Floating Land and Dragon Spine Continent in terms of heritage and depth.

In the warship’s communications group chat, Song Wujiang was providing background information about the Golden Disk River System and the Tianqi Kingdom to Song Chi and Song Yan.

The Golden Disk River System was developed over forty-thousand years ago, and the Tianqi Kingdom, which dominates the entire system, was founded almost concurrently with its development. Because the Tianqi Kingdom has existed for over forty-thousand years, its strength far surpasses that of the Yaohan Kingdom.

Although the Golden Disk River System isn’t large, measuring only 1.2 million light-years in diameter and with an area even smaller than the current Yaohan Kingdom, the Tianqi Kingdom has accumulated unparalleled power through forty-thousand years of development.

As for the known immortal powers, the Tianqi Kingdom hosts as many as six such forces and holds five floating lands of seventh-level grade in its grasp.

Among them, the strongest entity in Tianqi, the royal Liang clan, has three star-annihilating starships at its disposal.

And remember—this is only what’s openly known. The hidden forces undoubtedly run deeper.

During their conversation, the three warships had entered the publicly accessible areas of Golden Disk Floating Land.

Led by Song Wujiang, the three headed straight for the public access zone’s Chigu City.

The grand auction was being held in this city.

“Ancestor, which force is behind this Chigu City?”

Song Yan asked.

“Chigu City was established twenty-thousand years ago by the Chigu Luo Family, which is also the power hosting the upcoming grand auction,”

Song Wujiang replied, seemingly aware of the two’s curiosity regarding the Chigu Luo Family, and proceeded to elaborate.

“The Chigu Luo Family inherits the legacy of the Chigu Behemoth. Twenty-five thousand years ago, a super-galactic prodigy emerged from their ranks, achieving the prestigious title of Annihilation Starship Captain in just over three thousand years.

It was during this golden age that the Chigu Luo Family became Tianqi Kingdom’s fourth immortal clan. However, their fortunes were short-lived. When that Annihilation Starship Captain undertook his first assignment as a stationed protector for the Immortal Qin Dynasty, he met with an untimely demise. Thus, after bearing the illustrious title of an immortal clan for barely three thousand years, the Luo Family’s status fell sharply, and they never regained their former glory.”

Hearing this, Song Chi’s thoughts churned before he asked a question.

“Did the captain lose his life due to a large-scale invasion of Eight-Armed Snake Demons?”

Seeing Song Wujiang shake his head outright, and understanding the matter might involve those “unspeakable incidents” the ancestor had previously mentioned, Song Chi refrained from probing further. Instead, he changed the subject:

“Ancestor, since stationed assignments are so dangerous, why not register only when the ten-thousand-year deadline approaches?”

Faced with his query, Song Wujiang appeared as if he had the answer ready in advance.

“It’s simple—the impending civilization war will soon begin. Such a massive conflict is unlikely to end quickly. During this period, assignments distributed for protection posts by the Torch Ancestral Court are bound to decrease substantially…”

Song Chi and Song Yan exchanged glances, each catching the fleeting surprise in the other’s eyes.

Evidently, neither had anticipated that the ancestor’s actions were aimed at exploiting a loophole.

Still, the trio didn’t harbor excessive optimism. After all, the personnel in the Torch Ancestral Court were certainly no fools; understanding the underlying dynamics was well within their grasp. In the follow-up stages of the civilization war, special assignments could very well be issued.

One thing was clear—this wasn’t an idea unique to Song Wujiang. Once news broke of a comprehensive war between two river-system communities, plenty of Torch Human Civilization’s Fearless Captains had already begun attempting to attain the rank of Annihilation Starship Captain. With such a surge in numbers, the chances of slipping through unnoticed increased correspondingly.

…

“The auction is still half a month away…”

Leaving the auction hall, Song Wujiang waved the extravagant entry token he had in hand.

After confirming his identity as an Annihilation Starship Captain, the auction’s official staff immediately granted him a top-tier token. With this token in hand, entering the auction with Song Chi and Song Yan would be a breeze.

At a nearby high-level Torch hotel, the trio successfully checked in. After exchanging brief greetings with his ancestor and Song Yan, Song Chi summoned the Heavenly Ruins Cang Qiong and took off toward Floating Land Firmament.

He planned to embark on an Alien Star Domain exploration.

Having not engaged in Alien Star Domain exploration for a considerable period, and with time left until the auction, he chose to conduct a trial run.

More precisely, he intended to use this opportunity to evaluate the Heavenly Ruins Cang Qiong’s current combat power.

With the Seed of Torch recently upgraded to gold, and various warship components enhanced to the eighth rank, Song Chi himself was unsure of the ship’s peak combat power. A practical test was deemed appropriate.

However, randomness in deployment can often introduce unpredictability; unfortunately, the ship’s teleportation did not land in a suitable star domain.

Nonetheless, Song Chi was in no rush to return. After confirming via the Sky Patrol Radar and Transit Star Map that no advanced floating lands existed in the area, he initiated “Red Vault Jump” using its miniature neutron star mode.

In just one jump, the Heavenly Ruins Cang Qiong arrived over six million light-years away.

…

“Still no mid- or high-rank floating lands…”

Looking at the radar map displayed on the Heavenly Eye component, Song Chi frowned and furrowed his brow.

If that remained the case, he might have no choice but to return to Golden Disk Floating Land.

The cooldown time for the “Red Vault Jump” feature was fixed at one year. Even with reductions from the Time Chess Board and Zen Seal: Inner Speed, it still required half a month to reset.

So Song Chi decided to wait for several minutes, since the “Transit Star Map Collector” feature of the Aurora Transition Device still needed some buffer time to generate the star map.

A few dozen minutes later, Song Chi shifted his gaze to the transit star map.

Compared to the detection range of the Heavenly Eye, this transit star map magnified the scope by over a hundred times, revealing numerous items absent from the Heavenly Eye radar.

A fourth-level floating land nearly a thousand light-years ahead…

Not far from it was a third-level floating land…

Despite the star map displaying more content, Song Chi’s expression remained grim; there were still no sixth-level floating lands visible.

“Forget it, I’ll return for now. Testing the ship’s combat power can wait until later…”

Making up his mind, Song Chi was about to use the spatial anchor point left behind at Golden Disk Floating Land for his return. But when his peripheral vision made one final sweep across the star map, an anomaly caught his attention.

“Wait a minute, this sector of the starry sky seems unusual…”

The transit star map revealed a peculiar vacuum zone.

If it were a regular vacuum area, it wouldn’t have seemed odd, as much of the Shattered Starry Sea consists of vacuum regions. However, this segment of the transit star map was different.

Typically, vacuum zones are sprawling expanses, but this particular area had fragments of floating land and small asteroids scattered around its periphery, while the central region was devoid of anything detectable.

Song Chi had a singular thought: this wasn’t a naturally formed vacuum area but more likely the result of an entity actively absorbing all detected signals from the jump device, thereby creating this anomaly.

Without hesitation, Song Chi halted his return to the ruins market, preparing to personally investigate the star domain.

Since the transit star map showed the anomaly was only a few hundred light-years away from the Heavenly Ruins Cang Qiong, reaching it with any of the two teleportation components would be child’s play without waiting for the “Red Vault Jump” cooldown.

Still, he refrained from initiating the jump right away and chose to wait.

The earlier “Red Vault Jump” had triggered the cooldown for the “Neutron Star Fission” feature, and Song Chi preferred to wait for that cooldown to conclude before advancing.

Although Zen Seal: Inner Speed could directly reset the cooldown, the seal itself required a substantial buffer. It wouldn’t immediately provide acceleration again upon use, so caution was warranted.

The star map suggested that the anomalous vacuum zone had significant dimensions. If it were truly a cosmic lifeform, its life rank wouldn’t be weak.

Several hours later, the “Neutron Star Fission” feature finished cooling down, and Song Chi wasted no time activating the Aurora Transition Device.

Once the jump completed its charge, the Heavenly Ruins Cang Qiong plunged into the violently oscillating spatial vortex.

Six hundred light-years away, the Heavenly Ruins Cang Qiong emerged from the jump channel, finding itself in pitch-black surroundings devoid of any other objects.

However, this didn’t imply an error in his initial judgment. This jump’s drop point wasn’t yet near the anomalous vacuum zone, still separated from it by several dozen light-years.

Within the main control room of the Heavenly Ruins Cang Qiong, Song Chi’s mental command activated the Heavenly Eye feature of the component “Heavenly Eye.”

A projection light screen slowly emerged in front of the central console.

Song Chi’s gaze locked onto the screen, and upon discerning its contents, his pupils suddenly contracted.

“What…what is this…”

Displayed on the projection screen was an enormous, bizarre entity suspended quietly in the starry void—a blood-red, worm-like structure over tens of thousands of kilometers long, pulsating eerily as its surface continuously writhed.

It had no visible root or stem and didn’t appear to belong to the category of starry sky plants, nor did it resemble starry sky behemoths in any conceivable way.

While Song Chi was struck by confusion, the Dome Sky Wisdom Brain rapidly projected an attribute light screen ahead.

Name: Starry Sky’s Intestine

Category: Special Cosmic Lifeform

Description: A unique cosmic lifeform. Some speculate it originates from the distant Multiverse Era, while others theorize it’s an accidental creation from the multiverse’s collapse. Despite varying theories, one common trait stands firm—it continuously absorbs various forms of cosmic energy to cultivate an array of exceedingly rare and extraordinary starry sky strange objects.