Chapter 689: Terror

Chapter 689: Terror

Varak stood motionless in place, yet the eight crystalline eyes on his canopy still held the images from several seconds ago.

His colleague.

That old officer who had personally torn apart enemy armored beasts during three border wars.

In the instant he lunged at the “bipedal creature,” he had been frozen solid.

Completely unable to understand what had happened. The other party seemed to have used nothing more than a single glance to still everything.

That officer remained suspended in midair in his pouncing posture, even the venom flung from the tips of his tentacles frozen into motionless droplets.

After two black giants walked in, they carried the “sculpture” out like warehouse cargo.

The entire process felt so natural and logical that it made Varak’s tentacles go numb.

Varak glanced down. The silver-gray color at the tips of his tentacles still hadn’t returned, and the patterns on his bark continued to tremble faintly—a physiological reaction caused by overwhelming tension.

At that moment, a tall shadow stopped in front of him.

It was a black giant priest.

The other party’s elongated body blocked part of the cold blue lighting. The vertical slit-like mouthpart in the center of his chest opened and closed slightly, emitting a low vibration. Varak instinctively looked up, locking all eight crystalline eyes onto him.

“Move.”

The black giant priest spoke in the Tentacle Tree language.

Several black giants stood behind him like black city walls.

Especially after personally experiencing the black giants’ combat power, the oppressive feeling they gave off was far more real than warship cannons.

Having witnessed the inexplicable time stop earlier, the Tentacle Trees had no intention of resisting. They followed the black giant priest out of the laboratory. The corridor was quiet.

The light emanating from the walls was soft and stable. There were no exposed energy conduits, nor did it appear to have any complex mechanical structures.

Yet the more it was like this, the more uneasy Varak felt.

Because he couldn’t understand any of it.

His tentacles unconsciously brushed across the wall.

The miniature detectors in his wrist device immediately went into a frenzy.

Unknown minerals.

Unknown energy structures.

Unknown stabilization fields…

Countless red “Unable to Analyze” characters kept scrolling across the screen.

Varak’s canopy slowly tightened.

When they reached the corner, he saw black giants lined up on both sides.

An entire row of several-dozen-meter-tall black giants stood there silently, like statues cast from black steel.

At the same time, the energy detector on his wrist suddenly began vibrating.

Beep.

Level Five.

Beep.

Level Five.

Beep.

Still Level Five.

One reading after another popped up.

Varak’s footsteps unconsciously slowed, the light in his crystalline eyes contracting slightly.

Suddenly, another reading appeared.

【Exceeds Measurement Range】

The wrist device flashed violently.

The characters blinked three times before stopping on a glaring red line.

“Detection target exceeds current measurement limit.”

Varak’s tentacles stiffened instantly. He slowly raised his head and looked toward the end of the corridor.

The corridor seemed to connect to a large hall, and standing at the exit were two hundred-meter-tall black giants!

Sixth level!

Definitely sixth level!

And beings like this… were merely standing guard here?!

Varak suddenly felt his canopy grow heavy.

He recalled the fleet’s initial expedition report.

【Target Civilization: Primitive Level】

【Recommendation: Suitable for Conquest】

What the hell was primitive about this?

His tentacles began to tremble lightly.

If more than twenty fifth-level and several sixth-level beings were merely corridor sentries…

Then what had those “fierce battles” they fought in the void even counted as?

Looking back now, Varak finally understood.

Their entire expedition fleet… had merely been experimental material for the master of this world.

At the end of the corridor, the black giant priest submitted a teleportation request to the sixth-level black giant guards stationed there.

Watching his several-hundred-meter-tall kin operate on the massive display screen beside him, the black giant priest’s thoughts drifted elsewhere.

He felt that Master’s palace and laboratory needed further expansion.

He hadn’t noticed it while walking over earlier, but now it seemed that using only fifth-level black giants because the corridors were too low really and damaged Master’s dignity…

Moments later, the request was approved. The teleportation array in the hall emitted a soft white light.

Seeing this scene, Varak paused for an instant.

The black giants behind him did not urge him.

But that silence felt even more suffocating than any urging.

Finally, Varak stepped forward.

Buzz…

Space began to distort.

The next second, the light faded.

Varak stared at the scene before him, stunned.

The sulfur-colored sky above was gone.

In its place was a warm, slightly orange sun.

Wind blew across the plains.

In the distance, a river gurgled, and large patches of yellow-green vegetation swayed in the breeze.

“Sp… spatial teleportation?!”

If he weren’t afraid to speak, Varak felt his voice might have warped badly.

He cautiously stepped on the grass beside him, confirming it was real.

No matter how he looked at it, the surroundings didn’t seem like an illusion.

But they had clearly been indoors just moments ago…

He turned back to look at his equally shocked clansmen. Feeling that familiar spatial dizziness, there was no doubt—they had indeed undergone spatial teleportation!

In Tentacle Tree civilization, only flagship-class warships had sufficient power and energy sources to perform spatial teleportation, and the teleportation devices themselves were larger than the hall they had just been in!

This technology…

“This will be the place where you live for the next period of time,” the black giant priest’s voice came from the side.

Varak instinctively looked at his wrist device.

Environmental scanning began fluctuating wildly, clearly still unable to gather specific data from the sudden environmental shift.

But Varak had already recalled it. This should be another region of this world.

Recalling the warship’s earlier scan results, Varak cautiously turned toward the black giant priest.

“My lord…”

The tips of his tentacles curved into a respectful arc.

“The environment here… is not suitable for our race’s long-term survival.”

“Oxygen is too low, nitrogen is too high, and it lacks…”

The priest said nothing. He simply reached out and abruptly ripped off the life-support system attached to Varak’s body.

Snap!

The device smashed onto the ground.

Varak and the other Tentacle Trees were so frightened by the sudden action that their tentacles waved wildly, their crystalline eyes filled with terror.

Without the life-support system, in this environment, he wouldn’t survive more than a few…

Air rushed into his breathing pores.

Warm.

Moist.

Carrying a certain familiar scent that blanked out his mind.

His movements froze.

At this moment, his wrist device finally refreshed its data.

The scan showed extremely high oxygen concentration, low nitrogen content, and more importantly, the air contained 0.3% of special aromatic hydrocarbons. Varak’s eight crystalline eyes widened simultaneously.

This ratio…

It was completely identical to the air composition of the northern temperate zone of Harowen Prime during spring!

The priest withdrew his hand, his tone indifferent:

“The environment here has already been modified. You no longer need life-support systems.”

Varak lowered his head to look at the wreckage of the life-support device on the ground, then slowly raised it again to gaze at the sky.

At this moment.

Varak felt even greater terror than when he had faced the time stop earlier.

Because although time stop was terrifying, it could at least be understood as “some kind of ultra-high-tier weapon.”

But now…

The other party could actually replicate the spring air of their home planet on an alien world.

And it was done in batches.

This was no longer a difference in strength. This was a difference in civilization level!

So vast that they couldn’t even imagine the other party’s upper limits.

After the brief chaos, subsequent captives were teleported over one after another. Large numbers of Tentacle Trees stumbled out of the white light.

Some still maintained the terrified postures from when they were captured.

Others let out short, sharp cries after discovering their life-support systems had been removed.

However, under Varak’s calming influence, they quickly settled down.

A few young Tentacle Trees even squatted down, using their tentacles to dig into the soil for testing.

In the end, they stared blankly at the results.

“Trace elements in the soil…”

“Identical to the agricultural zones on the home planet…”

“How is this possible?!!”

A young technician’s voice trembled.

Seeing this, Varak sighed beside him and forced himself to calm down.

He was the fleet commander.

The fleet was finished, but at the very least, he still needed to maintain order.

“Everyone, fall in!”

He issued the command. “Assemble according to original formations. Logistics team, check the wounded. Technical officers, tally equipment losses. Other units divide into groups according to the fleet roster. One group search for food, the other collect tools and materials. We need to build a camp before nightfall…”

The familiar commands finally helped the crew regain some composure.

At least… someone was still directing them.

Varak lowered his vibration frequency and added, “Do not lower your guard.”

However.

The moment his words fell, the teleportation array lit up again.

The black giant priest had returned.

All the Tentacle Trees instantly fell silent. Countless crystalline eyes turned toward him warily.

The priest wasted no words. He simply raised his hand.

A blue arc of light flashed, and two machines appeared out of thin air.

One small, one large. Both had simple, almost plain designs, looking like two silver-white rectangular boxes.

“These are Type-3 biological breeding devices.”

The priest pointed at the small machine, then reached out and pressed the groove.

Blue light swept across.

Buzz…

A pale green nutrition block appeared out of thin air within the blue light.

“…Capable of providing long-term nutritional supply for populations in the millions.” The priest’s tone was as calm as if he were introducing ordinary furniture.

Around him, however, came the sound of countless sharp inhales.

Millions.

From a palm-sized machine?

This was no longer technology. This was a miracle!

Immediately after, the priest pointed at the other one. “This is a matter printer.”

He pressed his hand on the rune and then released it.

The same blue light flashed. Within the glow, the hologram of a house appeared simultaneously.

When the blue light withdrew, the house did not disappear. It remained standing there solidly.

It was as if someone had forcibly dragged a picture into reality.

The entire camp fell into absolute silence.

Several thousand Tentacle Trees froze in place at once, the light in their crystalline eyes flickering wildly.

Varak even heard someone’s breathing pores letting out rapid leaking sounds from excessive shock.

The priest calmly added, “The usage method for both machines is very simple. Press and hold the switch and think of what you want. They will detect your spiritual fluctuations and produce the corresponding food or tools.”

Among the group of shocked Tentacle Trees, Varak was the first to recover. Seeing his colleagues eager yet hesitant, he slowly stepped forward.

Mimicking the black giant priest’s earlier actions, he extended a tentacle and pressed the rune.

The first thing that surfaced in his mind was a bowl of soup.

The seasonal soup from the northern temperate zone of his home planet during spring.

When he was young, his mother would cook it every year.

After the expedition began, he hadn’t tasted it in a very long time.

Buzz.

Light flashed.

A bowl of hot soup appeared.

A shallow hexagonal bowl, pale orange broth, with three thin slices of mushroom floating on top.

It was even steaming.

Varak slowly lifted the bowl with some disbelief and took a sniff.

Then his tentacles began to tremble uncontrollably.

The taste was exactly the same as in his memories.

At this moment, he finally understood completely.

What they were facing was not a “higher civilization” at all.

It was an existence that had already surpassed their entire theoretical framework!

Matter printing.

Environmental reconstruction.

Time freezing.

And these things… were merely daily necessities given to captives on the other side.

Varak suddenly thought of something else.

When their fleet first entered the plane, they hadn’t detected any orbital defense systems, so they had assumed the place was completely undefended.

But now, he suddenly realized.

It wasn’t that they couldn’t detect them. It was that the other party simply hadn’t bothered to hide.

Or rather…

What they could detect had always been what the other party allowed them to see.

Then.

Varak suddenly thought of his home planet.

His bark tightened instantly.

The flagship database contained everything—both the world coordinates and Harowen’s coordinates.

And that bipedal creature had already read the entire database.

Varak lowered his head and looked at his own tentacles.

The silver-gray color was rapidly fading, turning white from the tips onward.

It was their race’s most primal fear response, signaling that the body was entering an extreme survival state.

Behind him.

His young adjutant was hugging the printed food, cautiously sniffing it, a trace of post-disaster relief even appearing in his crystalline eyes. Beside him, the old logistics officer was trembling as he stroked the printer’s shell.

Pale green sap slowly flowed down his bark—a physiological reaction to extreme shock.

Varak slowly retracted his tentacles and raised his head.

The warm sun still shone over the plains, the wind blew across the river, and the air carried the familiar scent of home.

Yet within this familiar environment, he only felt ice-cold all over.

He finally realized.

He had personally handed the gateway leading to their home planet over to a monstrous civilization whose power could not be measured!

Varak silently lowered his canopy and let out an extremely faint vibration:

“It’s over…”

“Everything is over!”