Chapter 1624 - After the Battle (2/2)
This was akin to an apocalyptic battlefield where the two armies had been pounding at each other for hundreds of year without any clear victor, and suddenly, a group of engineers came along with hammers, axes, and pliers, setting up a catapult and blasting the opponent’s fortress into dust with the first lob…
Salaman felt that even as a one-use weapon, its overwhelming power was enough to negate any shortcomings.
The Petrachelys had now docked on friendly grounds. After a short rest, Hao Ren and the rest went aboard the Aiur to meet Salaman.
Vivian smiled as she looked at the guardian giant who wore a difficult expression. “The war has ended, Commander.”
“Just… like… that…” Salaman was conflicted as he said the words. With an almost-sigh, he continued, “We have fought for thousands of years, and the sacred ground was almost lost, and it just somehow ended so suddenly. There’s nothing left of Amantir, it’s really…”
“Doesn’t feel real right?” Vivian smiled understandingly. “A thousand-year-long struggle with this sickness is suddenly cured one fine morning. Anyone would feel lost. The same happened with me when both my memory lost and mental split were cured that day. Relax, and trust in the truth. This war has ended.”
Hao Ren looked at Salaman and the other guardian giants standing not too far away. He understood how they felt. “Seems like everyone needs to rest and recuperate. I too need to calculate the losses of my droid swarms and to fix whatever is needed. How about this, let’s go back to the Core and let the soldiers rest. As for the battlefield, leave it to the engineering droids to clean it up, they won’t tire anyway.”
Salaman had no reason to object, and while he wanted to commence the cleanup and reconstruction of the sacred system, he knew his soldiers needed rest, so he agreed to Hao Ren’s suggestion.
Leaving the droids on clean-up duty behind, the two armies warped back to the Core.
After a day’s rest, everyone seemed much more refreshed, and many of the post-combat works were now on course.
The war had ended, and the force of madness threatening this sacred ground was totally wiped out, but the headache following it had just begun.
First, they needed to perform an in-depth and total scan of Star Cluster X: Hao Ren and Salaman were worried if the minions of madness would have escaped from the earlier battlefield. Due to the foul nature of the force of madness, the escape of any high-level mutants would definitely cause trouble down the line. So Hao Ren had ordered the droid swarm to set up high-sensitivity sensor arrays in all control zones and sent patrols with mobile scanning stations to perform a dragnet sweep of the system. At the same time, Salaman had activated the system’s divine power network to search for any data on the minions of madness, not letting anything escape their pursuit.
Then it was the reconstruction works for the Core and the surrounding facilities, and that Hao Ren did not need to worry. Salaman and his army were already pumped up and have busied themselves, with Hao Ren providing a troop of engineering drones to help out.
Next on the agenda was dealing with the Throne of Destiny and the Weaves of Destiny. Now that the war had ended, and the Core was safe, Salaman had to bring the matter up again: even if Vivian would not sit on the throne, the activation of the system for studying was needed.
Hao Ren agreed without any objections but before officially commencing the study of the Throne of Destiny, he had two other pressing issues to attend to—the crystal of Amantir that he had just snatched back, and the sprites within the MDT’s hard disk.
The droids have uprooted and relocated the cutting edge all-purpose research lab from the Executor’s planet to the Core, and while the lab was not as well equipped as the science center in CARS, it was still capable of analysis the three crystals. The crystals of Naqdal, Agodal, and Amantir were finally reunited, and they were placed at the center of the lab’s main hall. Three autonomous anti-gravity platforms held them in place while a large number of droids and analyzers darted back and forth, testing and analyzing the three crystals.
As he looked at the crystal of Amantir on platform three, Hao Ren sighed. “As you can see, the thousand-year-long corruption of the dreamer has affected the crystal. While the goddess did provide protection, the corruption still occurred.”
Salaman was not there personally (his massive frame would make it difficult for him to move alongside Hao Ren), but instead used a floating holographic projection to communicate. His projection also looked up the crystal, his voice solemn. “…The corruption is visible. This is much worse than we thought.”
Hao Ren sighed again. “It’s actually much better than I expected. At least the crystal is intact, and was not turned into fuel by those crazy bastards.”