Chapter 1637 - Tree Planting (1/2)

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Ever since the observer had created a stable gateway between the Core and Tannagost, Salaman and his guardians had been frequenting both places. It was not only due to the warriors in the army wishing to see the legendary “revived land”, but it was also by invitation of the observer.

The guardian army was tasked to defend Star Cluster X and had not paid attention to the happenings outside of that sector. But now that the biggest threat to the Core had been dealt with, and they were simply waiting for the “Lord of the Throne” to arrive, plus Hao Ren and his droid swarm had taken over most of the defensive works within the sector, it was pretty clear that the mission did not need to go on. Or at least, the entire guardian army did not need to stay put. Thus, many personnel under Salaman’s command were freed from duty.

Besides, the other locations within the Plane of Dreams required their strength.

The maintenance of Tannagost’s ecosystem, the engineering works at the Gate of Solenne, and the various exploration as well as investigation tasks within the Plane of Dreams itself, plus the excavation and study of the goddess’ religion and relics; there were all sorts of messes to be cleaned up. There was order to be restored and there were ruins to be rebuilt. While Hao Ren’s droid swarm could take on most of the hard work, they were simply emotionless machines and lacked the understanding of the “local situation”, so there was a shortage of manpower all over the universe.

Thinking about it, when the Gate of Solenne’s star forge started producing parts of the Creation’s Engine, Lemendusa was alone there supervising it. It was such a sorry solitary scene…

Thus, the appearance of Lemendusa and his army solved that pressing problem.

Tannagost had become the most important transportation hub due to the presence of CARS, and Hao Ren had built many warp and acceleration devices in all parts of the universe. He had also set up a huge number of starports and warehouse facilities. All guardian giants coming from the Core would transit there before they were sent to where they were needed, and the ones overseeing this were Salaman, Muru and the CARS mainframe. Salaman knew his men, while the CARS mainframe understood the manpower needs of each location. Muru, on the other hand, was the intermediary. This was a very rudimentary “triumvirate”, but things seemed to be working out well so far.

When Hao Ren and the rest returned to CARS, what they saw was a scene of orderly industry.

Standing on the CARS observation deck, one could see clearly the busy transportation network on the starports. The mountain-sized black starships moved slowly by the starport as the guiding and anchorage beams formed tidy and clear pathways in space while the argent droid carriers and swarms were buzzing about between the berths like swarm of bees; farther away, there were massive accelerator catapults or stargates, and these massive facilities were capable of sending an entire fleet deep into space with just a flash.

The accelerator catapults were used to send ships into unexplored or complex, hard-to-pinpoint star systems, while the stargates were connected to another starbase, or to other developed outposts. Hao Ren’s next target was to set up a stargate between Tannagost and the Core, further enhancing the connectivity of these two locales. It would also improve the signal transmission between CARS and Star Cluster X. With this, Zorm could then better control that “remote body” on the Executor’s planet without the need for additional antenna arrays.

“Before you lot came over, this place had never been as lively,” Hao Ren said in realization. Next to him was Salaman’s holographic projection. “While we have set up so many starports and warehouses, the ones using them were the droids. You know, these droids have a hive mind and the individual units do not have any external communication settings. So even millions of droids going in and out of the port would not create any ‘noise’, and this place looked like a haunted port at times.”

Salaman indulged in some nostalgia too. “There were a few space cities around the Star of Creation back then, and they were much much livelier than here.”

“One day, this universe will recover and prosper again.” Hao Ren smiled. “We are taking that first step forward.”

“I really hope that ‘seed’ is as strong as you say it is,” Salaman said, his expression serious. “With that, we can boldly step into the Umbral Realm to search for Mother.”

“Of course, it will surprise you.” Hao Ren was full of confidence.

Nolan’s voice rang from the speaker, “Boss, the navigation course is plotted, we can take off any time.”

When they returned to the Core, the scars of the earlier battle was still visible.

This could not be helped because only about half a month had passed since that monumental battle, and countless pieces of wreckage from the thousand-year-long war had accumulated there. Floating in space was not only broken starships and bodies but also difficult-to-clean active energies and unstable dimensional rifts. The droids were already cleaning these dangerous space junk up at peak efficiency already, and more time would be needed for these pieces of space junk to be totally cleaned up.

The wreckage above the Core was the first batch to be cleaned, and the space around this sector was much cleaner now. The guardians and the droid swarm were rebuilding defensive structures in low orbit, but the situation on high orbit was not that encouraging: A massive dark red energy cloud lingered, and when starlight passed through the clouds, all sorts of bizarre distorted images would be produced. That was the reaction of the dimensional rift and the gravitational flux, and those would take a good while to actually be cleaned up.

Standing before the crystal mountain before the Throne of Destiny, Hao Ren looked at the sky, and while it was night now, the thick roiling energy cloud had blotted out the starlight, so nothing was visible. Hao Ren knew what was going on in high orbit and clicked his tongue. “Tsk, actually, if we go along with my plan, it’ll all be fine. Just set a whole bunch of dimensional bombs there, and boom, no more contamination. As for the rift, it’ll heal by itself. Besides, there’s no danger with the rift as long as you go around it, unlike the troublesome contamination…”

Salaman’s expression was deadpan. “While this is a creative plan, I believe the guardians, with our powers from Mother, are more than capable to face those tainted powers. Of course, if you have plenty of explosives that need to be disposed of, there’s no problem.

“Ahem, let’s focus on the Throne.” Hao Ren coughed dryly.

Once again, they came before the place where Vivian had gone through the “test”, and once again, there was the group of sprites living on the crystal wall, and once again, Hao Ren was overwhelmed by their enthusiasm.

“Wah! The queen! The queen is back!”

“Is the queen looking to turn it on?”

“We have already restarted the system…”

“But it still shows a blue screen when it restarts…”

“But we have a plan to fix the blue screen!”

“The sprites will change the error message page to red…”