Chapter 1 A Man of Vision… Sort Of

Hao Ren considered himself a man of vision—well, maybe not a man of *total* vision, but at least *some* vision.

The last time he left the Dream Plane, he had made some arrangements on a whim, never imagining they would be used to find someone. At the time, he wanted to explore the Dream Plane's starry sky and chart a star map for future operations, so he ordered the Petrified Turtle Ship to release a batch of self-replicating probes. These probes could replicate themselves as needed and used faster-than-light antennas for networked thinking. They would plan the best exploration routes themselves, constantly advancing into the depths of the universe, mapping all the celestial bodies they encountered and building small observation stations at regular intervals to maintain this advanced drone network.

The probes operated by sending out a group of high-speed units to quickly scan the starry sky, followed by high-precision units to gradually fill in the gaps in the scanned areas. This way, Hao Ren could grasp the distribution of celestial bodies in large areas of the Dream Plane in the shortest time possible.

Obviously, after this drone swarm had been operating for a while, the first thing to be sent back was a rough star map, including only the distribution data of major celestial bodies within a certain range. However, specifically scanning those celestial bodies for signs of life wasn't so easy; that required precise observations by slower, follow-up probes. So far, the drone swarm Hao Ren released was only doing preliminary work like sketching, not yet at the stage of detecting life. Moreover, only a few days ago did the drone swarm send back the first star map, and he didn't expect it to come in handy so soon.

The fastest probes had already mapped stars within billions of light-years—centered on Planet Holletta.

The data terminal pulled up the rough star map to search for a point within its range from which the starry sky would be consistent with the Angry Spirit's memory.

Nangong Wuyue waited anxiously nearby, and Nangong Sanba also detached himself from the equipment to join his sister in monitoring the progress—it seemed he had luckily avoided the invincible Whirlwind Punishment this time. Hao Ren comforted them, "Don't worry, those drones are constantly expanding outwards. They scan a large area. Even if there isn't a suitable star map this time, it won't be long before we find one."

Wuyue gently rubbed Hao Ren's trouser leg with the tip of her tail, "It's okay. We've waited over a hundred years."

The lab door slid open silently, and Lily cautiously slipped in, bringing the freshly washed cat girl with her. The husky's fur still felt a bit damp, and her clothes and Lily's were mostly wet—apparently, bathing a cat was quite a chore.

"What's going on?" The husky noticed the serious atmosphere and swallowed the "Awoo!" that had just reached her throat. She then tugged on Hao Ren's sleeve and whispered.

"Gǔn," washing its face with a paw while maintaining a serious expression, helped explain, "They're definitely looking for dried fish for this noble me."

Hao Ren patted Gǔn's head, but before he could say anything, he was interrupted by the data terminal, "...This unit has found a highly probable location, but..."

Nangong Sanba was impatient. "But what?"

The data terminal opened a holographic projection, showing an empty, vast expanse of space. This was an image transmitted by a probe from the Dream Plane: "A drone mapped these images while traversing the starry sky. The positions and characteristics of these stars are consistent with the Angry Spirit's memories, but the problem is… there are no celestial bodies in this place."

"No celestial bodies?!" Nangong Wuyue exclaimed, then quickly realized something. "Could it be… my parents were sent into space?"

The data terminal swayed. "Logically, that shouldn't be the case. Spatial teleportation usually chooses something with mass as the landing point first, due to the disturbance of space caused by gravity. But this location is indeed a bit strange… There are no celestial bodies here, only a cloud of cinders, as if a big explosion happened many years ago. The information returned by the drone is limited. This unit only knows this much."

Hao Ren stared blankly for a long time, finally patting Wuyue's shoulder, "Don't worry, at least your parents weren't teleported into the sun, right..."

Lily glanced at Hao Ren. "The bat has reminded you how many times? If you can avoid comforting people, try to avoid it. Most of the time, your mouth deserves a slap."

Hao Ren awkwardly opened his mouth. "Okay, let's not think too much about it. It's better to go to the place and see the actual situation. In any case, the star map won't lie. The Angry Spirit must have been to that place. Let's go back and discuss it with the others and set off to the Dream Plane to confirm as soon as possible."

The Nangong siblings looked at each other silently and nodded. They weren't in the mood to say much now.

The atmosphere was stiff, and even the confused husky next to them became obediently quiet. The cat girl found an out-of-the-way place to squat carefully, wiping her face with her paws and muttering, "Big cats are unhappy again, then I don't want dried fish..."

After that, no one spoke. Hao Ren explained the situation to Galazur via the spaceship communicator, then directly activated space jump to return to Earth.

When they returned home, it was already evening on Earth. Elizabeth and Izhaks had already gone to bed. Only Vivian was in the living room, humming a song while knitting a scarf and watching TV. The vampire girl saw everyone coming out of the basement and looked up to greet them with a smile: "You're back? Want something to eat? I made gluten soup tonight."

Hao Ren waved his hand to indicate that he had already eaten outside, then sat down next to Vivian: "We've unlocked the Angry Spirit's memory. We have news of the Nangong parents."

"Oh? That's good news," Vivian stopped her work, seeing that the expression on Hao Ren's face seemed to have content, "Any unexpected situations?"

"Probably somewhere in the Dream Plane. The drones I released earlier happened to find a highly probable star area," Hao Ren told Vivian the general situation, "...The problem is that there are no celestial bodies in that place."

"Then it seems we can only go and confirm the situation," Vivian tapped her chin with her finger, "Shall we leave tomorrow?"

Hao Ren glanced at the Nangong siblings: "Get a good rest today. We'll leave tomorrow."

The next day, Izhaks learned about the Angry Spirit's memory and took the initiative to ask to come along to help find people. Considering that they were going in the spaceship, and some of the personnel could stay on the spaceship when needed, Hao Ren decided to bring everyone in the house with him this time—including the cat and the fish. This also saved him from worrying about the trouble and destruction that the bear child might cause while guarding the house. Before leaving, he called Raven 12345, confirmed that there were no temporary mission arrangements, and then set off with his team.

The Petrified Turtle Ship quickly traversed through a vast expanse of space. Distant starlight projected a hazy halo on the spaceship's silvery-white hull. According to the navigation signals left by those probe drones, the spaceship was rapidly approaching its destination.

When it was 0.3 light-years away from the target, the spaceship made a temporary deceleration. It broke out of hyperspace and approached a small, silvery-white building in space.

This building was small in scale, only about a third the size of the Petrified Turtle Ship. Its exterior looked like a short, stubby tower lying horizontally in space. At its top, four symmetrically distributed crystal plates floated, and around the building were some small, floating turrets—the defensive power of this small outpost, enough to deal with ordinary wandering celestial bodies and invaders (if any). And if it encountered a greater threat, the entire outpost would warp away as a whole: after all, it was just a broadcast antenna and didn't need to confront enemies head-on.

This outpost was one of the results of those drone swarms that Hao Ren had released earlier. While constantly advancing into the depths of the universe, those drones were also constantly building a vast network. They were both proliferating themselves and searching for suitable celestial bodies in the universe to build production bases, while also building signal relay stations in space according to a strict and sophisticated blueprint, like the facility in front of them.

These things worked together to form an automatically running drone swarm. Although these simple, low-tech drones could do very little, for a surveyor performing reclamation missions, these things were of great use.

A beam of light from the Petrified Turtle Ship connected with this small outpost, directly reading the latter's most recent observation records, while the crystal plates at the top of the outpost also changed direction and pointed into the depths of space. It was contacting a drone that was hurrying through the starry sky, conveying distant information to its master.

On the bridge of the Petrified Turtle Ship, the data terminal relayed the observation report from the outpost: "Two probes were ordered to return to provide us with more precise constellation navigation in this area. No celestial bodies have yet been found in the target area… but there is a pile of ashes."

"Ashes? What ashes?" Vivian asked curiously.

"Of a sun."