Chapter 195 The Trail of Stars

Receiving the data terminal's notification, the banquet had to end prematurely. Hao Ren and the others hurriedly bid farewell to Galazriel and quickly arrived at the Petrified Turtle Rock, which was hovering in the orbit of Santu Su IV. Inside the spaceship's laboratory, the device analyzing the Angry Spirit had completed its scan, and a complex, chaotic, but readable report was presented to everyone.

The data terminal connected itself to the laboratory's main console, emitting a buzzing sound: "Many things are still chaotic, but these are issues for later processing. Most of the Angry Spirit's memories have been successfully extracted."

Nangong Sanba immediately stepped forward: "Did you find information about our parents?"

"That's why we called you over – the Angry Spirit's memories contain countless people, and the main console doesn't know which ones are your parents," the data terminal projected a beam of light, indicating an autonomous machine next to the analyzer, "Which of you will cooperate? The system needs to extract your memories to mark the images that appear in the Angry Spirit's memories. Don't worry, the autonomous machines are safe. Their tentacles won't cause any health problems… psychological ones don't count."

Nangong Sanba looked at the mechanical squid with its wildly waving tentacles, feeling apprehensive: "...Isn't there a more normal device on this spaceship? Or you could let me directly look at the Angry Spirit's memory bank. I'll shout stop when I see my parents' images..."

"Anyway, besides the mechanical squid, all we have are electronic coffins, and you siblings are even more allergic to those," the data terminal's voice became cheeky again, "And do you know how vast the Angry Spirit's memory bank is? Counting the time when it was still human, this thing has been 'alive' for at least fifteen thousand years. Are you planning to live here for the rest of your life with your human brain's processing speed?"

Wuyue slapped Sanba on the back of the head with her tail: "Brother, stop talking nonsense, go up."

Nangong Sanba gritted his teeth, wearing an expression as if he was heading to the front lines as he sat down on the chair next to the autonomous machine: "Here I go… I hope it doesn't stick a tube in the back of my head."

Before Sanba finished speaking, the autonomous machine had already raised its tentacles and placed them on his temples, while another tentacle held a small scanning device and gently pressed it against the back of his head. A moment later, an image of Nangong Sanba appeared on a nearby holographic projection. He looked surprised: "Where… where am I?"

The data terminal explained: "A secure interactive interface. Because your memories need to be extracted and compared with another set of memories, which puts a lot of strain on a mortal brain, your consciousness has been transferred to the laboratory's equipment. Next, you don't need to do anything. The system will automatically complete everything."

"High-tech," Nangong Sanba looked pleased, "Isn't this the legendary 100% realistic virtual reality… I feel like there's no difference from the real world. Hey, Landlord, do you have any porn on your computer?"

Everyone was stunned. Wuyue immediately raised her tail and hissed as she crawled towards her brother. The data terminal's cheap voice then rang out: "Watch your language… in a state of consciousness extraction, you can easily expose your subconscious thoughts. Of course, it's a little late to say that now."

Nangong Sanba hadn't even reacted to what was happening when Hao Ren covered his face and sighed: it seemed that this guy's super windmill of shame was unavoidable today.

While Nangong Sanba was chatting idly, the various devices in the laboratory were working busily. Human memories and the Angry Spirit's memories were being extracted and compared to find the whereabouts of the missing couple from a hundred years ago. This was a highly precise task – in the Angry Spirit's fifteen-thousand-year memory journey, only what happened on that one day was the target.

Nangong Sanba faced this memory extraction experience with a relaxed and even teasing attitude, but if it weren't for finding his parents, ordinary people probably wouldn't accept the words "memory extraction" so easily, as the process didn't sound very safe.

After a long wait, the data terminal suddenly whistled: "Stop! Found them!"

Wuyue immediately pulled her tail off her brother's neck and hissed as she crawled over: "Let me see!"

The data terminal switched the holographic projection: "Are these your parents?"

The projection showed a somewhat unclear picture. It was only possible to vaguely make out a man and a woman in front of an old farmhouse. The picture was skewed and distorted, and the couple in the center seemed to be on guard. This seemed to be the Angry Spirit's first encounter with Nangong's parents.

Despite the picture's considerable blurriness, Nangong Wuyue immediately recognized them. She covered her mouth and made a few noises in her throat before nodding vigorously: "Yes… that's them! Can you find out where the Angry Spirit took them?"

The picture moved quickly. In a series of constantly shaking, twisting, and vibrating images, everyone saw the brief battle from a hundred years ago. The man and woman in the picture fiercely fought against the owner of the viewpoint, but in the end, all the images were completely covered by a wave of interference. When the interference dissipated, the farmhouse and the couple had disappeared. The viewpoint turned to the sky, and a starry sky appeared before everyone's eyes.

This starry sky was also very blurry, but compared to the previous images during the battle, its viewpoint was stable and thus easier to recognize.

Lili turned her head to look at Hao Ren and then at the data terminal: "Is that it? A bunch of stars?"

"What else were you expecting? A set of coordinates?" the data terminal retorted, "Being able to see the starry sky is already an unexpected surprise, otherwise, we would have to use information extraction to determine where the Angry Spirit went that day. Now we can use this starry sky to determine where the owner of the viewpoint was that day… Starlight is a valid address in the universe, at least as a short-term address. A hundred years won't cause too much change in the starry sky. As long as we find where in the universe we can see these stars."

Gun looked curiously at everyone bustling around with a bunch of strange devices and tugged on Hao Ren's sleeve: "Dried fish?"

Only then did Hao Ren notice Gun's presence. He was shocked: "Hey, where did this cat come from into the lab… how did she get so dirty?!"

The cat girl looked disheveled. Not only was she covered in oil stains, but her face was also covered in dirt and dust from running around, looking as dirty as when she was a stray cat. But she didn't care at all. She just uncomfortably tugged on her clothes and started washing her face with her hand.

Lili wagged her tail and puffed out her chest: "She drilled into the roasted elephant earlier. I had to dig her out with great effort."

"Quickly take her to take a bath!" Hao Ren waved his hand and then turned to the terminal, "Can you find the location of this starry sky?"

"The Sovereign Hub's K3 main console records the locations of all celestial bodies in this universe. We can apply for access to determine where in the universe you can see this starry sky."

Hao Ren nodded: "Then I'll leave it to you."

The data terminal successfully applied for a data interface from the Sovereign Hub and then began to examine the celestial snapshots of this universe.

Hao Ren never expected that one day he would actually use the functions of the Sovereign Hub. He had a deep impression of those three planetary fortresses – the vast artificial celestial bodies that operated the rules of the universe, or rather, the Heavenly Dao. He had always thought that he probably wouldn't have the opportunity to come into contact with that level of stuff in his life. But now it seemed that an inspector was indeed a profession where anything was possible. No one could say for sure what those messy daily tasks would lead you to encounter.

"Strange…" the data terminal muttered in confusion, "K3 has traversed all the celestial bodies in this universe and found no similar star map."

Hao Ren blinked: "What does that mean?"

"This might not be a scene from this universe," the data terminal said with some disappointment, "This unit has a bad feeling…"

Nangong Wuyue's tail suddenly tensed: "Could it be… in the Dream Realm?!"

"The Angry Spirit took people to the Dream Realm?" Hao Ren was also surprised, then reached out and vigorously tugged on Wuyue's tail: "Relax a bit… don't cling to my leg, okay?"

"There is a certain possibility – let's not discuss the principle, anyway, the Angry Spirit itself has a close relationship with the Dream Realm," the data terminal clicked as it popped out of the slot, "The proliferation probes we sent out earlier have flown tens of billions of light-years away and roughly surveyed the distribution of celestial bodies along the way. Now it's time to gamble on our luck – hopefully, Nangong's parents are on a planet within those tens of billions of light-years."