Chapter 1

Dream Dimension.

Although heavily damaged in the "World Collision" a long, long time ago, becoming a vassal plane of another universe, the Dream Dimension is still a vast and boundless world for most mortal civilizations. It has a deep and boundless cosmic space, countless ancient galaxies and newborn stars, and countless dark spaces buried in the deepest reaches of space that no one has ever set foot in.

In the center of the universe, the ancient nebulae have almost completely turned into waste heat. The once glorious galaxies now have only large swaths of lifeless shadows and ash remnants. Light is fading and becoming extremely precious here: one by one, the dying stars dot the deep darkness with a few rays of light, each spark of embers being a fortress. These stars, barely collected and lit in the nebula's exhaust gas, are extremely rare, separated by tens or even hundreds of thousands of light-years, looking at each other from afar. Their candlelight cannot illuminate this forgotten and dying cosmic space, nor can it nurture any life, at least not conventional life.

Without life, there is no mental activity, no thought activity, and the evil force in the cage has no chance of escaping.

So this cage has been silent for thousands of years, guarding the passage of time in silence.

But it is not completely devoid of life.

The "Night Watchers" who guard the cage in the darkness live here. They set up fortresses around clusters of embers, monitoring the dark abyss in the deepest part of this dead space, listening to even the slightest sound around them.

Silence like death is the norm in this cage. Not only is there not a single sound in the cold, dead cosmic space, but even the vibration of starlight is strictly controlled. There is no mortal race living here, and there is naturally no resonance between minds—all in order to prevent the suppressed power from breaking through the blockade. But even so, the Night Watchers have their own way of communicating.

These ancient beings have mastered the secret of protecting their inner selves and have received the blessing of the gods. When they communicate through the resonance between stars, the evil force suppressed in the depths of the cage is powerless.

A lone star on the outer event horizon of the dark abyss brightened slightly, emitting a series of faster-than-light information that was incomprehensible to ordinary species. The information quickly spread throughout the star sector and immediately triggered a response from several nearby stars.

"S-26, control your frequency. Do not engage in unnecessary communication."

"S-26 replying, this is not unnecessary communication. Mind shielding has been activated, the tremor is safe."

"What have you discovered?" A message from the middle layer of the dark abyss chimed in.

"The Star of Creation has been extinguished for more than a hundred time units. As agreed, reporting time now."

"What changes are there in the outside world?" The signal source from the middle layer of the dark abyss continued to ask.

"All is quiet, very quiet. Preliminary estimate is that more than ninety percent of the lights of life have been extinguished. Some deep-space areas are as quiet as if they are in the critical point."

The stars fell silent for a while, maybe only a few seconds, maybe as long as several days. Within the critical point of the dark abyss, the flow of time becomes very strange. The Night Watchers are no longer accustomed to recording events through time. For them, the passage of time is the progression of one event after another. In the long silence between two events, time is meaningless.

If it weren't for recording how long the war had been going on, the Night Watchers would have abandoned the concept of "time" long ago.

After some time of silence, the S-26 border monitoring station suddenly sent another message: "W-17, I hear noise coming from the deep space. What's wrong there?"

A signal came from the middle layer of the dark abyss: "It is trying to break through the outer wall."

A new signal came from a star millions of light-years away: "It's happening more and more frequently."

"The ark and fire left by the Creator Goddess are still without any news, and the guardians she created have not shown any signs of returning to normal. It seems that the leaked pollution was more serious than expected," W-17 said a long passage unusually, "We must prepare ourselves, the situation may continue to deteriorate."

"The situation will continue to deteriorate," S-26 agreed, "We must cherish the use of manpower and not do things that are not suitable for us. We have lost many watchers in a hundred time units."

"But necessary patrols should still continue," W-17 said, "This universe is still changing. Some things that we don't understand have emerged and are spreading. S-26, do you still remember what you once discovered?"

"Yes, I am deeply impressed by them—their rate of expansion is astonishing, and they have a high degree of discipline, even more disciplined than us. Now they have spread to thousands of galaxies, and their expansion rate is increasing sharply with the scope of their spread. Perhaps one day, they will cover the entire universe."

"How much do we know about them?" Another signal source from the middle layer of the dark abyss asked, "How do they create themselves?"

"It's hard to understand. Those things seem to be able to replicate themselves endlessly without material resources, and their expansion rate never slows down, whether in barren or rich star regions. I once observed that thousands of those things suddenly appeared in a material vacuum area without any celestial bodies—almost out of thin air."

"What is their purpose? Are they harmful?"

"It is impossible to determine. They seem to be highly intelligent beings, but lack the purposefulness of intelligent life. They are just constantly expanding and setting up a large number of incomprehensible nests and outposts in the cosmic space. But in this process, they neither attack anyone nor occupy any planets—they seem to be more enthusiastic about staying in space to observe than landing on planets. Therefore, I cannot determine whether those things are harmful, but I can only determine that they pose a threat."

Just as S-26's message was sent, another outpost on the border responded: "I have additional intelligence. I have observed that they possess a considerable degree of force. In some accidental events, they can easily destroy stray celestial bodies that threaten their nests, and the proportion of these armed individuals in their entire group is increasing rapidly. Perhaps the expansion of those things has reached a certain critical point, and now they are gradually turning to a military mode."

S-26 also spoke again: "Additional intelligence, I observed that their expansion direction has changed, and they are changing from aimless expansion to directional expansion. Their vanguard seems to be coming here."

The new additional intelligence silenced all the Night Watchers. After a brief silence, W-17 sent a message: "Their behavior patterns are changing. I think we should increase the monitoring of them."

"Perhaps take a more proactive response?" A border outpost asked, "Such as intercepting them."

"That should be an action taken only when there is no other way, S-77," W-17 said, "We must ensure the stability of the internal defense line. Once 'it' breaks through the wall, the harm will far exceed any disaster."

"Agreed." "Agreed." "Agreed."

In the silent dark abyss cage, the resonance communication between the stars gradually calmed down. This star region, which is not observed by anyone and has never been set foot in, returned to dead silence once again, as if there has never been any vitality here in the past, present, or future.

And in a piece of silence, the last murmured low hum suddenly broke the silence again: "W-17, how is the situation in the deepest critical point?"

"There is no sanity left in the critical point. 'It' has completely occupied its prison. There is only endless screaming and clamor there, but the outposts on the last defense line are still sending back messages. N-66 is leading other outposts to block the prison."

"...W-17, my brother, do you still remember the peaceful and idyllic era of this universe?"

"...S-26, my brother, like you, I have already forgotten."

"For the grace of forgetting."

"For the grace of forgetting."

The Night Watchers' conversation ended, and they returned to tranquility, continuing to wait for the almost meaningless "time" to enter the next node worth discussing.

And far away from this eternal prison, in another universe's starry sky, a new drone hive is gradually starting up. In the depths of the hive's crisscrossing alloy frame, which resembles biological tissue, red and blue lights begin to pulsate like breathing.

A constantly changing face emerged from the surface of the hive. The collective consciousness of the drone swarm looked out at the dark and deep universe. In that darkness, everything was unusually silent.

The deep space of the universe is indeed silent, but being silent to this extent is somewhat abnormal.

After a moment of thought and calculation, the collective consciousness issued a series of new production and expansion plans.

It has only one mission: to expand, continue to expand, and keep expanding into the depths and end of the universe!