Chapter 1 Lockmarton's "Nest"

This was Lockmarton's "nest."

This came as a great surprise to Hao Ren, so much so that he was stunned for more than ten seconds after seeing the deciphered text. It wasn't until the data terminal started bumping his head impatiently that he suddenly woke up. "I'll be damned… Do you know what these are?"

"You just stand there and don't say anything, how would I know!" The data terminal flew around with a whoosh. "What did you find? Is this a pit dug by the Creator Goddess back then? Did she become obsessed with digging pits before creating life?"

"This is a nest, prepared for Lockmarton…" Hao Ren frowned. "I can now be sure that the Red Moon is indeed some kind of projection of the Star of Creation—albeit a scaled-down version. But the Lockmarton we saw in the Kolor world was hundreds of kilometers in size. Even if this nest is the original size on the Star of Creation, it shouldn't be able to accommodate such a huge body… So this should be where Lockmarton spent its 'childhood'."

Hearing Hao Ren's words, the data terminal paused in mid-air for a long while (presumably a sign of being stunned), and then broke the silence after a few seconds. "...Partner, you truly are a troublemaker ordained by the goddess… Every clue you find is a big news."

This time, Hao Ren did not refute the data terminal's words at all, but thoughtfully stroked his chin. "Which era of the Star of Creation do you think the Red Moon is a projection of?"

The data terminal didn't react for a moment. "Which era? What do you mean?"

"I've seen the Star of Creation in an illusion—at least a part of it. In the illusion, I saw solemn temple complexes standing on the Sea of Origin Blood, as well as white towers and vast assembly grounds. Those things were huge, even the guardian giants could move freely among them, so those building complexes would be quite conspicuous at any time. But we haven't found anything like that here. The probe has scanned the surface of the Red Moon, and apart from a few reefs and islands protruding from the sea, there are no targets other than the sea on this dwarf planet."

As Hao Ren spoke, he pointed to the nests that had once accompanied Lockmarton through its "childhood" stage. "And there are these things. Mulu and Layman Dusa grew up on the Star of Creation, but they never knew that there were these ruins on the Star of Creation."

The data terminal understood Hao Ren's meaning. "Are you saying… the Red Moon summoned by Vivian is actually some kind of copy from an ancient era of the Star of Creation?"

"The Star of Creation has two eras," Hao Ren nodded. "With the Creator Goddess fighting the Lord of the Mad Ones' return and sealing her own memory as the dividing line. In the first era, only the goddess and Lockmarton lived together on this planet. In the second era, it was the stage for the guardian giants, the First Born, and the Seeds of Origin to be active. What I saw in the illusion was undoubtedly the second era. I think the reason why Mulu didn't know about Lockmarton's nest on the Star of Creation is because the Creator Goddess erased these traces before sealing her memories… After all, she had to delete all information related to the Lord of the Mad Ones."

"It seems she didn't delete them completely," the data terminal shook its body. "The Star of Creation from the first era has been reproduced."

Hao Ren nodded and connected to New Erim: at this moment, the Red Moon had stabilized, and Vivian should have the energy to talk to him.

"Hao Ren?" Vivian's voice came from the communicator. "How is it going on your side? Everything is going smoothly here!"

"I'm on the surface of the Red Moon, and there's been a major discovery," Hao Ren knew that Vivian had been waiting for news from there, so he didn't waste any time. "It can now be confirmed that the Red Moon is a scaled-down copy of the Star of Creation. Its diameter is about one-eighth of the Star of Creation. It has a physical form but no gravity, and it also has a lot of anomalous properties that don't conform to the laws of physics. I found Lockmarton's nest on the back of the Red Moon. It was built by the Creator Goddess herself, and judging from the size, it should be where Lockmarton spent its 'childhood.' I now suspect that the Red Moon is a copy of the ancient appearance of the Star of Creation."

"Wow—"

"What kind of reaction is that?"

"A little surprised, but not too unexpected. I had already guessed that the Red Moon was related to the Star of Creation, but I didn't expect that you would actually see the den where Lockmarton lived… Suddenly I feel so awesome that I can summon such a thing."

Hao Ren: "…"

It seemed that Vivian was quite calm after hearing these big news. Should he say that she was indeed an elder? She had a super high resistance to big news!

At this time, Lily's boisterous voice suddenly chimed in: "Landlord, landlord! Remember to take more photos! Show them to me when you get back!"

Hao Ren glared. "I'm doing research here, can you be serious?"

"Then take me to see it next time—I see that Vivian's situation is quite stable here, and she shouldn't need the emergency stop device…"

Was this husky treating the Red Moon as a tourist attraction?

Just as Hao Ren was speechless at Lily's thoughts, Nolan's voice suddenly sounded in another channel: "Hao Ren, the probe has found something in the seabed—you should be interested."

Hao Ren was stunned and quickly grabbed the data terminal floating next to him and put it in front of his eyes. "Connect the image!"

The holographic image on the data terminal quickly switched to the probe's perspective that Nolan had transferred. Hao Ren saw a dim red field of vision appear on the screen. With the various enhancement filters and image enhancement effects of the probe, this dark red field of vision slowly became clear.

The probe was moving quickly above a rugged seabed. You could see that the seabed was covered with black, craggy rocks. The rocks receded rapidly, and the seabed ahead gradually became flat. Then, a large expanse of crystal clear crystals appeared before Hao Ren's eyes.

They were crystal clusters that grew as densely as a forest, most of which had slender, straight lines and a translucent texture. After filtering out the red inherent in the seawater, these crystal clusters showed a beautiful blue-white luster, which seemed out of tune with the red atmosphere of the Star of Creation itself. These crystals grew in clusters on the seabed, and the sharp tips probed towards the sea surface above like the branches of a tree. Between the crystal clusters, Hao Ren saw many suspended luminous objects, which were rhomboid crystal fragments—looking like they had fallen from the crystal forest.

These luminous crystal fragments and the soft halo emitted by the crystal clusters themselves complemented each other, making the originally extremely dim seabed particularly bright. Hao Ren believed that even without the aid of the probe's night vision function, ordinary people could clearly see everything around them on this seabed.

"What are these crystals…" he muttered, stroking his chin. "They look quite different from the style of the entire Star of Creation… Nolan, can you analyze their composition?"

"The composition list has been sent to you, but nothing noteworthy has been found. It is a high-strength crystal with extremely high conductivity and also has high permeability to arcane energy. The shipboard mainframe preliminarily analyzes that there should be some kind of resonance effect between these crystals, but it is probably the 'stillness' attribute of the Red Moon itself that is having an effect. I can't observe direct evidence of resonance between the crystals. There is no response to stimulating the crystal clusters. In addition, one thing is very concerning. I have not found substances similar to these crystal clusters in other parts of the Red Moon. In the material scanning results of the entire planet, only this seabed has such a crystal—this is not in line with the formation rules of general planets."

Hao Ren frowned and connected the communication to the public channel: "The probe has discovered a large crystal jungle on the seabed of the Red Moon Sea. I'm going to go down and take a look."

Vivian's voice was a little worried: "Will there be any problems?"

"The probe didn't find any danger, and I won't mess around."

Vivian wasn't pretentious. She understood Hao Ren's character, so she just reminded him: "Okay, be careful."

Hao Ren gave a nod, temporarily hung up the communication, and then followed the positioning coordinates sent by the probe to the deep sea with the data terminal.

A moment later, they arrived at the seabed where the crystal jungle was located.

The powerful water pressure acted on the body, making Hao Ren's movements a little inconvenient, but thanks to the existence of the rigid shield and the fact that the Red Moon Sea itself was not very deep, Hao Ren could still withstand this water pressure. Feeling the resistance he encountered between raising his hands and feet, he couldn't help but wonder: the water pressure itself was caused by the planet's gravity. The existence of water pressure meant the existence of gravity, but the result of gravity detection on the Red Moon in space was blank, which meant that this planet did not have any gravitational disturbance to the outside world… This was a huge sense of disharmony.

He couldn't help but think of a word that could slightly explain the phenomenon in front of him: semi-closed system.

The Red Moon might be such a system: as a "summoned object" that does not exist permanently in the real world, many of its physical properties are internally closed. It may have its own gravity and mass, but these properties are limited to the Red Moon itself. It is incompatible with the outside real world, which causes some of its physical properties to be unable to affect the outside real world, so the observer observes it from the outside and its gravity is zero. But the Red Moon is not completely detached from this world (otherwise it would not be observable). The radiation it releases can affect the outside world, it can also be observed optically, and if someone enters the interior of the Red Moon's "system," he can also feel some of its influence—

Such as the water pressure in the Red Moon Sea.

This was truly a wonderful "planet."

With this in mind, he came to the bottom of one of the largest crystal clusters.

The crystal emitted a soft glow, standing quietly on the seabed like a towering tree, looking full of mystery. The data terminal flew around the main trunk of the crystal cluster, and the scanning beam cast bright blue mesh lines on the crystal surface.

But just like Nolan's probe, the data terminal could only scan some simple physical parameters of these crystals, but there was nothing it could do about the secrets deep in the crystals.

But Hao Ren had a strong intuition that these crystals growing on the seabed were definitely not that simple—their material parameters were different from those collected in various parts of the Red Moon, and they didn't look like the products of this planet at all. This alone was enough to make people curious about them.

The data terminal scanned around the crystal cluster for a long time, and muttered a little depressedly: "Tch, this thing is just a hard rock, it can't read anything…"

Hao Ren didn't say anything, just gently stroked the surface of the largest crystal with his hand, with a thoughtful look on his face.

Inadvertently, the mark on his palm burned by the god's blood came into contact with the crystal.

A faint burning sensation came.