Chapter 580: Soul-Searching Commander: The Secrets of the Hatchery!

Almost zero.

Qin Zheng's voice came over, filled with incredulous excitement.

He appeared as a humanoid light-shadow beside Qin Hao, pointing at the nebula outside the window and explaining:

"We are no longer sailing against the rules of the cosmic sea; instead, we glide along the seams of the rules."

"Even while sailing, we can actively capture those ownerless, scattered rule fragments to replenish our consumption."

He said, extending his hand.

Only see, outside the nebula, a region suddenly turned viscous, like an invisible great net.

A wisp of gray rule, representing 'extinction,' that had drifted out from some cosmic decay far away, before it could fully dissipate, was caught by this great net,

then swiftly decomposed into the purest energy, evenly distributed to every Yanhuang citizen nearby.

"Just like a whale filter-feeding on plankton in the sea."

Qin Hao commented softly.

This is an entirely new mode of survival.

From passive fleeing to active predation.

The Yanhuang Civilization is adapting to its new identity at a visible speed.

"How's the situation over there, Old Three?"

Qin Hao asked.

Qin Wu's thoughts were like a blazing flame, full of soaring fighting spirit:

"Great! So great! Dad, I'm leading the First War Corps to clear the path ahead of the nebula; just now we encountered a patch of chaotic rule turbulence—before, our universe would have to detour around it,

now we just charge straight in; before those turbulences could get close, the brothers tore them apart and ate them as snacks!"

Before, they relied on the universe's shell to protect themselves.

Now they themselves are the shell, and an array of billions of indestructible shells.

Very good.

Qin Hao nodded, "Let everyone get familiar with this new way of fighting and surviving; the road to the hatchery won't be peaceful."

His gaze turned toward the direction of the prison cell.

There, the commander of the Supreme Flagship is imprisoned, along with thousands of high-ranking Hunters.

These people are now the Yanhuang Civilization's most important source of intelligence.

Qin Hao's figure vanished from the bridge, and the next second he appeared inside the prison cell constructed of rule-chains.

That Hunter Commander no longer bore any of his former dignity.

His silver robe had turned dull and lifeless, his eyes filled with fear and confusion.

He looked at Qin Hao, his lips twitching for a while before managing to utter a sentence:

"What... what exactly are you monsters?"

He could not comprehend.

How can a civilization abandon its own vessel,

and become this... this indefinable existence?

This violates every evolutionary path set by the hatchery.

We are your grave-diggers.

Qin Hao's tone was very calm.

He stepped before the commander, looking down at him: "I need to know everything about the hatchery—its structure, its defenses, and its master."

The commander gave a bitter laugh:

"What good would telling you do? You think defeating one of our fleets means you can challenge the great master?"

You have no idea what you're facing; the hatchery isn't a place, it's a concept,

it is the origin of this cosmic sea, the beginning of all logic. Going there is like a drop of water trying to extinguish a star.

Even a drop of water can pierce stone.

Qin Hao remained unmoved, "It seems you're not willing to cooperate."

"'Cooperate? Then be squeezed dry of your last bit of worth by you and thrown away like trash?'"

The commander's eyes flashed with resolve, "I..."

He hadn't finished speaking when Qin An's figure silently appeared behind Qin Hao.

He didn't look at the commander, merely placing his hand lightly on the prison cell wall.

A warm yet irresistible surge of emotion spread along the wall.

This force carried no attack, yet it was more terrifying than any weapon.

It bypassed all of the commander's logical defenses, directly touching the deepest memories of his soul.

The commander's body began to tremble violently.

Before his eyes was no longer Qin Hao's face, but memories surfaced: the tension of his first mission at birth, the guilt of betraying comrades to gain promotion,

the innate fear of the hatchery's master...

All the emotions he had buried under logic and order were now flung out.

No...... stop......

The commander let out a painful groan.

For a logical lifeform, this senseless emotional impact is crueler than outright erasing his existence.

Qin Hao simply watched silently.

Because Qin An was reading everything of his.

Moments later, Qin An withdrew his hand, his face somewhat pale.

He nodded at Qin Hao: "Dad, we've got it."

A massive influx of information instantly surged into Qin Hao's mind.

About the structure of the hatchery, about the few words of that mysterious master, about the entity known as the Mirror of Truth...

Qin Hao closed his eyes, quickly digesting this information.

When he opened his eyes again, his gaze became deeper.

"So that's how it is…"

He muttered to himself.

Just then, the entire nebula shuddered violently.

A powerful resistance came from ahead, an invisible wall blocking their path.

"Dad! The void regulations ahead are rapidly increasing!"

Qin Si's alarm sounded.

"We are approaching a high‑density regulation zone; the spacetime structure here… is like steel forged a hundred million times, making our power hard to penetrate!"

Qin Hao looked up ahead.

At the edge of his vision, the void was no longer pure black but presented an eerie gray.

There, time and space had lost their fluidity.

"We've arrived."

Qin Hao's voice spread throughout the Yanhuang Nebula: "Everyone, prepare to pass through this storm belt; then we'll see the enemy's lair."

As his words fell, the gray area suddenly lit up with streaks of pallid lightning.

That wasn't real lightning, but a logic‑fracture phenomenon caused by excessively dense regulations.

Each bolt represented the annihilation of a concept.

That gray region, the imprisoned hunter commander called the Sea of Oblivion.

This is the sedimentation layer of the Cosmic Sea's regulations, where, over countless ages, the remnants of all vanished, collapsed, and erased universes and civilizations have finally gathered.

It acts like a natural barrier, separating the hatchery from the outside world.

An ordinary warship entering would, in an instant, be torn to shreds by billions of conflicting regulations.

Even an immortal powerful being would lose its mind here, eventually assimilated into a meaningless tangle of logic.

At this moment, the dark‑gold nebula formed by the Yanhuang Civilization hovered at the edge of the Sea of Oblivion.

"The regulatory density here is more than ten thousand times that of the chaotic turbulence we encountered before."

Qin Zheng's consciousness manifestation appeared beside Qin Hao, his expression unprecedentedly grave.

"Moreover, these regulations are not disordered; they revolve around a certain core, undergoing a slow, heavy cycle."

Once we enter, we will be swept into that cycle until all our traits are worn away.