Chapter 335: Peeking into the Future for the First Time

"Could this group of people be pawns of the Meditation Research Institute?" Such a speculation surfaced in Li Yu's mind.

According to what Carol and the others said, Elise had been messing around in Lant Hub for nearly ten years. She didn't look like a spy sent out by Meditation.

However, a speculation was always just a speculation. Li Yu directly controlled Elise, and her head didn't explode. The same went for her subordinates.

Subsequently, Li Yu investigated through various inquiries and finally determined that Elise had absolutely no connection with Meditation, including her subordinates, none of whom had contact with Meditation.

Then something interesting happened. This group of people had no connection with Meditation, but there was a Meditation backdoor program in the spaceship.

"Claptrap, how long ago was this backdoor implanted?" Li Yu asked.

"The implantation time should be eight days ago."

"Eight days ago..." Li Yu looked at the dumbfounded Elise: "What did you guys encounter eight days ago?"

"Navigating normally in the Ancient Starpath. We didn't encounter any abnormal situations." Elise answered like a puppet.

However, after asking this sentence, Elise, who previously answered every question, seemed to lag. Her mouth opened and closed, but she didn't emit any sound.

Under the ability of the Bewitching Sound Seed, it was impossible for Elise to hide anything. This situation right now was clearly a bit special.

"Something's not quite right. Soul-Shaking Heaven, go into her mental consciousness and take a look." Li Yu rubbed his chin and ordered.

"Yes, Chief God!"

Receiving the order, Soul-Shaking Heaven immediately surged into Elise's Spiritual Body. Not long after, Soul-Shaking Heaven's voice came out from Elise's mouth.

"Chief God, this lifeform has been tampered with. A portion of her Spiritual Body seems to have been severed."

"A portion severed?" Li Yu became interested. That was highly likely Meditation's tampering. He immediately ordered: "Go see if the others have also had a portion of their Spiritual Bodies severed."

Soul-Shaking Heaven moved very quickly, shuttling rapidly among Elise's subordinates, making Anthony and the others shiver in fear.

In a short while, Soul-Shaking Heaven found out the specific situation: "Your guess is correct. The other crew members have also had a portion of their Spiritual Bodies severed."

Li Yu narrowed his eyes slightly. Elise's group was unluckily captured by Meditation, but they clearly didn't kill them.

They merely erased their memories, implanted a backdoor program in the spaceship, and then let them go.

What Li Yu was curious about was, why did Meditation do this?

To let this group of scavengers in the Ancient Starpath act as spies? If so, it was indeed a good idea.

Although the Strength of Carol, Elise, and the others wasn't high, having survived in the Ancient Starpath for so many years, they naturally had their unique survival methods.

By implanting a subprogram in their spaceship, this group of scavengers became Meditation's extended tentacles.

"Claptrap, can you reverse track the specific location receiving the information?" Li Yu asked.

"Sorry, Master. The other party seems to have specifically implemented anti-tracking measures. I cannot track it for now." Claptrap's tone was full of apology.

Li Yu wasn't disappointed. After all, it was a large-scale Research Institute; they would definitely try their best to avoid being reverse tracked.

Elise's eyes gradually cleared up, breaking free from the control. In a daze, she felt as if something had changed.

She cautiously looked around, inexplicably feeling that the environment had changed somewhat. Wasn't that old snake's head lowered previously? When did he suddenly raise it?

How did Carol get to the front of the porthole? Can he teleport?

Elise had many doubts in her heart, but right now she could only hide them and wait for that Masked Man to decide their fate.

.........

Somewhere in the Ancient Starpath, a large number of black warships floated silently in the Starry Sky. In the Command Center of the Main Ship, Meditation's Commander looked up at the giant Holographic Screen.

The screen was divided into hundreds of small blocks. Some images were very blurry, some were exceptionally clear, and some were simply black screens.

Displayed on them were scenes from various parts of the Ancient Starpath, fed back through the subprograms implanted in the Scavenger Ships.

Those scavengers whose Strength was so-so actually had extremely strong survival capabilities in the Ancient Starpath.

Not long ago, when they first arrived in the Ancient Starpath, a Scavenger Ship actually used a Psionic Tide to shake off their pursuit, and even destroyed two warships.

Although it made him exceptionally angry, it also gave him an inspiration. These scavengers wandering in the Ancient Starpath were natural spies.

So afterwards, they wantonly captured scavenger teams, erased their memories, implanted program backdoors, and released them again.

As he expected, those released scavengers became their tentacles, allowing them to know every tiny anomaly in this section of the Ancient Starpath like the back of their hands.

Only that Scavenger Ship that escaped at the very beginning already knew of their existence. This was highly likely a hidden danger.

He frowned slightly, but then felt whether he was overly worried. It was just a Scavenger Ship; even if they knew of their existence, what could they do?

"Anomaly discovered." Someone quickly reported. A scene rapidly enlarged on the Holographic Screen. What was playing on it was precisely the scene of Li Yu's fierce battle with the Starry Sky Whale.

"Sir, that kind of creature is called a Starry Sky Whale. According to body length detection, it should have reached the level of an A-Tier Lifeform."

"Another A-Tier Lifeform..." The Leader stared intently at the battle scene.

"This spaceship has lost its signal; it should have been destroyed." The subordinate immediately reported afterwards. However, the Leader didn't take it to heart:

"Just file it. Finding the traces of the Heart of the Titan is the top priority right now. What is the situation with those two A-Tier Lifeforms from Returning Star right now?" he inquired.

"Report: a scavenger squad encountered them a day ago and has already been wiped out. The location they are currently at should be near the Malygos Dragonbone."

"According to the transmitted images, they seem to have a few more people."

The Leader nodded, an inexplicable smile appearing on his face: "It should be their backup arriving. Since that's the case, let's go welcome them."

"Li Yu is from Returning Star. Although we can't capture him for now, we can collect some interest from Returning Star first!"

............

No matter what method, as long as she could survive, it was fine. This was Elise's inner thought.

So she tried every means to show herself off in front of Li Yu, attempting to use her beauty to win a chance to live.

"Lord, my room is at the innermost part. The materials used inside are extremely precious. You can rest well inside."

"Shameless woman." Olena cursed secretly in the channel, gnashing her teeth in anger. "Does she really think the Lord would take a fancy to her?"

Stanley glanced at her and couldn't help shaking his head, but didn't speak.

Using every means to survive wasn't shameful in the eyes of people like them.

Anthony even felt it was a bit of a pity, pity that he was a male snake-person and couldn't use this method.

"Elise, come over here for a moment..." Li Yu was pondering how to find the Meditation fleet when he suddenly thought of the new Talent he had obtained previously.

He still didn't know what it was about, so he was just preparing to test it on her.

"Yes, esteemed Lord..." Joy appeared on Elise's face, thinking her method had worked, and she walked towards Li Yu with her slender long legs.

Although there were relatively many people here, as long as she could survive, who cared.

She walked up to Li Yu, waiting for his further action.

Li Yu raised his hand and, under Elise's expectant gaze, stopped at a distance of two or three centimeters away from her body.

Subsequently, a majestic invisible force enveloped her, making her uncontrollably tremble. Under this kind of power, she felt she could be crushed to pieces at any moment.

Li Yu triggered his newly acquired Talent. Subsequently, the Force enveloping Elise poured into a Dimension Li Yu could hardly pry into like a floodgate opening.

The familiar sensation of perspective stretching, but this time it was slightly different from before.

His perspective seemed to enter the crevice of time and space. The colorful pictures around him made him feel a bit bloated.

Wrapped in the Force, he struggled to squeeze through the barriers of time and space, like a fat person trying to squeeze through a narrow passage, incredibly difficult.

He could feel the massive consumption of the Force. Just a few seconds made it somewhat unbearable for him.

The possibilities of the future were endless. Every current choice would affect the future.

Peeking into the future wasn't to change the future, because the future was changing at every moment.

It was to obtain limited information from it, thereby focusing on the present.

If one wanted to peek into the future, the price paid was also extremely huge.

As if passing through a water membrane, Li Yu's perspective suddenly brightened. This was a Withered Star Sector, completely surrounded by black warship debris.

Elise's corpse floated in the Starry Sky, her whole body covered in injuries and missing many limbs. Her spaceship had broken apart not far away.

This was a war. According to Carol's description, those black warship debris should belong to the Meditation Fleet.

Who was the enemy? Could it be me?

Li Yu looked around, but perhaps because of the influence of time and space, it resulted in his inability to see scenes too far away; it was all blurry.

Inferring according to normal logic, they rode Elise's spaceship to find the Meditation Fleet, and then went to war.

After the battle ended, the scene presented before him should be exactly like this.

It was just, why did Elise die here?

With his personality, he would absolutely not recklessly charge forward with Elise's spaceship. He would definitely have them hide in the dark.

He wanted to make himself see further, however, he was like an ordinary person carrying a mountain.

Wanting to distance himself from Elise, every step required a huge price to be paid.

"That is..." Li Yu's mind trembled slightly. He actually saw Stanley's corpse. He was even more miserable than Elise, his eyes glaring angrily, and not a single part of his whole body was intact.

Stanley actually died too!?

Unlike Elise, unless it was a Desperate Situation, Li Yu would absolutely not sit back and watch Stanley die.

Even Stanley died in this battle, which was enough to show that the situation had reached its worst point.

A sense of dizziness struck, and the Force wrapping him was almost entirely consumed.

At the same time, his perspective became more and more blurry, as if someone dragged him from the sky into the underground. The brilliant pictures of time and space filled his sea of consciousness.

His vision gradually cleared, and he returned to Elise's spaceship. The weakness brought about by the depletion of his Mental Power made him dizzy for a moment. At the same time, his stomach churned, and he even wanted to vomit.

He was already an A-Tier Lifeform now. To be able to make him have this kind of reaction was enough to prove the difficulty of traversing the Dimensions of time and space.

However, what Li Yu didn't know was that if the Star Gazer knew that traversing the Dimensions of time and space only brought him the backlash of dry heaving and dizziness, he would probably be unimaginably shocked.

Under the mask, no one could see Li Yu's reaction. Only Soul-Shaking Heaven could feel Li Yu's suddenly dissipated Mental Power.

Unfortunately, he was already Li Yu's Subordinate Deity now, having inscribed Li Yu's Divine Imprint into his Mental Core. His life and death were both grasped in Li Yu's hands.

The Strength of the Meditation Fleet was actually this strong, or were there other variables...

Li Yu's expression was Moody. According to his original idea, it was to find the Meditation Fleet and secretly observe.

If the opponent's Strength was within his expected range, he would directly use the 【Apostle】 to blow them up.

And then find the Encryption Key for that ring from the Meditation Fleet.

But the information obtained from peeking into the future this time made him somewhat Apprehensive.

Logically speaking, if the Strength of the Meditation Fleet exceeded his imagination, he definitely wouldn't make a move.

That is to say, if a fight started, in his cognition, he should have the advantage.

But in the future he saw, even Stanley was killed in action; it was already a massive Desperate Situation.

Either there were variables, or the Meditation Fleet hid too deeply and deceived him.

Although this was only one possible future out of the infinite futures, the information obtained from it was enough to give Li Yu a warning.

"Lord?" Elise asked timidly, not knowing what had happened.

"Stand down, it's nothing." Li Yu's tone was flat, fundamentally unable to detect any sense of weakness.

Elise didn't know what had happened and didn't dare to resist, only able to obediently leave.

"Lord, are we still traveling according to the original trajectory?" Anthony asked.

"No..." Li Yu shook his head: "We will temporarily stop here for a period of time."

"Yes..." Regarding the decision Li Yu made, no one dared to question it, and no one dared to ask why.

It seemed he had looked down on the Meditation Fleet too much previously. It was a large-scale Research Institute after all; its Strength was right there.

Even with the 【Apostle】 as a trump card, he couldn't treat the other party as A Sure Thing. Li Yu reflected on his own mindset.

Li Yu massaged his temples. His Mental Power was slowly recovering, and he wasn't as uncomfortable as before.

Pondering for a moment, he took out the whale core cut from the Starry Sky Whale, instantly attracting the attention of Anthony, Carol, and Elise.

To scavengers like them, if they could obtain such a whale core.

Basically, they could bid farewell to this Drifting and Homeless scavenger Identity, go to the Star Glory Empire to buy a Citizenship, and then leisurely live a retired life.

(Sorry, I had something to do yesterday and fell a few words short. Just finished it up now, extremely sorry.)

(End of this chapter)