True Tentacle Monster
“In the interstellar era, one person is used like ten. Truly a beast of burden.”
“Criminal? Who is Lao Zhen looking for?”
“Doesn’t seem like Ruoxi.”
Dense barrage flew from right to left across Lin Zhen’s face.
‘Found it?’
He looked up, startled as if a thunderclap out of nowhere, his long eyelashes trembling slightly.
He felt as if he had returned to that day when he stumbled upon the transaction scene of the Sheriff, Aristocrat, and Chatosi under the Junk Star, thus changing his life.
Lin Zhen clenched his fists, looking at the young mentor sitting behind the mahogany table with excitement and anticipation.
His eyes only had the other person left, his peripheral vision completely plunged into darkness.
“Chatosi… Mentor, have you really found him?”
“Chatosi? Who the heck is that?”
“Seriously, that Galactic Wanted Criminal.”
“Seems like in the first episode of the first season, he kidnapped Xiao Lin on the Junk Star.”
“I remember now, One-eyed Tea Beard.”
Xi Muzhi looked at his proud protégé’s almost unconcealed excited gaze, his right hand curled up, knuckles lightly tapping the table.
“Mm, I indeed received news. Three days ago, on a habitable planet a hundred thousand light-years away, the galaxy sheriff’s office reported a severe child trafficking case, confirmed to be the work of Chatosi.”
“Child trafficking case?” Lin Zhen’s gaze sharpened, and he asked urgently, “He, where is he?”
‘I should start preparing… Wait, if we factor in the travel time, he should be ready to transport new trainees to the battle camp!’
The mysterious Star Energy Technology of Forced Awakening, the training methods for Star Energy Users that are not inferior to or even surpass the Cosmic Academy, can easily seize territory in the dangerous Negative Universe.
Over these five years, the stronger he became, the deeper his understanding of the Empire, the more unfathomable he found the Saints’ hand society.
And the clearer it became in his heart—just how incredibly lucky it was that they managed to escape from such a powerful organization back then.
And how unreliable his own idea of rescuing Yun Ruoxi by himself alone was.
Unless they could break through to Level 5 or above, they absolutely could not rely solely on the strength of their nine people. Instead, they must unite all possible forces, especially the strength of the Empire.
But the problem was, in the Positive universe on the surface, there were no less than ten thousand anti-Empire or outright evil organizations that had raised their banners, not to mention the Star Bandit forces that burned, killed, looted, and occupied territories everywhere.
And the Saints’ hand society not only had its power mainly in the Negative Universe, but also did an excellent job of disguising itself in the Positive universe.
It might have even planted agents within the Empire’s high ranks. After all, if they couldn’t do that, they couldn’t have survived intact for over five thousand years.
But in that case, compared to these forces, the Saints’ hand society seemed too harmless.
Even if he self-exposed that he was a trainee who escaped from the Saints’ hand society and painted their threat in glowing terms, with no status, he couldn’t get the Empire, already overwhelmed with work, to pay attention and send any manpower.
On the contrary, he might be caught by the Saints’ hand society’s spies. Unless they could provide concrete intelligence, such as the exact coordinates of the Saints’ hand society’s base in the Negative Universe.
And no matter what, as long as they could master the coordinates of the Saints’ hand society’s base, even if the Empire was still unwilling to help, they could try to rescue Yun Ruoxi on their own.
This was called not putting all eggs in one basket, a wisdom that Yun Ruoxi herself had once told them.
Therefore, while the group of seven worked hard to become stronger, they never stopped searching for traces left by the Saints’ hand society in the Positive universe.
Three years ago, just after enrolling in the Imperial Institute of Technology, everyone found time to retrace the escape route they had taken during their warp.
But when they relied on Chicha’s records and painstakingly found the exact location of their first warp at that time, they found that the Jump Node had actually disappeared long ago.
A Jump Node is a weak point in the cosmic membrane, and it can indeed self-repair and disappear. But it had only been a year, so it was unlikely.
More likely, the Saints’ hand society was worried that they would use these Jump Nodes to return to the vicinity of Samira-21 Colony and use Chicha’s navigation logs to reversely find the base location. So shortly after they escaped, they manually closed the Jump Node.
Afterwards, on their way out of that star system, they encountered pursuits by suspected Saints’ hand society assassins, which further confirmed their speculation. But regardless of the reason, this path was completely blocked.
So, they then thought of two other methods. First, to find a way to contact the Military Headquarters and get them to restore all of Chicha’s memories.
As long as Chicha’s memories were restored, they could confirm the coordinates of the army he was in at the time in the Negative Universe battlefield. He, who had once infiltrated the Saints’ hand society’s network, could then follow the lead to find the existence of the Asha Star system.
This itself was the agreement Lin Zhen made with Chicha at that time.
So over the past two years, while evading the Saints’ hand society’s assassins, Lin Zhen had been looking for a suitable opportunity to establish contact with the Empire’s Military Headquarters and return Chicha’s Hunxin.
Logically, this was the most feasible path.
But in the end, this path unexpectedly failed. Because the army to which Chicha belonged—the Shadow Special Operations Corps under the Third Expeditionary Army—had, along with its designation and records, mysteriously disappeared from the Military Headquarters’ archives for unknown reasons.
It had become a ghost army that no longer existed.
Even if Lin Zhen hadn’t been cautious at that time, hadn’t voluntarily gone to them, and hadn’t used his real face and name to contact the Military Headquarters, he might have been arrested by the Military Headquarters.
Obviously, the defeat of the Shadow Army back then had its own secrets, making the Empire so tight-lipped that even after a thousand years, they would silence people.
Under these circumstances, Chicha had no way either. A thousand years had passed. The connections he had made, the friendly superiors, his own family—none of them might have survived. He could only stay by Lin Zhen’s side and wait for an opportunity.
After all, Lin Zhen had successfully passed the exam and entered the Imperial Institute of Technology. If there was any way to bypass the Military Headquarters and restore his memory, it could only be within this institute.
And thanks to him being by Lin Zhen’s side, continuously providing some technological knowledge that hadn’t been overwritten, Lin Zhen was able to quickly shine at the Cosmic Academy, even restoring the manufacturing process of Level 5 Bio-alloy in his freshman year, benefiting his mentor Xi Muzhi.
Thus making the other party promise him one thing—to help him find traces of Chatosi.
Lin Zhen was very sure that Chatosi was a long-term partner of the battle camp, always abducting children for them.
So if he could find the channel through which Chatosi handed over children, he would definitely be able to contact the Saints’ hand society. And this was the last feasible method they had after failing twice before.