Chapter 1543: On the Road to Finding Silvan
Finding Exodus on the mountaintop went quite smoothly. However, when she saw the snow-white circular s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p, Lin Sanjiu"s heart couldn"t help but hang in the air. She scoured the vicinity of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p"s entry door, searching up and down for a long time, only to return to the door empty-handed, letting out a long sigh.
Ji Shanqing, who had just helped her search, sighed as well. Yu Yuan, who hadn"t moved from his spot, was still sitting there and asked, "Can we go in now?"
Lin Sanjiu raised her hand, wiped her face, and nodded.
Silvan"s fighting ability, reactions, and intelligence were unquestionable. Throughout the entire Twelve Worlds, there weren"t many who could pose a threat to him. If he was separated from friends due to some external reason, he would surely want to regroup just like Lin Sanjiu. If one were to say that the game world was vast and boundless and finding someone was like finding a needle in a haystack, then this Exodus would naturally become a meeting place that both of them could think of.
Time had pa.s.sed, and Silvan might not wait in the original place the whole time, but he knew Lin Sanjiu would return eventually. How could he not even leave a message or a note?
"Maybe he went into the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p and left a message for Silas," Ji Shanqing had said during the search. Lin Sanjiu was uplifted and hurried into the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p to check again, only to find that since their landing until her entry, the Exodus had not opened its door, let alone left a message from Silvan.
So, there were only two possibilities left: one, Silvan did not want to find her; two, some unforeseen accident had made it impossible for him to find her.
Considering the circ.u.mstances of their separation, the first possibility was out of the question. Lin Sanjiu couldn"t think of a power that would make Silvan disappear without a fight, and unable to escape.
"Actually, I didn"t dare to hope too much," she said, sighing as she led the two into the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p. "If he could come here, he could hear the broadcast I put out on the ground to find him. It seems we"ll have to look for clues from the Queen Mother."
Exodus roared into the sky after several tens of minutes. She looked down at the forest being buffeted into waves by the airflow, gradually shrinking into green dots; the land rapidly retreating beneath her feet, landing, until it finally became a color on the planet. "Silvan is no longer here," she thought. After spending all this time searching in vain, she was now sure of it.
"No matter how I think about it, it"s hard to explain," Lin Sanjiu said to the grand prize as Yu Yuan piloted the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p back to the Queen Mother. "If he was suddenly teleported away, why couldn"t he see the messages I left for him in various ways after the teleportation ended? If he saw them, why hasn"t he responded?"
Ji Shanqing evidently couldn"t care less about Silvan"s whereabouts, but he still acted as Lin Sanjiu"s sounding board, offering comforting words. "When we see the Queen Mother, we might find some clues."
Now, the hope of finding Silvan was all tied to the Queen Mother. But soon, even this hope was shattered—the Queen Mother was gone.
To avoid becoming a satellite of a large planet, the Queen Mother had stopped far from the game world, and that coordinate had remained in the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p"s navigation log. Exodus arrived at that coordinate after several days of travel, only to find an empty spot. The Queen Mother, like Silvan, had disappeared without a trace.
"It"s not a mistake," Yu Yuan said before Lin Sanjiu could speak.
Where had the Queen Mother gone? Lin Sanjiu couldn"t help but become agitated. She knew the Queen Mother had some ability to move forward, but Silvan was still missing. Could the Queen Mother be out shopping by itself?
"If it broke through this layer of the onion universe and entered another layer, it will be even harder for us to find it," Ji Shanqing said. "No one knows how many layers there are in the universe, and no one knows where it will end up. However, though determining its direction and location won"t be easy, it doesn"t mean there are no clues at all."
Lin Sanjiu"s eyes brightened. "Do you have a way?"
"The method that the Queen Mother uses to traverse between the layers of the onion universe is actually of the same nature as the Great Deluge, which I"ve already explained to you," the grand prize said, nodding. He glanced at Yu Yuan not far away. They were all sitting in the s.p.a.cious c.o.c.kpit at this time. Ji Shanqing didn"t trust leaving Yu Yuan alone in such an important place, and Lin Sanjiu habitually liked to be with her friends. "When a hole is created in s.p.a.ce, even if it"s restored, it will definitely leave an imprint."
"Do the Veda have the ability to detect such traces?" Lin Sanjiu responded immediately.
Yu Yuan, who had not partic.i.p.ated in the conversation but had not missed a single word, obviously knew that he had some unavoidable hard work to do again. He looked back at the two of them.
"Although you seem to think that being Veda rather than a human is a bad thing," Yu Yuan said matter-of-factly to Lin Sanjiu, "you sure need my help often."
Lin Sanjiu felt a bit embarra.s.sed. "So... what you mean is..."
The Veda turned around and answered, "I have no particular meaning. I will take this into consideration when making a decision."
"Then I"ll have to rely on you for this," Lin Sanjiu replied, playing along with the Veda"s apparent indifference to helping or not helping her. She had learned how to swiftly settle matters in her favor. "You"ll need to leave the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p, right? I"ll get the protective suits and come with you."
She had some time on her hands. After all, Marcie had been teleported away and would surely need time to find a visa to the Karma Museum; her other friends were likely still on their way to that world. She could use this time to look for Silvan as much as possible, but as for how to traverse the layers of the universe, that was beyond her abilities.
"Why are you coming with me?" Yu Yuan asked.
Even with coordinates as a reference, they were still in the vast emptiness of s.p.a.ce, looking for possibly non-existent traces of spatial damage. To help the Veda find them as quickly as possible, Lin Sanjiu donned a protective suit, tied a rope, and slowly floated into the s.p.a.ce outside the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p with the Veda, who had left his body. She took a breath inside her helmet and activated [No coincidence. No story].
"You can start now," she said to the empty darkness outside—she couldn"t actually see where Yu Yuan was, only knowing that he was to her right when they left the s.h.i.+p. She turned her head to the right, hoping he could see her lip movements. "I"ve activated [No coincidence. No story], so I should be able to help you find it quickly..."
Her words stopped midway.
"Get back quickly!" she shouted inside her helmet. "Get back to the s.h.i.+p! Grand prize, pull me back, pull me back—"
END