The big explosion caused by the demonic flames ripped the entire door apart, and half of the corridor was shaking violently. After the choking smoke finally slowly dissipated, Hao Ren was holding the s.h.i.+eld walking in front of them, being the first person to enter the control center of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p.
Behind the door was a large, bright chapel-like hall, with irregular polygons. In addition to the iconic sculptures, there were many fancy control devices and projection devices in the hall. All consoles were arranged in concentric circles and were distributed in layers into three rings. The equipment was carefully decorated and designed, which, although looked like a machine, was more like ritual equipment to be used at some religious ceremony. They could see this style throughout the s.h.i.+p, so there was nothing to care about.
The dome of the hall was towering, with three large round openings in its ceiling and bright beams of light shone down from the round openings, arranged in the center of the circle of equipment in the innermost part of the hall. The light beams were floating with dazzling figures and graphs. As Hao Ren entered the hall, they were still refres.h.i.+ng rapidly. This should be the display interface of the main control system of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p.
Hao Ren was on high alert, in case there was any automatic warning devices or sentinel robots, but he reached the three huge columns of light without being attacked. It looks like even the core area alarm of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p had gone offline. He stood in front of the three huge beams of light, curiously looking at the runes that were constantly refres.h.i.+ng. Because he had never been exposed to the technology of treacherous children, he had no idea what the state of the thing was.
The data terminal roughly interpreted the information on the light beams, "This is the self-check program of the core host. It"s jammed and constantly repeating a few threads. Maybe there"s a problem during the process of trying to restart."
Hao Ren was walking between the control equipment curiously. He noticed that the light of the control equipment was still on. The operating panels of those devices were unique: There were several parallel rows of crystals on most of the operating panel. Between the bars of crystals, there were strings of red lights, which was the input device. After the data terminal confirmed the function of one of the devices, he carefully placed his hand on the panel and plucked a "light string", and then the lights on the ceiling dimmed—which was an interesting way to operate.
Although the stubbornness and foolish behavior of those treacherous children had brought severe suffering to the universe, Hao Ren had to admit that they might be a species uniquely gifted in art. It would be nice if they could use their talent in a slightly normal way.
Suddenly, Lily shouted loudly, "Landlord! There"s a corpse here! There"s a corpse here!"
Hao Ren immediately ran towards Lily and saw that she was pointing at the s.p.a.ce between the two controllers and said, "Look!"
Hao Ren looked in the direction of her finger and saw a man in a short, gorgeous robe lying face down on the floor and his body twisted into a strange posture. Apparently, he had been dead for a long time.
Hao Ren and Y"zaks were stunned by the unexpected discovery. They did not expect that a body was left on the abandoned s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p. Perhaps they would be able to uncover the secret of the emergency evacuation from the dead crew. Y"zaks turned the body carefully, and three of them were surprised when they saw the state of the body.
The dead was a treacherous child, looked like a commander, and he died a terrible death. His face looked pale, his eye sockets were sunken, and his skin was wrinkled and showed obvious signs of dehydration. These characteristics seemed to imply that the man suffered severe blood loss before his death. And what was more worrying was the man"s expression: horror, utter unspeakable horror. His eyes were almost completely protruding from their sockets and his mouth was so wide open that he almost tore his mouth apart. Every inch of muscle on his face was filled with fear and his eyes were bloodshot. One of his hands was pressed in the heart, and the other hand twisted strangely to the back as if he was trying to grab something.
And it looked like he was scared to death.
None of them were qualified coroners, so the data terminal took the initiative to check the body. Watching the data terminal examining the body, Hao Ren could not wait to get the answer and ask eagerly, "What is the cause of death? Is he really scared to death?"
"One of the causes of death is horror. His heart was all broken. But the other cause of death is… blood loss. The body lost at least half of its blood, and every blood vessel had varying degrees of distortion. And some of his internal organs seemed to have been heated. In the area where the blood vessels were denser, the internal organs were almost cooked. Both factors are lethal. I"m not sure if he was scared to death or was boiled to death from the inside by his own blood first."
The data terminal described the cause of death flatly without any emotions. "That sounds strange," said Lily.
"This way of death is quite fresh and refined." Hao Ren was trying to make this topic seem less bizarre but everyone knew that he could not say anything nice. Lily slapped him with her tail as soon as he opened his mouth. "Err, never mind how he died, let"s see if there are any other bodies."
Lilly sniffed about but found nothing. The man lying on the floor seemed to be the only clue.
Hao Ren stood up, pondering the bizarre death of the commander while looking at the machinery equipment that was on standby. He suddenly had an idea and asked, "Is there any surveillance equipment here? After all, it"s such an advanced s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p."
"I go and look for it, but don"t get your hopes up," the data terminal said as it was floating to the center of the hall, "the system is completely off-line, so it"s hard to say if there"s any data being saved when the accident happened."
The data terminal came to the center of the three large beams and then activated its sensing function. A large number of tiny pale blue lines emerged from its silvery outer case. A kind of soft and pleasant melody rippled in the air. The data terminal, which was often being teased as a coaster, brick, paperweight, and hammer, finally had the chance to show off its power of being a high-tech product. Its signal waves resonated with the "humble" equipment nearby and began to invade the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p"s nervous system with crus.h.i.+ng force.
As the data terminal ma.s.sively invaded all the devices nearby, the consoles that were in standby or offline mode were starting to run as if they were resurrected. Hao Ren then heard the noises of running machines and systems. Two projectors in front of him were turned on, and the holograms above the projectors were showing the view of outer s.p.a.ce and Petrachelys appeared in the corner of one of the pictures. It seemed that the data terminal had gained access to the external monitor.
The data terminal first tried to reset the host state of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p and gain control of the entire s.h.i.+p, but it later found that the host model was a little special and it would take a while to completely take over. In order to avoid total loss of control, it relocked the restart process of the host and then began to separate the data that looked like the surveillance data in the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p.
They waited patiently. As the data terminal said, they did not get their hopes up.
But today seemed to be a lucky day. Soon, the data terminal shouted happily, "I found it!"
Hao Ren snapped his fingers and said, "Connect it to the projector!"
The data terminal took over control of one of the three huge beams of light. It temporarily blocked out the host status report that was constantly refreshed on the light beam and then transferred the screen of the monitoring system to it.
The screen was shaking slightly, but it was soon stabilized. It began to play the footage that was left behind not long ago. It was the scene in the control hall and was recorded before the crew abandoned the s.h.i.+p and escaped.
It was a busy scene in the control hall. The officers were busy issuing orders and making plans on the command s.h.i.+p. Everyone sitting in front of the console looked serious. According to their actions, the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p was apparently in a war zone and was probably in the midst of a battle.
The three of them stared at the screen, wanted to find out what had caused the huge changes in the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p.
Then they saw a ma.s.s of thick liquid substance suddenly appeared in the center of the footage.