Translator: _Min_ Editor: Caron_
Earth time, May 4th.
In the vast space tens of millions of kilometers away from Earth, a spacecraft travelled at a constant speed.
In this spacecraft without any apparent trace of life, a young man lay inside. He wore a respirator and lay quietly in the hibernation chamber. His bodily functions seemed to have completely stopped. The entire hibernation chamber was attached to the cockpit. The inside of the glass was scattered with ice shards that just looked like an ice coffin.
The blue signal light flashed dim, accompanied by a quiet noise. The mist slowly floated out from the gaps on both sides of the hibernation chamber and was removed by the fan located inside. The top glass cover slowly opened, and the entire hibernation chamber was split into four steel shells that began to retract to the back.
“Hibernation has now ended…”
An electronic voice without any emotion rang in his ears. Liu Qingpeng opened his eyes, then moved his stiff limbs. Taking off the respirator, his stomach twitched abruptly. He bowed down and tried to vomit, but nothing came out except for his stomach acid.
In order to prevent the food in his stomach from damaging the internal stability of his body due to decay, he only ate nutrient supply for three days before the flight.
Holding the control in his hands, the feeling of coldness gradually faded. After a while, Liu Qingpeng recovered from the state of discomfort.
“I… am here?”
“I am connecting the navigator for you… please wait.” The electronic voice spoke again after it had confirmed the pilot’s heartbeat, and the green signal light flashed. Soon, a burst of static noise entered his ears and began to become more clear.
“This is the command center. Please respond after hearing this message.”
Liu Qingpeng adjusted his breathing. He pressed on the helmet and turned on the microphone. “Stingray A-1, received.”
Navigator: “I am very happy to hear your voice again. It seems that you are still alive… static…”
Liu Qingpeng smiled and moved his sore neck. “Can I take this as your blessing?”
“Of course.”
From the ground command center to his current position, even electromagnetic waves must take four to five minutes. However, with quantum entanglement communication technology, the distance of tens of millions of kilometers was eliminated. Although there was noise mixed in the communication, it was fairly clear.
Following the instructions of the navigator, he re-corrected the route and the Stingray began to slow down.
In his current position, he could observe unnatural black spots with optical instruments.
This discovery made him both excited and anxious. He was excited by his luck; no accidents had occurred on this flight of death. He was anxious because even the navigator couldn’t tell him what was waiting for him out there.
He glanced at the Gauss Rifle plugged on the right side of the cockpit. However, the rifle which cost one million XND didn’t give him an increased sense of security. He was even wondering if he encountered an alien with a laser gun, would this expensive “toy” come in handy?
“Move close to the UFO. If the other side attacks… static…”
The communication from the ground command center was abruptly interrupted. Liu Qingpeng frowned and restarted the communication device, but he still couldn’t receive any signal.
“Communication shielded?” he murmured while rubbing the safety in his hand. He examined the unnatural blackness of dozens of kilometers through the optical sight.
There was no extra energy for him to change course, fly out of the communication-shielded area, and obtain new instructions. With only one chance for contact, only twenty-four hours were left for him to investigate the target.
Traveling a distance dozens of kilometers took the Stingray A-1 a few hours. When the dark UFO was close to a distance that could be observed by the naked eye, the Stingray finally ended its deceleration phase and reached a relatively static state.
All communications were blocked; even the drone showed no images after being released.
Looking at the darkness a few hundred meters out, Liu Qingpeng hesitated for a moment. He then gritted his teeth and pulled out the Gauss rifle from his right leg. He buckled the gun to his spacesuit then manually opened the cockpit before jumping into the darkness.
In the boundless space, the fear programmed in his genes instinctively overwhelmed him.
After taking a few deep breaths, he finally overcame his biological fear. His arms bent backward, controlling the small nozzles with his joints, and drifted out to the UFO.
When he approached the ten-meter mark, the oddity disappeared abruptly. In front of his flashlight, a silver-white ball about 10 meters in diameter suddenly appeared in his vision. At this moment, he could only conclude that this was definitely not a natural phenomenon.
Liu Qingpeng raised the Gauss Rifle, controlled the nozzle to adjust his speed, flew around the ball, and found a twisted fracture on the back of the ball. On the steel-like frame in the fracture, fragments of meteorites could be seen.
“It was hit by a meteorite? What a coincidence…” Liu Qingpeng whispered aloud, but he was secretly relieved.
The energy of the flying object was obviously exhausted and couldn’t dodge an incoming meteorite. In fact, when he came in, he still had some concerns. If the flying object suddenly flew away, he really wouldn’t be able to get back.
The spherical flying object was three levels in size and the middle level was the widest. On this flying object, he didn’t find any traces of aliens nor any traces of hibernation chambers or even a cockpit.
Perhaps it was unmanned itself, or perhaps he was unable to understand the way in which the higher beings operated the flying object.
“It seems that this toy isn’t useful after all.” Liu Qingpeng barely forced out a smile and lowered the muzzle. He walked back and forth in front of the ball and carefully checked every corner while collecting evidence.
This aircraft should’ve belonged to a certain civilization, and in all likelihood, it was a civilization that had disappeared in the passage of time.
Nature erased everything that existed in it, leaving behind only the wreckage floating in boundless space.
It took about 30 minutes. Liu Qingpeng captured every corner of the flying object. After collecting one gigabyte of data, his mission was completed.
This should be the case.
However, just as he returned to the middle layer, he stood next to the platform that he had first examined. He used the flashlight to unintentionally find a dent on the flat table.
The dent was very special, as if only the light at a certain angle could make it appear.
“This is?” Frowning, he reached out and touched the dent. At the same time, a prism of light illuminated from the platform. A rounded sphere slowly rose from the other side of the platform, separated from the platform, and floated above the platform.
This lost civilization seemed to be fond of spheres.
Looking at the fluorescent ball, Liu Qingpeng, unable to control his curiosity, reached out…
