From Abyssal Invasion to Bursting Stars with a Single Sword-Chapter 206 - 170 Reminder from a Distant Star

The three of them retreated from the search area of the mech police guard and found a temporary hideout to take cover.

"How did we suddenly get attacked? They started with dozens of miniature missiles. That's just too absurd," Lin Zeyu vocalized the question that was on everyone's mind.

Lu Heng hadn't figured out what exactly was going on either.

His recent communication with the cylindrical robot had gone smoothly.

Although he had not yet gained the approval of the Escape Faction, being able to continue the conversation indicated there was room for further contact.

"The attacker turned the meeting robot to ash, so it's unlikely to be an attack by the Escape Faction."

If it had been an assault by the Escape Faction, they wouldn't have destroyed that cylindrical robot. With the Sikes Civilization's technological methods, there were better ways to attack.

From this, one could deduce that the attacker was not part of the same faction as the Escape Faction.

However, as far as Lu Heng remembered, the three factions within the Sikes Civilization's internal struggle were not so intense as to attack each other.

These three factions of the Sikes Civilization had different ideologies, but they all belonged to the same civilization. There definitely was competition among them, but not to the extent of resolving their differences through warfare.

Su Muyu, cradling her right elbow in her left hand and pinching her chin with her right hand, paced the room deep in thought and said:

"The mech police guards who were searching for us had official insignias. They must be the official mech police guard of the Sikes Civilization."

"Could it be that they have filed a case against us discussing the Beast Fighting Arena, and we are being hunted?"

Lu Heng slowly shook his head, "Even if it's a manhunt, they wouldn't go to such extremes. Starting with dozens of miniature missiles, this isn't an arrest but an attempt to kill us outright."

Su Muyu also showed a puzzled expression, "Right, the launch of the miniature missiles was basically a sneak attack, which doesn't quite align with normal arrest procedures."

She looked out the window, suddenly thought of a crucial point, and added, "There's another strange thing. Your meeting with that cylindrical robot lasted at most three minutes.

"Even if we were discovered by the mech police guard, it wouldn't be possible to gather so many of them that quickly, along with arranging a missile bombardment."

Lu Heng also recognized the issue and nodded in agreement, "I noticed that as well. The attacker must have known our meeting coordinates in advance.

"If that's the case, there's only one possibility, there was a leak in the communication line I used to contact the managers of the Escape Faction."

"What do we do now?" Lin Zeyu, finding himself unable to contribute, asked the most substantial question.

"I want to double-check to see if there's a problem with the channel to the Escape Faction."

Having made up his mind, Lu Heng sought out another computer terminal and contacted the regional manager of the Escape Faction to schedule a second meeting time and place.

This time, Lu Heng dispatched a Shadow Clone, sending it to the street corner.

He met with a cylindrical robot again and exchanged only a couple of sentences before facing another barrage of miniature missiles, followed by sweeping high-energy beams.

The number of mech police guards deployed to hunt them had doubled since the last encounter.

The Shadow Clone was obliterated in an instant under the missile attack, and the cylindrical robot was also blown to pieces.

They were attacked once again.

The circumstances of the two meetings were almost identical.

There was no longer any doubt; the message had been leaked, and it was an official pursuit by the Sikes.

However, the Escape Faction had sent a cylindrical robot for the meeting twice.

Although these robots had no armed modules, they were highly intelligent and not easily expendable.

Therefore, it was almost certain that it wasn't the Escape Faction's manager who betrayed the information, but rather there was a problem during the transmission of the information.

They had suffered from missile bombardments twice in one day.

Although Lin Zeyu was not in the blast zone, he felt a tingling in his scalp just watching from afar: "Do you think there's any chance Hasegawa Tom is behind this? That bastard, if he transported to this world before us, would definitely want to kill us."

Before their arrival, the trio had analyzed that Hasegawa Tom might have entered the same Abyss Battlefield and even earlier.

Which meant, Hasegawa Tom could have already obtained a high status within one of the factions and then made use of the faction's power to initiate the attacks.

Su Muyu slowly nodded, further analyzing the idea, "There certainly is that possibility, but there's one question, how did Hasegawa Tom know we had come in? And how did he know it was us contacting the Escape Faction?"

Lu Heng's eyelids gently closed as he said, "He must have seen me. I fought a match in the Mechanical Arena. As long as he keeps an eye on the beast fights, he can easily find my videos.

"As for how certain he was that it was us contacting the Escape Faction, that's not difficult.

"At this time, anyone contacting the Escape Faction in this manner, even if it's not us, is highly likely to be other Superpower Users.

"This time, the Challenge Task was a Source Material battle. Even if he found out that the contact was not us, killing other Superpower Users would still get him the Source Material, so it wouldn't affect his decision."

"So you're saying Hasegawa Tom has already joined the Escape Faction? This starting situation is too disadvantageous for us. What do we do now?" Lin Zeyu asked the same question again.

He was utterly clueless now and suggested, "Should we try joining another faction?"

Lu Heng shook his head, "It's not a good idea to switch."

Within the three factions, the Descent Faction was a group of lunatics, essentially embodying anti-social personalities.

Updat𝓮d from freewēbnoveℓ.com.

These people from the Sikes race hoped for the Abyss to descend and rule the Sikes World.

Joining this faction would mean serving the Abyss, leading to many troubles later on.

The Salvation Faction, also known as the Stay and Defend Faction, was the mainstream faction of the Sikes Civilization, with over 70% of the Sikes people supporting it.

This faction had significant influence and did not accept outsiders joining them.

The Escape Faction, on the other hand, was open to outsiders due to their smaller power and population, hence they were willing to accept outside groups.

Although the third task in the "Challenge Task" was to join one of the three factions, realistically, only the Escape Faction was accessible to join.

Moreover, Lu Heng only knew the communication methods of the Escape Faction.

So when it came to joining a faction, there were no other choices.

...

Two consecutive meeting failures made the plan to join a faction problematic.

Lu Heng calmed down and began to collect world information to rethink his action plan.

The official name of the Escape Faction was the "Civilization Continuation Plan."

This faction was not an illegal organization; it had an official website that publicly promoted its ideology.

Anyone could access the data about the faction by logging onto the website of the "Civilization Continuation Plan."

This included information about the faction leader.

The three of them began to browse the website, reading and discussing the information.

The current number one leader of the Escape Faction was a woman named Yeliana Sikes.

The surname "Sikes" in Sikes Civilization was a prominent family name; two centuries ago, "Sikes" was even of royal heritage, but it later became normalized, allowing any Sikes citizen to use the surname.

On the Civilization Continuation Plan website there was a photo of Yeliana Sikes; she appeared to be a normal Sikes female without a mechanical exoskeleton, using bionic skin.

Likewise, her exact age was also indiscernible.

If one were to use human concepts of age, Yeliana Sikes would appear to be in her twenties.

The website also displayed the percentage of the population supporting the Escape Faction, accounting for 7% of the Sikes citizens.

This support rate was higher than what Lu Heng remembered.

In his previous life, when he entered the Sikes World, the support rate for the Escape Faction was only at 5%, and it was on the rise at that time.

Because in his previous life, he had entered the Sikes World a year after the Abyss Descent, when the Abyss invasion was more severe than now.

Large-scale internal conflicts within the Sikes Civilization had already erupted.

And the Abyss was showing increasingly overwhelming strength.

As the Abyss became more difficult to combat, the support rates for the Descent Faction and the Escape Faction would continue to increase, while the Stay and Defend Faction's support would rapidly decline.

This meant that the support rate for the Escape Faction should gradually increase as the Abyss invasion progressed.

But why had it reached 7% already?

According to the timeline, the current support rate should be below 5%.

A support rate higher than his original memory was the first inconsistency.

Moreover, the number one leader of the Escape Faction was not the same person from his memory.

When Lu Heng had joined the Escape Faction in his past life, he had never met this Yeliana Sikes among the faction's leaders.

Meaning, this Yeliana Sikes had either died or retreated from public life in the timeline of his previous life.

Could it be her death that led to a significant drop in the support rate for the Escape Faction?

As Lu Heng pondered this mystery,

Su Muyu suddenly reached out and tugged at Lu Heng's arm, then pointed at the holographic display screen and said, "Take a look at this news article."

Lu Heng turned to look and froze the moment he read the headline.

It was titled "Warning from the Famous Scientist Lakrini Sikes."

The article's subtitle read "The Abyss is Unbeatable; Only Fleeing the Constant Star System Can Ensure the Continuation of Civilization."

At first glance, the news article seemed like propaganda for the Escape Faction, using Lakrini Sikes's warning as its material.

Who is Lakrini Sikes?

He was the brain in the vat on the λ838 Wasteland Planet in Orion.

When Lu Heng helped free him, he also entrusted Lu Heng with a recording to send an early warning about the Abyss invasion to the Sikes Civilization.

And now, this message was appearing in the news.

Lin Zeyu also leaned in to look and blurted out in shock, "This... isn't this the warning message we sent?"

Lu Heng nodded and said, "Yes, it's the one we sent, I never imagined it would become a propaganda slogan for the Escape Faction."

Su Muyu continued to check Lakrini Sikes's data and exclaimed in surprise, "Turns out this Lakrini Sikes was one of the three most prominent scientists in their civilization over the past century."

Understanding dawned on Lu Heng as to why the current support rate for the Escape Faction was so much higher than in his previous life.

It turned out that Lakrini Sikes was a famous scientist of this century, and a scientist of such caliber had broadcast a message urging the civilization to be vigilant of an Abyss invasion.

For the average Sikes person, their first reaction would be that the Abyss was truly terrifying.

Moreover, Lakrini Sikes died on a Wasteland Planet because of his investigations into the true nature of the Abyss.

If such a renowned scientist could die, the ordinary Sikes people would feel even more that the Abyss was unbeatable.

Under such a mindset, it was not surprising to see an increase in the number of Sikes citizens supporting the Escape Faction.

Furthermore,

Su Muyu found an even more crucial piece of information in the data.

The number one leader of the Escape Faction, Yeliana Sikes, turned out to be the daughter of Lakrini Sikes.