Star Gate-Chapter 984: Divine Spirits (II)

“There used to be a network system across the entire civilization,” Director General Wang explained. “Information could be exchanged simultaneously. The nine base stations were in charge of relaying information—where the redwood tree sat in residence—but we later lost contact with them. Now that the network has been reconnected, we have no other place to communicate with.”

“Is communication possible if we recover the nine base stations?” Li Hao asked curiously.

“It should be,” nodded the director general. “I asked the redwood last time and learned where the other eight base stations are. Their plant spirits are most likely alive. If we can capture those sites and reactivate the base stations, we should be able to restore full network coverage.

“That will further perfect the sky canopy system. Otherwise, problems can still easily develop. The base stations that Yuming have set up for the moment are simple and crude. Others can easily sabotage them.”

“Everything is more troublesome without the nine base stations.” Yuming nodded in agreement.

Something seemed to be retreated throughout the hallway as they chatted. The lurking sense of danger looming over the group vanished. Just as they prepared to set foot inside, Li Hao suddenly walked up to the screen and displayed Stellaris.

A surge of energy reached out probingly and the robotic voice quickly sounded, “Stellaris ripples detected... the Sword Sovereign has not arrived... His heir has arrived as a visitor... and is hereby bestowed with level one clearance...”

“Seriously...?” Director General Wang muttered helplessly. The damned ruins changed their response based on who they detected! It wasn’t even the Sword Sovereign standing here, just a few ripples from his weapon!

“There are three levels of clearance at the research center,” Yuming explained. “Regular researchers have level three clearance and can come and go at will. Some executives have level two, which permits them to activate some unique devices. The research head has level one clearance, giving him control over most of the machines and warehouse. The Sword Sovereign possesses a special clearance, handing over the entire research center to him.”

The special clearance level was plainly outside of the hierarchy of authorization.

Li Hao nodded, he’d been struck by a stroke of inspiration just now since he remembered Red Moon once disseminated certain rumors that Stellaris could control a lot of ruins. He’d never verified it, and today it seemed that while control would be difficult to achieve, he would walk through the ruins with a lot of face.

Stellaris stirred in his grasp. Li Hao smiled at it—the weapon seemed to have awakened by quite a bit after he traveled to the Hao Cosmos. It responded to his commands much more readily. Previously, he’d only been able to prompt a response out of the sword through the Breathing Method of the Five Styles.

It looked like those days were over.

With Li Hao and Director General Wang both bearing clearances, the two walked ahead of Yuming and Yuan Shuo. As they passed through the hallway, Yuming began giving a tour.

“This is the entrance hallway of the research center. There are eight experimental divisions in the center, each in charge of different subjects. Here, we research mental reincarnation, divine spirits, the differences between a main and minor world, the range of core origin dao, the construction of passageways through the universe, classified research into the Star Gate, signal transmission through the void, and the effects of a minor world becoming independent.”

Li Hao blinked. This place studied very grand topics! Wasn’t this just a small branch center?

“Is this what branch centers focus on?” Director General Wang also seemed surprised. “I thought they would look more into new generation armor and the like.”

“That’s the mission of armament research centers. We are not in charge of that.”

The other three snapped their glances to Yuming.

“Don’t look at me like that,” the boy said with resignation. “More of the ancient’s memories are coming to me in this place. They exert a greater influence over me, which is why I said we. I’m putting myself in the shoes of that ancient senior.”

“That’s not good!” Li Hao frowned.

Yuming sighed and didn’t say anything. It was to be expected that Li Hao was opposed to his condition. For an ancient to take possession of a modern human’s body... While it hadn’t really possessed Yuming, the more that ancient memories revitalized, the more they would occupy the boy’s mind. That would direct him down the path the ancient had taken.

There was nothing that could be done about this.

“Do your actions fall under the umbrella of mental reincarnation?”

Yuming nodded. “The main world is divided into the yin and yang world. The Human King accomplished this later in his rule, after he established and assumed mastery over the main world. Mental reincarnation is possible within the Human King’s inner world, but Silver Moon does not possess the requisite requirements. Hence, we wanted to experiment here.”

“I know one person who did something similar—Hong Tu of the Wind and Cloud Pavilion.”

“What he did... was probably in line with the yin yang conversion method from the main world.” Yuming cocked his head in thought. “There are many drawbacks to that method and the old memories will be quarantined. They can’t really be considered the same person. We can only describe them as having watched someone’s memories, such as watching a movie. That doesn’t mean the new person will fully commit to the memories!

“Hence, the drawbacks are huge. They should actually be viewed as a completely new person. What the research center was studying was to fully combine the memories. I would be you and you would be me. There would be no difference between the two.

“However, the research center had its fair share of difficulties and disadvantages. This world was not complete and the dao of life and death yet to be perfected. Such a conversion of mental strength was hard to achieve.

“In order to overcome these failings, one had to borrow the mental strength of the main world like I did. In other words, the possession that the commander speaks of. The true reincarnation method does not entail these actions. Reversing life and death, yin and yang consumes only energy, a special energy. It is not a low level body possession like what I’ve done.”

“So you finally admit to it?” Li Hao snorted.

“What else can I say since that is what the commander thinks?” Yuming responded wearily. “Not to mention, I don’t want to do anything like that either. My mental strength was quite free when stored in the research center. But Yun Haoran—that is, my grandfather—insisted on guiding my mental strength into a physical body. He triggered an irreversible reincarnation process. I’m quite resigned about it too.”

Li Hao didn’t respond and continued walking forward, passing through the hallway. Buildings loomed into view. The area was so brightly lit that it was as if day. This was a stark contrast to the dimness of other ruins.

“Are there other powerhouses residing here in mental form?”

“I don’t know.” Yuming shook his head. “There was a research head, three vice heads, eight department heads, three hundred researchers, and one thousand guards back in the day. The research head, two vice heads, some of the department heads, and two-thirds of the guard followed the Sword Sovereign when he set out on his campaign. The rest were in charge of maintaining the research center’s functions. I was in charge of the department of mental reincarnation...”

“You were one of the department heads?”

“Ah... yes,” Yuming nodded after some thought. “But I was so weak that my mental strength had long scattered! If anyone’s still alive, they should be one of the executives. If any of the guards are still around, they’ll be like the guards of the other city—only bits of their obsession will be lingering.”

“One of the eight department heads... why don’t I know you?” Director General Wang suddenly remarked.

“Does the director general know anyone other than our research head?” Yuming asked drolly.

“I... do,” Wang Ye responded sheepishly. “I knew one of your vice heads—Liu Pinghao!”

“We don’t have a vice head by this name,” Yuming answered with resignation after some thought. “Director General Wang... truly is a police officer! You set traps everywhere! Liu Pinghao... Liu Pinghao... he should’ve been one of the vice commanders of the local guard.”

Li Hao looked at Director General Wang; the man grinned back at him. “Ahem, then I must be remembering incorrectly. My apologies!”

Yuming’s resignation deepened. “The sky canopies and blood qi pills that the commander wants are basic items that can be found in the first warehouse. That one usually holds bits and ends of lower level research, they should still be there. We sometimes upgraded our basic research in our free time...”

Well, fine! It was Li Hao’s turn to be resigned. What they valued immensely was nothing to the ancients.

“So there was a divine spirit department out of the eight?” The young man was rather curious about their research material.

“Correct,” Yuming nodded. “Some local divine spirits were born when the minor world first came to be. We killed some and some outright dispersed, but left their corpses behind. There’s one such body here, which provided the basis of our research.”

“Which god?”

“The earth god! He held sway over the earth and possessed a formidable body, which is why his body remained after his death. He was a peak Saint when he died! Recall that the core origin dao still shone upon this world back then, so he was a turn peak Saint...”

“He won’t have come back to life, will he?” Li Hao suddenly asked. “The revitalization of the world might revive some of these dead spirits.”

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The old gods were dead, but they could be resurrected. If the world was awake, that gave them ample conditions to come back to life. It would be very troublesome then, even if Saints now were a far cry from Saints then.

Director General Wang now was not the Director General Wang of the past either. Even if he was, he was still much weaker than a peak Saint.

“He can’t have.” Yuming shook his head. “The Sword Sovereign killed the earth god himself. He will not revive unless the Sword Sovereign’s sword intent is extinguished. Even if a new god is born, it won’t be that one.

“Do not underestimate the strength of a New Martial exalted emperor. If someone wishes to resurrect powerhouses that the exalted emperors have killed... Silver Moon needs to be stronger than the main world for that to be possible!”

Alright, I guess.

The group had entered the research center proper. Eight buildings were scattered throughout, each independent of the others.

“This place teemed with activity back then,” Yuming sighed. “The research center was sealed off when disaster arrived and eventually, all of us died in here.”

“You knew that death was in store for you.” Li Hao frowned. “Did no one run outside to search for a chance of survival?”

“We couldn’t,” Yumign explained. “After the research center was sealed, it would take the research head to open it again. We’re not like the main cities that can send out some of their people. We couldn’t even leave.”

Li Hao nodded and looked at Director General Wang. “You guys knew you were going to die, so did none of you take the risk to venture outside?”

“Since we’d chosen to stay behind and defend, we couldn’t run around haphazardly,” Director General Wang smiled. “What if danger occurred when we weren’t in residence?”

Bah, inflexible!

Li Hao was of the mind that he certainly would’ve chosen to leave. Though the outside world was perilous, that didn’t mean there was no chance at all. Yet Director General Wang and the others had chosen to remain at their posts. One could say that they were fulfilling their duties—those not of New Martial would probably not understand.