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Chapter 37: The Empire's True Intentions
As they moved forward, Tang Fang couldn’t stop thinking about one thing. Why could the creep tumor spawn in the acidic vapor zone when, in the game, it could only be placed on creep? Could it be that these highly corrosive acid solutions were actually some kind of organic substance similar to creep?
An organic solution capable of melting the titanium alloy armor of starships? How was that even possible?
Clearly, no one could answer that question.
Since the creep tumor’s self-replication ability required a cooldown period and needed time to recover before it could be used again, their progress wasn’t particularly fast. After nearly an hour, they had only advanced about two kilometers.
By now, according to Namie’s rotation speed, dawn had broken. The soft, steady light of the tranquil star filtered into the acidic vapor zone, scattering through the suspended particles in the air and casting an eerie glow over the entire foggy region.
Tang Fang turned off the searchlight on his shoulder and glanced around. The edges of the creep were shrouded in thick mist, and it was unclear how much farther they had to go.
"Tang Fang, check the magnetic readings," came Arroz’s voice through the comms, laced with surprise and confusion.
Following his instructions, Tang Fang brought up the environmental readings window. As he scanned the graph generated from the scan results, he couldn’t help but gasp in shock. The magnetic readings in the nearby area were extremely high, and the fluctuations in the curve were unusually violent.
Such phenomena typically occurred only near active electromagnetic fields with immense energy—certainly not something you’d expect in a supposedly lifeless place like this.
"Arroz, what do you make of this?"
"It seems Namie isn’t as simple as we thought."
Tang Fang nodded deeply in agreement. "Yeah."
The military’s official explanation for why they had to defeat the Sulru Empire and secure the development rights to Namie was that the planet’s crust contained precious mineral resources that would bring enormous economic and military benefits to the empire. But Tang Fang had always dismissed this claim. Precious minerals? What a load of nonsense! If it were just about minerals, why would they need to mobilize the Archimedes? Didn’t the Thunder Fleet have its own exploration ships and research vessels?
Moreover, during Alfred and Joanna’s conversation, it was mentioned that the mission of the research vessels was to decrypt and decode. When Tang Fang disembarked from the space transport aboard the Archimedes, he noticed over a dozen Pioneer-class research vessels docked behind the Thunder Fleet—all identical to the Archimedes. Such an extensive scientific fleet, all for surveying the composition and quantity of resources deep within the planet’s crust? That story was as believable as a straight-to-video adult film actress’ moaning—only a fool would buy it.
Just as Tang Fang was frowning in deep thought, one of the Queens, which should have continued spawning creep tumors ahead, suddenly stopped. It sent him a message indicating that it couldn’t spawn at the designated location.
"Huh?" Tang Fang’s heart skipped a beat. He focused his attention on the Queen, and through shared vision, he saw an incredibly strange sight.
Directly in front of where the Queen stood was a majestic rock structure. From afar, it stood out starkly against the basin-like terrain of the acidic vapor zone.
But that wasn’t the strangest part. What left Tang Fang utterly stunned was that carved onto the outer walls of this massive structure, which spanned tens of thousands of square meters and was mostly shrouded in acid fog, was a bizarre rune resembling the Greek letter ε.
"Epsilon! It’s an Epsilon ruin!" he exclaimed aloud in shock.
"What?!" Arroz’s eyebrows shot up. "What did you say? Epsilon?"
Without answering, Tang Fang waved to the two men and ran toward the structure. Arroz and Housen exchanged glances and quickly followed.
By now, the creep had spread to the foot of the rock structure. However, due to the lack of organic acid to provide nutrients, the creep couldn’t cover the surface of the building, meaning it also couldn’t clear the acid mist hovering above it.
From an overall view, the structure was a platform. Its base was a standard square stone foundation, while the upper part featured a diamond-shaped extension with a slightly reduced area.
The rock had a faint reddish-brown hue, smooth and dense in texture. Despite being immersed in corrosive acid mist for countless years, it remained perfectly intact, as pristine as ever.
"So it really is an Epsilon ruin! Who would’ve thought there’d be something like this on Namie!"
Arroz and Housen stared in awe at the towering structure that reached hundreds of meters into the fog, their faces etched with shock.
"No wonder… so that’s the reason," Tang Fang muttered, exhaling heavily. Suddenly, everything clicked into place. The Monya Empire wasn’t after mineral resources—it was after the Epsilon ruins on Namie.
Epsilon—a Greek letter, and also a codename. It was the name humanity gave to a certain advanced civilization.
Two hundred forty years ago, a meteorite over two kilometers in diameter struck the Moon, shaking the world. Countries with lunar landing capabilities around the world successively landed on the Moon to investigate the impact event.
Months later, a prominent European media outlet disclosed critical information: during the collision, the meteorite shattered into pieces, revealing a small alien spacecraft in the impact crater. Led by the United States, major powers around the world reached an undisclosed agreement to conceal the incident. They dismantled the spacecraft and transported it back to Earth in parts.
This revelation caused an uproar in the international community. Faced with public scrutiny, the media released footage captured by lunar satellites, proving the authenticity of their claims.
As Earth’s satellite, the Moon belonged to no single nation or individual—it was the common property of all humanity. The actions of these major powers were tantamount to stealing from humanity’s shared assets.
Fueled by countries that hadn’t benefited from the discovery, the international situation became turbulent. The United Nations Security Council erupted into chaos. Under pressure from the global community, the leader of the Third World took steps to ease tensions with neighboring countries and regions by publicly releasing technical data obtained from part of the spacecraft. Then all other major powers soon followed suit.
Through the combined efforts of scientists worldwide, humanity spent a decade deciphering the most valuable alien technology from the small spacecraft and integrating it into their own technological tree. This led to the development of the warp engine, enabling faster-than-light travel in space. With this breakthrough, human civilization entered a new era—the Great Galactic Era.
In the following decades, as more spaceships were completed, nations began sending scientific expeditions beyond the Solar System. During this rapid advancement in aerospace technology, humans discovered similar technological structures to the alien spacecraft on planets not too far from the Solar System.
By studying and analyzing the technologies used in these desolate buildings, humanity derived numerous groundbreaking scientific achievements. These included famous advancements like planetary atmospheric modification, quantum slipstream communication, controlled nuclear fusion reactors, and the refining technology of Element Zero. These innovations greatly enriched humanity’s technological tree in the field of space exploration, laying a solid foundation for the eventual formation of the Earth Federation, colonization of the universe, and expansion of the star map.
As for the unknown civilization that brought about this massive technological revolution, their tribal totem resembled the Greek letter ε. Thus, the Federation government referred to them as the "Epsilon."
Sadly, despite being humanity’s mentors and predecessors, in over two centuries, no one had ever encountered a single member of the Epsilon race. Across the vast ocean of the universe, aside from their abandoned technological structures and wrecked warships, it was as if they had vanished entirely from existence. Only these ruins and remnants of their ships remained, silently testifying to their former glory.
Gazing at the ancient, weathered yet grand structure before him, Tang Fang sighed softly. If this were over a century ago during the Federation era, this place might have been visited by countless pilgrims coming to honor and mourn these great beings who were like prophets to humanity.
But today, these Epsilon ruins had lost their former luster in the eyes of humanity. They were no longer sacred but had become something akin to a future technological reserve.
As a civilization far surpassing humanity, the places where they once lived naturally retained unique Epsilon technologies. By analyzing and studying these technologies, humanity might uncover entirely new techniques to integrate into their current scientific systems, leading to the development of even more advanced innovations.
For example, the powered armor of the Sulru Empire, the Element Zero refining technology of the Monya Empire, the precision drones of the Solon Empire, and the laser weapons of the Charles Federation—all these renowned technologies across the universe owed their origins to the exploration of Epsilon ruins.
The discovery of each ruin might represent the birth of a new technology, weapon, or even a new type of warship. In this chaotic, fragmented universe, their value was immeasurable.
Sometimes, nations would even go to war over the ownership of a single ruin.
Take Namie, for instance. Based on Tang Fang’s assessment, the existence of Epsilon ruins on the planet was likely known only to the Monya Empire, while the Sulru Empire remained oblivious.
The two sides divided the planet along the equator, each controlling half. Logically speaking, in modern military warfare, logistical bases were typically located deep in the rear to avoid direct exposure to enemy fire and prevent decapitation strikes.
Tang Fang didn’t know where the Sulru Empire’s base was, but judging by the position of the frontline outposts, it was at least 2,000 kilometers away from the equator. On the other hand, the Monya Empire’s base was shockingly close—less than 1,400 kilometers from the equator. At such a distance, it was essentially within range of medium-range missiles. Even though missile interception technology had advanced significantly by this era, rendering enemy missiles less effective, imagine the pressure on frontline troops when facing missile threats while simultaneously dealing with combined attacks from ground and low-altitude units.
This was why, when Tang Fang received the mission—"Investigate whether the Sulru Empire has established a missile base near the equator, verify the intelligence, and determine their troop deployment"—he had some doubts but didn’t suspect it was a false mission.
But now, reflecting on it, the entire situation defied conventional logic. Why was the 3789th Division’s base built there? There must have been another reason, a necessity.
The most likely explanation was that the Epsilon ruins were near the base—or even inside it. In that case, interference devices and defensive fortifications would block enemy reconnaissance, maximizing the protection of the ruins from the Sulru Empire’s detection.
Thinking back, Tang Fang had found it strange that the 3789th Division wasn’t advancing but instead adopting a defensive posture. But now it made sense—they were stalling for time, allowing the research vessels docked behind the Thunder Fleet to accelerate their decryption of the runic codes and extract Epsilon technology.
Even if they lost the battle and Namie’s resource development rights fell into the Sulru Empire’s hands, the Monya Empire would still come out ahead. Losing on the surface but gaining a tremendous advantage in reality.
Deception in warfare was an art, and this was a masterful execution of the strategy of "building a visible road while secretly crossing the river." Tang Fang couldn’t help but admire the mind behind this operation.
If both sides knew that there wasn’t just one Epsilon ruin on this planet—that there was another one hidden in the acidic vapor zone—he wondered how they would react.
"Hey, look at this."
As Tang Fang was lost in thought about the battle for Namie, ignoring his surroundings, Housen’s voice came through the comms. Turning his head, he realized that the man who had been standing beside him had somehow wandered to the foot of the ruins without him noticing.
"You idiot, don’t move around at will. Who knows if it’s dangerous?" Arroz frowned.
"What danger? Everyone knows the Epsilon disappeared from this universe for some unknown reason, and all their relics are ownerless. How could there be any danger?" Housen rolled his eyes at him.
Ignoring Arroz’s warning, Housen took another step forward. It was then that Tang Fang finally saw what he was standing on.
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