Chapter 268: Penetrating the Stellar Troposphere

An Li stood on the cold metal surface, and the ground that was once thought to be impenetrable began to cave in. The metal seemed to turn into quicksand, forming a depression and sinking.

"The metal particles here have already been shattered!"

An Li fled from the scene.

The entire Star City was now on the surface of the star. Previously, the city had been floating on the stellar surface, supported by the stellar wind outside the star, and the electromagnetic forces between the particles kept them connected. At this moment, their actions were like a static electric response, causing a large amount of electricity that originally maintained balance to escape, and the entire Star City began to collapse into the interior of the star.

Such a massive collapse of matter would undoubtedly lead to the destruction of the entire star.

An Li shouted, "Run!"

All the officials and scholars transformed into their sequences and headed towards the spaceship. An Li did the same, but at this moment, she received an unknown signal that caused her mecha's earpiece to buzz.

She turned back to look at the star being explored and allowed her deputy brain to analyze the just-received information.

The mecha's flight speed was not slow; it could accelerate to over 50 km/s in a short time and maintain a speed of over 300 km/s for an extended period.

At this moment, everyone had returned to the spaceship, and when they turned around, they noticed that An Li had not come back.

"What is the commander doing? Why hasn't she returned?"

They saw that An Li had transformed into a giant sequence, [The Chapter of the Mourners], which was a sixth-level sequence. The reason for choosing this sequence was because of a book associated with it.

An Li turned into a huge book, but instead of words, it had countless tentacles. At the center of the tentacles was a giant eye, rotating and observing. The pupil of this eye was a circular library, but the library was empty without a single book. In the center of the library was a small table with a record player on it.

This was the full form of [The Chapter of the Mourners]. Its ability was simple; when the record player on the book turned, a mournful melody would play. All sounds that heard the music would be infected with sadness, and those with weak wills might even commit suicide.

This sequence leaned towards support rather than offense, and it was not particularly fast.

Just as everyone on the spaceship thought An Li was about to fly back, they discovered that she was flying towards the collapsing Star City.

"Has the commander been influenced by something?"

Everyone was shocked, but the next moment, they received a message.

"Initiate weapon strikes on the stellar surface, destroying the corona layer above 1.5 million degrees Celsius. Use the energy to blast a hole into the interior of the star, then use binding force to prevent the hole from healing quickly. I'm going inside the star."

After this message, there was no further communication.

Although they didn't understand why An Li was doing this, everyone began to assist the spaceship's main computer in carrying out the instructions.

The Red Dragon was a small spaceship with quickly adjustable weapons. In a short time, all units were in position, and a large amount of antimatter was ejected. After the antimatter and particles annihilated each other, they released a massive amount of energy, increasing the destructive power. After nearly an hour of continuous bombardment, a deep pit was finally blasted on the stellar surface.

Then, the powerful magnetic binding force came into play. Pure magnetic binding was extremely energy-consuming, so before activating the magnetic binding device on the spaceship, they began to disrupt the star's gravity, causing gravitational turbulence on the stellar surface to reduce its gravitational pull.

At this moment, everyone saw that the spaceship's energy was rapidly declining at a rate of 4% per minute. Even with continuous charging by collecting surrounding matter and light energy, the spaceship could only maintain the open hole for no more than 27 minutes.

"Commander, 27 minutes!"

The message was sent out, but An Li plunged into the open hole.

The hole was not very deep, only about 20 kilometers. For the entire star, it was just a scratch. An Li did not intend to rely solely on a small spaceship to penetrate deep into the star. Instead, she wanted to utilize the Star City's matter that had flowed into the stellar hole.

The mass of this matter was undoubtedly higher than that of the surrounding hydrogen, and it would continue to sink.

This matter was incredibly strong, capable of withstanding the power of nuclear fusion and blocking the temperature of nuclear fusion. Moreover, the temperature on the stellar surface was already several thousand degrees Celsius, so it was estimated that only when it sank to the radiation layer of several hundred thousand degrees Celsius would this matter start to melt and be destroyed due to high pressure and temperature.

The reason An Li did this was because of the information she had received.

The information clearly stated, "We are here!"

This message was not in the language of the Olive Branch Civilization but in the language of the Federation.

She didn't know if this was a trap, but she felt she had to investigate, even if the journey was extremely dangerous.

The design of the Red Dragon was insufficient for it to penetrate deep into the star's interior. Although the surface metal could withstand high temperatures without melting, the metal's thermal conductivity would cook the life inside. Spaceships designed to enter the star's interior had unique designs, with even the outer shell not being very sturdy, focusing on reducing the temperature's impact on the interior of the ship.

Following the flowing matter, An Li entered the interior of the star.

Her entire body was immersed in the matter, and the surrounding pressure continued to increase, surpassing 10,000 atmospheres in a short time.

She stayed in the matter for a while, allowing the quarks inside her body to continuously adjust her physical structure to adapt to the surrounding pressure. Then, she continued to penetrate deeper, repeating this process.

"Where is this place?"

An Li confirmed that the information came from this direction, but as she kept penetrating deeper, she couldn't find anything.

By now, she had penetrated almost 100,000 kilometers into the star but still hadn't encountered anything. The surrounding temperature was nearly 100,000 degrees Celsius, and the temperature of the metal had exceeded 3,000 degrees Celsius. If it weren't for her sequence and mecha, this temperature would have turned her into ashes.

The mecha was constantly using energy to create liquid nitrogen-level low temperatures, consuming energy at an alarming rate, making An Li increasingly anxious.

The reason she dared to come down was that she believed that if there was sound in the depths of the star, it proved that there was a cavity inside the star. As long as she reached that maintained cavity, she wouldn't die.

However, ordinary stellar cavities were located a few thousand kilometers inside the star. An Li had heard that the Federation had once opened a cavity about 3,000 kilometers inside a star, but now she had already penetrated over 100,000 kilometers into the star, and the front was still as dark as an abyss.

At this moment, even An Li's usually calm heart couldn't help but feel a bit of panic. Perhaps this was not a place that life could reach.

After all, the technology of Star City was too advanced, and the depth it could reach didn't mean that the Federation's technology could do the same.

However, at this moment, An Li no longer had a way back.

She continued to penetrate deeper, even accelerating. The intense pressure changes made the mecha somewhat powerless.

110,000 kilometers!

120,000 kilometers!

130,000 kilometers!

150,000 kilometers!

200,000 kilometers!

Penetrating the troposphere and entering the radiation layer.

But still, nothing.

"How is it still nothing? The surrounding temperature has already exceeded 2.4 million degrees Celsius. Even the Olive Branch Civilization wouldn't be able to..."

Just as she was thinking this, the darkness before her eyes suddenly vanished, and the space around her brightened.

Finally, she had arrived!