Chapter 2 A Egg from the Starry Sky

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Mu Fan pulled out the dagger embedded in the mutant beast's neck, wiped the blood off its body, and smiled broadly, paying no attention to the five claw marks still bleeding on his back.

Luck was on his side; this was a lone mutant beast wandering the jungle's edge, dangerous but not deadly. To him, the blood and wounds on his body were far less important than the several hundred kilograms of meat lying on the ground!

He realized he had never truly been full before. Squinting his eyes nostalgically, Mu Fan decided to stop dwelling on it since filling his stomach was the priority. This amount of food could last him several days if rationed. He lowered his head, preparing to take his bounty away.

Wait, something's off. There was a sound! A monstrous roar, like a sonic boom, pierced the air. Suddenly, the shadow of his prey appeared on the ground.

Mu Fan sharply looked up, witnessing a flaming rainbow streak across the firmament, resembling a divine sword stabbing straight into the land of Loga Star!

He stood in a daze, watching the mesmerizing fireball crash into the depths of the jungle.

Hold on, the jungle's depths?

Mu Fan's eyes widened as he realized the situation wasn't safe for him. As the fireball struck the ground, a shockwave from the explosion three kilometers away surged forward with unstoppable force, felling trees in its path.

His mouth hadn't even closed from the shock when, with a bang, he was knocked off his feet.

Smoke billowed up, and the firelight was extinguished in the jungle. People in the city, more than forty kilometers away, only heard the loud crash, taking it as the usual meteorite fall and continuing their intoxicating nightlife.

...

Snap.

My tooth, can I still eat meat? A crisp sound of teeth clicking against dirt echoed from beneath the rubble. Mu Fan shook his head vigorously. When the two tree shadows before him merged into one, he finally came back to his senses.

Resting his head on the ground, he looked at the firmament, now returned to its calm and dark state, then let out a loud wail—my meat!!

In a spring-like motion, Mu Fan leapt to his feet bursting with energy, ignoring the fresh wounds and the debris covering him. He glanced around and thankfully found that the meat hadn't been hurled away. He sat down again with ease.

"What could that be? A meteorite from outer space, or some floating space debris?" Mu Fan's bright eyes sparkled with thought, "I'd better take a look first. I can come back for the meat later."

Treating the night as if it didn't exist, the recent explosive impact had scared all the fierce beasts away. As he moved closer, he noticed the trees were more severely fallen the closer he got. Mu Fan skillfully advanced toward the crash site.

The smell of charred wood reached him as he vaulted over a massive tree as wide as an embrace. He saw a gigantic, spider-web-like radial crater, with something lying quietly at its center, occasionally sparking—a "Black Egg"? Yes, it was a Black Egg. Mu Fan was satisfied with his conclusion, as his limited knowledge couldn't provide a more fitting description.

Carefully sliding down from the edge of the crater, Mu Fan curiously approached the Black Egg, which lay silently at the bottom. The occasional sparks it emitted didn't reveal its true color, appearing as a dark object roughly over a meter long.

"There're electrical sparks; it's probably a metal object." Mu Fan grabbed a broken tree branch nearby and tapped it, producing a "thud." There was space inside. He felt the leaves on the branch he had picked up—they're warm. "Hmm, the surface temperature has started to drop."

Mu Fan placed his leather-gloved hands on the Black Egg's surface, feeling the gently hot warmth transmitting from it. He lightly pushed it, causing it to move slightly in the crater.

"Weighs around 200 kilograms," Mu Fan stood, surveying the area, then used surrounding dirt to cover any sparking parts on the Black Egg. With a grunt, he hoisted up the Black Egg, lifting it onto his right shoulder, and with a few swift bounds, jumped out of the crater, heading directly for his food catch. In the outskirts of Loga Star's District 22, under the night's cover, no one noticed a solitary figure, bearing a large black egg on one shoulder and dragging a dead mutant beast with the other, running swiftly along the path into the wilderness.

With a broad grin and shining eyes, Mu Fan thought of going home, eating meat, and then figuring out what treasure he'd stumbled upon—could it be a gift from the stars?

The dense night clouds, coated the planet with thick space debris, and the wilderness far from the city, on the jungle's remote edge—all perfectly concealed the small drama that had unfolded on this distant planet.

...

0.7 light years away from Loga Star, at the edge of the local star system, in the eerily quiet space, a chaotic mass of space debris drifted aimlessly. Deep within the asteroid belt, a massive black rift suddenly tore open, and three heavy battleships, silvery-white in their entirety, emerged. Their sleek bodies bore no insignias, but the massive dragon-like particle cannons attached to their sides, with countless uniquely-shaped cannon barrels protruding from the hulls, declared the terrifying combat prowess of these warships.

"Family Head, the fleet has transitioned to the Outer Domain. We've lost the trail! I am at fault, Family Head. Kindly punish me!" On the flagship, a captain dressed in navy blue military uniform knelt halfway. In front of him stood a tall, middle-aged man in a similar blue uniform. Behind the glasses on his nose were eyes that exuded coldness and authority. The elder glanced expressionlessly at the kneeling captain, paused for a few seconds. "Our Huangchuan family has been dormant under the Empire's banner for a century. Amidst the Empire and Federation's overt and covert struggles, most of the former nobility has vanished into thin air. Playing it safe, humph. Those nobles of Emperor Star have completely decayed. Opportunity has fallen into our hands now; if we don't seize it, we'll never get another chance. Chuan Shisan, which star system is our fleet in now?"

"Family Head, we have now transitioned to the Galaxy Federation realm, currently positioned within a small asteroid belt, undetected by any Federation forces. Please advise." An officer to the right of the middle-aged man swiftly operated the holographic display, projecting a small three-dimensional star system map for everyone.

"Chuan Yi, stand up. It shouldn't be the Empire's Eagle Eye lackeys; if it was them, they wouldn't have entered the Federation's star domain. We can rest assured for now. To avoid exposing the fleet, hurry back and quicken the preparation process." After a brief contemplation, the man called Family Head said, "Return to base."

"As you command, Family Head!" The captain rose and returned to the command podium to issue orders, "Engage the jump drive at 175% power, activate Huangchuan Iron Curtain mode, load spatial node coordinate One, and perform vector coordinate calibration. All hands—return to base!"

The recently vanished black fissure suddenly reappeared, stretching open like an enormous vertical pupil. The sleek white battleships turned an eerie black and then gradually receded into the fissure. The vertical pupil closed, leaving the asteroid belt as silent as before.

If any scientists from a Federation lab were present, they would have been astounded. The small-scale static space transmission technology was a field the Federation had just begun to explore, yet it was already in actual use by someone. But all of this went unnoticed by anyone.

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PS: Thanks to the reader who dares to teach all saints to bow their heads for the reward, and thanks to the readers Bai Yiduo and Can★Xue Wuhen for their rewards!

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