Chapter 23: The Star Devourer’s Trail

Watching the engineers, the supreme commander turned to their assistant, shrugging helplessly.

“What is wrong with these people?” he muttered. “I was just asking a question!”

The supreme commander’s assistant merely shrugged in return.

Researchers were always an eccentric bunch, yet remarkably unified. Being looked down upon by their team was often the norm, and there was little one could say against them, for sometimes, their eccentricities proved genuinely useful.

Just like now.

After a period of rigorous spatial analysis, examining energy fluctuations and the decay traces of radiation particles, they ultimately arrived at a terrifying conclusion.

“My heavens, no! Could that accursed monster truly devour an entire star?”

Immediately, the entire scientific engineering team erupted in a flurry of discussion, debating the plausibility of such an event.

It was simply too incredible to fathom. A mere cosmic creature, without the aid of any technology, was supposedly capable of consuming an entire star.

This feat far exceeded the known limits of biological entities. Even with all their advancements, humanity’s core technology for harnessing stellar heat remained monopolized by the Universal Empire.

The Universal Empire’s technology surpassed that of other smaller, peripheral alliances by several epochs. For such a level of technological blockade, they had found no way to achieve any breakthrough.

And now, a damned cosmic creature had, by its own physical body, managed to devour an entire star. How utterly inconceivable!

“Conduct a void detection scan of the surrounding space, then sort and detect the ambient dark matter. If the entity has just consumed such a massive amount of energy, its path of movement must have left extremely heavy traces in the universe.”

“This may be our only way to locate it.”

The chief technical officer listened calmly to their debate before offering their own opinion. Regardless of the entity’s abilities, their primary objective was to first capture this culprit, which had disrupted the entire Alliance nebula.

As for the scientific breakthroughs, the study of its corpse could certainly wait until later.

Otherwise, for such a self-moving star devourer, no matter how coveted its inherent technology, the longer they delayed, the more its destructive capabilities would outweigh any potential benefits it could offer.

When the expenditure completely overshadowed the gains, such a transaction would undoubtedly be deemed a failure.

Of course, judging by the potential benefits currently revealed by the entity, the Alliance could indeed stake all its capital. After all, this might be their sole chance to break through the Empire’s technological blockade!

As everyone descended into a state of fervent excitement, one individual, unnoticed by the others, covertly copied all the previously analyzed data onto a USB drive.

Since all the big data was centrally displayed on the main console, the integrated dataset made the collection process remarkably easy.

However, they were unaware that immediately after they had finished copying the data and unplugged the USB drive, the main console recorded the data transfer and performed an automatic cache.

Under the chief technical officer’s command, all the engineers began to scan the surrounding cosmic space using various precise instruments.

Before long, just as the chief technical officer had predicted, a deep gully appeared before their eyes within the arrangement of dark matter across the cosmic expanse.

“Perfect. Head in that direction!”

The supreme commander was no technological illiterate; they could at least understand basic analysis charts. Naturally, they grasped the implications of such a massive gully appearing in the dark matter under gravitational influence.

“Yes, sir!”

Upon receiving the order, the entire fleet responded in unison, then began to adjust their course, following the main vessel as they set off towards the vast trail left by the massive insect.

At this moment, the massive insect, having eaten her fill, was leisurely cruising through space with her children.

Only after emerging did she realize that her children had been circling the entire star, continuously absorbing its light and heat with their bodies, just as she had.

Many of her children, having absorbed the energy emanating from the star’s outer layers, began to evolve to varying degrees. Some had even successfully entered the third stage of evolution, their physical structures becoming more complex.

Other newborns gradually broke through the first stage of evolution. It was evident that after devouring the entire star, her children’s overall strength had seen a very significant increase.

Crucially, after consuming the star, the massive insect also imparted some residual energy to her children, helping those on the verge of breakthrough to complete their evolution in one go.

This expanded the ranks of her children’s top combatants while simultaneously shoring up any weaknesses.

However, the power of a single star was ultimately finite. With dozens of billions of children and her own enormous maw, it simply wasn’t enough to feel truly full.

Therefore, she needed more and more food and energy.

Thus, the massive insect called up the star map stored in her mind.

After several more instances of devouring the souls of human high-ranking officials and numerous technical personnel, the massive insect perfectly supplemented the incomplete pirate star map she had acquired previously. Concurrently, she also gained an understanding of several other abilities.

For instance, human quantum radar and Quantum Transport. It had to be said that humanity’s development in the field of quantum mechanics was truly impressive. With the support of several researchers’ souls, the massive insect gradually grasped what the quantum world roughly entailed.

However, to truly utilize it herself, she would require even more knowledge.

Currently, the only usable technologies were quantum radar and Quantum Channels. Yet, Quantum Channels required fixed quantum anchor points at both the entry and exit; otherwise, quantum drift incidents could easily occur.

The reason humans could use them so freely was due to prolonged development, which had established several main base stations with fixed quantum anchor points. The destination was set, and the entry only required a temporary anchor point, effectively opening the so-called Quantum Gate to freely enter quantum space and proceed towards a fixed direction.

If the massive insect wished to perform quantum movement, she would have to borrow humanity’s quantum anchor point base stations. However, this would make her highly susceptible to becoming a concentrated target for intelligent species’ military forces.

While the massive insect felt no weapon could harm her, her children would certainly suffer significant casualties. This was something the massive insect was unwilling to see.

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