The equally stunned Feeney hesitated in confusion—so that’s why everything had gone so smoothly today?
So he’d just walked right into this?!
Feeney looked at the two bedraggled young people nearby, especially his own dusty little cub.
Throwing a tantrum, he was still exactly like when he was little.
Feeney instinctively began, “Sorry abou—”
But halfway through his apology, his baby face froze stiff, then he slapped the ground as well.
“No, no, no, is this my fault? I’m a victim too, okay? Where is this place, how should I know?!”
Every time he got lost or something weird happened, was it because he wanted it?
What actual connection did it have to him?
Feeney thought these things, trying to convince and comfort himself—Amos would think this way too…
Well, maybe Amos wouldn’t.
“No signal, seems like we’re in an unknown area.”
Chao Huangmu also got up, still covered in dust, and first helped Zao Zao brush off the dirt before turning to inspect the battered starship and mech that had come with them through the accidental spatial transfer. He checked carefully and said,
“But the pollution index here doesn’t seem too high.”
For those from the Holy Cas star system, the structure and environment here were extremely unfamiliar.
All their material analyses showed they were no longer in their familiar starfield.
Feeney was fiddling with some things.
The little Crown Prince also stood, walking a circle around them.
This was a very empty area with no vegetation, bare and gray, completely alien.
Though occasionally, the roar of familiar exotic beasts could be heard, proving they hadn’t fallen into the same kind of place as the Angel Realm.
“The starship’s badly damaged,” Feeney said after a while, kicking the starship in frustration, his baby face gloomy. “Zao Zao, don’t bring out your crown or wings for now.”
Feeney instructed.
After all, this was unfamiliar territory. It was best to stay cautious, and Feeney was truly despairing over his bizarre constitution—he just hoped that, before Amos arrived, he could quietly stay by the family’s only cub and protect him to atone for his sins—well, this couldn’t really be his fault, right? Right?!
“Okay, Third Uncle.”
Chu Zao ambled back, looking up with his ashen face at Feeney, and responded.
Then he waved Chao Huangmu over.
“Brother Mu, over that way I think I hear those branch monster sounds, is it just me?”
“It really is.”
Chao Huangmu cocked his head and listened. He was just as dirty, rolled in dust, but when Chu Zao looked his way, his mouth split into a sunny grin, a hint of a sharp canine peeking out, but his teeth were so white and his face so dirty, it was pretty comical.
Zao Zao stared for two seconds, clearly trying, but failing, before bursting out laughing.
“Your face is way too dirty.”
“Is it?” Chao Huangmu wiped his cheek, looking at his equally grimy hand with puppy eyes. “Even dirty, Zao Zao still looks especially impressive—”
Especially impressive?
This dirt-smeared, shoulder-shaking laughing Zao Zao, completely forgetting he was supposed to look steady and reliable?
Feeney: …
Feeney, who had always believed his big beard was super handsome among the Holy Cas, was really starting to wonder what the Holy Cas people were made of—what kind of faith allowed them to ignore reality and toss out wild praise like this?
“Alright.”
Feeney said, as he watched the two crouch together, one pulling out handkerchiefs, the other water, getting ready to clean their faces—
“We need to properly explore later.”
Chu Zao looked over, nodded, and walked over to Feeney.
“If those really are branch monster sounds, we must be on the other side of the pollution—maybe if we find the direction of the pollution, we’ll know how far we are from the barrier line.”
Saying this, Chu Zao looked up at his uncle.
“Third Uncle, you’re a reliable adult Crown Clan, aren’t you?”
Recalling all the things that had happened to Feeney over the years, and the many trips through the training room—Chu Zao was a little troubled—why did all the ones prone to mishaps come together?
Wasn’t there a really reliable Crown Clan who could have tagged along?
At last, Chu Zao tried to convince himself, and Feeney too, looking up at the uncle always sent out as a top weapon by the Crown Clan to roam the stars.
We’re in a strange starfield, but we have a tracker—let’s just wait for Dad to come; Third Uncle, what do you think?
The cub’s point was obvious.
But Feeney’s mind was already running wild.
Given how many times he’d been taken in by this father-son duo before.
Feeney: …
Calling me a reliable adult Crown Clan—there’s got to be a catch!
“Don’t tell me, Zao Zao, you want Third Uncle to—”
Feeney looked up at the sky.
“Fly out and find the barrier, and then quickly come back for you?”
Little Chu Zao: …huh?
If Third Uncle really insists—well, it’s not impossible.
Feeney thought about it—
“So I have to cross the pollution, find the location of the barrier, wait for Amos to arrive, protect you two in the meantime, and finish scouting the area—”
That’s the work of several legions?
That’s for me to do?
Feeney let out a couple of hollow laughs and looked at Chu Zao: “Zao Zao, you see, that’s—” impossible.
Chu Zao: “Third Uncle, you’re basically a superman.”
The innocent little Crown Prince reached out and gave Feeney a thumbs-up, his face full of admiration.
Feeney: …
—You really went and accepted it, huh?!!
Feeney couldn’t help reaching out and patting Chu Zao on the head.
Get it together, Zao Zao!
The sixteen- or seventeen-year-old young Crown Prince stumbled a bit under the pat, muttering, “But you misunderstood yourself, Third Uncle.”
“Let’s just explore together, we shouldn’t split up in an unfamiliar place—”
When the other Crown Clan weren’t around, Feeney actually seemed pretty reliable.
He scanned the area. It wasn’t total darkness—there was light, but no visible source.
They set the starship as a center point and explored outward.
Feeney thought, then saw Chu Zao rub his head and pull out something from his pocket.
Finally, the cub produced a little notebook.
Chao Huangmu and Feeney both craned their necks to see.
Feeney: “What’re you doing, Zao Zao?”
“Journaling.”
Chu Zao lowered his gaze, long curled lashes fluttering, gripping the pen as he scribbled quickly in his notebook.
“Writing it down for Dad later.”
Oh—it’s like a report, then?
Feeney thought, glancing over to take a look.
Only to see Zao Zao writing—Taken by Third Uncle to an unknown planet. Pollution strange. Heard branch monster sounds. Got lost together. Deciding new direction to explore. Praised Third Uncle as superman. Third Uncle hit me.
Feeney: …
What kind of diary is that?
It’s a grudge-book, isn’t it?!
And you’re going to show Amos?
Feeney very much doubted Amos was, right this moment, just waiting to catch him. Why’d he ever agree to trade shifts with Amos?
Feeney sucked in a breath, instantly stricken.
He reached out—Zao Zao was no longer at an age he could just pick up and make submit as punishment.
Feeney put his arm around Little Chu Zao’s neck: “Zao Zao!”
“Third Uncle, Zao Zao is here.”
With his head of curls mussed by Feeney, the dusty Zao Zao looked at him.
Feeney pinched the cub’s cheek.
“Enough already, we don’t need reports like that.”
On the side, Chao Huangmu couldn’t help but chuckle.
Feeney and Chu Zao both looked over.
Feeney paused, then pointed at Chao Huangmu.
“Zao Zao, he was making fun of you.”
Chao Huangmu: …???
No way, Your Highness Feeney, don’t frame me!!!
*
Meanwhile, elsewhere on the planet, before that huge noise rang out.
Several mechs were gathered together.
The pilots stood in the middle, faces heavy.
“What’s the situation?”
“This isn’t a real survival round; our territory’s live feed has been cut off. This is the second wave, doesn’t look good.”
One young man pounded the ground.
“Damn it.”
He gritted his teeth, head down, dust swirling, then fell silent.
“The Gerson Empire has banded together, forming the strongest team. Every time they intentionally target us. Our Sacred Territory is trying its best. We’re the third batch about to be deployed; we have to be prepared.”
He spoke in a low voice again.
“They’re just taking out whoever they don’t like, colluding with those exotic beasts, raising us like livestock—they live in low-pollution, resource-rich areas, think they’re so great, but really, they’re just higher-grade food for exotic beasts!”
“Everybody knows that, and many have said this division is the exotic beasts’ trick, but it’s useless—as long as some side profits, they won’t pick the harder path. Fewer and fewer nations and races are willing to team up with us—a lot of what we know comes secretly from the East Alliance—”
“What use is secret info? In the end, our families, my younger brother, your sister, you—will all be targets for those beasts. Afterward, they’ll leave a few behind, claiming to let us restore our race—frustrating, so frustrating.”
“This survival pre-match is just a little warm-up, but already too many of our people are gone. I think there’s no point worrying now; we should just prepare for everything to come.”
This starfield was swarming with exotic beasts. Thousands of years ago, when pollution came and divided this place, swallowing it up, with no immortal races daring to get close to the pollution, the exotic beasts nearly wiped out humanity.
It wasn’t until the exotic beasts evolved conscious commanders that they realized this wouldn’t do—so they allowed humans to reproduce and replenish…to provide a constant supply of flesh to devour.
Thus began the survival games, with one official match and one pre-match each year. Countries and races ranking low or suffering greater deaths were herded further out, closer to the normal beasts, and the weakest thrown right into the beasts’ hunting grounds.
Basically, no one came back.
After that, humans lost their history; after desperate struggling, a new balance slowly formed.
Those who survived established relatively stable nations and races, but besides the dominant Gerson Empire, which allied with the beasts from the start, the others kept being herded along, driven by the beasts like livestock.
Even with advanced mecha tech able to take down minor exotic beasts, they were paper-thin before commanders.
Resistance faded away.
In the end, the survival games became routine, a common sense to all in this starfield.
Whether pre-match or survival round, countless people watched live.
They saw the participants eaten by exotic beasts, failing challenges, or killed by other nations, debating it feverishly—a near-crazed mania.
Now, the official match hadn’t started; this was the pre-match, to determine the coming tasks and start points.
The Sacred Territory, once the Holy Cas remnant, had cycled through untold generations.
As a race with stronger spiritual power and stubborn personalities, they would never submit, and were pushed ever further to the fringes. If they lost this survival game, they’d be cast straight into the beasts’ hunting grounds.
And judging from the pre-match—things did not look good.
They were the third and final batch for this pre-match.
They knew the other groups, but that just made things worse; when a live stream cut out, the meaning was clear—the streamer was in trouble. The mood was beyond heavy.
“Damn it, damn it—”
A youth clenched the dirt, but the tighter he gripped, the more the sand ran through his fingers.
Dark patches appeared on the dry earth—drops of moisture.
“Yu Ye, calm down—how will you compete like this?”
Someone next to him reached out to calm him.
“We can’t lose this time. We have to save our people, we have to go home—go back to our homeland—”
“Homeland, homeland, all about homeland…”
Yu Ye suddenly sprang to his feet, staring at them.
“But where is that homeland? What Holy Cas, what Sacred Crown? We’ve never encountered it, never even heard a thing about it. Probably just desperate elders inventing lies so we’d have hope.”
He’d spent his life hiding from beasts, once gazing longingly toward the homeland his elders spoke of.
Now, he’d shouldered the weight, but the entire Sacred Territory was being pushed to the brink of death—they were on the edge, one step away from falling off.
“Don’t talk like that.”
“What, we’re not allowed? That’s their homeland, not—mine—”
The man in his twenties dropped his head, tears slipping to the ground. A bit breathless, he took a deep breath, turning to eye his mecha.
“We could survive, but now they’re ganging up to get rid of us. What good is single combat ability? Are we really supposed to believe those generations-old rumors about a mysterious savior race? Impossible, doesn’t exist—I don’t believe it—”
Just as he said this, a thunderous boom and ground tremors put the Sacred Territory team instantly on alert.
“What was that?”
“A beast?”
“No, can’t be. Beasts don’t make that sort of sound, and this isn’t a hunting zone, there shouldn’t be any powerful beast here.”
Yu Ye got up.
He leapt into his mecha.
“Let’s go check?”
“Hey, wait, don’t act rashly!!”
The others scrambled after him, jumping in their own mechs, afraid Yu Ye, on edge as he was, might do something reckless.
They piloted their mechs onto a ridge overlooking a plain of sand and rubble below.
They’d just been here not long ago.
But oddly, it had changed. At the center, there was a black shadow—like some unknown aircraft.
“Adjust view, observe—”
They tweaked their mechs’ fields of vision—
“That’s? People?”
They saw three people standing before the starship.
“Seems so, no obvious abnormal traits, doesn’t look like beast commanders.”
“Shouldn’t be—if it was a beast commander, it would already have spotted us. They’re probably just regular people, not even noticing us here. But why are they here? And how did they get here?”
Though they concluded Chu Zao and company were human, not beasts, since it was close to their territory, they were instantly alert.
“Could they be Gerson Empire spies?”
“Or desperate saboteurs from minor worlds edging out of the survival game. We’ve dealt with plenty before.”
“I agree; look at that weird craft’s mecha.”
“That’s a mecha? It’s so crude! I could blast through it with one shot. What an old-fashioned relic.”
“Yeah—never seen mecha like that, so backward. Even tiny backwater places have better—”
That much was true.
Survival games demanded the strongest mecha—better machines meant better odds.
Some minor worlds would rather not eat than skimp on mecha research.
But that mecha beside the craft—
So primitive, it looked like no one cared about it. All the old design flaws hadn’t even been updated.
Down below, when the three had gotten there, they’d casually swept a glance upward—but the spiritual pressure was so weak, these three, each stronger than the next, didn’t pay them any mind, deciding to check out the situation later.
Now—
Chu Zao looked at Chao Huangmu, Third Uncle’s arm still around his neck, beautiful honey-colored eyes smiling, pen in hand, scribbling in his notebook—then, Chao Huangmu laughed at me.
Chao Huangmu looked from the notebook back to Chu Zao, eyes wide—his world collapsed.
“I didn’t, I swear, I would never laugh at such a handsome, powerful, reliable little prince!”
Chao Huangmu almost raised a hand to swear, urgently scooting over, puppy aura gone anxious. Not afraid of Feeney, he leaned into Chu Zao, trying to show honesty—
Very sincere!
Hey—
“Talk is cheap, Zao Zao don’t buy it.”
Feeney tried to shift the blame, even fished out a small packet of candy, trying to bribe him.
Chao Huangmu, seeing this, followed suit.
He dug into his spatial link—fruit, snacks, sweets, all sorts of goodies.
He offered up sweets: “My bad, this is compensation.”
Feeney, who’d only brought one small packet: “Hey, you brat—”
He stopped halfway, eyes shifting, smile vanishing into a shadowy scowl—
Tsk.
Up on the ridge,
Yu Ye raised his mecha arm, cannon aimed at the three.
“Let’s sneak over and see what they’re doing.”
“Should we take them out?”
“If needed. We have to keep the territory safe, but not yet—gather intel first—”
“Silent channel—wait, weren’t there three of them?”
Just as they spoke, someone cried out on comm.
“Yeah, so why are there suddenly only two—”
Yu Ye was still aiming, but now stared at the screen—one figure had vanished.
“And, did they just glance our way?”
“No way. They’re ordinary people—even beast commanders sometimes miss us at this range. Maybe he just walked out of our sight—”
‘Click—’
A tiny sound.
But terrifying—because it was right next to them.
Before they could finish speaking, they choked.
What’s happening?
Yu Ye’s mecha began throwing errors.
Suddenly, in their mecha vision, sparks and flashes—Yu Ye’s neighboring mecha jerked away in fear—
“Yu Ye, your mecha—”
Feeney relaxed his hand, and the detached mechanical arm, emitting crackling sparks, fell to the ground with a puff of dust.
Feeney’s crimson pupils glowed faintly as he stepped off the mecha above, head low from the angle, face shadowed and expressionless.
“Sorry to bother you—but you were somewhat impolite from the start. Still, since we’re new here, we really don’t want to cause trouble. But—”
Feeney spoke softly, carefully enunciating each word: “Please do not aim weapons at our family’s cub.”
In a strange and tense environment, a guardian—will react.