Excess Fat
"It seems you understand. Helping the 'Scholars' speed up this process aligns with our interests in settling accounts here as quickly as possible and evacuating safely," Yun Sha affirmed directly.
The jumbled clues in his mind were instantly connected as if struck by lightning! Yun Cangyuan felt a clarity mixed with enlightenment and nausea.
I see!
It wasn't some well-thought-out internal power struggle, nor a conspiracy to pursue higher positions; the motive was so naked and short-sighted—to run faster and cleaner!
His voice was slightly hoarse from suppressed emotions, carrying an incredulous question:
"The Four Great Powers... all made this choice? Abandoning the near-limitless energy of the Dyson Cloud, abandoning the complete industrial chain they've cultivated for hundreds of years, abandoning tens of millions of well-trained troops and vast habitable planets... just to run to an unknown world with different rules, to start from scratch, to become a group of 'rootless duckweed' living under someone else's roof or struggling to survive?"
"Everything you possess now is the accumulation of the Yuncang Civilization over thousands of years! You are its managers, its beneficiaries, and you could even say its masters... Forgive my bluntness, but I cannot comprehend this... landlord's escape plan."
He had imagined many possible reasons for betrayal from higher-ups, but he never imagined that the reason could be so "stupid" that it made him feel his understanding had been insulted.
Yun Sha shook his head, his gaze as if looking at an unenlightened child, tinged with pity. "Master? No, Yun Cangyuan, you're wrong. Never. We, all of us, from the moment we took that position, were merely organs. Perhaps we were once the brain, the heart, but now... we're more like fattened, immobile pieces of meat. When a giant beast moves to a new hunting ground, or is targeted by a stronger hunter, these pieces of meat are the first to be discarded, or Shedding on their own... So, will you come with us?"
Yun Cangyuan closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and asked a seemingly unrelated question, "Does the fleet know?"
"Them? They are the beast's minions, its skeletons. Why would we tell them beforehand that the excess flesh is going to Shedding? Of course, you can still tell them now. The play is almost over."
"I understand." Yun Cangyuan straightened his Spineback and gave a flawless military salute. "Then, I will return to the fleet command. That is where my duty lies, and where I belong."
Yun Sha stared at him for two seconds, then finally nodded, extending his palm towards the door. "I'm sorry. Please leave."
Yun Cangyuan turned and left.
As soon as he stepped out of the room, a familiar commander approached him anxiously and showed him a data panel.
"Brother Yuan! Look at this! Just intercepted from a public channel, the source is from the direction of the First Habitable Planet, a high-power, wide-spectrum broadcast, unencrypted!"
The data panel displays a familiar star map, with the azure "Blue Cradle" resembling a lustrous gem. But at this moment, dozens of glaringly bright red coordinate points are clearly marked around this gem.
"What is this? The latest gathering location of the invaders?" Yun Cangyuan didn't react for a moment.
No! That's not it!
The commander's voice trembled with excitement, "These red dots... are all civilian settlements located in near-orbit and Lagrange points of the First Habitable Planet! Each one... contains at least ten million people! This broadcast... exposes them all!"
Yun Cangyuan instantly understood—this was a certain force that, in order to delay the advance of potential invaders who might rush towards the "Blue Cradle," or to create greater chaos to cover its own actions, did not hesitate to use tens of millions of compatriots as "bait" to attract firepower!
Yun Cangyuan pursed his lips, said nothing, and left directly.
He didn't know if the Yuncang Civilization could be saved; the overwhelming sense of powerlessness almost swallowed him up.
Just then, his fingertips touched a hard, slightly angular object outside his uniform pocket.
He stopped and, at a secluded corner of the passage, pulled out the object—a seemingly ordinary rhombus-shaped metal medal with only simple lines and patterns on its surface, and a dark crystal inlaid in the center that appeared to absorb light.
This was given to him privately by the chief consultant from Yuncang Intelligence Administration Office, who always looked sleep-deprived, after the meeting before the Final Showdown began.
He still remembers the other person's seemingly casual yet meaningful question:
"General Yun, setting aside your identity and duties... do you love Yuncang? I'm referring to this Starry Sky, these planets, these... the entirety of people bustling about, striving to live."
He was somewhat taken aback, but still nodded. "Of course. It's my hometown, my civilization."
The consultant adjusted his slipped glasses, and his eyes behind the lenses seemed to flicker. "So, in your opinion, when this crisis, which could perhaps be called 'world-ending,' arrives, who is most likely to become the 'variable' that turns everything around? Or rather, the savior?"
"This problem... in any case, it won't be me."
"It could be you." The advisor's voice suddenly dropped to a whisper, as he removed the medal from his chest and pressed it into his hand without further ado.
"Keep it, General. This isn't a monitor, nor is it a Bomb... It's a 'key.' When you one day feel that everything couldn't get any worse, or when you see something that you can no longer stand idly by... find a port that connects to the fleet's core data bus..."
Yun Cangyuan just laughed it off at the time, finding it absurd. While considering whether to arrest the advisor, he stuffed the medal into his pocket. Afterwards, he was busy with war preparations and almost forgot about it.
Order is collapsing, loyalty is betrayed, and life is disregarded. The invaders are monsters, the powerful figures above are monsters in another form, and the millions of ordinary people caught in the middle, including himself, seem to be nothing more than dust in the monsters' game.
Since that's the case...
Yun Cangyuan's fingers turned slightly white from the force he exerted. He gripped the medal tightly in his palm, the sharp edges of the metal stinging his skin, but it made his eyes grow increasingly resolute.
Rumor has it that Yuncang Intelligence has grown to a level that the technical personnel of the Yuncang Civilization cannot comprehend; it is a monster with infinite intelligence and computing power.
Then let's release another monster.
A monster, perhaps even more powerful and Uncontrollable, conceived by the Yuncang Civilization itself.
"To fleet headquarters." He boarded the high-speed transport ship and gave the command to the autopilot system.
The starlight outside the porthole flashed by, like the chaotic streaks of tears left by Yuncang Stars.
But is it willing to save Yuncang?