Departure to the Ruins

"Bang!"

Yuan kicked open the warped door and stepped out with a dark expression. Behind him, the Taoties exchanged glances before following him out of the warship.

"Qiming, scan the surrounding environment."

"Understood, Master. Launching probes."

"Buzz!" A black spherical device ejected from Yuan's battle armor and shot skyward. After reaching an altitude of a thousand meters above Yuan, it hovered, emitting invisible energy waves.

Soon, a projection of Dobilun Star appeared before Yuan.

"Hmm, atmospheric composition is stable, no life. Damn! So poor? No resources at all."

After reviewing the data on the projection, Yuan felt a headache coming on. This wasn't a planet; some large comets had more resources than this.

"No, it must have been mined out." As more projections were scanned, Yuan realized that the planet's rich mineral deposits had vanished.

The remaining resources were basically worthless. To put it bluntly, they weren't even enough to cover the cost of extraction.

"Your Excellency, what do we do now?" Bruis kicked the ground beneath his feet, which had almost weathered into yellow sand. It was clear the planet had been ravaged.

Bruis's question plunged Yuan into thought. Wu Daozi had gone to such lengths to bring them here; it couldn't just be to look at endless yellow sand.

With that thought, Yuan's mind was made up.

"Qiming, connect to the warship's probes and increase their detection power. Establish a complete planetary civilization map and mark any areas where the detection waves show anomalies."

"Understood, Master. Connecting to the central system." Following that, the Stellar Furnace, which had been dormant since the warship's shutdown, reactivated.

The large detection devices on the battle armor were activated, and the small probes were all ejected into the air by the system. Only then did Yuan begin to answer Bruis's question.

"Wait here for the detection results for now. We have insufficient information. Blindly leaving the warship and losing its weapon systems would put us at a significant disadvantage.

Wu Daozi is a Mentor at the Super Seminary. Whether he's a God or not, he can control the Dark Dimension and use Dark Energy and Dark Matter.

The probes on the warship cannot detect Dark Matter or Dark Energy, but as long as the primary material world exists, unless it's completely concealed by space-time abilities or other high-level technology, there will inevitably be incongruous areas."

Hearing this, Bruis nodded blankly, as if he understood.

"You mean, this planet should have ruins or places like large laboratories that the probes can't detect?"

"Exactly. As long as we map out these void areas, we'll basically know where he wants us to go."

"But Wu Daozi and his group possess high-level god-creation knowledge, far surpassing our technology. What if these ruins or laboratories absorb the detection waves and disguise themselves as normal areas?"

Listening to Bruis, Yuan turned to look at him in surprise.

"Your Excellency, is there something wrong with what I said?" Bruis scratched his head, finding Yuan's gaze a bit strange.

"Nothing, you said it very well. As for what to do? There's no other way. This is the only method that can give me some data right now. If he doesn't play by the rules and uses god-creation level technology, then so be it.

Besides, although there aren't many resources here, the stellar resources are quite abundant. At worst!"

As he spoke, a fierce look filled Yuan's eyes. Bruis understood what Yuan was about to say.

Destroy the planet!

Yes, destroy the planet. If all else failed, they would simply blast their way through with the main cannon. Yuan didn't believe that, even then, the so-called laboratory could remain completely hidden.

Since there were no life forms on this planet, Yuan felt no burden. Destroying the planet was the most direct solution, but they couldn't do it yet. After all, the star from the Great Worm Bridge had subdued Yuan.

He didn't want to resort to such a drastic measure unless absolutely necessary.

His thoughts drifted further and further, and soon Qiming finished compiling the detection data.

"Ding! Master, an unknown structure has been detected."

Qiming's voice jolted Yuan. He quickly opened the three-dimensional projection. A projection of a massive structure was displayed by Qiming, located in the central region of the planet's continent, standing out abruptly.

"This old man isn't even pretending anymore, just revealing it directly." Enlarging the projection, Yuan could clearly see the vast palace complex.

It sat starkly on the surface, with nothing around it. There were no defensive or offensive weapons, not even a single hair.

"Your Excellency, it seems this is our destination. Shall we depart now?"

"Rest up. The situation is unclear, and I don't know what kind of 'ghosts' are in there. The warship can still barely operate. Let's move the warship closer. With the warship, we'll still have some power to resist."

"Your Excellency, forgive my bluntness. In outer space just now, although the star didn't directly destroy the warship, the damage is not insignificant. Why not repair the warship first?"

"No! Drive it over directly." Yuan pondered for a moment before rejecting Bruis's suggestion, then added:

"I've always had doubts about this warship of yours. Cole's repeated changes have made me uneasy. This warship cannot be used anymore!" Yuan's voice was resolute.

"Drive the warship over there and abandon everything else. Send some engineers to transfer all the supplies from the ship's hold. I will give you a design blueprint to build a new small warship."

"Are you really going to abandon it?" Bruis looked reluctantly at the warship beside them, its scars seeming to sing of past glory.

"Yes, we must abandon it. Don't worry, out of Divine River Body humanitarianism, I won't destroy it. After the supplies are moved, you can find a place to house it for the future."

Bruis nodded, then quickly said, "There's no need, Your Excellency. Although I'm reluctant, the overall situation is more important. The supplies on the warship are limited. Without the wreckage of the warship to rebuild, the cost would be too great."

"Haha, you're starting to look like a real commander now. But this is the effect I want. Use all original materials. Build the new warship from scratch, only then can I be at ease."

After speaking, he patted Bruis, signaling him to take the Taoties back to the warship.

What Yuan didn't say was that Cole was an experimental subject. Once they were in the new warship, if they still lost control, it would mean there was a genuine problem with the Taoties' genes.

If that were the case, Yuan would be helpless. He could either give them some technology as compensation and wander the universe alone, or solve the problem with them and let them continue to follow him.

The latter was something Yuan couldn't do in the short term. As for the former? A glint flashed in his eyes, and he shook his head, clearing his thoughts.

Wandering is lonely. Perhaps this place will be the key to breaking the deadlock? Sigh, let's just do good deeds!