Three warships swept through the Space Domain in a triangular formation.
They finally vanished abruptly at a node.
In the main universe, Qingyang and the others surveyed their surroundings, their eyes filled with curiosity and vigilance.
This was the area Qingyang had told Guxing to pick at random, so Guxing and Guxue, who knew about Fortune's effects, were extremely wary.
Qingyang, on the other hand, was inwardly excited.
He had casually made up an excuse for Guxing, a person blessed by Fortune, to choose an area. Since he had picked this place, there was a high chance that something was here.
A passive talent like Surging Fortune, similar to a fate attribute, was definitely far more heaven-defying than the vast majority of epic talents.
Besides, even if it did not work once, they would surely hit the jackpot after trying a few more times.
"Nothing special. Just an ordinary star system in a Star Lake Ecosystem."
Looking at the dozen or so planets orbiting a purple star, Guxue saw nothing unusual.
Stars of all sorts of colors could be found everywhere, especially within a Star Lake Ecosystem.
Even spiral-shaped ones were possible.
Hm?
Qingyang controlled the cruiser and deployed its scanners, blanketing the entire star system with detection waves.
[No abnormalities]
Qingyang refused to believe it. The three warships scattered and accelerated toward the planets.
Hundreds of spherical machines used for interstellar mining also flew out of the ships, carefully scanning the planets.
[No abnormalities]
Was there really nothing unusual?
After examining every planet, the three warships gathered in the orbit closest to the purple star.
Qingyang began considering what else he might have overlooked.
Hm?
Suddenly, from the corner of his eye, Qingyang seemed to see black streams of energy flash across the purple star, which was millions of kilometers in diameter and occupied most of his field of vision.
They vaguely formed enormous, twisted faces.
Dozens of vacant eyes, each tens of thousands of kilometers across and resembling pupils, opened slightly!
Yet in the blink of an eye, those black energy streams became chaotic again, drifting about without any pattern.
Qingyang stared intently at the purple star but could not see anything unusual.
A moment later, Qingyang looked away.
Guxing noticed Qingyang's gaze and looked at the star as well.
After staring for a while and sensing nothing strange, Guxing was about to suggest exploring another area.
The dual energies of yin and yang suddenly trembled faintly.
Guxing abruptly turned around, his pupils gradually changing into different black and white colors.
At once, an inexplicable, faint sense of danger continuously emerged from all directions, with no source or direction.
"Strange."
When Qingyang heard Guxing mention the sense of danger, his eyelids twitched.
"Danger?"
Danger sensed by Surging Fortune?
Without hesitation, the three warships immediately entered lightspeed and prepared to jump.
[Warning: Space has been sealed. Subspace Jump interrupted.]
Damn it!
Without time to think, Qingyang immediately ordered the three warships to sail at maximum speed and rush out of the star system.
Crack, crack!
An eerie shattering sound rang out. When everyone came to their senses and looked behind them, their souls nearly fled their bodies.
Dozens of twisted, bizarre faces drifted across the purple star, their hollow gazes fixed on the three warships.
Their distorted mouths and narrowed eyes swayed slightly, as if silently laughing.
"What the hell is that?!"
"Is the star alive?"
Every face covered a terrifying area of hundreds of thousands of kilometers.
Planets looked like candy beans before them.
This thing was absolutely not something they could face right now.
[Massive mental contamination detected. Star Armament trait activated.] [Shield value: -1000, -1000]
"!!!"
A mental attack that directly affected their physical shield values!
In an instant, everyone would probably become idiots—or something even worse.
Qingyang shouted, "Don't look at those faces!"
Massive amounts of black and white energy surged from Guxing's body, directly enveloping the stunned Guxue and the drivers.
Their mental resistance was the weakest here.
The enormous faces watched the three warships, their silent and bizarre laughter becoming more obvious as black patterns grew increasingly distinct.
It was as though those huge faces could break free of the star's surface at any moment and charge at them!
Qingyang anxiously thought, Star of Truth! Give me some advice!
[Stop advancing immediately. Calibrate the main cannons toward direction ××× and fire.]
Qingyang gritted his teeth. Looking at those faces, his sense of impending death grew ever stronger.
In the end, he chose to trust the Star of Truth. The three warships immediately stopped moving.
"Boss!"
"Commander!!"
Guxing's expression was grim.
Had Qingyang been mentally contaminated?
But the commander's mental resistance should have been the strongest among them all.
Qingyang ignored everyone as the main cannons of the three warships activated one after another.
The next moment, dazzling beams converged and blasted into an empty patch of space!
In an instant, all the disturbances and the sense of danger vanished, and the terrifying faces on the star froze as well.
Crack!
A shattering sound rang out, and everyone felt dizzy.
They immediately noticed that the entire star system had returned to calm. The purple star continued rotating steadily.
More than a dozen planets slowly orbited around it.
There was no abnormality whatsoever. Everything that had just happened seemed like an illusion.
The only difference was that the three warships were now headed straight for the purple star, only tens of thousands of kilometers away from plunging into it.
Guxing suddenly understood and immediately looked toward the place Qingyang had ordered them to attack.
Roar!
A creature a thousand meters long roared repeatedly. Its body was translucent, resembling an oversized white butterfly.
However, its severely damaged wings prevented it from entering subspace and escaping.
"This is... a level-four star beast, a Star Phantom Moth?!"
So they had been caught from the moment they emerged from subspace!
A level-four star beast—and a special one that used mental attacks.
Even a T7 Veteran Fleet would suffer heavy losses upon encountering one, although its frontal combat power was not even comparable to that of a level-three star beast.
Its mental power, however, far exceeded the standard for level-four star beasts. Even Guxing would need to reach the sixth rank before he had any chance of resisting it.
How had Qingyang noticed something was wrong in that situation and even found the Star Phantom Moth's location?
"Ahem. If an existence the size of a star attacked us mentally, it could probably break through our shields and kill us in one strike."
Yes, only now did Qingyang realize something had been off.
A mental attack causing tangible reductions in shield strength was indeed outrageous, but compared to something of that scale, it seemed far too unimpressive.
Although that was not why he had discovered the star beast, it still counted as an explanation.
Third-party data like the Star of Truth absolutely could not be exposed.
Guxing was full of admiration. "So that's how it was."
He had panicked just now. He had not expected Qingyang, a commander who had only just begun his career, to remain calm and think clearly.
Qingyang gave a dry laugh as he accepted Guxing and Guxue's admiration, then could not help changing the subject.
"Is this Star Phantom Moth valuable?"
He had never seen it in textbooks.
Guxing answered, "Extremely valuable. The mental crystal within its body and the Phantom Wing Membrane at the base of its wings are both good materials."
"The former can greatly increase one's Mental Threshold, while the Phantom Wing Membrane can be used to forge Star Armaments. The remaining materials can also sell for thirty thousand Star Points."
Qingyang immediately perked up. After the Radiant Moon Ship finished it off, they immediately began collecting the materials.
"Each department should keep a portion and send it to the research division," Qingyang added after thinking for a moment.
Research materials were also wealth. If they actually developed something, it could be worth more than the raw materials.
Glancing sideways, Guxue suddenly smiled. "Brother Qingyang, look. What's that?"
Hm?
Qingyang looked in the direction Guxue pointed and his eyes immediately lit up.
Damaged Starcraft and wreckage from conventional warships!
There seemed to be quite a lot of them, all orbiting around the purple star.
They were clearly the work of this Star Phantom Moth.
They had struck it rich!
As for the protagonist—at this stage of high school, the teachers were not commanders and could not log into the Star Network. The knowledge he had learned only covered basic matters.
There was also some basic knowledge for identifying cosmic environments and organisms. Many things the protagonist encountered through Fortune were beyond the basics, so it was normal for him not to understand them. Once he entered Commander Academy later, he would begin learning how to obtain advanced information—commonly known as growth.
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