Thanks to the Campbell people's powerful pioneering abilities, the entire Campbell Nebula lay within the sphere of influence of this nascent civilization circle, while the regions along its edges were occupied by a series of vassal states such as the Kabala United Kingdom. Hao Ren turned the ship's external monitors toward the nebula's core and saw two enormous clusters of light there, looking like two unprecedented suns concealed in the cosmic dust. Taram explained that they were a unique sight in the nebula. After a cosmic spectacle a million years ago, two star-making cores in the nebula had exploded. Hundreds of thousands of suns had collided and compressed together, forming the two brilliant light clusters. The Campbell people had constantly sought ways to study what lay inside them—but unfortunately, they had never succeeded.
"It's too hot there, the radiation is too strong, and the gravitational environment is far too complex," Taram said excitedly, his huge head bobbing up and down as though this were wonderful news to him. "Few races are blessed with such conditions. There's such a profound and unfathomable mystery right on our doorstep, and it can bring us tremendous joy. Oh, of course, it also causes a little trouble. The living conditions near the light clusters aren't very good. Spectacular, right? But this place is two million light-years from Earth... Hmm, people on Earth probably won't see that spectacular explosion until a million years from now—assuming their observational technology remains stagnant."
Taram remembered that Hao Ren had come from Earth, so he added that last remark. But Hao Ren could think of only one thing: These little green people really are the universe's most talented race when it comes to courting death. This was the first time he had ever heard of anyone being happy about having