After several hours of superluminal travel, the Giant Turtle Rock Platform finally emerged from hyperspace in an entirely new star sector. Accompanied by a burst of light that suddenly illuminated space, warped space opened up, and the silver-white Examiner's flagship slowly emerged from the Space Gate.
"Arrived at outpost hive L-B-35. Automatic navigation terminated."
Nolan's voice startled Hao Ren out of the star map. He raised his head and saw the simulated projections around the bridge gradually spread open, while the external monitors projected a panoramic view of the scenery outside the ship around the control platform.
He discovered that the ship had arrived in an unfamiliar region of space surrounded by clouds of dust. The background of space here was faintly lavender. Perhaps some thin, primordial gas clouds that had failed to form a galaxy shrouded this area. In the distance, a series of clearly defined, bright gray bands could be seen against the backdrop of space. That was where new stars were gestating. Ahead, in the direction the Giant Turtle Rock Platform was traveling, he saw the foothold the Drone Empire had built here.
A massive, bizarre metal fortress floated in space. It looked like a persimmon with several protrusions: an almost circular structure several kilometers in radius, sunken in the center and bulging around the edges. The enormous fortress was gray-white and deep black, with great quantities of metal and rock piled together, making it resemble some strange relic of a civilization. Countless blinking lights could be seen along the fortress's edges, and many pipe-like objects extended from the areas with the densest clusters of lights. Busy drones entered and exited the pipe openings, like industrious worker bees.
In the sunken area at the center of the enormous fortress stood several huge antenna-like structures. They had been