This was an abnormal starfield where life still remained.
When the Clear River Delegation arrived, void vessels belonging to the Homeland Civilization were still docked outside some of the planes.
However, most of those vessels had lost power, and the outer Water Element Rules shields had grown so dim they were nearly impossible to see.
No legions came to greet the delegation.
Nor did any strong practitioners fly out from the planes to ask why these unfamiliar vessels had arrived.
The entire large starfield had sunk into an extremely unsettling state of sluggishness.
Several Homeland fleets that still maintained basic operations did notice the Clear River Delegation's arrival.
Yet the inquiry signals they sent were exceedingly weak. Much of the information inexplicably went missing before it could even leave the vessels. By the time both sides truly established contact, the Homeland Beings responsible for garrisoning the outskirts learned that Lady Chenglan and the Tide King had personally arrived.
The prolonged loss of Life Source Power had left these Homeland Beings exceptionally sluggish in both thought and judgment.
They only knew that more and more planes could no longer provide resources, more and more legions had lost their combat ability, and their leader—the Dominator with a Level-8 Late-Stage Life Level—had remained silent for a long time.
It was not as though the outside world had made no attempt to contact this place.
It was simply that the vast majority of messages had never truly entered, while this starfield's cries for help had never received a response.
The planes were still operating, and the seas still rose and fell, but the beings living within seemed to have had most of their vitality drained away. Many low-level lifeforms simply lay quietly upon the seabed, having even ceased their basic hunting and migration behaviors.