The two Deep-Sea Hunters said goodbye and left to contact their fellow hunters and gather information for Pan Long's request.
About ten minutes later, the Doctoral Researcher arrived at the bar and sat down across from Pan Long.
"I heard you're looking into the Celestial Spirits?" he asked. "What makes those monsters worth special attention?"
Pan Long said worriedly, "The Deep-Sea Hunters have a legend about them..."
Before he could finish, the Doctoral Researcher laughed. "You mean the legend that the Celestial Spirits are the tendrils of the Star-Devouring Demon Gods' wills? That's just superstition."
"Why do you say that?" Pan Long asked.
"The reason is simple. If Demon Gods enormous enough to eat planets really existed, there's no reason we wouldn't have spotted them during astronomical observations," the Doctoral Researcher said. "Some observatories in this world use large telescopes capable of observing the Andromeda Nebula, millions of light-years away. That's so distant that even light takes millions of years to reach it... Yet we've never seen any enormous creatures roaming around and devouring planets."
"You might say, 'Perhaps they aren't in that direction.' But humanity didn't take up observing the universe on a sudden whim. We have a long history of it. Throughout all those years, not only have we never observed any 'Star-Devouring Demon Gods,' we've developed a specialized discipline called 'stargazing'... The Tower of Babel has an operative who knows about it. I think you should talk to her."
Pan Long's spirits lifted. Ever since learning that this world might face danger from enormous Demons that ate planets like meatballs and treated intelligent beings as pepper sprinkled on top, he had felt immense pressure. The weight of it had left him unwilling even to stand; he had simply sat there drinking away his gloom.
But the Doctoral