Ye Mo's fingertips were still resting on the edge of the control panel, like an old-fashioned access control bar stuck in a card reader, neither moving nor loosening. The main control room was so quiet that you could hear the faint hum of the cooling fans turning on the equipment, like someone had locked a mosquito in a tin can. He didn't open his eyes or move his body, but the " Neural Self-Healing Feedback " module in his brain was still running background programs, like an old computer forcibly rendering a high-definition video, the CPU so hot it could fry an egg.
The data retrieved from the previous fan-shaped scan hasn't been fully processed yet. External fluctuations remain stable, peaking every thirty-seven seconds with an error of 0.3 seconds, as regular as an obsessive-compulsive alarm clock. But the problem isn't outside—something's wrong inside.
The genetic fragments in his body vibrated again. It wasn't the first time, but this time was different. Last time it was just a slight resonance, like a phone on a vibrating table; this time, it felt like someone was typing code on his DNA strands with a small hammer, one tap after another, with a fairly familiar rhythm.
Ye Mo's heart skipped a beat: This frequency... sounds familiar.
Without making a sound, he increased the detection range from 100,000 kilometers to 150,000 kilometers, casually adjusted the module's calculation weight, and increased the background radiation noise filtering level by two levels. A bunch of noise on the screen was flattened, leaving only a few lonely signal lines jumping. One of them was a low-frequency pulse, hidden very deep, with an amplitude of only three percent of the normal communication signal. If his perception accuracy hadn't been boosted, he wouldn't have been able to detect it at all.
But he caught it.
He swiped his finger across the console twice, bringing up the historical battle data comparison interface. A sample of Ronan's fleet's remaining communication protocols popped up automatically. It was a piece of junk that he had salvaged from the black box of the Kree battleship after the last battle. He had only kept it as a souvenir at the time, but he never expected it to actually come in handy today.
The two sets of waveforms begin to overlap.
The first second showed a severe misalignment.
In the second second, they partially overlapped.
The third second—Holy crap!
Ye Mo's eyelids twitched violently. The encryption structure of that low-frequency pulse was highly similar to the military coding characteristics of Ronan's fleet! Although the content was compressed into gibberish and not a single complete byte could be pieced together, the nested frequency hopping method, the position of the checksum, and even that damned little tail at the end of the data packet... all matched.
This is no coincidence. The universe is so vast, how could two teams use the same outdated, rudimentary encryption algorithm? You're kidding me.
He slowly exhaled, feeling a tightness in his chest. It didn't feel like discovering enemy activity; it was more like suddenly seeing his ex's post on social media in the middle of the night—not exactly terrifying, just unsettling, and you know, this isn't over.
Ronan was defeated, and the jewels were locked in a vault, with the keys divided among the three of them. But that didn't mean his underlings would collectively retire and go back to their hometowns to grow potatoes. The Kree Empire wasn't a charity; after every successful coup, a few escapees were left to engage in underground activities. Besides, these people made their living through warfare. Now that their leader was down, were they going to fight back, or sell kebabs on the street?
Ye Mo didn't move, nor did he call for anyone.
Reporting now would be like firing a shot at nothing. You can't exactly point at the screen and say, "Guys, I think someone's secretly sending a telegram, it might have something to do with that purple-faced guy we beat up before." What would people think? Rocket would be the first to jump up and call you paranoid, Star-Lord might just pull out his guitar and sing "Paranoid" on the spot, and even Groot would suspect you've Wall Phasing lately and got a concussion.
But if we don't say anything... what if one day these people actually gather their forces and come back to attack, blow up the base gates and shout "Avenge Lord Ronan!"? Then it will be too late to say "I told you so!"
He opened his eyes, his gaze falling on the log entry in the lower left corner of the console. He tapped twice with his fingers, bringing up the private encrypted file interface. The system couldn't leave no trace of this kind of thing.
The file name was straightforward: [Suspected Signs of Ronan's Remnant Activities - Preserved Signal Fragment]. He recorded the low-frequency pulse, attached a waveform comparison chart, a coding structure analysis model, and also added a timestamp and location coordinates. After doing all this, he checked the permission settings again—visible only to himself, self-destructing after viewing with a 72-hour countdown, unless manually removed.
Done.
The following is a notification.
It can't be too light, nor too heavy. If it's too light, no one will take it seriously; if it's too heavy, it's easy to misjudge. He stared at the public channel input box for three seconds, then typed out a line:
"Attention: Suspicious residual signals detected, source unknown. We recommend increasing perimeter patrols, but will not escalate the alert level for now."
Delete and rewrite.
"I just detected a strange signal. The frequency sounds familiar, but there's no concrete evidence yet. Please keep an eye out."
That's still not right; it sounds too much like a joke.
Final draft:
"An unknown low-frequency pulse signal was detected. Its characteristics are related to the Kree military protocol. It is preliminarily judged to be a non-immediate threat. It is recommended to increase the sensor patrol density and maintain the existing defense configuration."
After reading it aloud, even I felt like yawning. It had to sound like an official government announcement, but at least it contained enough information to avoid causing panic.
My finger hovered over the send button for two seconds before I pressed it.
The moment the message was sent, a very short notification tone came through his earpiece. He knew that the other four people's terminals had received the notification. As for how they viewed it or whether they took it seriously, that was beyond his control.
He closed his eyes again, sinking back into a state of awareness.
This time, instead of scanning a wide area, he focused his attention on the direction from which the low-frequency pulse was coming. 150,000 kilometers away, the direction was roughly locked in the abandoned star belt Sector G-7, which had once been a forward supply station of the Kree Empire, but was later destroyed, leaving only some floating metal wreckage and a few broken ships stuck in gravity traps. A typical hiding place for rats.
He tried to trace the signal back to its source, but after only 30,000 kilometers, the genetic fragments in his body jolted again. This time it was clearer, and he could almost feel a kind of "response"—like shouting into a valley, and before the Echo arrived, the air trembled first.
Ye Mo frowned. This wasn't just residual signal; it was more like... someone was using this frequency to conduct a heartbeat test.
He didn't pursue it further.
There's no point in chasing now. Without authorization, we can't mobilize the spaceship to investigate; without evidence, we can't convince our teammates to take action; and his own abilities are still on cooldown. He just used " Regenerative Phasing " once, and his Steel Bone Module is almost depleted. If we really encounter an ambush, even escaping through Wall Phasing will be difficult.
The only thing we can do is keep an eye on it.
He switched the detection mode to passive listening, setting it to trigger an internal alarm immediately if the signal strength of the frequency exceeded the threshold. Then, he casually brought up the energy distribution diagram and fine-tuned the power of the high-precision detection system by 5%, transferring the saved power to the biological voltage stabilization system— Groot had been struggling these past few days, so every extra bit helped.
Only after doing all this did he relax his shoulders a little.
The cracks in his glasses were still there, and the dust hadn't been wiped away. He was too lazy to fix them or bother to change them. He'd worn this black hooded sweatshirt for almost a month; the collar was even a little stiff, but he was used to it. He used to think that dressing presentably would give him an "intellectual" air, but now he understood that surviving in this universe wasn't about how shiny his glasses were, but about having a quick mind, being ruthless, and having a thick skin.
He remembered the day he transmigrated. He was playing games in his dorm room on Earth, and the next second he woke up in a cave in Afghanistan. Tony Stark was staring at him and asking, "Which department sent you?" At that time, he tried to pretend to have amnesia to get away with it, but the system suddenly said, " Mutants ability detected. Absorb?" It almost gave him internal injuries.
Looking back now, the panic, hesitation, and caution I felt then are so similar to what's happening now. Both times, the heart was already pounding before the wind even moved.
The difference is that back then he only wanted to survive and avoided danger; now he sits here, knowing that danger is approaching, yet he can still hold his breath, piece together the clues bit by bit, and then try to get them out.
He is not alone anymore.
Although he was the only one in the control room at the moment, with everyone else at their posts, no one spoke or came over to ask him what he was doing, they were all there. Star-Lord was swinging his legs and tapping his feet in the cockpit, Rocket was swearing and modifying circuits in the logistics bay, Gamora was standing motionless in the outer corridor, and Groot's roots were embedded deep in the floor like five nails, firmly pinning this dilapidated base to the edge of the universe.
Ye Mo's fingers unconsciously tapped the control panel twice.
Da. Da.
It's like a response.
He opened his eyes, and the monitoring curves on the screen were all normal. The external fluctuations were still regular, and the low-frequency pulses had temporarily disappeared, as if everything that had just happened was just an illusion. But he knew it wasn't.
He reached up and touched his temple; it was still a little swollen. The resonance of the gene fragments hadn't completely subsided, like a battery that got stuck at 98%, neither going up nor down.
He didn't say anything, but simply turned down the brightness of the control panel and made himself a cup of instant coffee—it tasted like dishwater, but he drank it.
Then he closed his eyes again and continued to wait.
Waiting for the next signal.
Wait for the next tremor.
Those hiding in the shadows finally couldn't hold back any longer and revealed their true colors.
His left hand rested on the edge of the control panel, his right hand held a coffee cup, and his glasses slipped down half a centimeter, but this time, he still didn't reach to steady them.
The cracks are still there, and a layer of dust has accumulated.
But he no longer cared.