The Legendary Mechanic, page 543
He was not very clear on how this kind of amber formed, but Space Wonders were always difficult to explain. According to the data in his previous life, this amber seemed to have solidified the time and space of a small area.
Objects inside the amber would be isolated from reality, as if existing in another dimension that had no factor of time.
According to that logic, the bodies of beings covered in this amber should not change; they should have a long or even infinite life span, like sleeping in a capsule, and their mind should be frozen as well…
However, according to the NPCs who fought against it in his previous life, when they were trapped by the Spacetime Amber, they were indeed unable to control their bodies, and their energy could not escape it as well, but their mind was active. They could even see and hear what was happening outside the amber. They could even feel the passage of time in the outside world. It was like their minds were trapped in their bodies. This was what contradicted the logic and one of the important reasons this was one of the Space Wonders.
Only the minds of individuals trapped too long by the Spacetime Amber would enter stagnation and vanish in the end, giving up on maintaining thoughts. Stronger individuals would be able to last longer.
Therefore, this thing could create a cell that could trap any beings and not worry about the prisoner running away, while at the same time being a terrible torture.
Even if the target was a Beyond Grade A!
The only problem was that the process of activating the Spacetime Amber was quite long. It would be extremely difficult to trap a Beyond Grade A with it.
If this falls into the hands of an enemy, it’s very threatening to me. I will have one less thing to worry about if it’s in my hands.
All kinds of thoughts flashed past Han Xiao’s mind. He turned around and looked at the roughly ten-meter-wide black disc in the middle of the room. He observed the patterns on the disc for a while and roughly confirmed that this was some kind of pattern to transmit energy.
“Looks like this thing needs energy to be activated.”
Han Xiao waved. Psionic Prime obediently turned into many hovering guards and shot out beams at the disc, transferring energy.
Hum!
The disc suddenly shivered. As if some kind of device had been activated, the patterns lit up, and the dust on it fell off.
The next moment, this disc lit up entirely and displayed its real function… it was a screen.
A video started playing on the screen. A creature of this civilization appeared and slowly spoke.
At the time, their translators had yet to record this language, so they had no idea what it was saying. However, this did not prevent them from understanding the images. The images of this civilization before it went extinct appeared on the screen, as if it was displaying its entire history from the beginning. They started as primal beings, gradually learned to use tools. They invented airplanes and hovering cars, and they were trying to build galactic spaceships. The cities were beautiful, and the people were living peacefully.
However, due to the abnormal activity of their Fixed Star, the environment of this planet changed drastically. A disaster that was more than enough to wipe out all lives on the planet occurred. In order to preserve their civilization, they used their ‘holy relic’ to seal their people and saved all the information of their civilization in the database. There were databases in every ruin to make sure whoever discovered this would receive this information.
The appearance of that ‘holy relic’ was indeed the Spacetime Amber in Han Xiao’s memories. Realizing that he had come to the right place, Han Xiao was secretly relieved and continued watching.
A large amount of energy was needed in order to use the Spacetime Amber. This civilization had almost depleted all their energy sources just to charge it so that they could use it multiple times. There were ambers not just in this city’s ruins but in every ruin. While they were watching this recording, the teams that were exploring the other ruins discovered more and more amber as well.
At the end of the recording, the whereabouts of the Spacetime Amber was finally mentioned. It seemed to be placed in a huge city, but that was before the civilization went extinct, so they did not know which ruin it was.
I’ll have Phillip copy their database first. If their language is deciphered, I will be able to understand what this recording was talking about and find the ruins the Spacetime Amber is at.
Han Xiao was just about to act when a notification popped up on the interface.
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You have triggered the hidden mission [Traces of Existence]!
Mission Introduction: Due to the abnormal activity of the Fixed Star, a world ending disaster engulfed the Yasre Civilization. Before their doom, the Yasreans selected two paths at the same time. They wanted to preserve a small part of their race with their holy relic so that they could survive this disaster and rebuild their civilization in the future. So, they were waiting for someone to use the holy relic to release them in the future. However, if no one came, the Yasreans were willing to become eternal specimens and preserve all the information about their civilization, leaving the traces of their existence in the wide and endless universe. You are the visitor they have waited many years for. Sadly, time has already decided their final fate.
Mission Requirements: Using the Yasre Civilization’s ‘holy relic’, released all the Yasreans from the effect of their ‘holy relic’.
Rewards: 1,500,000,000 EXP, 1 Legendary Point, 1 Random Reward, 780 Exploration Points, and 1 [Bold Explorer] Ability Shard.
Chapter 837. The Last Witness |
Hidden mission… Han Xiao was stunned for a moment. When he then saw the mission reward, surprise appeared on his face. The second [Bold Explorer] Ability Shard‽
Han Xiao immediately turned to look at Feidin, who had all his attention on the Yasre Civilization recording. He gripped his shoulders and shook him vigorously.
“Wha… what are you doing?” Feidin stared at the overjoyed Han Xiao with a puzzled look on his face.
“You, amazing!”
Han Xiao was ecstatic. In his eyes, it was as if Feidin was emitting holy light from all over his body.
There was a slim chance that hidden missions would reward [Bold Explorer] Ability Shards. Over the past few months, the players had discovered quite a number of hidden missions and shared them with him. However, he had never triggered this reward—the goddess of luck loathed him as usual.
With Feidin along with him, the goddess of luck basically deliberately lifted her dress to show Feidin the holy light.
Han Xiao could not help but sigh in his mind. Overflowing charm, exceptional luck, a wife who he could sleep with in his mind, and the goddess of luck willing to be his mistress. Feidin was probably the biggest winner in life throughout the Black Star Army.
Although Nero also had the Advanced Luck Glow…
He was not handsome enough!
“You’re still the most reliable.” Han Xiao patted Feidin’s shoulder heavily with satisfaction on his face.
Feidin’s face was filled with question marks.
Seeing that everyone was looking at him with confusion, Han Xiao calmed himself down, coughed, and explained, “This civilization used its holy relic to build this kind of special amber. No one else other than us has visited this planet ever since. This means that this holy relic will be ours. I’m guessing that this is going to be another Universal Treasure.”
The others did not know that Han Xiao had come to this planet with a clear goal. They nodded and suspected nothing.
Han Xiao told the machines to search and found the database. Phillip copied all the data inside and finally deciphered the language of the Yasre Civilization.
Having updated the language packs of the translator, they returned to the black disc again and rewatched the recording. This time, they understood what it was about.
“I’m the leader of the Yasreans. Lucky visitors, when you see this recording, we might have already gone extinct. No matter who you are, please watch this recording till the end…”
The mission introduction on the interface had already explained the rough situation, so Han Xiao just filled in the details by watching it again.
The recording talked about the situation of the Yasre Civilization, which was within their expectations. At the end of the recording, the Yasrean hoped that the visitor could complete two things. One was to undo the effects of the Spacetime Amber, and the Yasreans shared their knowledge of the Spacetime Amber to make things easier. However, they had very limited knowledge about this extraterrestrial object that exceeded their understanding.
The second thing was for the visitor to preserve the information about the Yasre Civilization if the Yasreans were extinct so that the traces of their existence would remain.
The group of them had been traveling the universe for many years and were used to the end of civilizations long ago. This was what the universe was; new species were born, and old species went extinct every second. If they would easily be affected every time, they would have no time to do anything else.
However, every civilization was a miracle of life, so they would still respect the final wishes of a civilization when necessary.
Before that, Han Xiao had to first do what he had gone there to do.
With the translation, he knew the location of the Spacetime Amber. Han Xiao told the machines to bring out all of the ambers from every ruins and gather at the location of the Spacetime Amber.
…
Not long after, they landed at the ruins where the Spacetime Amber was.
Following the images, Han Xiao came to an empty room in the middle of this ruins’ central sanctuary. A mural entered his sights. It was about eight meters tall and thirty meters wide. The drawings were about the history of the Yasreans.
One of the images was a meteor-like black stone falling down from the clouds, with a group of tiny people below looking up. Han Xiao hovered up and came before this painting. He extended his hand and touched the meteor on this drawing.
His palm pressed onto the wall, and energy blew away the thick accumulated layer of dust.
Hu!
The dust was blown away.
Han Xiao pressed down heavily and cracked the meteor drawing open. Stones fell onto the ground.
Ka!
He dug out a dim white crystal from behind the wall, which had the same shape as the meteor in the painting.
Looking at the white crystal in his hands, Han Xiao’s eyes sparkled.
This ordinary looking crystal was the core of the Spacetime Amber. The Yasreans had hidden it in this mural.
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You have received [Spacetime Amber].
Spacetime Amber: A Space Wonder object with an unknown origin. It can freeze spacetime and form a solid layer with the appearance of amber around all kinds of things. Energy cost depends on the size of the amber formed. Current Energy Value: 0
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“I got it.” Han Xiao was thrilled.
This was the easiest to obtain Universal Treasure for him. After all, no one else knew about this thing’s existence other than him.
As he landed on the ground, the others surrounded him and sized the Spacetime Amber up with curiosity.
“This is the holy relic that can create amber that can block all kinds of attacks?” Hila sized the Spacetime Amber up. “Why does it not have any energy reaction at all?”
“This thing needs to be charged to be used,” Han Xiao explained. He then shot out a powerful flow of energy into the Spacetime Amber in his hands.
Boom!
An invisible impact wave exploded from Han Xiao’s body like a tornado. This was the aura that Han Xiao emitted when he released his energy at the maximum capacity.
The Mechanical Force flew into the Spacetime Amber as the dim Spacetime Amber started to gradually light up.
In the past four months, Han Xiao had completed the [Heber Stellar Furnace Cultivation] training. Having spent 3.9 billion EXP, his maximum energy had increased by more than 17,000, which was quite worth it for him.
The Spacetime Amber was like a bottomless pit that could devour an infinite amount of energy. Its energy value slowly grew.
Using the Spacetime Amber required a large amount of energy, but to a Mechanic who had mastered the psionic energy, there was more than enough energy.
Han Xiao thought about it and stopped using his own energy. He took out a few psionic reactors as batteries and linked them with the Spacetime Amber to keep charging it. It seemed like there was no limit to the amount of energy the Spacetime Amber could contain, so he did not worry about overcharging it.
After charging it, the Spacetime Amber finally showed an energy reaction.
With the Spacetime Amber in his hands, Han Xiao could feel the energy inside it. The method to use the Spacetime Amber was very simple; he just had to guide energy within it.
The way the Yasre Civilization used it was quite rough and did not have much to learn from, but Han Xiao recalled the better ways to use it, which the owners of the Spacetime Amber in his previous life had used. He could build a device that had the same frequency as the Spacetime Amber and put the Spacetime Amber in it. He could then connect to the device with Nerves Connection, so he would be able to control the Spacetime Amber with his mind and with greater accuracy.
Han Xiao would be able to easily build such a device, but now was not the time. He was not in a hurry to test the Spacetime Amber’s powers, so he decided to complete the hidden mission first.
The group of them walked out of the central sanctuary of the ruins. All of the Yasreans’ ambers were moved into those ruins. There were so many of them that they could not see the end of it.
Han Xiao came before a Yasrean and slashed the amber’s surface with the Spacetime Amber. The Spacetime Amber cut the translucent amber open with ease.
The Spacetime Amber could freely penetrate the amber created from itself and would not be affected by the frozen spacetime.
Pa!
Like a bubble, this piece of amber dissipated in the air. The Yasrean inside collapsed onto the ground.
Aurora hastily helped him up and said with joy, “There are vital signs. He’s still alive.”
“His soul has died. Although his body is still alive, he’s a living dead man.” Hila shook her head.
Unlike Aurora, she could sense the soul of lives, and she knew that the body of this Yasrean was just an empty shell despite it being still alive.
Han Xiao scanned through it. Due to the Spacetime Amber, the body of this Yasrean was maintained at the state it was in before being frozen. Although its brain had stopped working, it did not show any signs of deterioration and was still very much alive like his body. This meant that this person’s brain was frozen as well. However, if one’s brain was frozen too, there should not be any brain activity at all.
He made a speculation. Since one’s body energy would not be used in the amber, maybe it was their soul energy that supported their brain activity. This meant that soul energy being depleted was what caused their mind to die off. The stronger the individual, the more soul energy they had, so they could last longer.
That’s not impossible.
Having thought of the origin of the Spacetime Amber, Han Xiao did not think that this was a strange phenomenon.
The effect of the Spacetime Amber came from the Esper Ability of one of the Primordial Ones, whose Esper Ability was ‘Spacetime Freeze’, which was on the Super High Risk Esper Ability List.
Most of the abilities on the Super High Risk Esper Ability List had existed before, and this Primordial One was the first Esper who was discovered to be able to freeze space and time.
Such abilities were exceedingly rare. It was also a high-level forbidden technique in the Mage class.
Back then, this Primordial One was under the command of an advanced civilization and was killed in action. He had a Primordial One friend whose ability was to modify the properties of objects. That person turned his body into a crystal that would never rot and let it wander the universe as a form of burial. However, somehow, while wandering the universe, this crystal underwent a change that no one knew the cause of. It not only preserved the Primordial One’s ability to freeze spacetime, but its ability mutated too and became a Space Wonder. This was the origin of the Spacetime Amber, which the players only found out about in the later versions.
Pulling his thoughts back, Han Xiao used the Spacetime Amber to release all the Yasreans.
After checking through, none of their souls were still alive.
“Sigh, they’re all dead.” Feidin shook his head.
Han Xiao initially had a little bit of hope, thinking that maybe there would be a protagonist type character among the Yasreans who would make it. Sadly, there were none. In the face of time, it seemed like no one could escape death.
Seeing this, although they were used to seeing the ends of civilizations, they all had no mood to chat and kept silent.
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You have released all the Yasreans from the effects of the Spacetime Amber!
[Traces of Existence] Completed!
You have received 1,500,000,000 EXP and 780 Exploration Points.
You have received 1 Random Reward.
You have received 1 Legendary Point.
[Planet Legendary Point (Yasreans)—The Last Witness]: You witnessed the last moment of Yasreans with your own eyes. A civilization’s last sign of life vanished right before your eyes. Maybe, in the end, everything vanishes with time, but at least they existed.
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Han Xiao sighed. “Phillip, move these bodies onto the ship. Cremate them and release them in the universe.”
Feidin looked over. “Are you not preserving specimens using the Spacetime Amber?”
“Their souls dissipated with their civilization. Their bodies should be released too.”
Han Xiao had already scanned the bodies of the Yasreans, and there was nothing special. Furthermore, the Spacetime Amber had yet to be shown to the world, so he wanted to keep it as a trump card and not leave any clues behind.
