Interstellar Survival: Invasion

Chapter 274: Lost Time

"What did you see? A moving hat in this core room? Were you seeing things?" questioned Zhang Bao'er doubtfully.

"I absolutely saw it. I'm going to take a look now," said Old Du.

"Old Du, don't move rashly. We still don't know this place well. Wait for us before moving," I tried stopping Old Du.

However, Old Du stopped replying through the communicator. I started feeling nervous.

"Bao'er, Anxashe, head toward Old Du immediately," I ordered.

I also rushed toward Old Du. Following my system's guidance, it did not take me long to reach Old Du's position. At the same time, Zhang Bao'er and Anxashe arrived as well. Before me, Old Du was standing with his back to me. He stood motionless, and beside his right foot was a hat. However, it wasn't actually moving.

"Old Du, what's wrong with you?" asked Zhang Bao'er before stepping forward.

I hurriedly stopped him with my hand. We still had no idea what was going on. Moving rashly could result in our total defeat. After several minutes of observation, I tried taking a step forward. The moment my leg moved, the hat moved. I immediately withdrew my right leg.

"Bao'er, Anxashe, we need to find a chance to capture that hat. There is an unknown monster hiding in it," I said.

Suddenly, the sound of a switch being flipped rang out in the room. The lighting in the room dimmed.

"This must be the once-per-eight-hour rest Little Forest mentioned. Bao'er, this is our chance. Move!" Using the dark as our opening, we threw ourselves at the hat from two different directions.

I moved faster and was the first to land on the hat. My hands could clearly feel something soft under the hat. To get a good look at it, I removed the hat. In the dark, I couldn't see clearly, but the system reset was done, and the lighting in the room was slowly returning to normal, allowing me to finally get a good look at the creature before my eyes.

"Bulu!" Zhang Bao'er exclaimed behind me.

Yes, the creature before me was none other than Bulu. Hanging from the feeler at the top of its head was the white ring I had taken from Dirk. Bulu looked incredibly calm, and its body was not glowing at all. The liquid in its body flowed slowly as it lay motionless on the ground, looking like it was completely exhausted of strength. A big hand landed on my shoulder. When I looked back, I saw that Old Du had regained consciousness.

"Old Du, did you communicate with Bulu earlier?" I asked.

Oddly, Old Du had a look of loss in his eyes, as though he had just received a terrible piece of news.

"Hey, so what happened? What did Bulu tell you? Say something," urged Zhang Bao'er.

"I talked with Bulu. We had spent too long in the particle room. The entire world had changed," said Old Du.

"What do you mean? Be clear. I don't understand," said Zhang Bao'er in confusion.

"Old Du, what happened?" I asked.

"The particle space moves at an incredible speed, resulting in a different flow of time with the outside world. We had only spent slightly over an hour there, but outside..." Old Du paused.

"What happened outside? Don't tell me a thousand years have passed," I asked anxiously.

"No, not that bad. It has been two years. The Divine Empire and the Interstellar League are on an all-out war," replied Old Du helplessly.

"What? Two years have passed? Had we stayed that long in the particle space?" I asked in disbelief.

"Yes. That was why we hadn't been able to contact them after leaving the room," said Old Du.

"This isn't right. We couldn't find any memory recordings concerning the war in this room. If two years have passed, those recordings should be easily found," said Zhang Bao'er.

"You're right. Because of how long it has passed, we are actually in the old memory room. All the new recordings are stored in the new memory room," said Old Du.

"Damn that Little Forest. I'm going to teach him a really good lesson. He cost me two whole years of my life!" said Zhang Bao'er furiously.

"Your lifespan isn't affected. We merely skipped two whole years forward," said Old Du.

"Old Du, what else did Bulu tell you?" I asked, forcing myself to calm down and think of something to do.

"Bulu has lived on Planet Black King for two years. Both Temo and Dodo are still here. One day, Bulu accidentally saw a recording of Big and Small Forests being captured. In the recording, Little Forest mentioned our disappearance after entering the particle space. Thus, Bulu sneaked into the core room in search of the recordings concerning our disappearance," said Old Du.

"I understand. No wonder a thought suddenly entered my mind when we were in the ventilation duct. It was Bulu. I had thought that something was wrong with my brain," I said in realization.

"Yes. To help you, Bulu had to pierce through the cover, exhausting a large amount of strength. It has since been waiting here for us. When I walked near it, it used its final bit of strength to communicate with me before entering deep sleep," said Old Du with gratitude.

"Well done, Bulu. You saved all of us," I said as I gently rubbed Bulu's feeler.

"Old Du, what happened to Big and Small Forests after their capture?" asked Zhang Bao'er.

"They were never seen again. I don't think anything good has happened to them. We were too slow and dragged them down because of it," replied Old Du with regret.

"In that case, Ada must have also been captured by the enemy. My pitiful brother," said Anxashe with a sigh.

"Apart from them, Sarje is also waiting for us. I wonder what happened to the others," said Old Du.

"Canyue, what should we do now? It has been two years. Zhang Xingxing and the others must have left long ago," said Zhang Bao'er.

"Since Temo and Dodo are still on this planet, our first priority is to look for them. Perhaps we can get more information about the war from them. Since the new recordings are kept in the opposite room, let's sneak into it. See if we can get the latest update about the two. Old Du, remember to take your probe with you," I decided.

With a new order, everyone was given a new sense of direction. After Zhang Bao'er placed Bulu into my backpack, we took out the Eternal armors Little Forest had given us before and replaced our suits with them.

We then searched the core room for an exit. Before long, we found a shut door. At the corner of the door was some sort of a genetic lock. Seeing the lock, Zhang Bao'er raised his laser gun.

"Zhang Bao'er, have you gone mad?" I hurriedly stopped him.

"Wasn't this what Old Du did as well?" asked Zhang Bao'er, unconvinced by my objection.

"There might be a lot of robotic guards outside. We will be exposed the moment this door is opened. How are we supposed to continue sneaking around when that happens?" I said.

"Canyue, I can't open this lock. Without using force, I doubt we can get through this door," said Old Du.

Old Du's words sent me into thought. My eyes were still on him. Suddenly, a new idea arose in my head. I took out Dirk's white ring from Bulu's head and held it before the genetic lock. A ray of green light shone upon the ring, seemingly to scan it. After a while, the door slowly opened.

We were greeted with a smart robot. I was so nervous I almost fired my gun, but the robot merely stared at me for a bit before slowly walking away, completely indifferent to our presence.

"Looks like the security here has become lax due to the war," said Zhang Bao'er.

"I think it's due to what were wearing. Ignore the robot. Let's look for the new core room," said Old Du.

"We don't need to look around. I think that's the new room," said Anxashe as he pointed at the dark door to the front left of us.

We looked at where he was pointing and saw that an imposing door was at the end of the corridor. The door had the same design as the door behind us, but it also looked even more imposing and grand. Four smart robots were standing guard before the door.

"Looks like Anxashe is right. That should be the new core room," Old Du agreed.

"Now what? Do we strut over with our disguise before opening the door with the ring?" asked Zhang Bao'er.

"I don't see other options, unless you want to enter the particle space again," I said.

"No thanks. I will not enter that trash space ever again," rejected Zhang Bao'er.

"We'll go together. If questioned, none of us will speak. Let Anxashe answer. Just tell them we're performing a routine inspection," I said.

"Why can't we speak? Anxashe never spoke much. What if he says something wrong and exposes us?" questioned Zhang Bao'er.

"Bao'er, have you forgotten? Although we have our translators, the smart robots can look into our original spoken language. That will expose us," I said.

With the plan made, we advanced with Anxashe walking in front.