The "Polaris" shuttle, enduring despair-inducing pressure, tore through the damaged outer armor plate of Corona Borealis and plunged into a vast yet suffocating interior space. The sight before them was an apocalyptic scene utterly eroded by the "grey fluid." Metal bulkheads melted, twisted, and dripped like hot wax. Light was greedily absorbed by an anomalous forcefield, plunging the entire space into a dim twilight, with only the slow, viscous grey fluid itself emitting a gloomy, all-devouring glow. The air was filled with a low, continuous, inhuman "chewing" sound, mixed with the piercing hiss of energy being rapidly drained.
"The navigation signal source... it's right ahead! The power core area!" Wang Jing's voice trembled with fear, his eyes glued to the scanner's screen where a faint yet stubborn light flickered. Li Chenyuan maneuvered the nearly disintegrated shuttle, avoiding floating clumps of grey fluid that hung in the air like jellyfish, forcing the craft deeper inside. Every meter felt like crawling through the esophagus of a monster.
Inside Zero Station, time seemed frozen. Su Xiaolan lay in a deep coma, the lines on her life monitor terrifyingly weak. Lu Xingze stood before the main console, his previous irritability and fear replaced by an icy focus. "The underlying protocol framework of the temporary channel Wang Jing last established... it might still be there!" His eyes were bloodshot, his words rapid-fire. "We can't initiate transmission, but if there's a strong enough energy burst over there, could we passively capture a trace residual harmonic signal? Even just a regular pulse in the noise?" It was a bold hypothesis. He and the technician immediately dove onto the console, frantically attempting to reconstruct an extremely sensitive, receive-only passive signal capture network, trying to sift out particles of hope from the endless noise.
Deep within Corona Borealis, death shadowed their every move. "Left side! Evade!" Li Chenyuan yelled, yanking the control stick. A massive, tentacle-like surge of grey fluid shot out from the melting wall, grazing the shuttle's top and instantly leaving a spreading corrosive scar. The fluid seemed to possess a primitive collective consciousness, able to sense their intrusion and converge to besiege them. Even more terrifyingly, it reflected and amplified their deepest fears. Wang Jing's helmet display flashed with the distorted face of his long-deceased mentor, issuing silent accusations, while Li Chenyuan seemed to hear the dying screams of countless comrades-in-arms. "They're attacking our minds!" Wang Jing groaned, clutching his helmet. The passage ahead was blocked by a surging wall of grey. Their retreat was also cut off. They were trapped in a shrinking pocket of death.
At that moment, Lei Hao, who had been silently guarding the rear, glanced at the stubbornly blinking "Cradle" beacon on the scanner, then at Li Chenyuan and Wang Jing desperately seeking a way out. A look of serene resolve flashed across his habitually expressionless face. He swiftly unbuckled his safety harness. "Sir," his voice came through the comm channel, steady and calm, "please proceed.""Lei Hao! What are you doing?!" Li Chenyuan snapped. But it was too late. Lei Hao forcefully opened the rear emergency airlock! Freezing air and howling wind rushed in. He grabbed a high-energy backup battery, activated it to overload, and with the blinding flare in his grasp, leapt without hesitation toward the wall of grey death."Tell my family... I am honored."
These were his last words. The massive energy signal instantly drew the surrounding grey fluid, which swarmed toward him like sharks sensing blood. Lei Hao, along with the overloaded battery, was swallowed and annihilated, leaving not a trace behind. With his life, he had battered open a fleeting path to survival. The passage was momentarily clear. Li Chenyuan's eyes went bloodshot, but he didn't hesitate, didn't even have time to mourn. Almost instinctively, he slammed the thrusters to their limit. The shuttle let out a final wail and shot through the space that had just consumed his comrade.
Inside Zero Station, Lu Xingze suddenly leapt up. "Got it! An extremely intense energy pulse! Accompanied by... strong characteristics of consciousness dissipation!" He pointed at a sudden spike on the screen, his voice trembling almost beyond recognition. Although the content couldn't be deciphered, the clear signal proved his theory right. They weren't completely cut off.
Li Chenyuan and Wang Jing finally reached the entrance to the power core area. Here, things were relatively "intact." A massive, intricate structure resembling clusters of blue crystals—the "Cradle"—hovered in the center, emitting a faint yet resilient glow, barely holding back the sluggishly squirming grey fluid around it. They stepped onto this final stronghold. Wang Jing immediately located an access port and connected.
Instantly, a vast, chaotic torrent of information flooded into his mind, filled with endless sorrow and despair, accompanied by fragmented memory-images. He saw glorious cities collapsing beneath grey waves, countless faces dissolving in silent screams, and felt a millennia-spanning remorse and desperate will to endure. He clutched his head in agony, howling like a wounded beast, his eyes bloodshot and bulging.
"It... it's not a weapon..." Wang Jing's voice was hoarse, each word soaked in pain. "It's an 'Ark of Memory'... the final resting place of all consumed consciousness... It's broadcasting a calming signal... trying to soothe, even to reverse 'IT'... But..." His words broke off abruptly.
Their intrusion had thoroughly enraged the master of this place. More grey fluid surged from every direction, faster, more cohesive, like countless roaring grey dragons charging at the Cradle and the two intruders. Li Chenyuan sharply raised his heavy railgun, aiming at the faintly glowing blue control core of the Cradle. His face was taut, his eyes filled with agonized conflict. Destroy it? This ark that carried the consciousness of countless lost souls and the last hope of a civilization? But it was also the beacon that lured the Annihilation, the cause of this disaster. Protect it? They were utterly powerless before the onslaught. He had to decide immediately.
At that same moment, on Zero Station's main screen, the passive signal reception indicator spiked to an unprecedented peak, fueled by the Cradle's connection and Wang Jing's psychic impact. Even more shocking: in the medical pod, the deeply comatose Su Xiaolan suddenly convulsed, as if she had felt the torrent of consciousness from afar. A single crystalline tear slid from the corner of her closed eye. On her life monitor, her brainwave curve shot into a violent, jagged peak—extreme, abnormal, and off the charts.