326: Chapter 327 Remains, Imprints, and Low-Entropy Echoes

The ranger was like a wounded giant beast in the deep sea, dragging the wreckage of the assault boat forcibly pulled from the darkest depths of the Frost Crystal Graveyard, struggling through the cold, viscous mist filled with deadly crystalline fragments.

The wreckage was long out of shape, its hull twisted like a ball of metallic paper kneaded by a giant hand, with large patches of outer armor peeling off, exposing charred internal wiring and broken energy conduits. Solidified plasma traces remained at the broken thruster ports, like its final struggle, frozen forever in the moment of flight. It was like a corpse salvaged from the abyss, heavy and decayed, yet still carrying some unsolved secret.

And the ranger, this weather-beaten old patrol ship, was now tearing a long, narrow rift in the cloud belt at a near-suicidal speed. The tractor beam was like a chain woven of pure energy, connecting two ships with intertwined fates, as well as the boundary between life and death.

Every tiny course adjustment, every fluctuation in thruster power, made the already fragile connection point emit tooth-grinding groans. The sound of metal fatigue echoed in the silent bridge, like The Whisper of the Reaper, reminding everyone that this chain maintaining hope could snap at any time.

Spots of leaking energy drew brief and piercing trails in the dark mist, like bloodstains dragged across the snow by a dying man. It was a signal that any slightly experienced tracker would not miss—a clear, desperate, and well-defined escape route.

"Energy leakage intensifying! Tractor connection point stress has reached a critical value of 117%! It is estimated that within three hundred seconds, the assault boat wreckage will completely break due to structural fatigue, or trigger an energy core explosion!" Evelyn's voice rang out against the background of the sharp system overload alarm, so tense it was almost at its breaking point. Her spiritual projection fluctuated violently on the console, data streams flowing around her like a waterfall; she was using her maximum computing power to coordinate every bit of the ship's energy output—both to maintain enough speed to escape potential pursuers and to ensure that the fragile tractor connection would not snap in the next second.

"Don't slow down! Maintain maximum safe speed!" Excellence roared, his voice hoarse, the brand on his brow burning like a branding iron. He endured the intense pain as if countless steel needles were stirring inside his skull, his hands gripping the edge of the command console so hard his knuckles turned white. Forcibly activating the power of the brand just now to counter the essence of the silence of the crystals had caused unimaginable backlash and overextension to his spirit and this newly acquired power. Every breath felt like swallowing broken glass, and every heartbeat was accompanied by a tremor of consciousness.

"Senior Mute, assist in stabilizing the energy flow of the tractor beam!" he gritted his teeth and ordered.

Mute's fragment light flickered on a corner of the console like a candle in the wind. Though the light was weak, it carried an ancient and calm power, slowly permeating the energy flow of the tractor system. It was not a forced suppression, but rather a dangerous reconciliation of the turbulent tractor energy and the chaotic, dissipating power within the wreckage in a way that was almost like "combing." This was another application of the power of silence—not destruction, but appeasement, balance, allowing the system on the verge of collapse to maintain that sliver of life at the last moment.

Stardust stared intently at the rear sensors and wide-area space disturbance monitoring, her gray eyes reflecting the waterfall-like data stream. Her fingers skipped rapidly across the control panel, constantly adjusting the detection frequency and filtering algorithms. "No direct pursuer energy signatures in the rear!" she reported, her voice calm yet unable to hide the tension within. "But the energy disturbances inside the cloud belt have been significantly excited by our high-speed passage, forming a clear, continuously spreading 'wake turbulence'! It is estimated that within fifteen to twenty minutes, any unit with high-precision environmental monitoring capabilities will be able to roughly deduce our course and speed by analyzing the propagation and decay of this turbulence! We must exit the cloud belt before then!"

"Estimated time of arrival at Safety Point Three: eight minutes!" S-001 announced. Its voice was still steady, but its core processor was clearly running at high load. Its logic core was simultaneously processing dozens of parallel tasks: trajectory prediction, energy distribution, camouflage field optimization, wreckage status monitoring... every single one was a matter of life and death.

Eight minutes.

As long as eight centuries.

Inside the bridge, only the alarms, the hum of system overload, and the heart-wrenching, continuous groan of metal fatigue from the assault boat wreckage echoed. Every second felt like it was snatched from the hands of death. Time lost its meaning here, leaving only the rhythm of heartbeats and alarms, silently counting down to the final chapter of fate.

Excellence's gaze swept across the viewport. The mist was like a living thing, sometimes condensing into ferocious faces, sometimes turning into twisted tentacles, as if the Frost Crystal Graveyard itself was trying to swallow the ship that dared to intrude in its own way. He suddenly remembered the echo of silence mentioned in The Whisper when the Remnants of the Watchers carved the symbol into his brow—perhaps this graveyard was the final echo left by some ancient civilization before it fell into complete silence.

And they were walking on the edge of returning home.

Finally, at the last moment before the tractor connection point stress reading was about to break through the red alert line, the suffocating, endless crystalline mist outside the viewport suddenly thinned, like a heavy curtain being abruptly pulled open. Ahead appeared the relatively "clean" but still cold and dead void at the edge of the cloud belt.

Safety Point Three—an area composed of several large, ancient, but relatively stable crystal blocks like floating islands—was already in sight. They floated quietly in the void, their surfaces covered with traces of age-old erosion, yet they remained solid, like the remains of ancient beasts, providing brief shelter for the ranger.

"Entering the safety point! Initiate emergency braking! Release all non-essential energy loads! Activate camouflage field at maximum power!" Excellence roared, his voice carrying a hint of near-breaking fanaticism.

The ranger's rear thrusters suddenly fired in reverse, a piercing blue-white light drawing a sharp energy arc in the void. Like a train braking suddenly, it vibrated violently under the immense inertia, sliding perilously into the shadow of the natural, irregular "shelter" formed by those large crystal blocks.

At the same time, all the camouflage runes on the ship's hull glowed brightly, and the field generators overloaded, "assimilating" the ship and the towed wreckage as much as possible with the cold, dead surrounding environment. Energy signals were compressed to the minimum, thermal radiation was shielded, and the optical profile was distorted—the entire ship seemed to turn into a floating, lifeless meteorite.

Almost the moment the ship came to a halt and the camouflage field was fully deployed, the rear sensors detected that at the edge of the cloud belt they had just rushed out of, the spreading front of the energy "wake turbulence" had already slowly washed over their previous path like an invisible tide.

But fortunately, due to entering the shelter in time and activating the maximum camouflage, the turbulence did not produce any obvious, directional "echo" or "focus" here.

For now... it was safe.

Inside the bridge, a deathly silence lasted for several seconds, then was replaced by the sound of suppressed, heavy breathing like survivors of a catastrophe and the hum of the system gradually powering down. The alarms went out one by one, leaving only the precarious energy leakage reading of the assault boat wreckage still flashing a dangerous red light on the screen.

Excellence collapsed into the command chair as if exhausted, cold sweat already soaking his undershirt. At the brand on his brow, the burning pain and sense of emptiness did not fade; instead, they became clearer due to his mental relaxation, like a hot, sore, newborn organ after being overused. He tried to focus his mind again to "perceive" the brand, but found that the original vague "sense of presence" and "guidance" connecting to a higher dimension had become exceptionally weak and chaotic, like a radio with poor signal, only able to catch some meaningless static and fragmented, incomprehensible "noise."

The power of the brand seemed to have fallen into an unstable period of silence requiring time to recover due to overextension and countering the essence of silence.

"Captain, how are you?" Stardust was the first to rush to Excellence's side, her gray eyes full of worry. She held a portable medical scanner, but when the scanning beam fell on Excellence's brow, it only showed a patch of unresolvable energy chaos—it wasn't physiological damage, but some kind of higher-dimensional "mental overload."

"Not... dead yet." Excellence forced a grimace, his voice hoarse. "The brand... seems unusable for now. Needs... time to recover." He looked up with difficulty at the main screen, at the assault boat wreckage that was barely held in place by the tractor beam outside the shelter of Safety Point Three, still leaking energy and small amounts of matter like a giant wound. "How is... it? Are the people inside... still alive?"

Evelyn was rapidly scanning the status of the wreckage, her fingers flying across the control panel. "The overall structure of the wreckage is on the verge of collapse. The energy leakage rate has slowed slightly after entering a stable environment, but it's still fatal." Her voice was low. "Life sign scans... are still extremely weak, in a state of deep coma or near death, but have not worsened further. It seems that after we escaped the crystals, some basic, instinctive, or environment-related maintenance mechanism inside it temporarily stabilized its last breath. But if effective treatment is not carried out soon, whether it's structural collapse, total energy core leakage, or the final failure of the internal life support system, it will lead to rapid death."

"We need to go in." Excellence struggled to stand up, but a strong wave of dizziness made him slump back down.

"In your current state, going in is suicide!" Stardust held him down, her tone stern. "Besides, the internal situation of that ship is unknown. There might be untriggered defense systems, self-destruct protocols, or... traps or contamination left by the Scavengers. Entering blindly is too dangerous."

"But we don't have time to wait!" Excellence gritted his teeth, a hint of bloodshot appearing in his eyes. "Its condition could worsen at any time. Besides, didn't we risk so much to drag it out for the information and possible survivors inside? The 'Messengers', the wanderers... their encounters might be hidden in this ship. We can't stop here."

Mute's consciousness fluctuation came through then, with a hint of an uncertain suggestion: "Perhaps... we don't need to go in. Although its hull is severely damaged, the core data storage area... especially parts like the 'black box' or core memory bank, often have the highest physical protection and emergency energy supply in their design. If we can find its external data interface, or... take advantage of its current extremely fragile, near-stalled state to attempt an extremely gentle, non-invasive, Wireless Neural Interface or high-dimensional information 'empathy' reading... maybe we can bypass the damaged hull and directly contact its core data, or even... establish a sliver of connection with the extremely weak consciousness that might remain inside?"

"Wireless Neural Interface? High-Dimensional Information Empathy?" Evelyn quickly assessed the feasibility of this plan. "Theoretically possible, but it requires extremely high technical precision and a deep understanding of the target system's protocols. We know nothing about its model and internal protocols. Moreover, the Captain's current state... forcibly performing operations at the high-dimensional information level is extremely risky."

"I can try..." Excellence once again sank his consciousness toward the brand on his brow. Although it was still chaotic and weak, under Mute's reminder, he vaguely felt that the high-dimensional, primal, and "harmonious" power connected by the brand might have some inherent advantage in perceiving and understanding the essence and information of other existences (especially those also related to Order and silence). Especially when the target was in such an extremely fragile, almost defenseless state.

"No! It's too risky!" Stardust firmly opposed. "Your brand just suffered a backlash, and your state is extremely unstable. Forcibly performing operations at the high-dimensional information level, if you encounter backlash from negative emotions, memory trauma, or even information contamination possibly planted by the Scavengers in the residual consciousness, the consequences would be unimaginable! Your consciousness could suffer permanent damage or even be assimilated by the contamination!"

"Then are we just going to watch it, and the key information it might hold, completely disappear before our eyes?!" Excellence growled, his voice filled with unwillingness and anger.

Just as the two sides were at a stalemate, S-001's calm voice intervened in the discussion again in an unexpected way:

"Detected an extremely weak but abnormally regular and repeating non-standard encrypted wireless signal pulse from inside the assault boat wreckage. The pulse content cannot be directly parsed, but its carrier frequency and modulation method have a high similarity to the universal emergency beacon protocol automatically broadcast by an early model Silent Corridor unit when it suffers irreversible damage and enters the 'Information Legacy' state, identifying its identity, final status, and requesting a 'Terminal Information Dump'."

"It's... automatically calling for help? Or rather, broadcasting its final 'Information Legacy'?" Stardust reacted immediately, a hint of hope flashing in her eyes.

"And it's using an early universal protocol..." Mute's consciousness fluctuation carried a hint of excitement. "This means its system might be relatively 'ancient' or 'standard', and its interface protocols and encryption methods might be archived in our database! At least, the difficulty of cracking and interfacing will be much lower than an unknown model!"

"S-001, try to match its beacon protocol and establish a minimum, receive-only, one-way secure data link! See if we can receive its 'legacy' data stream!" Excellence immediately ordered. This was currently the lowest-risk and most likely way to obtain information.

"Attempting match... Protocol match successful! Establishing one-way secure data reception link... Connection established!" S-001 was highly efficient. "Starting to receive data stream... The data stream is extremely chaotic and damaged, containing a large amount of repetition, errors, and gibberish caused by physical damage. Attempting preliminary filtering, cleaning, and reorganization..."

Everyone held their breath, staring intently at the chaotic flood of data pouring onto the main screen like an avalanche, composed of 0s and 1s and a large number of unrecognizable error symbols. S-001's data core ran at full speed, its algorithms like a precision mesh, trying to salvage any valuable information fragments from this information ruin.

Time passed minute by minute, second by second. With every passing second, the energy leakage readings of the assault craft's wreckage slid a step closer to the edge of collapse.

"Data cleansing 10% complete... 20%... Identifiable information fragments detected..." S-001's voice sounded like heavenly music.

On the screen, intermittent and preliminary organized text, image fragments, energy signature maps, and... some blurry biological neural activity records filled with intense emotions, seemingly captured directly from consciousness, began to appear!

"...Code name: 'sharp falcon-7'... Affiliated with... Seventh Independent Patrol Cluster... Received... high-priority instruction from unknown source... Coordinates... Verification failed... But threat level marked as 'Extinction' class... Proceeding to investigate..."

"...Trap! All... 'Scavenger'! They are... waiting for us! ...Open fire! ...Shields overloaded! ...Engine damaged! ..."

"'Order' beams... belong to... 'Them'! ...Betrayal! ...Why..."

"...Escape! ...Must... bring the news... back! ...'Nest'... coordinates... 'Purge Fire' project..."

"...Contaminated! ...Body... is... changing! ...Pain! ...Delete! ...Must delete that part of the protocol! ..."

"...Last... hope... 'Low-Entropy Garden'... coordinates... echo-Sigma-9... But... path... contaminated... key... requires... pure 'Order'..."

"...They... are looking for me... chasing me... Crystal Cloud... hide inside... can't go on... energy... consciousness... blurring..."

The information fragments were chaotic and disjointed, filled with pain, fear, anger, and confusion, but they clearly outlined a tragic scene highly similar to the encounters of the 'Messenger' and the 'wanderer': receiving forged high-risk instructions, going to investigate, being ambushed by 'Scavengers', discovering 'Scavengers' using distorted 'Order' power (confirming 'betrayal' once again), suffering chaos contamination, escaping with all their might, and attempting to bring critical information (the 'Purge Fire' project and 'Nest' coordinates) back to a place called the 'Low-Entropy Garden', only for the path to be blocked, finally fleeing into the 'Frost Crystal Graveyard' and dying of exhaustion.

"Low-Entropy Garden..." Stardust caught this new term. "It sounds like the name of a... 'refuge point'? Or a code name? The coordinates are echo-Sigma-9, but the path is contaminated... the key requires pure 'Order'... What does this mean?"

"echo-Sigma-9... S-001, are there any records of these coordinates in the database?" Excellence asked.

"Searching... No exact matching records. However, the coordinate prefix 'echo-Sigma' is marked in ancient star map fragments as a vast and desolate void near the theoretical inner boundary of the 'Order Domain' but far from the main 'silence' network, with an extremely complex spatial structure known as the 'Ancient Echo Zone'," S-001 replied. "This region is famous for its extreme stability, low energy background, and a large number of inexplicable, non-naturally formed, regular geometric spatial structure remains. Theoretically, it possesses the natural conditions to be a high-level hidden base."

"Ancient Echo Zone... Low-Entropy Garden..." Evelyn said slowly. "It indeed sounds like an isolated and extremely hidden 'refuge point'. But the path being contaminated... the key requiring pure 'Order'... this likely means the normal path to get there (possibly a specific hyperspace jump Node, a high-dimensional information channel, or a 'the gate' requiring special 'key' verification) has already been controlled or contaminated by 'Scavengers'. The so-called 'pure Order' might refer to some kind of high-authority 'Order' power that hasn't been distorted by 'Scavengers', or... a more primordial power related to the 'string of taiyi', acting as a 'key' to open a new path or purify a contaminated one."

"Pure 'Order'..." Excellence subconsciously touched the dim brand on his brow. The power of the brand was clearly related to the 'Remnants of the Watchers', and their power shared the same source as the 'string of taiyi'. In terms of level, it should be far more 'pure' and 'primordial' than the 'Order' distorted by the 'Scavengers'. Could it be... that this so-called 'key' refers to someone like him who has received the recognition and brand of the 'Remnants of the Watchers'? Or at least, someone who wields power of a similar nature?

Just then, S-001 spoke again, its tone carrying a rare, simulated sense of "urgency": "Warning! Received an independent information package from the 'sharp falcon-7' wreckage data stream, highly encrypted and marked as 'Final Warning - Broadcast Before Self-Destruction'. The package is attempting to self-decrypt, but its decryption process has triggered an extremely unstable internal logic protocol, causing the wreckage's energy core readings to fluctuate violently and accelerate toward the critical point!"

"What?!" Everyone was startled.

"The information package is being forcibly decrypted and played..." As soon as S-001 finished speaking, a series of intermittent, hair-raising sounds filled with extreme pain and distortion—as if multiple voices (mechanical, biological, and even... contaminated) were screaming over each other—burst from the bridge's speakers, accompanied by rapidly flashing, extremely blurry, pixelated, and interference-streaked broken images that seemed to record some terrifying experiment or transformation scene!

"...Do not... trust... the Epsilon signal! ...They... are... no longer... them!..."

"...'Purge Fire'... burns everything... Order and Entropy... reshaping... new god..."

"...'Nest' is... in the shadow... of 'the gate'... devouring... incubating..."

"...'key'... Resonance... is... a trap! ...It is... calling... its own kind... then... swallowing them!"

"...Escape! ...Go to... 'Low Entropy'... only... 'primal order'... can... open... the final..."

At this point, the voice and images were completely drowned out by a sharp, soul-tearing "noise"—a terrifying mix of mechanical explosions, biological wails, and some indescribable, viscous, malicious high-dimensional information noise!

Immediately after, on the main screen, the readings representing the 'sharp falcon-7' wreckage's energy core soared to the top like a snapped kite, and then—

"BOOM!!!!"

Even through the crystal cover and the multiple shields of the 'ranger', an extremely violent yet strangely "restrained" explosion shockwave—as if even light and sound were being forcibly "absorbed" and "suppressed" by some power—slammed hard against the ship's camouflage field!

The 'ranger' shook violently, the lights on the bridge flickered wildly, and a large number of non-critical systems went offline instantly! The camouflage field let out an overburdened wail like shattering glass, and energy readings instantly plummeted into the red zone!

"The wreckage... self-destructed!" Evelyn's voice was filled with alarm. "But the explosion pattern... is abnormal! The energy was highly constrained and... 'directional'? Most of the destructive power seemed to be directed... toward its own interior?"

Indeed, that explosion was less a destruction and more a thorough self-annihilation from the informational to the physical level. When the aftershocks of the explosion quickly dissipated and the sensors stabilized, everyone saw that the 'sharp falcon-7' wreckage, which had been floating outside the cover, had completely disappeared. Not a single metal fragment or energy residue remained, as if it had been completely "erased" from space-time by an invisible hand. Only a brief but exceptionally "clean" eerie "vacuum" area remained where it had been, with background radiation levels even slightly lower than average.

And in the center of that "vacuum" area, a tiny, extremely faint but heart-stoppingly pure pale golden light—of the same source as the brand on Excellence's brow and those pale golden characters—flickered like a candle in the wind before completely going out and dissipating into nothingness.

It was as if that self-destruction had not only destroyed the wreckage but also "purified" or "sacrificed" the last remaining trace of anything related to "Order," the "Remnants of the Watchers," or some "pure" essence within it.

Inside the bridge, there was a deathly silence. Only the faint hum of the system's self-repair and the heavy, suppressed breaths of the crew, filled with unspeakable fear and shock, could be heard.

"It... in the end..." Mute's consciousness fluctuation was filled with sadness and coldness, "did it to prevent its 'contamination' or the 'secrets' it knew from falling into the hands of any possible enemy... including us?"

"That final information package..." Stardust's face was pale, her voice dry. "Epsilon-3 has fallen or been controlled... the 'Purge Fire' project... the 'Nest' is in the shadow of 'the gate'... 'key Resonance' is a trap... and, 'primal order' is the 'key' to open the 'Low-Entropy Garden'..."

"It mentioned 'primal order'." Excellence spoke slowly, his voice hoarse, but his eyes reignited with a cold flame because of that final warning and information. "It seems this brand on my brow... might truly be a part of that 'key'. At least, it is one of the keys leading to that 'Low-Entropy Garden', or rather, leading to the truth of confronting 'Purge Fire' and the 'shadow of the end'."

He looked out the viewport at the void where the 'sharp falcon-7' wreckage had once been, now only a dead silence, and slowly clenched his fist.

The wreckage was gone, but with its final, resolute self-destruction, it left behind a clearer and more urgent warning, and an incredibly heavy clue pointing toward the "Low-Entropy Garden" and "primal order."

And for the 'ranger' and its crew, after another tragic and nearly futile rescue and information gathering mission, the weight of the scales named "Truth" and "Responsibility" in their hands seemed to have grown several times heavier.

The road ahead was still shrouded in mist, filled with hidden killing intent.

But the direction seemed to have been illuminated just a bit by that dying soul's final "echo," carried with blood and fire.

Even if that sliver of light pointed toward an even deeper and more dangerous darkness.

The alarm sounds completely subsided, but the atmosphere inside the bridge was heavier than ever. The aftershocks of that self-destruction had not only destroyed the wreckage but also left an unhealable crack in everyone's hearts.

Evelyn silently pulled up the last received data stream for a secondary analysis. Although most of the information had been annihilated, S-001 had successfully captured and cached a small segment of core data at the last moment before the explosion—a vague description of the "Purge Fire" project and a coordinate marked as "echo-Sigma-9."

"'Purge Fire'..." she murmured. "'Burns everything... Order and Entropy... reshaping a new god.' This doesn't sound like a simple weapon project; it's more like a... cosmic-level 'reset'. The 'Scavengers' want to use the fire of chaos to burn away all existing Order and chaos, and then... create a new god?"

"Or, they themselves are that 'new god'," Mute's consciousness fluctuation was low. "'key Resonance is a trap'... this sentence is worth pondering. They are luring beings like you, Captain. Those who possess the power of 'primal order'. They need this power to complete some ritual or activate some device."

Excellence did not speak. He closed his eyes, his fingers lightly stroking his brow. The brand there, though dim, still existed. He could feel that power slowly and with difficulty recovering. Like a deeply buried seed, it was accumulating the strength to break through the soil in the darkness.

Stardust walked to his side and handed him a cup of warm synthetic nutrient solution. "Drink something. You're too weak."

Excellence took it and forced a smile. "Thanks. You're right. In my current state, I can't even stand steadily, let alone think about some 'key'."

"But you must think." Stardust's voice was soft yet carried an unquestionable firmness. "'sharp falcon-7' told us with its life that time is running out. Epsilon-3 has fallen, and the 'Scavengers' tentacles are spreading. If we don't find the 'Low-Entropy Garden' soon, find other possibly surviving 'Remnants of the Watchers', or... find the truth of 'primal order', we will eventually become a piece of wreckage in the mist, just like 'sharp falcon-7'."

Excellence looked up at her. In those gray eyes, there was no fear, only determination.

He took a deep breath, downed the nutrient solution, and slowly stood up. Although his legs were still trembling, he stood straight.

"Orders for the whole ship," his voice wasn't loud, but it reached everyone's ears clearly. "Enter stage one alert status. S-001, analyze the 'echo-Sigma-9' coordinates, calculate the optimal flight path, and avoid all known 'Scavenger' activity areas and high-risk spatial anomalies. Evelyn, continue parsing the 'Purge Fire' data, looking for any possible weaknesses or breakthroughs. Senior Mute, assist me... while the brand is recovering, maintain the connection with the power of 'silence'. Stardust, you are responsible for ship defense and tactical planning."

"Yes, Captain," everyone responded in unison.

The 'ranger's' engines roared low again, like a beast awakening from exhaustion. It slowly detached from the cover of Safety Point Three and headed toward that void known as the "Ancient Echo Zone."

Outside the viewport, the starlight was sparse, and the mist was gradually thinning. But in those unknown depths, it felt as if countless eyes were silently watching this tiny ship.

And Excellence knew that what they were sailing toward might not be a sanctuary, but an even greater storm.

But so what?

Some paths must be walked by someone.

Some fires must be extinguished by someone.

And some 'Order' must be guarded by someone.

Even if the price is—absolute silence.