400: Hell start, Void Predator

Dead silence.

It was like being soaked in the deepest ink; there was no sound, no light, and even his sense of "self" had become thin.

Lin Fan's consciousness coalesced into its first thought within this infinite, dead silence.

I'm still alive.

[Resurrection protocol complete.]

[Body reconstruction finished.]

[Current divinity rank: Lv.5]

[Soul status: Extremely weak.]

[Warning: Resurrection Anchor stability has dropped to 6%. Please replenish Soul energy or reduce death frequency as soon as possible, Host.]

The prompts on the System panel were cold and mechanical, like a tolling death knell.

Lin Fan's eyelids felt as heavy as two mountains. He used all his strength just to barely force open a sliver of a gap.

What met his eyes was a tilted metal ceiling covered in spiderweb-like cracks.

The air was filled with a pungent burnt smell, mixed with the metallic scent of cooled metal.

He tried to move his fingers.

A strange sense of powerlessness, originating from deep within his body, made even this simplest of actions incredibly difficult.

divinity rank Lv.5.

This number was like a cold needle pricking deep into his consciousness.

From divinity rank Lv.25 to Lv.10, and now to Lv.5—he had almost been beaten back to his original form.

Two huge gambles had nearly cost him everything he had.

'I've lost everything...'

'If there isn't a gold-legendary tier compensation for this, I might as well uninstall this System.'

Just as his self-deprecating thought flashed by, he was drawn to another crimson System warning still hovering in his field of vision.

[New environment scan complete: You have arrived at the lawless zone of the 'Crimson Expansion Belt'.]

[Warning: The spatial ripples generated by the blind jump have attracted the attention of a 'Void Predator'.]

Void Predator.

Just those five words caused Lin Fan's Soul, which had just regained a hint of awareness, to feel a bone-chilling cold.

It wasn't that high-and-mighty "heavenly might" with a sense of judgment brought by the Order Elder.

Instead, it was something more primal, a purer... sense of hunger.

It was as if in the endless darkness outside the Ark, a pair of eyes that could not be measured by any scale had already locked onto this piece of "meat" floating in the dark.

He struggled, propping up his upper body with his elbows.

A violent wave of dizziness hit him, making everything before his eyes spin.

The Core Plaza had turned into a mess of ruins.

The tens of thousands of survivors who were previously sitting cross-legged were now lying unconscious on the ground in all directions. Many had blood at the corners of their mouths, clearly having suffered heavy injuries from the massive overload and Law backlash of the spatial jump.

Zhao Linger, Fatty Zhang, Li Hanyue... His gaze swept over them and saw those familiar figures lying unconscious not far away.

The Great Elder of the Tomb Keepers was slumped in the center of the now completely extinguished formation, his ancient hemp robe covered in dust, motionless, his life or death unknown.

The entire Ark was deathly silent.

It was like a giant steel tomb floating in the Universe.

And they were the funerary objects in that tomb.

Boom—

A dull thud of an impact came from the bottom of the Ark without any warning.

This time, it wasn't a vibration of Law, but a purely physical, brutally arrogant collision.

The entire Ark shuddered violently because of it.

On the ceiling, a massive metal structure could not withstand the force and crashed down, hitting the ground nearby and kicking up a cloud of dust.

Lin Fan's pupils constricted suddenly.

It's here.

That "Void Predator" had already found them.

He forced himself to calm down, his brain working at an unprecedented speed.

Fight?

Don't be ridiculous.

In his current state, even a slightly strong Mortal could knock him down. With his divinity rank at Lv.5 and his Divine Power nearly exhausted, he couldn't even cast a basic divine art.

Flee?

The Ark's Jump Engine had completely broken down after that suicidal activation.

Now, this was just an immovable steel coffin.

Hide?

To a cosmic creature like this, the massive energy resonance that exploded at the end of the jump was like a ten-thousand-watt searchlight in the dead of night; there was nowhere to hide.

A dead end.

A dead end even more hopeless than when facing the Purification Fleet.

That Order Elder would at least follow some "rules" and give him a chance to find a loophole.

But the thing before him—its only rule was to eat everything it saw.

'Damn it, out of the tiger's den and into the wolf's lair.'

'And it's an unreasonable wolf at that.'

Lin Fan gritted his teeth, enduring the pain as if his body were falling apart, and began to crawl along the floor.

He didn't crawl toward Zhao Linger, nor toward anyone else.

His target was the Ark's Core Control Console, which had gone completely dark and lost all its luster.

There might still be a final sliver of hope there.

The cold metal floor scraped against his palms and knees.

Every inch forward felt like rolling on the edge of a blade.

He could feel the vibrations from the Ark's hull becoming more frequent and more violent.

That "predator" seemed to be using its body to test how hard the shell of this new "food" was.

When it lost its patience, it would be the end for everyone.

Finally, he crawled to the front of the console.

The surface was covered in dust and dried blood, and most of the light screens were pitch black.

He reached out a trembling hand, fumbling until he pressed down on a startup panel that still had a faint glow.

[Energy System check... Core Energy: 0.1%]

[Life Support System: Offline.]

[Defense System: Offline.]

[Weapon System: Offline.]

Lines of hopeless data appeared on the only main screen that was lit.

The Ark was truly dead.

Even the most basic Life Support System was shut down. If the Cultivators' Physiques weren't far superior to Mortals, the survivors in the plaza would have already suffocated to death.

'No... there's still a chance.'

Lin Fan's gaze was fixed intently on the line: "Core Energy: 0.1%".

This tiny amount of energy couldn't power the engine, nor could it start the weapons.

But perhaps... it could do something else.

For example, restart the Life Support System to forcibly wake someone up.

In his mind, the faces of several people flashed by in an instant.

Li Hanyue? If she woke up, she could only stare helplessly at that monster.

Fatty Zhang? Waking him would only lead to crying and screaming, adding to the noise.

Zhao Linger? Her Medicinal Pills might be useful to him, but recovery takes time, and a distant well cannot quench a nearby thirst.

Then, only one choice remained.

The Great Elder of the Tomb Keepers.

Besides himself, the Great Elder was the only person on this ship who might know about certain hidden functions or emergency protocols.

Without hesitation, Lin Fan diverted all of that 0.1% energy into the Life Support System's "Emergency Wake-up" program.

He set the target.

The Great Elder of the Tomb Keepers in the center of the formation.

[Command confirmed.]

[Transmitting life-support surge to the designated target...]

Buzz.

An extremely weak stream of energy was channeled into the Great Elder's body through the circuits beneath the floor.

The Grand Elder lying on the ground suddenly twitched.

It worked!

Lin Fan was overjoyed.

However, in the very next second.

RUMBLE!!!!

An unprecedented, terrifying boom that seemed as if it would tear the entire Ark in half came from above everyone's heads.

Lin Fan looked up abruptly.

Through the cracked dome, he seemed to "see" it.

In the infinite darkness of the Void Realm, an indescribable shadow, so massive it blotted out all starlight, opened its... mouth.

In that giant mouth, there were no teeth, only rings of absolute darkness that rotated slowly like nebulae, capable of swallowing all light.

Its probing of this "tin can" was over.

Now, it was mealtime.