511: Chapter 511 can only be described as "Wow!"

In the rest area, most people had already fallen asleep or were engaged in private meditation.

The impact and reflections brought by the day's sights and sounds needed time to be digested.

The door to Shirley Orlando's cabin slid open silently.

She had changed into casual clothes that were easy to move in and inconspicuous. Naturally, she wouldn't carry the large chainsaw gun "Red Skull" on her, but two pistols specially made by the Technology Research and Development Department—arranged through Mariabell's connections—and some handy small tools were securely hidden in various places on her person.

Tired? Please, for a vibrant adolescent girl, the energy bar is always full, okay?

She didn't plan on sleeping just yet.

Following the inspection team during the day for a superficial look and listening to those smart people analyze things back and forth was truly exhausting.

Although it made sense, she trusted her eyes and instincts more in her bones. Behind those glamorous things, something else was definitely hidden.

Especially that guide Adrian; every time the topic went a little deeper, that flawless, polite smile made her hands itch.

She really wanted to go up and give him a smack.

She strolled to the common rest area and saw Evelyn holding a refreshing drink, looking at the night view outside the window, seemingly lost in thought.

"Director, can't sleep?" Shirley approached, her tone casual.

Evelyn glanced at her without answering, merely swirling her cup gently.

"Those places during the day were too eerie; it makes one feel uneasy all over." Shirley leaned against the window, also looking out at the hive cities that resembled giant integrated circuit boards. "It's too clean—cleaner than the battlefields we've swept."

"I want to go out for some fresh air and see if the Holy Capital is just as disciplined at night."

Evelyn didn't immediately object.

She took a slow sip of her drink, her gaze lingering on Shirley's face for a few seconds, seemingly weighing something.

She knew what Shirley's adventure meant, and she also knew the capabilities of those from the Red Constellation. It had to be said that making them stay put as guards was indeed a bit of a waste.

"Alone?" Evelyn asked.

"Hehe, the old man's guy should be following me quietly." Shirley grinned. "He's even more familiar than I am with how not to be noticed."

Evelyn knew who she was referring to—Sigmund's deputy, an old Jaeger renowned for his caution, experience, and loyalty back in Zemuria. He didn't talk much normally, but he was extremely reliable at critical moments.

Otherwise, Sigmund wouldn't have had him take on the role of nanny when Shirley and Randy were children.

"Stay safe. Do not initiate contact, do not start conflicts, and do not leave traces." Evelyn swirled the cup in her hand. "If discovered, try to escape peacefully. If that's not possible, limited self-defense is permitted. Remember, our current identity is that of friendly visitors."

"Don't cause any trouble, my little Shirley~"

"Yes, Lady Evelyn! Just looking around, Shirley promises not to act out." Shirley made an exaggerated gesture of assurance, but a spark of eagerness flashed in her eyes.

A few minutes later, Shirley and the middle-aged Jaeger known as the Old Butler silently left the ship.

They avoided the main surveillance areas of the starport, moving using shadows and structural blind spots.

The Old Butler's counter-reconnaissance and infiltration skills were consummate, easily leading Shirley past several sentry posts and automated patrol routes set up by the Shankong people.

His intuition for danger and utilization of the environment made even Shirley secretly admire him.

They didn't even need to use the company's various small gadgets.

After confirming no one was following, the two of them, like ghosts blending into the night, quickly left the starport and its surrounding core security zone, diving deep into the vast architectural complex of the Holy Capital, Aetherland.

Traveling through it in high-speed transport during the day, it just felt massive. Only by actually walking through those intricate, three-dimensional intersecting streets, overpasses, internal corridors, and vertical passages could one appreciate the staggering scale and complexity of this hive city.

It was also fortunate they were strong enough; otherwise, even moving around would be a problem.

Late at night, most public transportation serving upper-class citizens had stopped running, and the lights in public areas had been dimmed significantly.

Soft ambient lighting outlined the buildings, and some decorative glowing crystals and holographic billboards were still working, emitting a faint glow.

The two had no clear goal, simply relying on intuition to avoid the brightest, newest, and best-looking areas, exploring toward the relatively dim directions.

"Young Miss, this way." The Old Butler stopped at a fork in the road, pointing to a passage that was significantly narrower and showed signs of repaired damage on the ground.

The sound of the air circulation System here was somewhat unusual, carrying a faint, stale odor.

They continued deeper along the passage. The biomass coating on the building surfaces became mottled, and rust appeared on the metal structures. Most of the doors and windows on both sides of the passage were tightly shut, with curtains drawn securely.

Occasionally, they saw one or two pedestrians returning late, but they were in a hurry, heads down, unlike the composed people seen during the day.

"This is getting interesting." Shirley lowered her voice, her eyes scanning the surroundings in the darkness.

After crossing several more simple overpasses that were clearly hastily added to connect different old areas, they arrived at a place completely different from what they had seen before.

This place seemed like a corner forgotten by planning.

The buildings were no longer towering vertical megastructures but low, crowded, old-fashioned houses haphazardly built together.

Materials were mixed, many clearly being reused from old building Materials. The stale smell in the air became intense, mixed with the scent of mold and the sour stench of untreated garbage.

Even more nauseating was the thick scent of excrement.

The streets were narrow and pitted, with unknown garbage and waste piled on both sides. There was no normal public lighting, only a few sporadic streetlights on the verge of going out, casting flickering glows.

Sewage overflowed, accumulating into small puddles in the low-lying areas of the road.

There were "people" here too.

They were huddled under doorways, by corners, sitting on tattered mats. Their clothes were ragged, covered in patches, and dull in color.

Most were terrifyingly thin, with protruding cheekbones, sunken eye sockets, and rough skin with an unhealthy hue.

Many showed obvious symptoms of disease. Uncontrollable coughing, large patches of rashes or ulcerations on the skin, and stooped bodies. But no one talked, no one complained, and no one even made much noise.

They just sat there quietly, staring blankly ahead, or simply closing their eyes as if they had given up on thinking and hope, merely waiting for something.

"This..." Shirley's brow furrowed. She had seen slums in Zemuria, seen ruins after war, and seen desperate people.

But this was different. The silence here was more distressing than wailing.

The people here didn't seem like living beings; they were more like a pile of breathing, slowly rotting things.

"This is quite the eye-opener." The Old Butler said in a low voice, his tone cold. "I didn't expect the history of poverty, disease, and despair to need protection in this form?"

Just then, a slight mechanical whirring sound came from the end of the street.

The two quickly vanished into a deeper shadow.

A group of "people" appeared.

They were several humanoid machines with simple, sleek lines. They were about two meters tall, with matte white shells and a ceramic-like texture, but precise mechanical structures could be seen at the joints.

The heads were smooth ovals with no facial features, only a blue glowing strip running across them.

Although their appearance had nothing to do with humans, their movements were quite humanoid.

They were pushing several heavy carts, which held a few giant containers.

The group stopped in the middle of the street, and those residents who were either sitting or lying down seemed to receive a silent signal and began to slowly gather.

They held various crude containers—broken bowls, chipped cups, and flattened tin cans.

They opened the containers, which contained a thick, grayish-white, odorless paste. A humanoid machine used a long-handled ladle to scoop a portion of the paste and poured it into the broken bowl held out by the first resident.

The portion was fixed, no more and no less. After receiving it, the resident silently stepped aside, not eating immediately, but just holding the bowl with both hands, head bowed, waiting.

There was no significant noise throughout the process, only the slight sound of mechanical arms moving and the sticky sound of the paste hitting the bottom of the bowls.

No one scrambled, no one complained about the portion, and no one even glanced at the contents of the bowl.

The distribution lasted for about ten minutes, and all the gathered residents received their scoop of food.

Then, the blue light on the head of one humanoid machine flickered, emitting a string of emotionless synthetic speech: "Grateful."

With that "Grateful," all the residents holding bowls simultaneously brought them to their mouths and began to eat.

They swallowed quickly, but it didn't feel like devouring; it was more like completing a ritual. Their expressions remained numb, and their eyes were still hollow.

The eating process was equally quiet, with only faint swallowing sounds.

In less than two minutes, everyone had finished eating.

The blue light on the humanoid machine's head flickered again: "Pray."

All the residents who had finished eating, as if the same button had been pressed, simultaneously bowed their heads and folded their hands or made similar gestures with damaged fingers: "Grateful for the gift, wash away my sins. May Order endure forever, may high heaven forgive."

The prayer ended.

The humanoid machines pushed their carts away, disappearing into the end of another dim street.

The residents who had received "food" also dispersed silently, returning to their original corners, sitting or lying down, turning back into those lifeless shadows.

The street fell back into a deathly silence, leaving only the stench of garbage and the wail of the night wind.

In the shadows, Shirley and the Old Butler did not move for a long time.

Shirley felt her palms grow a bit cold.

She had seen cruel battles, seen death, and seen mountains of corpses and seas of blood.

But this scene before her—this way of presenting poverty, suffering, and despair in such an orderly manner, and making the people within it accept and even feel grateful—gave her a chill that went deep into her bones.

This was more hair-raising than the bloody slaughter on a battlefield.

For a moment, she even felt that her nickname "Bloody Shirley" was quite kind.

"Let's go, Young Miss." The Old Butler's voice was very grave. "This is not a place where we should linger. Nor is it a place we can easily change."

Shirley nodded, taking one last look at that deathly silent street and those figures like tombstones under the dim lights. Turning around, she and the butler silently blended into the darkness from which they had come.

She had to tell Evelyn everything she had seen.

This place was too wrong.