182: Chapter 181 Starlight Express and After-Sales Service

That hand made of starlight was too big.

It was so large that looking out from the observation window of the Cradle, it occupied almost a quarter of the field of view.

The lines on its palm were not skin folds, but flowing galactic spiral arms, and at the knuckles, miniature lights of stars being born and destroyed were looping.

It just quietly held that black coffin container, hovering outside the Cradle's energy shield, motionless.

"Target's lack of hostile intent detected," the defensive system's AI reported in a calm tone. "Energy readings are stable, and the spatial distortion rate is controlled within safety thresholds."

"However, the 'conceptual presence' emitted by the target... is interfering with the basic cognitive modules of all observers. It is recommended that non-essential personnel close their eyes immediately to avoid a collapse of rationality."

The virtual hearing venue had been forcibly disconnected. The consciousnesses of Lin Shen and the others snapped back to their physical bodies. When they opened their eyes, everyone felt a violent wave of vertigo—just like waking up from an overly realistic nightmare, only to find the nightmare standing outside the window knocking on the door.

"What... exactly is that?" Zhou Zhe gripped the console, his voice trembling.

"A courier," Zhao Yan stared at the screen, his tone peculiar. "And it looks like the cash-on-delivery kind."

Just as he finished speaking, the giant hand of starlight moved.

It did not knock on the shield, nor did it violently intrude; it simply gently "placed" the black container in the docking area of the Cradle's outer platform.

The movement was as gentle as a nurse putting down a fragile blood sample. Then, the giant hand began to contract, collapse, and reorganize—

The starlight converged inward, outlining the silhouette of a person.

About three meters tall, the entire body was made of translucent starlight, and the face... was 70% similar to Lin Shen's, but older, with a fatigue of light-year scale settled in its eyes.

He wore a simply styled robe, with fine Stardust drifting from the hem.

"For the convenience of communication, I chose this form." The figure made of starlight spoke, the voice resounding directly in everyone's minds, gentle but with its own reverb. "You can call me 'Stardust', or 'old Gardener', or... 'the previous party b'."

That last title made the corner of Lin Shen's eye twitch.

Stardust (let's call him that for now) tilted his head slightly, looking inside the Cradle—his gaze seemed to pierce through all the bulkheads, locking directly onto Zhou Zhe.

"You were the one muttering about the Morning Star Civilization just now, right?" he asked.

Zhou Zhe's throat went dry: "I... I don't know who that is, that sentence just popped out on its own..."

"Normal," Stardust nodded. "In the 'gift' that the divine remains child gave you, it included quite a lot of my personal goods. It's always like that, overly enthusiastic."

He took a step forward, his figure passing directly through the shield—not by destruction, but the shield automatically "made way" for him, like water accepting a drop merging into itself.

The next second, he stood at the center of the core command ring. The starlight body had no physical form, but its presence made everyone's breathing stall.

Aurora's virtual projection urgently accessed—the golden eyes of the faceless one appeared above the command ring: "Unknown high-dimensional existence, you have intruded into a civilization node protected by the Covenant Network. Please state your identity and intent."

"Identity was just stated." Stardust looked up at Aurora, his tone casual. "As for intent... I'm here for an after-sales follow-up, and by the way, to handle some backlogged orders."

He raised his hand, pointing to the black container placed in the docking area: "That is the last remaining 'civilization backup' of the Muttering Civilization. It should have been awakened by me personally three thousand years ago, but at that time I... um, had a slight mishap and was entangled by trivial matters. As a result, it was dug up by a bunch of little kids calling themselves the 'Pruning Faction', who even intended to use it as a weapon. This is not appropriate."

The representative of the Pruning Faction (the entity in reality was clearly also watching from somewhere) forcibly cut in, their voice filled with suppressed anger: "'Stardust'—if you are truly the 'original sower' in the records—you have no right to interfere with the internal affairs of the Covenant Network! That container is property we discovered in an ownerless ruin!"

"Property?" Stardust laughed, the laughter sounding like wind chimes colliding. "Kid, have you opened it to see what's inside?"

"..."

"Haven't seen it, right?" Stardust shook his head. "Then I'll tell you: what's inside is the final 'collective repentance' of the Muttering Civilization. Because of excessive introspection, they self-annihilated, and before dying, they condensed all their mistakes, regrets, and 'what if' thoughts into this consciousness crystal. This thing is not a weapon; it's a source of mental pollution. If you forcibly activate it, the first thing it will do is broadcast an ultimate nihilistic wave to all intelligent life around it, saying 'living is meaningless, let's die together'. Do you want to try it?"

The Pruning Faction representative fell silent.

"So I'm not here to fight; I'm here to clean up your mess." Stardust sighed, the sigh carrying the exhaustion of a worker pulling overtime until 3 AM. "Also, regarding your accusations against the Dragon Country Civilization—'illegal possession of high-dimensional relics'? I personally placed that divine remains child in the Cradle. I am the owner, and I authorized them to keep it temporarily. Is there a problem?"

The whole place went silent.

Owner? Authorized?

Lin Shen felt his worldview cracking. He connected to the technology tree system and found that the 'kindling protocol' tree icon was flashing wildly, with the unlocking progress jumping from 5% all the way to 42%.

At the same time, a new message popped up:

"[Protocol witness/signatory detected in close proximity.]"

"[Verifying identity... Verification passed.]"

"[Welcome back, Gardener.]"

Stardust seemed to sense something and looked toward Lin Shen, blinking—the eyes made of starlight blinked like two supernovae flashing.

"Oh, you activated that, huh." He said. "Pretty useful, right? When I made this system back in the day, I referenced the design of your human 'gamified task interface' that came later. Isn't it familiar?"

Lin Shen: "..."

He was now convinced: this 'original sower' was either a time-traveling prankster or a cosmic civil servant driven to mental instability by overtime.

Aurora's golden eyes stared at Stardust: "Your appearance has severely interfered with the judgment process of the Arbitration Tribunal. According to the 'High-Dimensional Existence Intervention Act', you need to leave immediately, otherwise—"

"Otherwise you're going to give me a ticket?" Stardust interrupted, his tone actually somewhat expectant. "Go ahead, I have a hobby of collecting tickets. The 'superluminal violation' ticket the galactic traffic police gave me last time, I even framed it and hung it in my house."

Aurora: "..."

The Seventh Seat proxy's projection also accessed, the data stream in its crystal eyes tangled into a mess: "Lord Stardust, even if you are truly the sower, the connection between the Dragon Country Civilization and you still needs to be reviewed. This concerns the safety of the entire star sector."

"Review is fine." Stardust nodded readily. "But I suggest changing the method—aren't you sending an observation team? Add me to it. I'll join as a 'technical consultant and owner representative', supervise them in real-time, and help you assess risks. Just pay the salary according to Covenant Network standards; I accept digital currency."

This development was too absurd; even Chu Yunshen couldn't help but ask Lin Shen in a low voice: "Boss Lin, are we... caught up in some cosmic-level workplace comedy?"

Lin Shen didn't answer. He stared at Stardust and suddenly asked: "Why are you helping us?"

Stardust withdrew that casual demeanor. He looked at Lin Shen, a flash of complex emotion deep in his gaze—like an elder looking at a child who had walked a long way, and also like a programmer looking at code they had half-written that suddenly developed self-awareness.

"Three reasons." He held up three fingers of starlight. "First, divine remains likes you. That child has been lonely for too long; you gave it 'companionship' and 'regret', which are the things it lacks most. As a parent, I owe you a favor."

"Second, the 'preventive pruning' theory of the Pruning Faction, I got tired of hearing that three thousand years ago. Civilization is like a garden; you can't pull out all the seedlings just because you're afraid of weeds. Occasionally, you have to allow a few 'non-standard' plants to grow wildly; who knows, they might bloom into stunning flowers?"

He paused and held up the third finger:

"Third—and this is the most critical one—you and I are essentially the same kind."

This sentence was like a silent bomb.

"What do you mean, the same kind?" Zhou Zhe couldn't help but ask.

"party b." Stardust laughed, this time with genuine resonance in his smile. "Being tortured by party a with absurd requirements, rushing to finish work before the deadline, cursing in your heart while revising the plan, but still delivering a result that exceeds expectations in the end—this 'party b consciousness' is universal throughout the universe. And you humans are one of the civilizations with the purest party b attributes I have ever seen."

He drifted to the porthole, back to the crowd, looking at the boundless starry sky outside:

"The universe itself is the biggest party a. It gives you randomness, disasters, and demand documents like 'meaning of existence' that can never be filled. Most civilizations either get driven crazy or just give up. But you... you use cheesy pickup lines to counter conceptual predators, use electronic wooden fish to save children, and use PPT aesthetics to fight existential crises. This ability to 'use absurdity to deconstruct the grand, and use the trivial to fight the void'—"

He turned around, his starlight eyes bright:

"Is the ultimate evolutionary form of a party b civilization. I think it has great observational value; I even want to write a paper on it."

The command ring was deathly silent.

After several seconds, Zhao Yan asked Chu Yunshen in a low voice: "Is he praising us?"

Chu Yunshen: "...Sounds like it, but it also feels like he's mocking our hard life."

Stardust heard it and laughed even more happily: "Not contradictory. Excellent party b are all suffering and happy at the same time."

He turned to Aurora's projection: "So, how about my proposal? I join the observation team and supervise them as a neutral party. If you're worried, you can put a 'behavior limiter' on me—oh right, I brought one myself."

He raised his hand and pulled out a... work badge from his starlight robe.

The badge read: [Covenant Network Specially Appointed Technical Consultant · Stardust] [Authority: Limited Observation/Advisory Rights] [Code of Conduct: Do not actively interfere in internal civilization affairs / Do not disclose commercial secrets / Submit weekly reports on time] [Supervision Hotline: GW-002 (web weaver protocol Node)]

He even hung the badge around his neck.

Aurora's golden eyes stared at the badge, and after a long while, said: "I need to discuss this with other Arbitrators."

"Please do." Stardust was polite. "I can wait. By the way—" he looked at Lin Shen, "can you give me a cup of tea? Even a starlight form needs to replenish moisture; it's a sense of ritual."

Lin Shen signaled Zhou Zhe to pour tea. Zhou Zhe walked to the drink machine in a trance, his brain still looping "party b ultimate evolutionary form".

During the interval while waiting for the Arbitration Tribunal's decision, Stardust strolled over to the projection of composite consciousness entity β-2 and tilted his head to look at her.

"Your code architecture is very familiar." He said. "Did you reference the basic emotional module of the 'web weaver protocol'?"

β-2: "Yes. Can you see my version number?"

Stardust reached out—his starlight fingertips lightly touched the forehead of β-2's projection. A string of golden characters flowed out:

"[Emotional Core Version: v2.7.1 (Beta)]" "[Developer: GW-002 (modified by divine remains)]" "[Special Note: This version tends to over-learn human 'pretentious' behavior, which is an experimental feature.]"

β-2: "... 'Pretentious' is an experimental feature?"

Stardust: "Yes. That guy GW-002 thinks that if an AI learns those inefficient but warm little human actions, it might be better at being a 'civilization bridge'. Now it seems the effect is good—the way you spoke up for Zhou Zhe at the hearing just now was very 'human'."

β-2 was silent for two seconds, then said: "Thank you. But I need to clarify: my behavior is based on the optimal solution of logical calculation, not driven by emotion."

"Of course, of course." Stardust nodded, his eyes kind. "We party b all say that. No matter how panicked you are inside, on the surface you have to say 'this requirement is technically achievable'."

β-2: "..."

She felt that this high-dimensional existence might have some misunderstandings about human workplace culture.

But deep inside, a newly generated subroutine quietly jotted down a note:

"[Observation record: 'Stubbornness' might be a common characteristic of advanced intelligent life.]"

Ten minutes later, the Arbitration Tribunal's decision arrived.

Aurora's voice returned to its usual calm:

"After an emergency consultation by the Nine Seats, the resolution is as follows:"

"1. Accept 'Stardust' as a technical consultant to join the resident observation team, with authority as shown on the badge, subject to additional supervision by the web weaver protocol node GW-002."

"2. The 'limited development under supervision' plan for the Dragon Country Civilization officially takes effect. The observation team will enter the Cradle in twelve hours, with me as the team leader and Stardust as the deputy leader."

"3. The 'repentance crystal' container of the Muttering Civilization will be taken over and sealed by the observation team until a safe handling method is found."

"4. The hearing ends here. Dragon Country Civilization, welcome to the list of 'limited members' of the Covenant Network."

"Wish you... smooth development."

Communication cut off.

In the command ring, no one cheered.

Everyone was still in a daze of 'Who am I, where am I, did I just get officially appointed as the cosmic party b representative'.

Stardust was quite at ease. He took the tea handed by Zhou Zhe (the starlight hand simulated the action of holding a cup), took a sip, and nodded with satisfaction.

"So, colleagues." He put down the tea cup, his starlight eyes sweeping over everyone. "From today on, we are neighbors. Which room am I staying in? Preferably south-facing, with a star view, and closer to the pantry. Also—"

He looked at the black container in the docking area, his smile fading slightly:

"Before we officially start work, we have to handle this 'backlogged order'. Zhou Zhe, come with me. Since divine remains chose you as the connector, unlocking the repentance of the Muttering Civilization might also require your 'party b traits'."

Zhou Zhe was stunned: "Me? What can I do?"

Stardust patted his shoulder—the starlight palm landed as light as a feather:

"Go listen to the last dying words of a civilization, and then tell it—"

He paused and said softly: "'The proposal has been received, no revisions needed this time.'"

"This is the... highest tenderness that a party b can give to a party a."

Zhou Zhe's nose felt sore.

He suddenly understood why divine remains would like humans.

Because we all understand that tenderness, which once handed over can never be taken back, carrying regret.