161: Depart

The ten days following Ilya's submission of the ship's design to Lei Wen were the most agonizing yet expectant days of her life.

She practically lived on the observation deck of the [Horizon] Space Physics Research Institute, her crimson eyes constantly fixed on the void, as if her gaze alone could burn through space.

Finally, as the tenth day was drawing to a close, at a safe anchorage about fifty kilometers from the space station, a silver-white giant ship "embedded" itself into real space out of thin air.

Its appearance was so abrupt that even the space station's most advanced optical sensors experienced a frame drop.

This was a jump, a super-technology of the Faleim Civilization—instantaneous movement that bypassed distance and process.

"My god..."

Ilya pressed herself against the thick radiation-shielded glass, her rapid breathing clouding it with a patch of white mist.

Presented before her eyes was a perfect piece of industrial art.

This warship, named the [Wanderer], had a total length of about five kilometers, comparable in size to a standard Faleim destroyer. But for humans accustomed to ships only a few hundred meters long, it was a moving mountain of steel.

Its hull lines were incredibly smooth, without a single visible seam, as if it had been cast from a single massive block of silver liquid metal.

The hull's surface lacked the complex piping and protruding modules found on human warships; instead, faint blue energy patterns pulsed beneath the silver armor like living veins.

"It's beautiful," Ilya murmured. At this moment, all physical formulas and data paled in the face of such ultimate aesthetics... Half an hour later, Lei Wen accompanied Ilya as she boarded this dream-like vessel.

Upon entering the bridge, Ilya was immediately drawn to the minimalist yet powerful command console. All the control interfaces were floating holographic projections capable of direct brainwave interaction based on the user's thoughts.

"Let me introduce you to your new toy," Lei Wen said with a smile, like a generous elder gifting a sports car to a child.

"First, the firepower." Lei Wen pointed to two inconspicuous emitters at the bow in the holographic projection. "Two Phase Disintegration Beam generators. They aren't lasers or particle cannons; they emit a high-frequency phase wave that can bypass enemy energy shields and physical armor, disintegrating the target's structure at the quantum level."

"Simply put, this is true damage. In this universe, no one can withstand a single shot from you, except for civilizations that also possess phase technology."

Ilya's eyes lit up like two small light bulbs as she nodded frantically.

"In terms of defense," Lei Wen continued, "the outermost layer is the Dark Matter Deflection Shield, which uses the gravitational properties of dark matter to deflect all attacks. The inner layer is Aetheric Dragonscale Armor, a super-strong material combining biological and metallic elements capable of self-repair. At the very center, there's a layer of Nanite Regeneration Armor (courtesy of Grey Wind)."

"With these three layers of defense stacked together, unless you fly headlong into the core of a black hole... No, even if you charged into a black hole, you'd come out unscathed."

Ilya reached out to touch the cool surface of the command console as if she were stroking a lover's skin.

"What about the power system?" she asked impatiently; this was what she cared about most.

"Here." Lei Wen brought up an image of the power core: a sphere enveloped in a pitch-black force field.

"A Dark Matter Reactor and Dark Matter Thrusters."

"Dark matter?" Ilya exclaimed. "You... no, the Faleim People can already use dark matter as an energy source? Let me see the schematics! I want to take it apart and see!"

"Stop!" Lei Wen quickly closed the projection and stood in front of Ilya with a serious expression.

"Ilya, this is my only condition."

Lei Wen pointed at the black sphere and said, "The power core and Jump Drive have been 'black-boxed.' You cannot dismantle them, scan their internal structure, or read the underlying principle data."

"Why?" Ilya bristled like a cat whose tail had been stepped on. "I'm a scientist! Giving me a machine whose principles I don't understand is pure torture!"

"It's precisely because you are a scientist, and the kind of mad scientist who would go without food or sleep to solve a puzzle." Lei Wen sighed helplessly. "The Faleim technology tree is tens of thousands of years ahead of humanity's. Dark matter technology involves high-dimensional physics and the conversion of void energy, which is beyond your current understanding."

"If I didn't seal it off, you would definitely spend the rest of your life in this engine room, staring at a pile of things you can't possibly understand until you die of old age."

"I'm giving you this ship to explore the universe, to see its wonders, and to find unknown truths—not to turn you into a ship mechanic."

Ilya opened her mouth to argue but ultimately deflated.

She knew Lei Wen was right. If she had the chance to figure out a dark matter engine, she would absolutely cast 'exploration' to the back of her mind.

"Fine... you have a point," she muttered poutily.

"In addition to those, this ship is equipped with a full suite of Faleim tachyon sensors," Lei Wen continued. "The tachyons they call Amroka Particles are millions of times faster than the speed of light, orders of magnitude stronger than our entry-level Tachyon Radar. Your vision will be broader than that of a god."

"Furthermore, to handle various extreme situations you might encounter during exploration, the ship is loaded with various special force field generators to ensure your activities are foolproof."

"Most importantly," Lei Wen snapped his fingers.

"Main control, come out and say hello."

"Hello, Captain."

A soft, neutral electronic voice echoed through the bridge, and a blue orb of light materialized before Ilya.

"I am the Wanderer's central tactical and scientific research auxiliary AI. You may call me the Navigator."

"I have integrated all of the Faleim Civilization's Star Map data and open-access basic science databases. Additionally, the ship has a small onboard intelligent robot production line, which can manufacture engineering, exploration, or even combat robots at your request."

"I can take full control of all ship operations, including jump calculations, weapon fire control, and logistical maintenance. You only need to give commands, or even just a thought."

"Of course," the light orb flickered, seemingly adapting to Ilya's brainwaves, "if you wish to experience the joy of piloting, we have also prepared a manual control system that fully conforms to Earth's human operational logic."

Looking at all of this, Ilya's eyes actually reddened slightly.

"This is too perfect."

"Thank you..." she said with her head down, her voice as quiet as a mosquito's buzz.

"What did you say?" Lei Wen pretended not to hear on purpose.

"I said thank you! You rich guy!" Ilya looked up and glared at him fiercely, but the smile at the corners of her mouth couldn't be hidden.

She couldn't wait to jump into the command seat. The specially designed chair automatically adjusted its size, perfectly cradling her petite frame. Her fingers danced across the holographic interface; watching the data at its peak performance made her feel intoxicated with a sense of control.

"Alright, now that you've received the ship, it's time for me to go," Lei Wen said. "When do you plan to set out?"

"Now! Right now! Immediately!" Ilya shouted without looking back. "I've already set the first coordinates—the star system 81 light-years from Earth that you told me about! I'm going to see that so-called medieval civilization!"

"So soon?" Lei Wen was taken aback, then remembered something and asked hesitantly, "Um... Ilya, do you really not plan to say goodbye to your parents?"

"Dr. Heinrich and Ms. Irisviel—they are your biological parents, after all."

At the mention of her parents, Ilya's excited movements suddenly froze for a second.

She turned around, the smile vanishing from her face, replaced by a coldness and detachment unbefitting her age.

"Goodbye? What's there to say goodbye to?" she said coldly. "From the moment I refused to report to medical school at twelve and chose physics instead, we've been estranged."

"In their eyes, I'm a rebellious daughter with perfect genes who degraded herself by studying ethereal stars. In my eyes, they are a bunch of pathetic wretches who only know how to stare into microscopes, trying to play God through gene editing."

"We've long had nothing to say to each other."

She waved her hand as if shooing away a fly.

"They don't care where I'm going. They're probably busy cloning chimpanzees in some lab right now! I'm too lazy to listen to their lectures on family honor and the future of human genetics."

"Lei Wen, just go. Don't let such boring, mundane emotions delay my voyage."

Lei Wen looked at her stubborn gaze and sighed inwardly.

Is this the loneliness of a genius?

"Alright then. I wish you a smooth journey."

Lei Wen didn't press further; he knew some knots couldn't be untied by a few words from an outsider. He turned toward the airlock, but before leaving, he glanced back one last time at the silver-haired figure completely immersed in the Star Map.

He left the Wanderer and returned to the space station's berth.

But he didn't leave immediately.

He stood before a massive observation window, watching the silver-white warship slowly start its engines and release its docking locks.

In another hidden waiting room not far from him, two pairs of eyes were also staring through one-way glass at the ship about to depart.

It was a young couple who looked to be only in their thirties, but the weariness in their eyes betrayed their true age.

The man was tall and handsome, and the woman was elegant; they were Ilya's parents—Dr. Heinrich von Klein and Ms. Irisviel.

They hadn't been called by Lei Wen; they had learned of their daughter's impending departure through their own channels and had come specifically for this.

"She's leaving." Irisviel's hand tightly gripped her husband's sleeve, her knuckles white and her eyes red.

"Yes, she's leaving." Heinrich's voice was low and raspy. As he looked at the incredibly advanced alien warship, his eyes held no anger or disappointment, only a complex pride.

"Our daughter, she's achieved what we could not."

Heinrich gave a bitter laugh.

"We spent our lives trying to crack the code of life, trying to make humanity live a little longer in this tiny Cradle."

"And she... she built a ship to lead humanity out of this Cradle."

"Maybe she's right, Alice." Heinrich gently put his arm around his wife's shoulder. "Compared to the vast starry sky, our microscopes are indeed too narrow."

"She doesn't need our goodbye, because we cannot go where she is going."

Irisviel covered her mouth, sobbing silently.

She watched as the warship's thrusters emitted a ghostly blue light, seeing it slowly adjust its orientation toward the deep darkness.

"Ilya..." she silently called out her daughter's name in her heart. "Fly. Fly far away, and don't look back."

"You are free."

As if hearing her mother's heart, the Wanderer paused for a second in the void.

Inside the bridge, Ilya suddenly felt an inexplicable pang in her heart. She instinctively looked back toward the space station's massive observation window.

Across the vast distance and through the reflective glass, she could see nothing.

But she felt as if two gazes were piercing through the vacuum, resting upon her back.

Warm, accepting, and filled with sorrow.

"Tch... just an illusion."

Ilya bit her lip, forcibly suppressing that trace of strange emotion.

She turned her head, no longer lingering.

"Navigator! Start the Dark Matter Reactor!"

"Start the Jump Drive! Enter Warp Drive mode!"

"Target: F-81 Star System."

"Let's go!"

Hum—

The space around the Wanderer instantly distorted, and the silver-white hull turned into an uncatchable phantom.

Under the gaze of Lei Wen and her parents, the ship carrying all of a girl's dreams vanished into thin air at the edge of the Solar System.

She was gone.

Heading toward a distant place that would take even light decades to reach.

Lei Wen withdrew his gaze, glanced at the couple still standing by the window, and silently turned to leave.

Everyone has their own journey.

For Ilya, it was the sea of stars.

And for him, he had to continue steering the course for Human Civilization in this complex mortal world.