Falling into the Abyss

Roland stood silently in front of the floor-to-ceiling glass in a leisure hall onboard Starwind, looking at the seemingly motionless starry sky through the thick nano materials. There was a scarlet liquid swirling in the glass in his hand, and sometimes it flowed into his mouth and dyed his lips red.

The sky looked so quiet. Who could imagine that there were foul winds and bloody rain among the stars?

At present, a terrifying plague had broken out in the Earth Alliance. In the initial stages, the infected would grow black blisters all over their body, and they would become very bloodthirsty. They wanted to eat raw meat and would take the initiative to attack any living creatures, even killing each other. In the later stage, their skin began to melt and deform, and tentacle-like organs would grow on their bodies. From a distance, their entire person looked like a giant caterpillar crawling on the ground. In the end, most of them died because they exploded into pulp. Only a few of them survived, but they could no longer be regarded as human beings. And those who were splashed with their body fluids would also be infected.

Patient zero was the blond security guard who was one of the few survivors of the massacre during the underground gathering in the Forbidden City. Before he grew ill, he said that he was caught by the “tentacle” of the “monster” Ethan, and another “tentacle” poured something down his throat. He went crazy without warning, attacking several guards and nonhumans, and those who were attacked by him were infected immediately. The plague first broke out in the Forbidden City. The Council dispatched troops to quarantine the Forbidden City, but it was too late. Some infected guards hid their injuries and escaped the Forbidden City, bringing the infectious disease to other space stations.

Isolation blockades had been set up, and the Earth Union was now in its most vulnerable state. The Ophiuchus Alliance, which had claimed to be a humanitarian state, took the opportunity along with other planetary states to send a rescue team to the Earth Union. This was one of the few opportunities to investigate the internal situation of this closed-up country in a roundabout way.

Before the outbreak of the plague, the Earth Union wanted to secretly execute Chen Zeng and tried to bring him out. It was just that he was snatched away in transit by a group of prepared believers. Behind all this was the Ophiuchus Alliance controlling the situation. Their informants reported confidential information such as the time and route of Chen Zeng’s transfer. They were responsible for spreading the news to his followers in the Earth Union, as well as providing them with weapons and equipment in the name of foreign companies. The outbreak of the great plague in the Earth Alliance further confirmed the biblical “four horsemen” that heralded the end of the world—plague, war, famine, and death.

Now the plague had begun, and the war was about to begin. In addition, the appearance of Ethan’s mutation had been spread by many survivors of the underground massacre, and people increasingly believed that the Great Evil God was descending. With the surge of believers, the government of the Earth Union became increasingly nervous. The Earth Union’s government explicitly forbade people from collecting any brochures or books about the Lord Grace’s Association in their homes. They were not allowed to talk about Chen Zeng, the Lord Grace’s Association, the Great Evil God, or even any words and phrases about Christianity. All those who were spotted doing so would have their moral value points deducted. The court of ethics had even encouraged neighbors, friends, and relatives to report each other. Each person who reported someone could get a moral value reward of about five points.

However, the more repressed some things were, the faster they grew. In particular, religion was an irrational and inflammatory ideology. People were faced with the terrifying plague, the fear of their dearest people growing desperate to eat themselves, the fear of seeing their children turning into black insects, the fear of being locked up in an isolation zone and waiting to die, and despair engulfed them. They could not obtain salvation and were full of resentment, so they had to seize their last comfort, hoping that their sincerity could move some higher power in the dark.

If there was no such hope, people would go crazy.

According to their informant, several of the Earth Union’s space stations had been completely isolated, and people from other space stations were worried. The Earth Union was silent about the real situation of the epidemic. They simply said in the news over and over again, “The epidemic is under the control of the center for epidemic control. Please do not panic, and actively cooperate with the management.” They spoke empty words that no one would believe. Everyone who had a way out fled to other planetary states, while those who had no way out gathered in the middle of the night to pray to God and Chen Zeng’s photos. Some people even prayed to the image of a man with tentacles painted by an underground artist for forgiveness and immunity from the Great Evil God. This image seemed to be representative of the Great Evil God, whose original form was Ethan Eldridge.

Roland understood the importance of Ethan, and he also learned a lot about the Eves’ plan from Samuel. He did not believe in the Eve’s religion, nor did he believe in such nonsense as Disorder and Order. However, he knew that other universes did exist, especially the parallel universe that had caused a lot of trouble. The great plague also existed. If the information was reliable, then it also originated from Ethan.

Roland sighed. When he saw Ethan for the first time, he was dressed in a clean and tidy gray suit, his hair was combed, and he was wearing a pair of silver-rimmed glasses. He was smiling gently and appeared a little introverted. He never thought that this man would become a monster with tentacles on his body.

All the cameras inside the medical room were damaged. The last scene the crew saw was Ethan wrapping himself up with those tentacles. It was like a pupa.

Panic spread across the ship, as people believed that the “Great Evil God” was on their ship. Roland didn’t expect that the faith of the Lord Grace’s Association planned by the secret service had already spread throughout the Ophiuchus Alliance, and he didn’t know whether he should cry or laugh. However, he didn’t know if Ethan was carrying the plague virus. The situation was now beyond his control, so he ordered Starwind to return to the Ophiuchus Alliance immediately.

Initially, he did not believe in the so-called Great Evil God, but now, even he had also begun to waver.

If there was a super civilization far surpassing any civilization in the galaxy, he was afraid every planetary state would face a catastrophe. They must put aside their historical conflicts and ideological antagonism and guard against the possible invasion of the parallel universe.

And Ethan…should they get rid of him?

Roland’s heart had long since been as cold as a rock after experiencing all kinds of terrifying secret service training. Pushing this man into the pit of fire again and again made him feel guilty, but after all, he was only a weapon. In the end, it was up to the higher-ups to decide what to do with Ethan.

“Reporting to you, sir, our ship will dock in the port in an hour. The headquarters has asked us to go through the quarantine procedure, and it may take several days,” a beautiful female Omega officer reported to him.

Roland nodded and gave her a charming smile. “I got it.”

However, she did not leave immediately. She seemed to be hesitating, as if she was wondering whether she should ask something. Roland motioned with his eyes for her to ask.

“Sir……that thing in the medical room……everyone is scared of it…… Shall we use Robot 3 to disinfect it?”

Roland shook his head and replied, “No, that person is very important. Keep the medical room sealed. Someone will deal with it when the spaceship arrives at the port.”

At this time, Samuel, who had been hiding quietly around the corner, heard their conversation. He frowned and turned away.

He didn’t know about the past entanglement between Roland and Ethan. He just thought that the people from the Ophiuchus Alliance liked to act friendly. In fact, they were no different from the people from the Earth Union.

Ethan’s medical room was guarded by two Ophiuchus Alliance soldiers outside. Samuel approached quietly and knocked one of them down with a punch. The other wanted to raise his gun to shoot, but before he could even aim, Samuel grabbed the gun and knocked him out with the butt of the gun. Samuel took out a ten-thousand function sphere, which was the one that Tanisiel had given him before.

He soon got in touch with a man.

Derek, who was imprisoned in the Forbidden City, but had actually been quietly assisting the Earth Union government, appeared in mid-air and looked at him coldly. “Where are you now?”

“We’re still on the Ophiuchus Alliance’s ship. We’re about to enter the port.”

Originally, it was impossible to utilize real-time communication given the distance between them. Fortunately, Starwind was an advanced spacecraft and was equipped with a warp drive information transmitter. He just had to connect to the transmitter’s network remotely, similar to what he had done when he was on the Eves’ planet.

Yes, on the Eves’ planet, he had already made contact with the Earth Union through the ten-thousand function sphere. And the reason why he was able to break into the basement of Tanisiel’s house was due to Derek’s help.

It was going well this time, too. The only risk was that he may be discovered by the Ophiuchus Alliance, so he had to make this call quick.

“Derek, I need the code for this door. It’s the medical room, the one on the second floor of Starwind.”

“Give me five minutes.”

The call was interrupted, and Samuel waited for a moment. Sure enough, he heard the door click, and the fingerprint identification lock had been opened. He pushed hard at the door, only to find that it wouldn’t budge at all.

What was going on? Wasn’t the lock of the door hacked?

The alarm sounded out suddenly, the mainframe indicating that someone was trying to break into the isolation area. Samuel knew that his plan was discovered, but he didn’t want to give up. He pushed the door with all his strength, but it didn’t budge, as though it was sealed. There were soldiers coming from both sides of the corridor. Samuel turned around and sent a couple of punches at them. With two or three swipes, he knocked down one of them before turning around and kicking the other. Roland rushed over, and as soon as they met each other, they knew they had met their match. Samuel’s punches were fierce and brimmed with evilness, while Roland was cautious and steady. As soon as they began to fight each other, no one dared to get close at will or shoot rashly. Otherwise, their superior may be injured by mistake.

“Samuel! We can sit down and talk about it!” Roland shouted as he defended himself.

Samuel sneered, “What do you guys want to do with Ethan?”

“It’s just that the government wants to check him. It’s routine!”

“Check? Are you going to dissect him with a knife and check him slowly? You hypocrites!”

Just as the two men were grabbing at each other’s wrists, the door to the medical room suddenly opened.

All of them stood still, and the soldiers were frightened.

A slender hand first emerged out of the crack to push the door open wider. Then, Ethan slowly came out of the darkness. He was dressed in one of the medical room’s simple robes, showing a large patch of his rosy skin. The rose-colored emblem was still visible on his chest. His originally thin body seemed to have been reborn, and he returned to the symmetrical and compact body he had before entering the Forbidden City. His full muscles lay dormant under the white skin, and he was no longer a sickly gray. His appearance remained unchanged, but his dark brown hair was neatly combed and glossy, his lips were ruddier, his green pupils were as somber as emeralds, and his slender pupils were filled with a trace of monstrosity.

He was still Ethan, but he felt different. He became unexpectedly good-looking, and his whole person seemed to glow under a new ray of light. Roland and Samuel were also a little stunned.

Ethan should be in his best-looking state. After the pupa period, Heavenbounders would have a short period of time when they were at their most beautiful, which was probably now.

However, he didn’t laugh, didn’t cry, and didn’t have any expression. He just calmly looked at the chaotic scene. Ethan felt that his body felt fresh and full of vitality. He had never felt so full of strength and potential. However, his heart was still dead.

“Samuel, stop fighting,” he said in a flat voice, “If they want to check, then let them check.”