Dimensional Hotel
Chapter 334: Angel Gloom

Chapter 334: Chapter 334: Angel Gloom

Although it was a bit regrettable that we couldn’t immediately obtain the secret jump coordinates of the Venerate Saints Monastery, for Yu Sheng, the information he gained was still far beyond expectations — especially the part about the "Angel Catalyst," which exceeded everyone’s predictions.

The research motivations of the Venerate Saints Monastery in this area may be filled with their mad "world defect theory," but the "academic" part of this research itself is undoubtedly valuable. No matter what, the purity of knowledge and theory is unaffected by their extreme thoughts.

Therefore, the focus of the discussion between Yu Sheng and Baili Qing quickly fell on those "Angel Catalysts."

"What is the current state of those ’Ankaela Crystals’?" Yu Sheng asked.

"They’re still in the Containment Zone, and the Special Service Bureau has continued its research on the Ankaela Crystals, but there’s been no progress," Baili Qing nodded, "including the research on the ’secondary crystals’ as well."

"I want to go and take a look," Yu Sheng stroked his chin, "The matters mentioned by that cultist are still quite intriguing."

Baili Qing agreed readily, "Of course — actually, I just informed the Containment Zone to prepare, we can go anytime."

Yu Sheng nodded, called over Hu Li and Luna, then went over to pick up the little puppet still seriously playing with cat’s cradle, "Stop playing, let’s go check the ’Anti-Erin Crystal’ together."

The little puppet immediately started twisting around in his hand, "Hey, are you never getting over this joke?!"

Ignoring the little creature’s protest, Yu Sheng led her and opened the door to the inside of the Containment Zone. However, just as they were about to walk in, he felt a somewhat unusual gaze from beside him. Turning his head, he found Baili Qing looking at him steadily.

"What’s wrong?"

Baili Qing’s expression was on the verge of cracking, "...Could you at least show some respect for the security system of our highest-level containment facility?"

Yu Sheng was taken aback by the words, feeling a bit embarrassed, "Should I close the door and then slowly open it again to show that it’s difficult to open?"

Baili Qing lightly sighed on the spot, nearly raising her blood pressure, then refrained from mentioning "respect" and instead kept a straight face while stepping through the door.

Yu Sheng and his group arrived inside the containment facility with extremely high security, encapsulated by massive gray-white cement structures.

Having received advance notification, the place was already prepared. A piece of the "Ankaela Crystal" and several samples of secondary crystals were moved from secure containers to the laboratory before Yu Sheng’s arrival.

The crystals shimmered with a hazy glow under the lights, appearing still quiet and harmless, showing no sign of the so-called "puncture" force that the cultist trembled about in the interrogation room.

"Angel Catalyst..." Yu Sheng frowned, looking at the crystalline substance on the platform, "It’s surprising that we previously thought this thing’s only purpose was to be anti-Erin... It’s unexpected that a group of cultists has delved so far into research on Angel Remains."

"It’s quite normal, after all, they’ve been secretly researching for over a decade, and the only advantage we have over them is that we actually have a batch of high-activity ’catalysts,’ " Baili Qing said calmly, "For subsequent interrogations of other cultists, we need to prioritize information on Angel Catalysts and figure out how they ’utilized’ these catalysts."

"I suspect their ability to sneak into Mist City is related to this technology — the low-activity catalysts obtained from the ’Shadowless Skeleton’ must have some utility, and its ’puncture’ effect on the Exotic Realm sounds suitable for infiltration. That cultist surely concealed a lot of key information," Yu Sheng mused, then glanced at the laboratory leader standing nearby, "You still haven’t found a way to make these crystals react, have you?"

The laboratory leader’s expression was somewhat reluctant, "It’s quite embarrassing. We’ve tried various methods, but the stability of these crystals is beyond imagination."

"Stability...?" Yu Sheng muttered, involuntarily recalling the cultist’s mention of the strange and horrifying incident that occurred while launching a transition ship meant to transport the "Ankaela Crystal."

Baili Qing evidently had a similar thought to Yu Sheng.

"That small boat," she mused, "transmitted audio resembling a crew loss just three minutes before transition, yet everything was normal onboard at that time, and it ignored the mother ship’s stop command and initiated the transition on its own... This strange situation is clearly more than an ordinary ’navigation accident,’ and considering the mission they were executing at that time, it is almost certainly related to the Ankaela Crystal aboard."

Yu Sheng also pondered, then suddenly turned and looked at Luna, who had quietly been following him, "You were on their mother ship at the time, do you know anything?"

Luna was silent for a few seconds before slowly shaking her head, "At that time, in the Holy Coffin, I didn’t know."

"...Of course, they were worried you’d ’wake up,’ so they usually kept you in the Holy Coffin, definitely not letting you come into contact with these things."

Luna nodded, but after just two or three seconds, she suddenly broke the silence: "But, hearing the ’screech’, during prayer, inside the Holy Coffin."

Baili Qing blinked and, after pondering for a moment, looked at Yu Sheng: "What does she mean by that?"

Yu Sheng didn’t quite understand either...

However, he was somewhat accustomed to Luna’s limited ability to express herself. After patiently communicating with her several times, he managed to barely grasp what she meant to convey.

"Are you saying that, although you were on standby inside the Holy Coffin at the time, you heard strange noises coming from the ’system’ connected to the Holy Coffin? Do you think those noises might have been signals sent back when the small boat encountered trouble, and these signals were ’leaked’ to you after being received by the mothership?"

Luna nodded slowly, stumbling over her words: "Holy Coffin, records."

"The Holy Coffin has a recording function?!" Yu Sheng was taken aback, and his heart instantly raced.

Before he could speak, Baili Qing nodded and said, "I’ll notify the expert team currently on that ship to try to extract the system logs from the Holy Coffin."

Yu Sheng acknowledged with a hum, then after pondering for a moment, he couldn’t help but express his confusion: "What exactly happened to that ship at the time? I can understand if you say they carried dangerous goods and exploded during the jump, or even if you say they somehow ended up as heroes in a dimension with a 2D art style, but receiving audio signals of the incident three minutes before the phase engine activated..."

He rubbed his chin, pondering for a few seconds before uncertainly voicing his speculation: "Could it be that the ship not only jumped into an anomalous space but also punctured the flow of time? The crew was torn apart by the Ankaela Crystal, and their ’voices’ were thrown into the time stream, reaching the point three minutes before departure?"

He was just speculating offhand after some deep thinking, but to his surprise, Baili Qing immediately showed a slightly serious expression and quickly discussed with the lab director nearby on the issue of whether the phase engine could facilitate time travel when interfered with by angelic power.

"I was just speaking off the cuff," Yu Sheng hurried to explain when he saw this, "I’m just drawing on my experience of writing too many novels and letting my imagination run wild this time..."

In response, Baili Qing turned and looked at him seriously: "...You usually write non-fiction?"

Yu Sheng: "...?"

"Small-scale time jump anomalies are an extremely rare but documented phenomenon across the universe," Baili Qing explained, "but as I said, they are exceedingly rare, and more importantly, they contradict the working principles of the phase engine— theoretically, if a time jump occurs, the coordinate parameters the phase engine receives would certainly become invalid, making transition impossible, and vice versa. If the ship can transition, it means the ’time’ component of the coordinates received by the phase engine must be correct..."

She paused here, waiting for Yu Sheng to digest this part of the information before continuing: "So, I’ve ruled out the possibility of them experiencing a time jump from the start, but if the ’Angel Catalyst’ truly possesses such power, enabling the phase engine to defy the objective laws of our universe..."

"Defy the objective laws of the universe?" Yu Sheng was bewildered, "Is that even possible?"

"The Dark Angel is essentially a ’guest’ from beyond the universe," Baili Qing stated with utter seriousness.

Yu Sheng scratched his head, feeling that the current topic seemed to exceed his educational level—this needed Little Red Riding Hood.

Even though Little Red Riding Hood might not understand these things either, she’s in her last year of high school, and her brain is more resilient.

Yu Sheng shook his head, temporarily setting aside these somewhat far-fetched imaginings, and at that moment, another thought suddenly crossed his mind.

"Wait, one more thing. Xuan Che mentioned to me earlier that the Taixu Spirit Hub once caught a group of monastery cultists at the border area of Feiyu-13b. They were secretly building a base there, and on the scene, they also found an ’Order Pillar’ ship under construction!"

Baili Qing’s eyes instantly turned serious.

"Given the current information, the ’Order Pillar’ should be a high-level ship with special missions and symbolic significance within the entire monastery. It should be a high-precision model used for major operations. They hid one in the Boundary Land to research something of the ’Angel Catalyst’ level, so what about Feiyu-13b..."

Yu Sheng spoke while looking up into Baili Qing’s eyes.

"...Could there be another unawakened Dark Angel hidden there too?!"