Great! I'm surrounded by villains!
Chapter 293 - 212: Flower Buds

Chapter 293: Chapter 212: Flower Buds

The interstellar cowboy’s wondrous adventure continued.

Half an hour ago, he and "First Mate" Duan Mingyuan had joined forces on a Dead Star to repel an Angel Envoy sent by the gods, an envoy impervious to blades and immune to fire and water, but in the end, the clever interstellar cowboys still found its weakness and defeated it with an attack "beyond common sense."

As of now, Earth Wolf Twelve was quite satisfied with this adventure and believed that if their encounters on the planet Forest Sea were aired in the style of nostalgic animation, they would surely be well received.

After all, firearms, cigars, and formidable enemies—this is the romance of every interstellar man.

Mingyuan directed his gaze at the ever-receding roots.

The attacks had ceased along their way, the roots swiftly withdrawing wherever they went until they came beneath a towering giant tree and no Angel Envoys bothered them anymore.

A gap appeared in the tree, opening up a further path for them.

After blasting an irremediable hole in the trunk of Divine Wood, Mingyuan finally had the chance to make it clear they meant no harm.

Only now, that statement seemed somewhat unconvincing.

"We originally had no ill intentions."

Mingyuan corrected himself out of precision, as he also temporarily couldn’t determine the Divine Wood’s stance. If it turned out that this path to the core of Divine Wood was a trap and an attack was launched against them again, then he might still show malice.

However, after dealing with the Conscious Space of Mechanical Star, he found the behavior logic of the "Cocoon" quite easy to understand—seemingly void of human cunning, once bested, it would hide away like an injured beast to lick its wounds.

Mingyuan observed that the parts erased by the dimensional collapse were sprouting many new buds, seemingly trying to repair the damaged parts of Divine Wood.

Although the parts engulfed by the dimensional collapse couldn’t be restored, fortunately, Divine Wood was massive and that one hole wasn’t fatal.

Following the spiral staircase upwards, it led them up into the clouds.

At the end of the road was a simple wooden hut, empty and bare except for a budding flower at the center—the gathered bud gently trembling, the fear from the Angel Envoys extending all the way here, filling the entire space with disquiet.

"Is this the true face of the deity?"

Earth Wolf Twelve gripped the handle of his revolver, the quivering bud appearing much more fragile than the man-eating plant they had encountered earlier. If necessary, he was ready at any moment to draw his gun in a "best in show" finishing move to shoot through the deity before him.

But before clarifying the situation, he wasn’t the type to draw his gun at the first sign of trouble against those who had lost the will to resist.

"Cocoon" seemed to have given up resistance.

He leaned closer to the bud, almost pressing his face against it, carefully examining it.

He smelled the fragrance of the flower, a strange aroma he had never encountered before.

Earth Wolf Twelve still found it hard to believe what he was seeing; he had been to more than twenty Dead Stars but had never seen a "Cocoon" with his own eyes.

Not just him, even the researchers at Universe Company didn’t understand the true nature of "Cocoon." Some thought they were a kind of virus, while others considered them the leaders of monsters or elemental creatures, or even an extreme natural disaster. Even scholars were divided on the essential nature of "Cocoon."

But now, Earth Wolf Twelve could say those experts were full of it.

At least in his view, "Cocoon" was just an especially large bud.

"What do we do now? Should we take this bud back to nurture?"

"Once it leaves the planet, ’Cocoon’s’ Strength will quickly wither."

Mingyuan cited the theory mentioned by He Ya, feeling an Energy from the bud even more vigorous than that of Mechanical Star’s "Consciousness."

"You better watch what you say, it hasn’t completely lost its Strength yet."

He warned Earth Wolf Twelve, clearly, the interstellar cowboy’s remarks had displeased Divine Wood—if it weren’t for his watchful eye, the bud might have grown a mouth to swallow Earth Wolf Twelve’s head. "If we were to measure using Boss’s health bar, It should have three-quarters of its life remaining."

"Wait a second, is this phase two!?"

Earth Wolf Twelve was startled and scrambled back several steps.

If the "Cocoon" on this planet hadn’t been defeated, his previous actions looked like deliberate sabotage.

Not only would this cost him his life, but he would also face relentless reporting from his teammates afterward.

"It has initiated negotiations with us."

The bud was the core of Divine Wood, and destroying it would deal an irreversible fatal blow to Divine Wood.

Even so, Mingyuan didn’t know whether "Cocoon" could actually be killed—no one had ever killed a "Cocoon" before, and no one knew what would happen to the planet it presided over upon its death.

According to the limited information, "Cocoon’s" existence was closely related to the planet itself. Mingyuan suspected that if "Cocoon" died, the entire planet would quickly wither away.

Leading the two men to the core not only indicated it no longer wished to resist but also showed its willingness to share all the information it knew with them.

"Cocoon" too had memories; it had witnessed everything that had happened on the planet since its birth.

Mingyuan stepped forward, placing his hand upon the bud.

The next moment, myriad images flooded his mind, placing him in a God’s-eye view, overlooking the changes on the planet.

And so, Mingyuan made an important discovery.

The discovery made him furrow his brows, forcing him to reevaluate this planet that had already been destroyed once.

He found no trace in the bud’s "memory" of anything related to the Chamber of Commerce or the Silver Lotus Family; it was unaware of the Chamber’s existence, focusing solely on the planet itself.

When the inhabitants of the planet began yearning to seek the truth of the world and what lay beyond it, their spark of curiosity was snuffed out.

Among the many "Cocoons" Mingyuan knew, this one could be considered the most reclusive; it disliked humans from outside and was uninterested in interacting with other members of its kind, spending most of its time in slumber and relishing the moments when the whole planet quieted down.

Yet on the other hand, it had become a ring on the finger of the butler of Morgan VII and helped the family eliminate those legendary assassins.

Mingyuan had assumed the old butler was an incarnation of "Cocoon," and the family had struck some kind of deal with one of them. However, the information he extracted from "Cocoon’s" memory overturned all speculations.

A new question arose.

If this wasn’t a false Conscious Space constructed by "Cocoon," then what was this place?