How can a retired savior be considered retired if his price drops to 40,000?

Chapter 339 No time to explain!

"...To be honest, this is not without cost. Even if the Emperor's Dream does nothing but hangs in orbit and maintains the minimum energy-saving operation, its energy consumption is comparable to that of a densely populated hive city."

Of course, Stormbound or Fujimaru Ritsuka himself could not afford to supply this ship, which was larger than most of the Glorious Queen-class ships when fully deployed. But the wealthy emperor was willing to pay for it. Even though Fujimaru Ritsuka still felt her heart bleeding when she saw the energy consumption form, it was not her blood after all, so she really shouldn't continue to say anything.

In the magnificent corridor, she finally remembered to stop talking in time and did not express the central idea of ​​"what a waste" that followed. She really felt that leaving such a ship in the port would not only waste several of the best berths at once due to its size, but also be meaningless because of doing nothing: if the Emperor's Dream turned back into Somni - even if he could directly join the operation of Storm's Edge and join Trismegistus to provide additional computing power; such a life would obviously be better than doing nothing alone in orbit, and constantly fighting wits and courage with the nearby mechanical arks and technical priests who tried every means to get close to him.

Of course, the existence of the Emperor's Dream itself caused far more problems than these, but for a ship as huge as a space city, what made him aware and annoyed were mainly those little people in red robes.

Somni was unable to return to Storm's Edge, mainly because the Custodians were "obstructing him in every way", and secondly because Somni himself felt that they were right. Vasilian believed that the Emperor's Dream was a perfect symbol that could be hung over everyone's head, with its infinitely glorious and sacred appearance and huge size to shock and remind everyone how terrifying the Emperor's power was. Moreover, for Chaldea, who was temporarily residing here, before their own facilities were truly established on the ground, the Emperor's former flagship could also be used as a ceremonial venue, so that they would not need to borrow any venue from the Blood Angels Chapter - although up to now, they have been borrowing, because Chaldea has not yet encountered a guest of sufficient weight that the Custodians think is worth using the Emperor's Dream.

But it is true that there are occasionally guests on the Emperor's Dream who are invited aboard because of Fujimaru Ritsuka's personal decision, such as Inquisitor Maran and Captain Brother Stern this time.

For these two, the Wilchak case itself was no longer important at this point. What was more important was what exactly Chaldea was. After Inquisitor Maran was defeated by Cleopatra, Stern realized that the Grey Knights should take the lead in this issue: he raised several questions to Hastings from the perspective of a psychic, including descent, summoning spells, and the protection of the Emperor, etc.; then, when Hastings sorted out these questions and sent them to Fujimaru Ritsuka's desk, he also made a suggestion that "it is best to solve these problems in one go"; then, he suddenly regretted saying so much - he should have thought that the way Fujimaru Ritsuka's brain works is not consistent with the logic of normal imperial people.

In short, Fujimaru Ritsuka confidently brought people to the Emperor's Dream: this psychic creation giant structure that was re-established in the real universe through conceptual summoning is of course an example that can perfectly answer all of Stern's questions. Hastings symbolically struggled without much hope, but it was useless. The only part of his amendment proposal that was approved was that Fujimaru Ritsuka chose to wear the Ortnaus Spiritual Exoskeleton during this meeting, and this was not for security or deterrence considerations, but simply because during this trip, she planned to use a secondary reactor on the Emperor's Dream as an explanation case for the concept of "spiritual core", and if she wanted to safely approach any reactor, she had to rely on the radiation protection function of the Spiritual Exoskeleton.

But now it seems that, apart from the fact that the Imperial Guards on one side tried to repeatedly emphasize "this is your honor", there is still a very low possibility that it will trigger the guests' rebellious psychology, and nothing should go wrong. During this journey, the real security and deterrence mission is a five-man Imperial Guard team including Vasily. If they need to face the fierce battlefield of gunfire and rain of bullets, then this lineup may be a bit stretched; but now they only need to face an elderly Lord Inquisitor and a Grey Knight Captain Brother, even inside the Emperor's Dream, which is literally alive - if this can cause Fujimaru Ritsuka to have any problems, then the Ten Thousand Men may just commit suicide collectively.

Of course, the other two parties involved in this hypothesis did not have any intention of causing trouble. Rather, if there was someone who was truly loyal to the Empire and the Emperor, and was walking in the magnificent corridors of the Emperor's Dream, surrounded by the highest masterpiece of history itself and human civilization, he would still have some evil thoughts. Hastings would have to look at his firm will before pulling the trigger.

This was indeed the case. Even the arrogant and authoritative Captain Stern, who seemed to have the final say on the Fortitude and Power, tried his best to remain silent in awe after he stepped onto the middle deck of the Emperor's Fantasy through teleportation; and even the Lord Inquisitor Marlan, whose years of experience and knowledge were almost untraceable and who probably had more experience and knowledge than others could imagine, unconsciously acted like a young girl when he walked here, and his excitement was beyond words.

It is not difficult to understand: perhaps in the eyes of outsiders, whether it is Captain Stern or Lord Inquisitor Marlan, the stories they experienced in their long careers serving the Empire are already a legend. But in front of the Emperor's Dream that has been revived from history, among the most glorious creations in the most glorious era of the Empire, their so-called "legends" are still as small as fireflies in the bright moon, and it is natural to feel reverence for them.

They were not the only ones who felt the same way. Perhaps the one who could keep a calm mind the most in the whole team was Fujimaru Ritsuka herself. She was like a happy little tour guide, holding a non-existent flag and leading the whole team all the way deeper. On the way, she talked about the mechanism of concept summoning and how to materialize the ether to form a shell. From the ether materialization, she talked about the key points of avoiding the influence of the curtain. From the key points, she turned back to the question of how the ether shell should be self-sustaining. She also mentioned that the ugly armor decorated in the corridor was the spoils of war seized by the emperor from the technological barbarians during the Unification War. In another scene, perhaps someone in the team would complain that her topic was too scattered and unfocused, but influenced by the current atmosphere, everyone maintained a decent calm in their humility and did not raise any objections.

However, this "decent calmness" also led to the fact that when Fujimaru Ritsuka's unfocused narration suddenly became stuck, it would be very obvious.

Although the design concept of the Ortnaus exoskeleton is far from the technological route of the Empire, the general idea of ​​prompting the user when the communication is connected is similar. Fujimaru Ritsuka had already informed others that she was busy and asked them not to contact her unless it was important. She had to apologize and answered the audio-only radio wave with a little embarrassment in front of everyone. Then, the slight embarrassment on her face quickly turned into solemnity within five seconds:

"Miss." The voice of the communication came from near her left wrist. Even if the sound quality was slightly distorted, people who were familiar with the previous situation could easily tell that it was Sevatar. "I'm in the Cathedral of Baal. Debit apologized to you and said that he messed up. I would say he messed up it badly - (electrical noise) - he also mentioned something like 'the light of Sirius' - (violent electric noise) - it's really glowing - the subspace -"

"Sevitarion?" Fujimaru Ritsuka frowned amid the strong communication interference. "Hello? Can you hear me? Alter dear?"

She didn't waste more than two seconds on this question. After confirming that the communication between the two sides was strongly interfered for unknown reasons, Fujimaru Ritsuka immediately opened the communication device on his left forearm, hung up the communication, and decisively pressed the button to connect directly to the Storm Edge: "Fujimaru Ritsuka calls the control room and requests that Chaldeas be synchronized with the current time and the Sheba lens be refocused. The target point is the main star of Baal - the first temporary settlement - the Baal Cathedral. My communication with this place has encountered serious radio wave interference, and the contract telepathy has also been intercepted, so I request an immediate and detailed observation of the location. Also, broadcast a call to Sigismund, Hill and Asclepius to go to the control room immediately just in case." There is no one in the main control room of the Storm Edge at the moment, but with this remote instruction, the equipment in it is still operating under the premise of no one controlling it. Fujimaru Ritsuka took this opportunity to turn around and apologize to the people around him, but the target audience of this sentence was actually mostly staring at the communication device on her left hand: integrated into the exoskeleton armor which did not have much space itself, it was only a small one, but it even included a very accurate long-distance visualization transmission mechanism - it was not to say that the Empire did not have similar things, but it was difficult for such a mechanism to be small enough to be placed on the thin wrist of a mortal girl while ensuring transmission efficiency and imaging accuracy.

It was currently connected to the specific imaging of the Sheba lens. After a brief blur, the communication device clearly projected an aerial photo of the first temporary settlement in the air. The center of the picture stayed at the location of the Baal Cathedral, and then gradually, with further and more detailed adjustments, the center of the picture seemed to be superimposed with some translucent, disturbing patches.

"What's going on?" A young man's voice came from the other end of the communication, but this voice obviously did not intend to wait for others to explain to him, but immediately got down to work. "In the observation area of ​​the Sheba lens, the foundation value of human nature has dropped precipitously, the earth veins of the main star of Baal have not been significantly affected, the subspace index has risen, and it is speculated that a subspace rift has unfolded there, and the pollution pattern is most likely purple - I hope you still remember that my job is a doctor, not a technician - the curtain has been weakened, and the city is beginning to become alienated with the building in the center of the picture. It is predicted that it will form - correction, the alienation tendency has stopped, but the subspace index is still rising in fluctuations, and the pollution pattern has polarized. It is suspected that a summoning is being generated locally, and its progress is obviously observably hindered. According to Trismegistus's simulation calculations, if the situation stabilizes, we have about three minutes and twenty seconds to respond."

This conversation makes people want to ask "what on earth happened", but even if the situation is unclear, the three-minute and twenty-second time limit is expressed clearly enough. Not only did everyone else on the scene keep quiet, but Fujimaru Ritsuka, who turned around and headed towards the bridge of the Emperor's Dream, did not give anyone a chance to interrupt: "Request the engine room to prepare for takeoff, and the Storm's Edge to enter combat readiness as a whole, load the Holy Sword Soldiers, and conduct a pre-war self-inspection; allow the Midnight Lords to collectively put on armor and load ammunition, and by the way, call Marshall Ketraro alone to share the computing power of Trismegistus with him - tell him that I want him to hijack the intercity radio of the first temporary settlement within three minutes and start broadcasting the Class IV evacuation alarm in rotation; request Sigismund and Hill to be ready for spirit transfer at any time; continue to try to observe the situation inside the church and contact Sevitarion; Somni, what are the monitoring results of the Auger array?"

"The target area has obvious breakpoints due to the influence of psychic energy." The ship's broadcast sounded without warning, "No effective data was obtained. More time is needed for observation and fitting."

"What about the range? What about our position relative to the church?"

"Not ideal. Direct orbital strikes are not recommended, but sending bombers to conduct air strikes is still feasible."

"I warned you not to trust traitors or people who show up out of nowhere." Hastings, who was beginning to behave like an inquisitor, complained quietly, forcing Fujimaru Ritsuka to sigh.

"Please, let's not share the responsibility at this point. Let's wait until--"

"——Something is happening," Asclepius' voice came out again from the communication. "The pollution pattern is still spreading, and the summoning is taking shape faster than expected, but a barrier that can cover the entire church has been established. The good news is that no matter who did it, it can probably hold out for a while, delaying the onset of the disease inside. The bad news is that Sheba is now completely unable to observe the situation inside the church, and to make matters worse, the detection of the spiritual base scale at that moment showed that the thing that came down might be a big guy."

"…Okay, I'm prepared. How big is it exactly?"

"It's hard to say. After all, Sheba only managed to scan it for a split second." Asclepius' voice sank unconsciously. "But based on the data from that split second, I'm afraid it has a size of the Grand Master level."

Ritsuka Fujimaru stood still, took a deep breath, and slowly exhaled.

"I'm going to the transporter. I have to get back to the Storm's Edge right away." She said this, then turned back a little and turned into another corridor. "Have the Holy Sword Soldiers been loaded? Two minutes! We'll take off as soon as I get back!"

"Uh, what about the Blood Angels?" Hill's voice squeezed into the channel at this time, "Should we warn them immediately?"

"They will understand that we should take emergency measures. Hastings, take care of the guests. Vasilian, you guys come here. Be ready and take off as soon as I return!" Fujimaru Ritsuka explained quickly. "If they have any questions, ask them in their own church. Who wouldn't know what happened on Baal? Maybe the Blood Angels' reaction is even faster than ours!"

(End of this chapter)