The Imperial Marshal’s Darling at the Tip of His Heart - Chapter 18

The Imperial starship was like a silent giant beast, cruising through the dark interstellar dust belts and advancing steadily toward the forbidden land known as Wuyin. Inside the hull, the lights were bright and order was absolute, forming a sharp contrast with the eternal darkness outside.

Yun Shu’s medical cell remained pure white, silent, and cold, but the atmosphere had quietly shifted. The ticking of the monitor was as rhythmic as ever, but the cables connected to his body seemed more numerous. In addition to vital sign monitoring, devices for muscle activity stimulation and neural stability maintenance had been added. The cloying sweetness of medicine in the air had grown thicker.

The Imperial medical team was executing Ling Yao’s orders, subjecting him to so-called adaptive treatment and physical enhancement. They were attempting to forcibly maintain this nearly shattered body above the minimum standard required to perform the mission. The process was agonizing. The injection of powerful drugs brought no comfort; instead, it caused the sharp, aching pain of muscle fibers being forced into activity and a sense of collapse following high neural tension.

Yet, he endured it and even cooperated with it. He needed this temporarily enhanced state to accomplish one vital task.

The materials Ling Yao provided regarding Planet Wuyin were vast and disorganized. He spent a great deal of time quickly browsing, memorizing, and analyzing them. The danger level of that planet far exceeded his imagination. The high-concentration radiation mist not only interfered with instruments but could also corrode biological organisms. The terrain was complex and volatile, riddled with bottomless fissures and highly unstable energy vortices, not to mention the terrifying creatures mentioned vaguely in the reports, beings mutated by Turbid Core energy.

However, amidst this desperate data, he also captured some extremely obscure descriptions of energy patterns that faintly resonated with Xilan’s ancient records and the anomalous signals from Calante. The truth seemed to be wrapped within the core of layer upon layer of mist, both tempting and warning him.

But relying solely on the fodder provided by the Empire was far from enough. He had to know more. Before heading into that wasteland, he had to arm himself as much as possible.

The opportunity came after a routine adaptive neural stimulation. That stimulation was designed to enhance his brain’s information processing capabilities and interference resistance in harsh environments. The side effects were a brief period of mental hyper-activity and sensory overload, followed by a period of deep exhaustion once it ended.

Yun Shu skillfully utilized this hyper-active window. When the medical officer finished the operation and left, leaving him temporarily alone in the cell, he closed his eyes as if falling into a deep sleep from exhaustion. But under the stimulation of the drugs, his consciousness became exceptionally clear and active.

He did not attempt to connect directly to the Imperial network, as that would be suicide. Instead, he concentrated his entire spirit like a precision receiving antenna. He focused all his strength on sensing the ubiquitous, subtle fluctuations of data streams within this most advanced Imperial starship.

The low-frequency hum of the engines, the energy rhythm of the shields, and the routine communication verification signals between departments formed the background noise. What he needed to find were the non-standard, encrypted signals with unique flow patterns. His target was the hidden private data node recorded on that chip.

His consciousness was like a fish diving into a deep sea, searching through the vast ocean of data noise for that one specific frequency. His head felt like it would explode. The stinging pain of Crystal-Erosion Disease became clear again under high mental concentration, but he forced himself to ignore it. Minutes and seconds passed. The hyper-active effect of the drugs was fading, and exhaustion began to surge.

Just as he was about to give up, he sensitively captured a thread of data that was extremely weak yet bore a unique encryption identifier, like a strand of spider silk in the dark night. Its flow was directed toward a communication unit within the ship with an extremely high physical isolation level, currently engaged in a targeted, faster-than-light quantum communication with the outside world. Its frequency characteristics matched the node identifier recorded on the chip perfectly.

This was it.

Yun Shu’s heart pounded, and his spirit instantly tensed to the limit. He could not intercept the content, as that would require physical access and higher authorization. However, he could attempt an extremely dangerous move. He could sense the intensity and pattern of the communication to infer the volume and activity of the data exchange, and even try to sense if any faint traces of recently accessed topic keywords remained on its encrypted shell.

This required raising his mental strength to the absolute limit, like using the finest silk thread to touch a high-voltage power grid. A slight mistake could lead to being detected or suffering severe mental trauma, but he did not hesitate. His consciousness condensed into a single thread, cautiously attaching itself to the outer edge of that data stream.

The massive torrent of information slammed into his perception, bringing waves of intense vertigo and nausea.

“High intensity, continuous energy overflow.” “Pattern recognition matches ancient file Etching.” “Tartarus external sensors show anomalous readings; correlation to be verified.” “Authorization requested again, rejected.”

A few fragmented keywords, blurred by the vast distance they had traveled, rushed into his perception like broken dream-talk. They were not complete pieces of information, but rather extremely faint content characteristic ripples left on the outer layer of the encrypted channel as the two parties exchanged data.

Yun Shu abruptly cut off the perception. His consciousness felt as if it had been struck by a heavy hammer, instantly recoiling back into his body.

He snapped his eyes open and leaned over the side of the bed, retching violently. His vision was pitch black, his ears were filled with a high-pitched whistling, and cold sweat instantly soaked his patient uniform. The cost was immense, but he had gotten it.

Those fragmented words echoed wildly in his mind: continuous energy overflow, ancient file Etching, anomalous Tartarus readings, and authorization request rejected.

They pointed to a startling fact. This hidden data node was not only continuously monitoring a point of continuous energy overflow, likely the Calante signal source or Planet Wuyin, but its data pattern was also related to an ancient file called Etching. Even more shocking was that something anomalous seemed to have happened in the forbidden land of Tartarus, and its access authorization was strictly locked. Even the mainstream requests from the faction behind this node, very likely the Imperial military represented by Ling Yao, had been rejected.

The volume of information was massive, and the implications were terrifying. The Empire’s internal investigation into the Turbid Core and related matters did not seem to be going smoothly; there were extremely high authorization barriers and unknown obstacles. What did the anomaly in Tartarus mean?

Just as he was trying to calm his heavy breathing and organize the information, the sliding door opened without warning. Ling Yao stood at the doorway, not entering immediately. He had changed into a tactical suit suitable for action. His posture was tall and straight, and his eyes were as sharp as a hawk’s as he watched him quietly. That gaze was scrutinizing, as if trying to discern something from Yun Shu’s extremely disheveled state.

Yun Shu’s heart instantly sank to the bottom. Had he been discovered? Had the mental probe triggered an alarm? He forced down the urge to vomit and struggled to prop himself up against the headboard, lowering his eyelids to hide the turmoil in his eyes.

“The side effects of the adaptive treatment seem a bit intense,” he said raspily.

Ling Yao did not answer. He simply stepped inside, his gaze sweeping over the monitor, which showed data that had spiked during the intense mental fluctuation and was now slowly stabilizing, before settling on Yun Shu’s sweat-soaked, pale face.

“It seems the medical team needs to adjust their dosage calculations,” Ling Yao’s voice betrayed no emotion. He walked to the bedside and picked up the data pad containing the information on Planet Wuyin, swiping through it casually. “How is your reading of the materials coming along?”

“I am still reading,” Yun Shu answered in a low voice, struggling to keep his breathing steady. “The environment is more complex than expected.”

“Otherwise, it would not be called a forbidden land.” Ling Yao set the data pad down, his gaze focusing on him again with a look that seemed to pierce through the flesh to look directly at his soul. “What are your thoughts on the energy mist there?”

This was a sudden test, both to check his understanding of the material and to evaluate the role he was about to play. Yun Shu took a deep breath, suppressing his physical discomfort.

“The energy signature of the mist is not uniformly distributed,” he answered with concentration. “There are clear tidal phenomena and conduit structures. Perhaps we can use low-energy pulses for sonar-style detection, mapping the internal energy flow patterns to find relatively stable paths.”

The plan he provided was based on the materials but incorporated his own bold deductions based on his understanding of energy patterns. It was a departure from the Empire’s conventional strategy of relying on powerful shields to force their way through.

A very faint trace of surprise flashed through Ling Yao’s eyes, which then turned into deep thought. “Sonar-style detection, bypassing energy fronts to find paths.” He mused for a moment and then nodded. “The logic holds. Give me the specific parameters and algorithms before we reach Wuyin’s orbit.”

This was an endorsement of his direction. Having said that, Ling Yao seemed ready to leave. But before turning away, he asked as if casually, “Just now, did you feel anything unusual?”

Yun Shu’s heart contracted violently, yet he did his best to maintain the natural fatigue and weakness caused by the treatment’s side effects. “Unusual? Does nearly vomiting up my internal organs count?”

Ling Yao stared at him for several seconds, those deep eyes seeming to want to see through him completely. Ultimately, he said nothing, letting out an unreadable hum before turning to stride away.

The sliding door closed.

Yun Shu collapsed onto the bed as if he had just been fished out of water, his entire body devoid of strength. The danger of that moment was no less than his escape through the sewers of Star-Fragment City. Ling Yao had certainly noticed something, perhaps the anomaly in the monitoring data or the faint energy ripples caused by his mental probe. But he had no evidence, or rather, given the mission at hand, he chose to temporarily set aside his suspicions.

The crisis was over for now. Yun Shu closed his eyes, overlaying and comparing the keywords he had just stolen with the data on Planet Wuyin. The ancient file Etching, the Tartarus anomaly, Planet Wuyin’s Eye of the Turbid Core, and the Calante resonance signal. These puzzle fragments were beginning to outline a massive and terrifying truth, yet the most critical piece was still missing.