The Imperial Marshal’s Darling at the Tip of His Heart - Chapter 19

The starship ended its short-range jump and returned to regular navigation. The subtle vibration that seemed to meld with his blood shifted, becoming steadier. This change indicated that they had entered a star sector with a stable gravitational field.

Yun Shu leaned against the medical bed, forcibly suppressing the violent backlash from his mental probing and the churning discomfort within his body. He struggled to adjust his breathing, trying to appear merely exhausted from the adaptive treatment.

The sliding door opened silently, and Ling Yao walked in. He had changed into a captain’s uniform that felt more practical for combat; the deep black fabric made his expression appear even colder. The Imperial Eagle insignia on his epaulettes shimmered under the cold light with unquestionable authority. He held a data pad, and his gaze immediately landed on Yun Shu’s pale, sweat-soaked face. He paused for a moment, likely evaluating if this wreck of a man could still be put to use.

“We have entered the outer gravitational circle of Planet Wuyin,” Ling Yao said, getting straight to the point. He turned the data pad toward Yun Shu to show a real-time star map. A planet completely shrouded in thick, rolling, grey-green mist occupied the center of the screen. It looked like a piece of rotting fruit, radiating an ominous aura. Sparse asteroid belts and obvious energy turbulence markers were scattered around it.

“Scanning is heavily obstructed and conventional detection methods are inefficient. I need the specific parameters and algorithmic models for the sonar-style pulse detection plan you proposed. Now.”

His tone was an unyielding command. There were no pleasantries or concern; he went straight to business.

Yun Shu struggled to lift his eyes to the star map. Even through the screen, he could feel the suffocating pressure radiating from that planet. It instantly overlapped with the records in his mind regarding the Cursed Land and the Eye of the Turbid Core, as well as his conjectures about the Calante anomaly, bringing on a wave of palpitations.

He took a deep breath to suppress the itch in his throat. His voice was raspy but clear. “The tidal effects of the energy mist are significant. Its density and energy levels are not constant. We need to first release a set of low-power, multi-band calibration pulses. Based on the echo feedback, we can establish a real-time topological model of the energy field.”

He explained the core principles as concisely as possible, his fingers unconsciously tracing the air as if outlining invisible energy threads. “The core of the algorithm lies in dynamic adaptive filtering and pattern recognition. It requires access to the underlying data stream of the ship’s primary sensors for real-time calculation.”

“Access to the underlying data stream is impossible,” Ling Yao interrupted, his voice icy. “I will give you an isolated computing unit with highest-level authorization, but you will only receive processed secondary sensor data. How much can you achieve with that?”

The restrictions were significant. Secondary data consisted of information pre-processed by the ship’s systems, which meant a loss of substantial raw detail, increasing the difficulty and error margin of the analysis.

Yun Shu remained silent for a moment, his mind rapidly weighing the situation. He had no capital with which to bargain. “Very well,” he finally replied, “but I need at least seventy percent of the sensor array’s processing power to synchronize the filtering. Otherwise, the signal-to-noise ratio will be too low for the model to converge.”

Ling Yao stared at him, trying to judge if this was a genuine requirement or another form of haggling. After a few seconds, he gave an order into his wrist communicator: “Technical team, allocate the sensor array processing power as requested. Open the highest authorization for isolated computing unit B7 and feed it the secondary data stream.”

The command was executed promptly. Ling Yao tossed a new access port code to Yun Shu. “You have ten minutes to initialize the model. The first round of detection is about to begin.”

The pressure was immense. He had ten minutes to construct a complex model capable of parsing an unknown energy field using restricted data while in an abysmal physical and mental state. Yun Shu wasted no words. He took the code and reconnected to the cold, isolated data pad beside the bed.

His fingers trembled slightly from weakness, yet the speed and precision of his coding did not falter. He ignored the fine beads of cold sweat on his forehead. His lungs ached and his breathing grew rapid. Ling Yao stood by the bed like a silent overseer, his sharp gaze fixed on the rows of scrolling code and the rapidly forming mathematical model on the screen. He could not understand every detail, but he could see the logical rigor and a certain ingenuity that surpassed current Imperial technology. This Xilan invalid’s brain was indeed a treasure, and an extremely dangerous weapon.

Nine minutes and forty seconds passed. Yun Shu tapped the final command, and the model initialization was complete. He coughed violently, his face becoming pale to the point of transparency, and leaned back against the headboard, gasping for air. Almost simultaneously, the ship’s hull vibrated slightly. An invisible, precisely modulated low-energy pulse wave shot toward the grey-green mist below, like a stone cast into a deep pool.

The wait for the echo felt indefinitely prolonged. On the monitor, Yun Shu’s heart rate and breathing frequency accelerated slightly. Ling Yao’s gaze moved back and forth between the data and Yun Shu’s face, expressionless.

Suddenly, the screen of the isolated data pad lit up, beginning to rapidly process the first round of echo data. A complex energy field topology unfolded layer by layer in a visualized format. Within the previously chaotic mist, blurred threads and areas of vast density differences began to appear.

“Port side thirty-seven degrees, down angle fifteen, there is a relatively stable low-density conduit extending about three kilometers, though the internal energy turbulence is fierce,” Yun Shu stared at the screen, speaking quickly. His voice was still raspy, yet it carried a sharp focus. “The mist thickness directly ahead is surging and energy readings are spiking. There is a high-intensity energy vortex; I suggest evasion.”

His analysis was precise and rapid, as if he could see right through the mist that shielded everything. Ling Yao did not hesitate and immediately issued the order to the bridge. “Adjust course according to the marked coordinates. Port side thirty-seven degrees, down angle fifteen. Maintain minimum speed and move fifty percent of shield energy to focus on the port side.”

The massive starship began to slowly adjust its posture, moving like a cautious giant beast along the faint and dangerous path Yun Shu had pointed out, sliding carefully into the depths of Planet Wuyin.

For a period afterward, the bridge and this medical cell formed a strange link. Yun Shu continuously analyzed the incoming data, correcting the model in real-time and pointing out potential dangers and brief windows of passage. His forehead was covered in cold sweat and his lips were devoid of color. Occasionally he had to stop to suppress violent coughing, but his mind remained strikingly clear and high-speed.

Ling Yao acted as the calmest helmsman, translating his judgments into precise navigation orders. There was no superfluous communication between them, only the most necessary information transfer and confirmation. An odd tacit understanding, built on a foundation of absolute control and forced dependence, began to grow in the silence.

The starship struggled through the mist of death. Occasional intense energy turbulence caused the hull to let out a groaning sound, and shield energy fluctuated wildly, yet no fatal crisis was triggered. After successfully avoiding a sudden, massive energy reef, Ling Yao looked at the safely marked path on the screen. He suddenly spoke, his voice unreadable. “It seems keeping you alive is indeed more useful than a pile of cold data.”

Yun Shu, his vision darkening from another round of high-intensity calculation, merely twitched the corner of his mouth slightly. His breath was faint. “Is the Marshal… finally willing to admit… that this antique… is of some use?”

Ling Yao snorted and did not take the bait. Instead, he said, “According to the echo analysis, the energy in the core area of the mist is showing an increasing match with the Calante signal residue and the standard characteristics of the Turbid Core.”

This meant they had found the right place. Planet Wuyin was indeed deeply connected to the Turbid Core.

Yun Shu’s heart sank. Approaching the truth also meant approaching greater danger. The stolen keywords flashed through his mind again: continuous energy overflow, Etching file, and Tartarus anomaly.

Just then, a minute but sharp anomalous spike appeared in the data stream. It did not come from the mist outside, but from an edge node of the starship’s internal communication network. The frequency characteristics briefly overlapped with the signal of the hidden data node he had captured earlier. Although it vanished in an instant and was swallowed by the massive flow of navigation data, Yun Shu caught it.

Was someone on this Imperial starship using that encrypted node for communication? At this exact moment? Who was it? What was the purpose? To report progress, or something else?

He forcibly suppressed the turmoil in his heart, not daring to let it show on his face. He simply stared at the screen more intently, as if his entire soul were occupied by the external detection. Ling Yao seemed not to have noticed this fleeting internal anomaly; his attention was completely captured by the increasingly bizarre inner structure of Planet Wuyin.

Scanning showed that beneath the mist was not a flat surface, but a terrain filled with bottomless canyons and twisted energy ore veins. The complexity of the topography far exceeded expectations.

“Find a landing site,” Ling Yao ordered. “Prioritize areas where energy disturbance is relatively stable and where there might be ruins or structural remains.”

Yun Shu gathered his thoughts and focused on the new instruction. After a careful round of scanning and filtering, he locked onto a relatively flat area on the edge of a massive canyon. Although the energy field there was still chaotic, no violent explosive activity had been detected for the time being.

“Coordinates marked. There is a massive hollow structure echo beneath this area. I suspect it is a subterranean rift or an artificial architectural ruin, but the edge is unstable and there is a risk of collapse,” he stated while sending the coordinates and data.

Ling Yao scrutinized the area with a sharp gaze. “This is it. Prepare the landing squad. You,” he looked at Yun Shu, “continue to monitor the energy changes in this area. Report any anomalies immediately.”

He turned to the door. Before it opened, he paused without looking back. He dropped a cold, hard remark: “Control your body. I do not want to have to send someone back to collect your corpse while I am down there.”

The sliding door closed. Yun Shu remained alone in his cell, listening to the faint sounds of landing orders and personnel movements from outside.