Age of Cosmic Exploration

At this moment, Ying’s group was still in harsh negotiations with the space merchants on the merchants’ ship. Not only were they being treated like convicts, the language and tone employed by the merchants got increasingly condescending. Under these circumstances, Ying’s expression became severe. Ebon, Liu Bai, and Wa Luo, as the Black Star Unit’s members, were combat veterans, so they knew things were going south. Stealthily, they moved closer to Ying, on high alert.

Ying whispered to them, "Sadly, Zhang Heng has been sent back to the Hope. We could’ve had him read the situation for us. These aliens don’t seem too friendly to me."

Ebon scoffed, "Let them try. I’ve noticed their weapons; even though they look different from ours, they’re still Gaussian weapons. I didn’t see any plasma weapons. Do they think we Black Star Troopers are paper tigers? We’ve killed millions of zerg aliens; I don’t believe we can’t handle this room of merchants."

Ying waved his hand, signaling Ebon to stop talking. He observed the faces around them closely... Even though he was unfamiliar with alien facial features, he could tell that the aliens were looking down on them.

Suddenly, the hall quieted down. Even though Ying had no clue what had happened, he knew it couldn’t be something good. In the next second, a laser fence appeared around the lowered platform they were in, effectively trapping them within.

A few seconds ago, far away from the space merchants’ mother ship, the Hope lost its light. Even though the power returned in a matter of seconds, the space merchants’ ship opened its hangar and about 10 giant spacecrafts and more than a thousand smaller combat crafts surged towards the Hope.

A few seconds after the laser fence trapped Ying’s group, a series of tentacle arms appeared from underneath the ground. The mechanical arms were sturdy and fast. They bound Ying’s group in only a few minutes. Even Ebon couldn’t react fast enough to escape from the arms.

The arms were made from some incredibly powerful metals. Even with the space armors’ aid, they had difficulties tearing off the bindings. Furthermore, the arms went for human joints like elbows and wrists, making it extremely difficult to exert force.

After that, smaller arms appeared. They started working on the business experts and accompanying workers’ normal spacesuits. Very soon, the small arms peeled the spacesuits off the people’s bodies. It was unknown what the atmosphere inside the spaceship was like, but after their spacesuits were removed, the few people groaned, gasping for air before fainting completely.

The smaller arms didn’t stop. They turned towards the others, the remaining Black Star Troopers. Their first target was Ren Tao.

Ren Tao gave a knowing smile as if the truth had suddenly dawned for him. He stopped struggling and told Ying and the rest behind him with a smile, "I suspect that the air in the spaceship will make human beings faint. No clue whether prolonged exposure will be fatal or not, but to be safe, please help me get into my space armor after I’ve fainted. If not, I’ll come back to haunt all of you."

Ebon roared back at him, "Are you kidding me? Can’t you see were immobile too?"

"No." Ren Tao smirked. "We’ll be free in just a minute."

As he said this, the smaller arms started working on his space armor. They took only few minutes to pull Ren Tao out of his space armor. At that moment, Ren Tao stuck his bound hands into his shirt and a snow-white Black Dragon baby appeared in his arms. He threw the baby dragon at the mess of arms without hesitation and yelled, "Sleepyhead, it’s time to wake up and slash through those arms!"

The baby dragon was woken up due to being tossed roughly to the floor. The moment he woke up, he started chirping in complaint. However, he knew that something was wrong as soon as he opened his small eyes. He sucked in a few deep breaths, but his small nostrils kept twitching. Almost instantly, his body tensed. Like an angry kitten, he hissed threateningly at the aliens beyond the laser fence.

Ren Tao finally collapsed, grasping his throat. The baby dragon was actually very intelligent. He had been feeding on the new planet’s unique, legged fish, so his IQ was higher than monkeys’ and orangutans’. His intelligence was on par with a seven-year-old human child. He cleverly avoided going near the laser fence and focused his aggression on the metallic arms instead. He was so small and fast that the arms were unable to keep up with him.

Black Dragon...

It was truly befitting of its super species name!

Ever since leaving the new planet, the research on the Black Dragons’ evolutionary system hadn’t stopped even though progress was glacially slow. The main issue was the Black Dragons’ unique genetic quality, namely its genetic enhancement quality. It was hard for man to envision why a peaceful environment like the new planet would breed a super species like the black dragons. It undermined the human understanding of evolution.

Even at this moment, the black dragon showcased its incongruities to mankind’s evolutionary knowledge.

Even though it was only a baby dragon, its teeth and jaw strength were strong enough to directly chomp through the metallic arms. Not only that, he was completely unaffected by the electricity that leaked out of the destroyed arms. He worked through the arms one by one until few of the Black Star Troopers were released from their bindings.

One of them was Ebon. With a mighty roar, he pulled out the sawblade on his waist and hacked at the remaining metallic arms. A series of metallic clangs later, all the Black Star Troopers were released. Ying yelled, "Ebon! Get 5 troopers and start cutting through the ground! If we can’t go out, we’re going down! Liu Bai, take another 5 and get the others back into their spacesuits and space armor. The rest follow me and we’ll make quick work of the remaining arms!

"Let’s do this!"

Back on the Hope, many people were startled by the sudden albeit temporary loss of power. People were shocked and afraid because they were, after all, in space. Who knew what would happen next?

Eva’s parents, who were resting and cooking, stopped what they were working on when the lights in their house flashed. They started fretting when Eva walked out of her bedroom sleepily, rubbing her eyes. "Mom, Dad, it’s going to be fine. Everything will quiet down soon enough. By the way, please remind the aunty that comes with the needles to do it with less force and more accuracy after I fall asleep. Her first shot will miss the artery and the second shot will miss from her shaking hands."

Eva yawned and returned to her bedroom, leaving her surprised parents behind. She closed the door lightly and hopped onto her bed. Then she pulled her teddy bear into her arms, lied down, and slept snuggled against the bear.

After the temporary power outage, Yao Yuan instantly knew that something had gone awry. He yelled at the ten Black Star Troopers that were guarding the meeting room, "Detain them! There is something very suspicious about these space merchants! Detain them!"

However, the troopers didn’t move. The space merchants started laughing in their own language while the troopers tried to speak above each other, saying, "Sorry, Captain, we can’t move. The space armors are completely offline!"

With that, Yao Yuan knew that something was truly off. He turned to the Defense Unit soldiers and ordered, "Fire! Kill them all!"

The Defense Unit soldiers carried low power Gaussian rifles, the kind that wouldn’t penetrate the spaceship’s walls, so their power was not as strong as the originals’. The 20 soldiers heard Yao Yuan’s orders and pointed their guns at the alien merchants. However, they were too late. The bullets bounced off the electromagnetic shields that appeared around the merchants. The gorilla alien leaped over the meeting table while other aliens rushed towards the soldiers. The only alien who remained seated was the big brain alien. He continued cackling in that strange laugh of his.

At that moment, a voice issued in Yao Yuan’s communicator. "Captain! We’ve lost complete control of the Hope. All the systems were hacked. The merchants used a code similar to something from old Earth and have taken control over our central mainframe! Everything is down!"

The four-armed gorillas slammed into the Defense Unit soldiers. Their strength was so great that one fell swoop of their arm practically bent and cut a human soldier into two. Either that, or the soldier was sent flying into the wall and splattered in a mess of guts. With their incredible strength and speed, 3 alien gorillas took 7 seconds to decimate 20 Defense Unit soldiers!

Yao Yuan understood that the time for words was over. Suddenly, a series of footsteps appeared from outside the door. However, they sounded too mechanically uniform to Yao Yuan’s ears. There was only one possibility. After the merchants had taken over the central mainframe, they used it to control the empty trooper space armors.

Yao Yuan leaped to one of the troopers’ sides and pulled out the sawblade on his waist. Right at that moment, an alien gorilla charged towards him. Yao Yuan leaped backwards, and with a twirl of his write, the gorilla was split into two sections and fell to the floor. Yao Yuan’s eyes were overcast with chilling vengeance.

"Don’t think that we Homo Evolutis are completely useless without the space armors...

"Killing the likes of you is as easy as pie!"