Xyrin Empire-Chapter 1462: Prediction System

(Happy New Year, everyone! As usual, I won’t be taking a break for the New Year—where are the red packets and monthly tickets?!)

The approaching Discontinuous Belt brings a lot of pressure, although I still think it will take at least three hundred years to reach the Abyss Gate. It seems like there’s plenty of time, but these three hundred years are just a blink of an eye to people like Sandora and Bingdisi, who have lived through several cosmic cycles. They’re already busy preparing for the possible impact.

We have Xiao Xue, who came back from the future, but truly, this naughty kid proves unreliable at crucial moments: she knows nothing about the "Discontinuous Belt." This may mean that the Discontinuous Belt didn’t ultimately cause any consequences, or it might be due to some other reasons that it wasn’t recorded in future textbooks. In any case, we cannot be complacent because of Xiao Xue’s attitude. Sandora is right, anything related to the Abyss can never be good, and considering it a great threat is never an overreaction, no matter the timing.

I accompanied Sandora to understand other aspects of the Deep Dive plan. Typically, Lin Xue would have gone home out of boredom by now, but today, for some reason, her work enthusiasm seemed extraordinarily high. She actually stayed with me and Sandora to hear the reports for quite a while. It wasn’t until Taville detailed the next deep dive plan that she ambled over: "Taville, didn’t you have something related to me to report?"

I was taken aback: "Girl Lin, what have you been discussing with Taville?"

"Nothing," Lin Xue waved her hand, "I knew early this morning that she had something to report to me today, and she even wanted to give me a surprise just now. Taville, I get your intention. It’s rare to see you so humanized, but sadly, I must be destined to never have surprises in this life."

Taville was a bit taken aback by Lin Xue’s words and awkwardly adjusted her glasses: "Uh, I do have something to report.... It seems navigating with the Prophet is indeed quite difficult. Your Majesties, and Madam, I’m very pleased to present to you a new technology—by the way, the primary developer of this new technology isn’t me, but Lady Orelia."

Hearing this, I suddenly got excited: even though I don’t understand the technology, I love a good spectacle. I suddenly regretted not having Qianqian stay. That girl loves excitement too... but it’s probably for the best, as she herself is a bundle of excitement, and her presence at a product launch could massively increase the likelihood of disaster.

Taville led the way in front, and I followed with Sandora and Lin Xue. The four of us soon arrived at the small transmission station within the research institute. Such transmission points are very common in the facilities of the Empire and are used to directly transport personnel and small shipments from one department to another. The transport distance could be as nearby as Shadow City or as far as two or three worlds away; you can think of them as a kind of super elevator. These stations are compact and simple, often lacking even an independent chamber. For instance, the ones on each floor of the research center are just an empty space at the end of the corridor, with a control panel set into the wall and a circular area depicted on the floor by blue light veins. Floating above the center of the circle is a line of text: Personnel and cargo transmission, no weight limit, please stay within the circle, set and go, no stopping midway, strictly no sticking gum under the controller.

This is a small station for inter-facility transmission, similar in scale to the civilian transmission stations you see on the streets outside, just that it operates on special "lines." Also, the last sentence of the aforementioned reminder was added by me when Xiao Xue couldn’t stop being a nuisance upon coming here.

"Do we still have to use the transmission station? Are we going to another space?" Seeing Taville setting the transmission target, I was quite surprised: according to the panel display, the transmission target point wasn’t even in Shadow City, it was already in Other Space.

"We are heading to the second research center established by Orelia," Taville said mysteriously, "the Mysterious system’s research department."

Just as I wanted to say something, the transmission station activated. A brief dazzling light flashed before my eyes, and as the light and shadows gradually stabilized, I found myself in an exceptionally spacious white hall.

This white hall has a distinctly different style from Taville’s research institute. Taville’s institute is covered in steel and cold tones, and the overall rugged and simple vibe easily evokes the image of a high-tech future base, reflecting precision, efficiency, and unity everywhere. But the white hall before me resembles more of a... religious place of some sort. I can’t quite describe the atmosphere here. It’s a place as big as two or three football fields, roughly elliptical, with the floor in a muted gray-white tone that has a texture between metal and rock, and the surrounding walls are a pure white with a soft glow emanating from them, giving the impression that all the walls around are semi-transparent. The hall has a high, arching dome, with streamlined beams radiating from the center of the dome outward like avian bones, possessing a sense of lightness and elegance. There aren’t many decorations in the hall, only a faint gold pattern where the dome connects to the walls, and sculptural decorations reminiscent of angel wings at the roots of the streamlined beams on the dome. For a white hall of such a grand scale, these two decorative elements are so minimal it’s almost at the limit of simplicity: adhering to the Xyrin Apostle’s consistent principle of "simple decor, focus on practicality." However, due to the overall color palette and the hall’s shape and curves, it still offers an elegant aesthetic of lightness and grace.

This is indeed the typical style of the newly rebuilt and flourishing Mysterious system’s architecture of the Empire. Its elegance and softness could even remind one of the Heavenly Hall. It’s hard for those encountering it for the first time to believe that these facilities were constructed by the iron-blooded and cool Xyrin Apostles, but it truly is drawn from the architectural artistry of the Xyrin Apostles. And within the Heavenly Realm City lies an even more graceful Angel Wall, inhabited by angels whose minds are filled with only the glorification of the Empire and the notion that war is justice—after all is said and done, Xyrin Apostles are still Xyrin Apostles. The amount of nitroglycerin in their heads seemingly has nothing to do with how beautiful their buildings are.

This must be the "Mysterious Side research facility" that Taville mentioned. I couldn’t have imagined that in such a short time, Orelia not only restarted most of the foundational industries of the Heavenly Realm City but also regularized the research team anew: the civilization-rebuilding capability of the Xyrin Apostles is indeed beyond comprehension.

The hall was bustling with many workers, among whom were many Angels with wings like Alaya, uniquely characterized by silver hair and golden eyes, distinguishing them from the Star Domain Divine Race. It’s immediately apparent that these are the Xyrin Angels "hatched" from the Angel Wall just a while ago. It seems not all Xyrin Angels engage in the combat sequence; some are evidently specialized in research projects like Orelia. In addition to the Xyrin Angels, the hall also contains many staff resembling ordinary Apostles. They wear long white robes similar to those of Taville, but with longer outer robes and gold-embellished collars (the researchers under Taville sport blue insignias or patterns), and in their detailing, there seem to be some special designs: this must be the standard attire for researchers on the Mysterious Side.

Everybody here looks scholarly and cultured in appearance, but I reckon the researchers here are just like those battle maniacs under Taville, capable of pulling out seventy or eighty kinds of explosives from their pockets at any given moment...

"Oh, this place looks rather good." I surveyed the surroundings and couldn’t help but click my tongue in admiration. Although I couldn’t quite grasp what was going on, the place was pretty spacious, yes, that’s the gist of it.

The layperson watches the spectacle while the expert pays attention to the details, Sandora made a more professional appraisal as she looked around: "This place is quite spacious."

I: "..."

That doesn’t seem so professional either... Well, anyway, Sandora is not from a research unit either.

As we were admiring this spacious and beautiful place, an elegant figure enveloped in Holy Light suddenly descended from above. Angel Kite Orelia appeared before us with a smile: "Your Majesties, and Madam, I just heard from Taville, have you come to inspect the ’Omen’ system?"

"Omen?" Hearing the name, I instinctively glanced at Lin Xue, thinking that this thing evidently had something to do with her just from the name alone, and then shook my head, "We don’t even know what we’re here to see, Taville’s been all mysterious and has said nothing."

"Please follow me," Orelia elegantly spread her wings and floated backward, "This is a versatile system, and you will surely be satisfied with its effectiveness."

A sacred white light descended from thin air at this moment, and Alaya’s silhouette slowly emerged in the light: the Angel Sister sensed the familiar atmosphere around her and awakened automatically from hibernation. She rubbed her eyes and looked around, finding all sights familiar, momentarily dazed, then reacted upon seeing Orelia floating in front of her, "Orelia? Did you rebuild the Knowledge Temple?"

I then realized that in the Mysterious Side, the term for "research center" is "Knowledge Temple," showcasing the cultural differences between the two sides.

"We found the remnants of the Knowledge Temple at the Chaos Border and began the rebuilding ahead of schedule," Orelia respectfully explained to Alaya, "The temple remnants still have some usable databases, and most parts of the Supreme Limit Laboratory are intact, making the reconstruction smoother than expected. The only issue now is a lack of personnel, but Scholar-type Angels can’t be rushed and must be cultivated slowly."

"Oh," the Angel Sister replied with that unique muddle-headed expression, though her words were clear, "Was it repaired according to the temple’s old site or redesigned? I recall there was an expansion plan for the temple back then, but the Virtual Realm Laboratory numbers were inadequate, and before it could expand, an incident occurred."

"No need to worry, the expansion has been completed," Orelia’s voice carried a slight sentiment, "It was rebuilt according to the unfulfilled expansion plan from back then. Though seven thousand years late, the expansion has finally been completed as per the design."

Alaya showed a silly smile as she gradually grinned, her tone full of satisfaction, "Good, another task accomplished."

The structure of the Knowledge Temple is vastly different from the Technology Side’s research centers. The entire building seems constructed through space expansion and other wondrous space-warping technologies. It is filled with vast spaces inside, many of which defy realistic geometric structures. For instance, there could be a wall lined with doors tightly next to each other, but regardless of which door you open, a vast room greets you, as if all the doors led to Other Space. You will see abrupt staircases and corridors on the walls or floor, yet on the other side of these walls, no space exists to house them. This construction shouldn’t logically exist in normal space structure, but it stands built this way, reminding me of the phenomenon of ghost walls...

How did I come up with such an association?

Orelia led us through a few large doors, none following normal space structure, prompting me to surmise that we entered a folded space laboratory-like setup. We then arrived at a slightly smaller circular hall—this is the laboratory. This place starkly contrasts the Technology Side laboratories, with all equipment displaying streamlined and elegant appearances, and I can’t discern their functions—though I can’t discern those in Technology Side labs either. Here, few large devices exist, but numerous floating runes and virtual "devices" are present. I saw some researchers influencing surrounding equipment or items on the experiment table by touching floating runes or directly "writing" patterns in mid-air—this novel operation is truly eye-opening. Yet after a round, I couldn’t spot the "Omen" device here, but many gravity-free platform-like operation tables abound, with subjects floating around in diverse forms, impossible to determine which garners in-depth analysis.

"’Omen’ is not a specific device, but a versatile system embeddable into various machines," Orelia heard my query and immediately explained, "All devices here are embedded with trial ’Omen’ modules, from weapons to shields, and soul upload devices; we are validating its broad-spectrum applicability."

"What exactly is it?" I couldn’t help but ask.

"An indeterminate rune array. Originally, Taville tried using Ghost Energy frequency division to mimic the Prophet’s ability to observe multiple world lines, but eventually, we discovered that a more uncertain rune system is more effective," Orelia said while leading us to the nearest experiment table, conversing with scholars here, then waited for on-site workers to ready the equipment, "You can directly see its effect."

A shield generator floated in the gravity-free area of the experiment table, a common Technology Side soldier external shield generator; indeed, just as Orelia said, "Omen" is versatile. Although crafted in the Mysterious Side’s Knowledge Temple, the tests here included Technology Side equipment.

Orelia touched the crystal panel beneath the gravity-free platform, anchoring the seemingly ordinary shield generator mid-air with floating devices. She then drew her golden Holy Light Longsword from the air and swung it at the shield generator.

This test’s minor attack, expectedly stopped by the Ghost Energy Shield, yet unlike normal Stress Shields, the generator activated before Orelia summoned the longsword!

Orelia ran several tests afterward: she wielded the longsword before the shield generator, and sometimes released scorching Holy Light close to hitting the generator—but no sign of activation appeared.

I understood this soldier external shield boosts soldier defense, adding a layer over the Xyrin Apostle’s innate shield. It operates in a stress mode and long-term mode; the former only activates upon a threat entering its scan range, whereas the latter is always open. The instant protection of the former surpasses the latter. However, the Stress System’s error rate is problematic: scanning nearby high-heat, high-energy, high-velocity, or otherwise threatening objects doesn’t always timely or accurately trigger, causing serious false alarms—sometimes an external shield activates just for an attack to merely brush past a soldier—either from the soldier’s luck dodging or enemy’s bad luck, thus wasting energy through unnecessary Stress Shield activation.

Moreover, when facing overwhelming attacks, stress mode might fail to react promptly. Against Ghost Energy attacks, soldiers must set the shield to a lower defense long-term mode due to the Ghost Energy Weapon’s superluminal attack speed, leaving no reaction time for sensors at all.

Now, I realized the function of this shield carrying the "Omen" system.

It’s predicting! Deciding when to activate before events occur!

Orelia tested several times, and sometimes her strike nearly hit the shield generator with a millimeter’s gap without any activation (under normal stress mode, this close range with high-energy rush should have triggered it centuries ago). Other times, with no movement, yet the shield generator activated, seconds before attacks emerged: Orelia’s silent spellcasting summoned Holy Light Piercing, an assassin-like attack highly evasive, yet before even she realized impending attack, the "Omen" system responded!

"This is ’Omen,’" Orelia retracted her weapon slightly displeased. Even cognizant of the test subject, dealing with a quasi-prophetic system displeased this Angel Kite. However, soon her tone shifted to pride and excitement, "A theoretically error-free system only defends against guaranteed hits, activating even if attacks haven’t yet emerged, even if foes haven’t thought to pull the trigger. If it doesn’t activate, it indicates missed attacks without harming anyone, despite fatal threats a millimeter from the target, it remains inactive. No waste, no errors; ’Omen’ is such a predictive embedded system."