Stars See Me [Interstellar] | Chapter 121 | Secrets of the Void | Novela.app

Simply put, Lei Ting was in a meeting. There were only three attendees: the 'Recorder,' the 'Gazer,' and Lei Ting himself. Splendid—only three people at the meeting, and two of them weren't even human. What did this prove? It proved that meetings were the inescapable destiny of mankind; even if one ceased to be human, the meetings would persist... and not only would they persist, but one could be dragged across hundreds of light-years just to attend. *The Gazer: Are you two even being polite right now?* ... Within the vast, pitch-black expanse of the Ethereal Plane, before the brilliant golden super-powered sun, a statue of a suit of armor holding a steel Earth aloft floated silently in the light. Beside it floated a blurred figure holding a scepter and wearing a gold ring, along with Lei Ting’s own figure, enveloped by his mental body. Among the three, he was the only one of normal human proportions. The Gazer stood over two hundred meters tall, and the Recorder was dozens of meters high. Compared to them, Lei Ting—who was nearly forty centimeters shorter than Valianna—seemed almost non-existent. At that moment, he flew to a position level with the Gazer’s cold visor to observe closely. He indeed found a faint hairline fracture upon it. Lei Ting crossed his arms thoughtfully and looked toward the Recorder. The Recorder, whose physical manifestation was the polar opposite of the Gazer’s solidity, turned His head. His only clear features were a pair of heterochromatic eyes—one red, one blue—which met the golden eyes behind Lei Ting’s visor. "Say what is on your mind," His voice echoed in Lei Ting’s consciousness. "This fellow usually lacks self-awareness." "'Usually'?" Lei Ting raised an eyebrow. "Yes, 'usually.' Like now," the Recorder said. "The 'Project Gaze' that created it... well, 'Xilin' and 'Gomorrah' didn't participate. One shouldn't put all their eggs in one basket, after all..." "So you did know." Lei Ting wasn't particularly surprised. "But... your mental fusion should have happened much earlier?" "It did," the Recorder said, transforming the scepter in His hand into a fountain pen and the jade plate atop it into a notebook—He seemed more accustomed to conversing in this guise. "We had already fused long before we sought an audience with the 'Emperor' as envoys. Just as I told you before—when we fled the Origin System, the entire *Solaris* fell into the Ethereal Plane... afterward, everything followed quite naturally." "...Actually, I’ve always wanted to ask," Lei Ting said softly, "setting aside why that supposedly powerful 'Emperor' didn't notice you, how did you... survive back then?" "You are mistaken, child," the Recorder chuckled. "We did not 'survive.' And it wasn't that the 'Emperor' failed to notice the connection between 'Xilin' and 'Gomorrah.' He simply... didn't care." The nightmare drifting in the lightless depths did not have a happy ending. Setting everything else aside, an escape ship would certainly have more than fifty thousand people on board. So, where did the others go? "Sometimes I feel that disaster never truly left us," the Recorder said softly. "Do you know why the *Solaris* was once almost renamed the *Fortune Cookie*?" Lei Ting blinked. "...That actually happened?" "Of course. It wasn't always a phantom, after all," the Recorder smiled. "In the years since, I’ve managed to keep its true face hidden from almost everyone—honestly, doing that among a galaxy full of clever people is no simple feat." "But surely others noticed," Lei Ting said, studying the crack on the Gazer’s visor. He could see a faint shadow of black mist within it; though it was suppressed firmly by the Gazer’s power, it was definitely there. "Besides me. Also, you said you’d let this one tell me, but He has no self-awareness right now..." "Don't worry. If we stay here a bit longer, He will wake up on His own," the Recorder said. "It’s an automatic wake-up mechanism. And as for what you said... yes, quite a few people have discovered the truth. The last one was Upton Onyx..." "...I thought you were going to say Evenheiler Kahn," Lei Ting said. "He was the one before that," the Recorder laughed. "Even is an 'S-class,' after all. Before his issues started, his observational skills were ranked first in his year." "..." Lei Ting’s eyes widened suddenly, and he snapped his head up. "Issues?! What issues?!" "Ah, right, you seem to be friends with him... and you were quite close for a while." The Recorder sighed softly. "He didn't tell you? His 'Heavenly Eye' should have shattered long ago. Because of that, the time he has left to think freely is likely five years at most." "'Heavenly Eye should have shattered'?! 'Five years at most'?!" Lei Ting’s pupils shook with shock. His voice rose, causing the golden radiance flowing around him to fluctuate, and the brilliant super-powered sun behind him flared with sudden intensity. Evenheiler hadn't told him something this massive! And based on what he knew of that "Golden Corncob"... that man would never allow himself to "live on" in a state where he couldn't think! Which meant... if not for this conversation with the Recorder today, Lei Ting might very well have learned one day in the future... that Evenheiler had committed suicide or died in a mutual destruction with something else. Suddenly faced with such a shocking fact, Lei Ting was stunned. He instinctively began to recall the man’s mental state, searching for evidence that things weren't that bad, only to realize with sorrow that for an 'S-class' to be so eroded by the power of the Ethereal Plane that he suffered nightmares even in Lei Ting's arms—that fact itself was the greatest evidence. He had originally thought it was just because the man had endured too much pain over the years... Now it seemed his deduction was in the right direction, but in the details, there were far too many problems he didn't want to accept. "Don't be nervous. Everyone has their day. We are all like this." The Recorder tried to comfort him, instinctively drifting a bit further away from that sun. "Besides... are you still thinking of him? Even though he aban—left you?" "...That wasn't abandonment," Lei Ting said gloomily. Even at a time like this, his first instinct was to defend Evenheiler’s actions, issuing a dozen metaphorical pardons in the civil court of his life. This maneuver left even the Recorder at a loss. Honestly, if it were the version of Him that first met Lei Ting nine years ago, He never would have imagined the boy would like that bastard Evenheiler to such an extent. Thinking back to when that fellow had come to Him in the middle of the night, saying he wanted to protect the Lei Ting who had been caught in his wake, the Recorder wanted to roll His eyes. Fine, great—he used that excuse to get official clearance from Him to "get close to Lei Ting," then charmed the young pillar of the Orion people into this state before running away. *Evenheiler Kahn, do you know you've broken the law?! You've violated everything from the Secrecy Act to the Security Act! Your crimes are too numerous to record!!* "...Stop thinking about him," the Recorder said dryly. "If you're really feeling down, shall I recite some poetry for you?" "...Huh?" Lei Ting blinked, still looking preoccupied. "Poetry?" When he first met the Recorder, He seemed to be reciting something with His eyes closed. Looking back, perhaps what He was reciting wasn't some classic text, but poetry? "Yes, poetry, and prose!" the Recorder smiled. "Listen, I—" "Be quiet," a voice said. The voice was grand and vast, booming as it echoed in Lei Ting’s mind. He turned and saw the Gazer also turning to look at him. Incidentally... He had lowered the hand holding the steel Earth and was now cradling it casually in His arms. "Be quiet," He repeated. "Recorder, recitation is forbidden." To be honest, seeing such a titanic figure make such a gesture was almost a little cute. But His voice was anything but cute—it was grand, deep, and heavy, yet if one listened closely, one could hear an endless "echo" similar to the Recorder’s. The echoes felt identical, proving that when the two were created, the technology used must have come from the same source. However, the Gazer’s power, like most other super-powered entities, was linked to the entire race, whereas the Recorder’s power seemed only linked to those fifty thousand super-powered individuals. Therefore, in a sense, the latter was "governed" by the former. As for why the former needed to govern the latter... Lei Ting asked the question directly. "It’s nothing," the Recorder said. "I—" "Because He is dying," the Gazer exposed the other’s secret with a detached tone. "Every time He recites something recorded, His progress toward 'Lostness' increases. When it reaches a certain point, the memories of His original body in the physical world will fall into chaos. "Forgetting what should not be forgotten, remembering what should not be kept, and confusing reality with the past... Recorder, you are on the verge of losing even your form. If this continues, you will not live to see the future you desire." What...?! Lei Ting snapped his head toward the Recorder. He saw a pair of warm, peaceful eyes. Under that comforting gaze, he suddenly remembered that years ago, the other had said He was dying. "The 'Record' does not include the future," that figure said softly to the Gazer. "Unlike you, who gazes into the future, we were always destined to live only in the afterglow of the past, 'Gaze'." "..." Gaze was silent for a moment, then said: "Why have you awakened me?" "Regarding your 'eye'," the Recorder smiled gently. He pointed His fountain pen at Lei Ting. "Our excellent junior has found one of your eyeballs... one of them," He said. "Now, let us avoid the eyes of 'those things' and tell him more... "Of course, limited only to the parts that won't bring those ghostly things to his door once he carries the knowledge back to the physical world." *** Glossary