The Way of the Empress

Moodys was stunned. Before he could recover, he looked at the unfamiliar surroundings and asked, “Why are you here? Where are we now?”

“I don’t know where are we. When the Dawn Legion and the Glory Legion arrived, there was a space tearing vortex. I went to look for you, and was swept here together…” Zhuo Yang reported the current situation to him seriously. “Our mechas and personal terminals were destroyed because of the vortex. I fished you out of the escape pod, and can’t judge where we are now…”

Moodys reacted to what Zhuo Yang said and his whole person almost exploded. “What did you say? You said that you came to me when the space tearing vortex occurred, and was swept down?”

Zhuo Yang didn’t hear his anger at all, and wanted to take credit. “When I found you, you were seriously injured, and the escape pod was almost out of oxygen. If not, I…”

“Zhuo Yang, are you crazy? Who gave you the courage. I can’t even guarantee I can survive such a thing, why did you rush in there? Don’t you want to live anymore?” Moodys was so angry that he wanted to tear Zhuo Yang’s head off and see what’s inside.

Knowing that he dared to rush over to find him without hiding from the space tearing vortex… Zhuo Yang didn’t want his life.

Did he want to rush over to bury him?

Moodys wanted to beat him up to let him know what it means to be high and mighty. “You— you just don’t know how to live or die!”

“Cough, cough—” After knowing that Zhuo Yang went through such a terrifying thing and dragged here with him, he was so angry that he almost had a heart attack, and violently coughed.

Zhuo Yang stepped forward and patted his back lightly, and was fearless. “You should be glad that I don’t know whether to live or die. If it wasn’t for me, you would be dead, you know?”

Thinking back now, remembering Moodys weak breath when he was pulled out of the escape pod, Zhuo Yang had lingering fears…

If it wasn’t for him, Moodys would be dead.

“You…you.” Moodys was so angry that he coughed again, spitting out the unknown liquid stuck in his throat. He subconsciously raised his hand to wipe it, and found that his hand was stained scarlet. “Blood…”

He thought it was his own blood, but suddenly recalled that the liquid should be the liquid that Zhuo Yang had poured into him in a daze during the past few days.

Moodys looked at Zhuo Yang subconsciously, and saw the bloody wound on Zhuo Yang’s wrist easily. He grabbed Zhuo Yang’s wrist furiously, and his heart skipped a beat without realizing it. “Are you crazy, Zhuo Yang?”

Although he has been in a coma for the past few days, he is still conscious.

In the chaos, he clearly remembered that he had been relying on this strange, sweet liquid to maintain his life.

In a coma, he couldn’t think about anything, so he subconsciously opened his mouth and swallowed.

But only now did he know that he had been drinking Zhuo Yang’s blood for the past few days… Zhuo Yang actually fed him his blood…

“You fed me your blood? How could you give your blood to me to drink?” Moody’s heart was full of mixed feelings. He was so shocked that he could no longer tell what state of mind he was in. “You first rush down with me and risk being torn apart in space, and then cut your wrists to get blood… Do you really want to die!”

Is it really worth Zhuo Yang paying so much for him? Moodys can’t imagine it…

What the hell is he capable of?

“I don’t have the ability to hunt. Even if I can find wild fruits and grass roots to feed my hunger, yu were seriously injured at the time. If I didn’t feed you blood, how could I get something to keep you alive?” Zhuo Yang was not at all flustered, and he asked rhetorically.

Moodys looked at him, his eyes reddening unconsciously, and he was speechless for a while: “You…”

“Besides, it is meaningless to mention what has happened now. No matter what I do, as long as we are still alive, it is good and worth it.” Zhuo Yang smiled at him, and used the medicine to heal his wounds. “Just remember, you owe me another life. You owe me a total of 2 lives. As long are you’re good to me and aren’t sorry is this life, that’s enough.”

Moodys made a muffled voice from his throat: “Have you thought about it? If I die, what will you do?”

“You won’t die.” But before he could finish speaking, Zhuo Yang interrupted him first. “I won’t let you die, because if you die, I won’t know how to live the rest of my life.”

He said slowly, “So, you must not die, you can’t die.”

He just imagined such a scene, and his heart was burned to the core.

“Otherwise, otherwise I…” Zhuo Yang thought about it, and wanted to say something more.

Moodys suddenly hugged him and covered his mouth with his hand. He didn’t want to listen to the answer anymore.

He didn’t want to hear Zhuo Yang say anything unlucky.

Moodys only knew that what he owed Zhuo Yang this life wouldn’t be able to paid back until even the next life.

With their personal terminals and mecha broken, Zhuo Yang and Moodys couldn’t judge where they were, or even whether they were still in Osphia.

Under such circumstances, waiting for search and rescue is unlikely.

Fortunately, life exists and this planet is suitable for survival. In this interstellar space, whether it is the Empire or Alliance, as long as it is a living and suitable planet for survival, it is almost impossible to be undeveloped.

As long as it is developed, there will be people living there.

As long as they can find people…

After Moodys woke up, they rested for two more days. They all felt that they could no longer sit still and continuing living like this.

After removing all the useful supplies from the fragments of the two mechas and the escape pod, Moodys and Zhuo Yang decided to walk in one direction along the east and leave the forest.

They walked for more than half a month.

Along the way, they relied on Moodys’ hunting and Zhuo Yang picking wild fruits to survive. Although it was boring, it’s not boring to have each other’s company… Moodys is very worried about the situation of Emperor Star, but now he can’t think about such things now.

The two walked and rested all the way east.

Finally, one evening, Zhuo Yang faintly saw the smoke from some kitchen far away, and immediately said happily to Moodys: “Moodys, look at the smoke. There must be someone where the smoke is coming from.”

“Yes.” Moodys responded to him in a low voice, his voice a little vague for some reason.

In the past few days, maybe it was because of serious illness or because they had stayed in the wild for too long, after taking all the antipyretic medicines from the mecha and the escape cabin, there was still no improvement…

Even the scars burned by zerg venom on his face have a tendency to relapse, turning into scarlet, festering wounds.

Zhuo Yang was worried, but they had no choice but to keep going forward, hoping to meet people, find a way to get in touch with Gu Che and the others, and return to Osphia for a detailed diagnosis.

“It’s great, it’s great, Moodys.” Zhuo Yang took Moodys’s hand, and let it go excitedly. Although he was already very tired, he seemed to be full of chicken blood all of a sudden and rushed forward.

Seeing his cheerful back, Moodys frowned and felt an almost invisible pain in his palm-

The place on his hand Zhuo Yang just pulled on slowly started to break and fester…

Moodys suddenly had a very bad feeling in his heart.

In the evening, when Zhuo Yang asked about the wound on Moodys’ hand, Moodys immediately found a perfunctory excuse.

After seeing the smoke, they walked for two more days before they saw the town.

As soon as they reached the edge of the town, they encountered a space magnetic field station that could be teleport. After exchanging some medicines for the planet’s planetary currency, they entered the space magnetic field.

Because they were not familiar with this planet, they chose a place called ‘Central Square’, hoping to arrive the most prosperous spot on the planet.

When they reached the central square, they saw a pair of huge stone statues of a man and a woman who were suspected to be a couple standing in the center of the square. The statues were surrounded by flowers, showing the love the planet’s residents had towards this pair of stone figures.

When he saw the stone statue, Zhuo Yang’s heart suddenly became cold. To be able to erect a statue of a real person in the central square of the planet, the stone carving must be of a great man of this country.

For example, the capital star of Osphia has a statue of the founding emperor or a statue of Moodys…

But the men and women in this pair of stone statues are people Zhuo Yang has never seen before.

In other words, this is probably not the territory of Osphia, but the territory of the Alliance.

Zhuo Yang’s thoughts turned. He quickly recalled the Alliance language he had learned but was not familiar with, thinking of what kind of lie to conjure in his mind to get a personal terminal to get in touch with Osphia, and how to return without exposing their identities.

“Mom, these are the flowers I bought today. Let’s give them to Marshal and Teacher Feng together.” At this moment, a mother and daughter passed by them, and the little girl said in a tender voice with flowers in hand.

The mother responded softly: “Okay~”

They spoke Osphian. Although there was some accent, Zhuo Yang could still understand everything.

This isn’t the Alliance, but Osphia’s territory…

“You… hello…” Zhuo Yang jumped up and hurried forward to stop the mother and daughter.

The mother-daughter pair were startled by  Zhuo Yang, who had been a savage life for more than half a month, wearing dirty and torn clothes. They thought they ran into a lunatic, but stopped after seeing Zhuo Yang’s beautiful face. It was the girl who spoke first: “Brother…Brother, what’s the matter with you?”

Zhuo Yang sighed. He was clean by nature. Although his clothes were dirty and difficult to manage, his face and hair were always clean and his beard was shaved. It’s good to be clean.

He looked at the mother and daughter and asked, “Beautiful lady, lovely lady, where is this place?”

“Central… the central square.” The mother looked at Zhuo Yang’s face. Although she admitted he was the best-looking person she had ever seen, she suspected there was something wrong with Zhuo Yang’s brain.

Zhuo Yang asked very politely: “No, no, I know this is the central square. What I want to ask you is… Do you know what planet this is?”

“This… This is the Jiuwei Star.”

“This is Jiuwei Star.”

After he asked this question, Moodys’ affirmative voice sounded at the same time as the mother’s.

“How did you know?” Zhuo Yang looked at Moodys in confusion.

Moodys, however, pointed to the couple’s statue under the stone statue. There was a line of text that they hurriedly ignored introducing the identity of the couple: “Marshal Xue Zhanting of Osphia and his wife Feng Chu.”

Jiuwei Star is the hometown of Mrs. Xue Zhanting. Back then, Xue Zhanting, as the imperial marshal, brought the idea of ​​equality and freedom to the battered Jiuwei Star, which had been long-oppressed by star thieves and the Alliance, awakening their souls and winning the heart of the lady.

When Xue Zhanting was still a marshal, there were stone statues all over Osphia, displaying his honor.

But after he was convicted of treason and nailed to the pillar of shame, all the stone statues of Xue Zhanting were smashed to pieces. Only a few planets occupied by the Xue Family army star thieves and his wife’s hometown did they still remain.

It’s just that on the planets occupied by the Xue Family army, only had him, and there was no one accompanying him.

And Xue Zhanting’s stone statue on the Jiuwei Star is with his wife…

Zhuo Yang listened to Moodys’ words and recalled the legend he had heard about this Marshal Xue. He immediately turned to take a closer look, seeing a man dressed in military uniform with a solemn expression, standing there with his quantum beast five-clawed blue dragon carved behind him, and a woman with picturesque eyebrows and gentle demeanor on his side. She held a book in her hand, snuggled up to his side, and her quantum beast, a small white fox, was by her feet.

Seeing this pair of men and women who can only be recorded in stone statues, Zhuo Yang inexplicably thought of what Changdi Qing, Dean, had said. “This loving pair, it’s really a pity.”

“…Jiuwei Star is the site of the Old Yellow Fox.” After seeing the stone statues of the marshal and his wife, Zhuo Yang suddenly remembered this.

Jiuwei star is the hometown of Mrs. Xue Zhanting, but now it is the site of the largest arms dealer in the universe, the Old Yellow Fox… And everyone knew the Old Yellow Fox hated the Osphia royal family.

If they want to get out of Jiuwei Star – the difficulty factor is no less than in the Alliance.

Moreover, what is even worse is that the network here is closed, which means that even if they borrow a personal terminal, they can only contact inhabitants on Jiuwei Star, and cannot reach Osphia’s side at all.

Moodys responded in a low voice, feeling dizzy: “… en.”

He nearly fell to the ground, but quickly regained his feet. Zhuo Yang was startled immediately, and asked carefully: “You… what’s the matter with you? Do we need to see a doctor?”

“No… It’s okay…” Moodys comforted him with a weak smile.

Just then, the mother and daughter behind them saw the festering on Moodys’ face and hands, and screamed: “Pan…Pandora…”

“It’s the pandora virus!”

As soon as their voices came out, it immediately caused panic among the people around.

The pandora virus was created by the crazy crown prince Hannibal 85 years ago in order to conduct human grafting experiments. The initial symptoms were persistent high fever, then the whole body festered, and then the limbs and arms fell off. After being severed, Hannibal took the opportunity to attach animal limbs to people disabled by the virus.

Later, for some unknown reason, the virus got out of control—

It became a huge plague. People who got the virus continued to have low-grade fever, and their bodies began to fester, and finally they festered, rotted, and died.

It’s a very scary virus.

At that time, Osphia decided to separate the inner and outer galaxies because of the inability to solve the virus, to prevent the pandora virus from spreading to the inner galaxies.

So much so that these outer galaxies and border planets became lost places. Purgatories on earth.

Later, it was only by relying on researchers from other galaxies that they saved themselves and developed the correct way to deal with pandora virus, to suppress the virus from spreading.

Unexpectedly, after so long, the name of this virus appeared again at this time.

“Don’t talk nonsense. Pandora has disappeared for so many years, how could it be pandora? His face was injured by zerg venom, not because of pandora.” Zhuo Yang vetoed.

The woman said: “Pandora virus spread throughout our Jiuwei Star before. I had it myself and won’t make a mistake. If you don’t believe me, just grab any part of his body and try to see if it will work. The skin will break within a minute and began to slowly fester…”

Zhuo Yang and Moodys’ hearts sank suddenly.

 

Out of one bad situation into another one.

 

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