Apocalypse Forecast

"Hey? Are you there?"

And the answer from the Broken Dog was: not here, ptooey!

It turned out that not only was there no one inside, but the molten streams of the Broken Dog almost ruined his face.

In his anger, Huai Shi simply wrapped this dog’s foul mouth with several tight loops; he really couldn’t understand where this thing learned all this!

Fortunately, besides its fondness for gnawing on metal objects, this dog didn’t cause Huai Shi much trouble.

The only inconvenient thing was its apparent decision to bind with him, never straying more than three steps away, even when Huai Shi went to the bathroom, it would lean on the partition and look down at him.

A pair of dignified dog eyes witnessing Huai Shi’s embarrassing moments.

Frustrated, Huai Shi crafted an iron eye mask for it and welded it shut.

By the time Huai Shi stepped off the border express, the entire carriage was almost gnawed empty by this creature.

Standing at the door, Huai Shi hesitated, wanting to speak but stopping.

In the end, he couldn’t contain his inner expectations and asked Marcus, "Brother, uh... can your post office reimburse this?"

Then it was Marcus’s turn to show an interesting expression.

Reimburse?

This thing needs us to reimburse it too!

Besides, is this a travel expense or a hospitality expense?

However, looking at Huai Shi’s expectant eyes, after being stunned for a while, he actually didn’t know how to refuse. His expression twitched, and he could only nod with difficulty.

"...I’ll... I’ll try my best."

Perhaps the peculiar setting of everything going wrong frightened the Mercury Institution’s higher-ups; after experiencing it first-hand, they didn’t dare to use planes to ferry Huai Shi anymore.

For the journey to the Pompeii Space Base, all they had was a self-pay, beat-up jeep.

And it was a convertible.

All the way, they ate a mouthful of dust and dirt.

By the time they arrived outside the base’s gate, both man and dog had turned grey, resembling refugees fleeing a disaster.

And Marcus, who was responsible for driving, actually breathed a sigh of relief.

For the first time, the battle-hardened Roman agent felt that escorting was so difficult.

The difficulty was not in protecting the target, but in protecting himself next to the target...

At two in the morning, in the dead wilds, the base was still brightly lit, bustling with people. Marcus parked the car and handed over Huai Shi’s reception task to the base’s security chief.

"Well, my task ends here," Marcus said. "Next, you’ll undergo some basic physical tests, and by tomorrow morning you can board the latest Earth-Moon shuttle to the Minerva Space Station. If you have any requests, I can relay them for you."

"Uh... there aren’t really any requests."

Huai Shi scratched his head, looking up at the launch pad in the distance: "Just one question."

He asked uncertainly, "Your spacecraft... is it safe?"

It’s not about being safe or unsafe; it’s that kind of special...

Marcus hesitated, but the serious-looking security chief beside him answered, "SIR, the Caesar III spacecraft has flawlessly completed over forty transport and construction missions without any incidents. Please trust in our professional level; we’re absolutely foolproof!"

Fine, so if something happens on the forty-first time, it’s not my concern!

I trust your level, you should also trust my professional level!

Huai Shi scratched his head, feeling more and more uneasy.

When he looked down at the naive and innocent-smiling Broken Dog beside him, he remembered what was wrong.

No, when we get to the stratosphere, if this thing gets hungry and starts tearing things apart, what the hell am I going to do!

Fu Yi tossed over a little dog of friendship, directly elevating Huai Shi’s difficulty level to nightmare.

But the people around, unaware of this thing’s danger, would stop to pet the dog’s head with a smile, completely oblivious that what they were touching was a weapon of mass destruction!

I guess it’s just too perfectly disguised.

Amazingly, even the strictest blood toxicity tests allowed this thing through!

"Sir, your pet is quite healthy; it seems perfectly fit to accompany you on this space journey." The doctor was smiling as he petted the dog’s head: "Oh, what a little cutie, what’s its name?"

"..."

Huai Shi, expressionless, remained silent for a long time, "Just call it... Huai Zhisu... Huai Zhisu Dog."

"Kashi Motoku?" The doctor listened and realized: "Sounds like a Yingzhou name."

"Yeah, who isn’t saying that?"

Huai Shi glanced at the grinning Broken Dog and said coldly: "It’s probably a Shiba Inu."

"Uh, Shiba Inu isn’t that color, is it?"

"It’s got a strange disease, iron deficiency, you see it’s faded."

Huai Shi reached out, picked up the Broken Dog, which had shrunk several times in size to only reach his calves, and swung it around casually: "Weak and sickly, maybe it’ll get heatstroke or sprain a paw or get depressed or injured in space, and then it can be used as a reserve food supply to realize its life value as a dog."

Out of the doctor’s sight, the juvenile form of Behemoth raised its head and glared with blue, watery eyes, baring its teeth at him.

"Annoying kid, just wait until I get back!"

If I don’t tear down your house, I’ll take your surname...

"Hahaha, you guys have a great relationship." The doctor looked on enviously from the side, "You must treat it really well, right?"

"Yes, isn’t it obvious?"

Huai Shi smiled as he held the dog and responded, "Look, I really like it."

The broken dog in his arms opened its mouth suddenly, biting Huai Shi’s arm with force, twisting tightly. Huai Shi’s smile twitched a bit as he grabbed the dog’s head and held it tighter.

They grew even closer.

Such happy days seemed endless.

.

The next morning.

Huai Shi, having slept for only three hours, got up and layered himself piece by piece into the space suit, then put on the helmet. Even though Rome’s most advanced technology had repeatedly compressed it, the space suit remained bulky and felt just like wearing Iron Armor, making movement incredibly slow and difficult.

Even the dog had a set.

Wearing this outfit, Huai Shi’s agility was reduced by more than half, and with five thick fingers, he probably couldn’t even hold a sword steadily.

But there’s no choice but to wear it.

If anything goes wrong, he’ll die.

He’s not strong enough to reason with the vacuum of the universe, let alone the terrifying cold and radiation... Not having reached the Fourth Stage, to complete the full Source Materialization of his body, he was merely relying on the Mountain Ghost’s talent to last longer than ordinary people.

But before that, the internal pressure would explode like a deep-sea fish ascending too quickly...

To Sublimators, space remains a dead end.

Otherwise, there wouldn’t be Lunar Prisons.

To this day, it remains the place where the Astronomical Society imprisons dangerous criminals, who due to their enormous threat to the world, cannot be kept but also can’t be killed because of their talents or other values.

Cannot be thrown to Hell, nor retained in the Current Circumstances.

So, they can only be cast to the Dark Side of the Moon, in a place unseen by Earth for thousands of years, quietly waiting for the day when they might be reused as tools.

Huai Shi once discussed with Ai Qing whether the General would be sent there.

But given the General’s cooperation during capture and other considerations, he was only thrown into the Sea Trench Prison, isolated under the colossal pressure of the deep sea trench.

But on the Moon, there is more than just prisons.

There are a multitude of laboratories and research bases for conducting key research that is not suitable to be carried out in the Current Circumstances and cannot be placed at the Border or Hell.

Now, almost every inch of the place is filled with flags of the Five Constants—though the land belongs to all humanity, you must be able to go up there, right?

Otherwise, what difference is there between the land on the Moon and a regular shareholder’s profits in the stock market?

They are merely theoretical constructs.

Now, at this moment, just outside Pompeii City, atop the volcano, from the launch pad set up around the crater came the countdown from the launch center.

The surrounding heat gathered rapidly, causing the solidified lava in the crater to begin melting again, bursting with intensely bright light.

Even during the initial design of the launch base, this volcano had been taken into account—all was aimed at efficiently converting geothermal heat as governed by rules to save fuel for the First Stage, making the launch process even more convenient.

Now, Huai Shi sat in the back seat, watching the drivers in front operate, and after shifting his gaze, he focused intently on the broken dog beside him.

He monitored it carefully lest it decide to take a bite out of something on the spacecraft that seemed tasty.

The cabin walls are thin; if they get chewed through, everyone will perish.

Meanwhile, on the seat specially prepared for transporting animals, the broken dog seemed completely unaware of what’s happening, bending down, raising its hind leg, rotating and swirling like a tornado, attempting to scratch its itchy ear roots through the helmet.

Against the backdrop of the countdown, a series of popping sounds echoed.

As the moment "0" appeared, Huai Shi’s vision went black.

He felt hundreds of times his weight pressing onto his body, almost embedding him into the seat—accompanied by the deafening sound of engines, the terrifying acceleration began.

Countless chaotic sounds converged from all directions.

The vibration of the engines, the faint roar of rolling fuel, the subtle vibrations as the heat-resistant tiles gradually cracked and turned red, and even the low sound from every piece of iron and screw.

All gathered into one, forming a tide, passing through the protective suit into Huai Shi’s hands.

His sense, as though invisible eyes, vaguely appeared, radiating outward along the touch of objects.

He felt the turbulent airflow stirred as the air was ignited and the roaring winds.

His consciousness coursed over the steel, looking down, sensing the earth rapidly becoming remote.

At that moment, Huai Shi opened his eyes.

Through the complex steel structure, he glimpsed the approaching azure sky, and beyond, the Dark Origin of the Cosmic.

In the dim world, behind the thick clouds, within the oppressive leaden gray-black, a sudden scarlet light appeared, igniting the darkness, daringly stretching, upward, forward, outlining the burning trace.

As if ready to ignite it all.

Tearing through all constraints, ascending height, traversing between heaven and earth.

Venturing beyond the skies...

In a human body, wielding steel, traversing the realm once solely belonged to the gods, casting everything on earth behind.

He is flying!