Starting Cultivation in Wasteland

Little Lake had deployed a large number of monitoring devices nearby and discovered the opposing side when it was still six million kilometers away.

Just as everyone was preparing for battle, Flower Scorpion angrily cursed, "It must be the military playing tricks..."

She felt that she and the boss had been unreasonably harassed for over a day, certainly to stall their side so the other could catch up.

However, the details involved "Golden Cicada Shedding Its Shell," and explaining further would touch upon near-Earth teleportation, which she couldn’t talk about.

Qu Jianlei thought things weren’t that simple. Did the military send someone to chase them just to vent some anger?

There indeed were people who acted on impulse, but it wasn’t common.

"Forget it, I’ll go check if someone has been implanted with a locator."

An hour later, he discovered it—not a locator, but purely an insider was emitting signals!

The insider was an A-level under Patrice, who openly expressed support for her in the Marquis’s mansion.

Patrice was quite upset by this and initially refused to accept the reality.

She even asked the person, "Have I not been sincere enough, or didn’t I pay you enough? Why are you doing this to me?"

The person, without any guilt, bluntly replied, "There aren’t all dead men yet, why would a woman get to be Marquis?"

With a raised hand, Qu Jianlei cut off the person’s head, calmly saying, "He’s lying."

"His emotional fluctuations are abnormal, surely someone bought him off. There’s no need to provoke a gender conflict."

In fact, the nerves of Imperial people were much tougher than he imagined.

Palamera regretfully suggested, "We could actually search his soul to see who exactly is pursuing us."

But just then, Granny Jia, who had been mostly silent, suddenly spoke up, "Soul searching is not good for you."

"If you ever want to surpass the supreme, don’t carelessly use the Soul Searching Skill."

Palamera was stunned for over a second upon hearing this: We’re talking about verifying the enemy’s identity, why bring up surpassing the supreme?

However, immediately after, he was overjoyed, his delight obvious on his face, even his lips trembled.

"Thank you, senior, for your guidance... Can you tell me why?"

This was information about surpassing the supreme, something money couldn’t buy!

The other three supremos on the deck instantly perked their ears upon hearing it.

Granny Jia smiled, pointed to her own boss, and said nothing else.

When she was young, she was the type to set fires without putting them out, and now that attitude flared up again.

However, seeing that she pointed to Qu Jianlei, the four supremos instantly lost their spirit—he was the most difficult to deal with.

"Alright, let’s first leave the Shattered Star Belt," Qu Jianlei spoke up, "Does anyone know of a suitable battlefield?"

"Head to the Storm Star System!" Someone spoke, surprisingly it was the injured Supremo Cartier.

"On the way, we’ll pass through a large electromagnetic chaos belt, where the starship’s combat power won’t exceed ten percent, but we have many supremos."

In his view, they had six intact supremos, and in such a place, they could maximize their effectiveness.

Qu Jianlei replied, "We have more than one starship."

If I really listened to you, I’d lose my greatest advantage in space battles.

Upon hearing this, Cartier fell silent. His combat power had been severely diminished, leaving him unqualified to say more.

"Let’s head to the Black Zone," Genetic Vine suggested, "but the celestial phenomena there are a bit complex and demand more from ship handlers."

The Black Zone in the universe is a not-so-rare complex region with various celestial phenomena.

As such, it’s not convenient for outside observation—you might see something distorted, though it’s not that it can’t be observed.

"Then the Black Zone it is," Big Head Butterfly straightforwardly stated, "This Black Zone in particular doesn’t faze me."

Qu Jianlei had great trust in Little Lake’s words, "Then the Black Zone it is!"

Since the insider’s signaling device was always in his hand, the two groups of starships, one chasing and one fleeing, headed straight for the Black Zone.

The distance between them exceeded four million kilometers.

Though the three pursuing starships were powerful, they couldn’t discern what type of ships they were chasing.

In fact, they had no idea where the opposing starships originated from.

"Did they repair a damaged starship? In space, who has such abnormal repair skills?"

"Maybe they stole someone else’s starship, there are several supremos aboard. Once they decide to throw decorum to the wind, who can stop them?"

"I’m curious how they got out of the Shattered Star Belt, could they have received reinforcements?"

"Rest assured, reinforcements won’t get past the military... at least we would know if that happened."

Indeed, Flower Scorpion was not wronging the military; the two sides were indeed colluding.

And just like that, a pursuit-escape game dragged on for five days.

As the distance drew closer to four million kilometers, the former plunged headlong into the Black Zone.

"Is this their last struggle?" the pursuers behind laughed.

In fact, over the past two days, they had realized the other’s intentions, but... would the Black Zone actually help?

The three starships they displayed were not all they had; back then, three against one was enough.

Now they have five starships in total: one imitation warship and four armed merchant ships,

A previous warship had already left—it was a real warship, just temporarily disguised, looking somewhat odd.

The warship had a time limit and had to leave, but a hidden armed merchant ship joined the fleet.

As for the two additional armed merchant ships, they joined the fleet later through a mix of coercion and inducement.

Then again, what they’re doing now is illegal, and if anyone was determined not to get involved, no one could force them.

This particular Black Zone is quite large, with a diameter of over twenty million kilometers.

For the pursuers, it’s a significant challenge, but for the escapees, it’s no different.

Theoretically, they could escape the Black Zone by fleeing in a straight line, but that’s not realistic!

In the Black Zone, no one can achieve "straight," as both human eyes and instruments are deceived.

This is not normal space; no one dares to enter a Black Zone directly during interstellar travel.

However, escaping the Black Zone is not impossible; with careful observation and calculation, it’s possible to come out given some time.

To the pursuers, the opponent seems desperate, trying to break into the Black Zone for a last chance.

But are they afraid? With five starships together, even if they have to push through, they can pave a path.

Ultimately, this Black Zone isn’t extremely dangerous; more than one starship has escaped before.

It’s just a pity the Black Zone is dynamically changing; otherwise, knowing the escape route would make it fearless to wander inside.

Five against one, how can this be compared? Especially since the opponent has their locator.

"Finally... entered the Black Zone," Palamera’s expression was a bit peculiar.

For someone who dares to venture into the Maiden Star Realm for fortune, the Black Zone is not entirely unbearable.

Yet he asked, "What about our other support starships?"

"Really dare to chase in," Qu Jianlei murmured softly, "Entered the Black Zone, and I can blow up their five ships with just one."

"Fi-five ships?" Palamera was stunned, "Wasn’t it three?"

"Five ships," Qu Jianlei answered decisively, "One warship, four armed merchant ships."

The four Supreme looked at each other for a long while before Genetic Vine spoke in a deep voice, "We only encountered three before."

"Hmm, I trust you," Qu Jianlei replied casually, "Anyway, it doesn’t matter, just five ships."

Palamera asked in a deep voice, "Is there anything you want us to do?"

"Just watch silently," Qu Jianlei replied, "Alright... the first one."

The first one was the armed merchant ship that joined later, eager to make a contribution, it charged too far ahead.

Little Lake was entering the Black Zone for the first time, but had previously analyzed many cases.

After rushing into the Black Zone, it analyzed various data while complaining about its computational power still being inadequate.

However, at the edge of the Black Zone, the related information was relatively easier to calculate, and soon it deduced several countermeasures.

With enough hardware, artificial intelligence has much greater computing power than humans.

However, lacking enough comparative samples and learning content, it had to verify with Qu Jianlei on how to handle the situation.

With a brief analysis, Qu Jianlei determined that some curved force fields and refracted waves could be utilized.

"Just plant large antimatter space mines at these points."

Space mines were weapons from the early space era, gradually phased out later.

The reason was simply their lack of mobility and the ease of being detected—unless in complex space environments.

Ultimately, there’s too much space to maneuver in space, making this tactic uneconomical even in pre-set battlefields.

Gradually, this tactic was phased out, now only used occasionally at crucial passage points.

However, undoubtedly, due to their immobility, space mines emphasize explosive power.

Especially large space mines, usually much more formidable than a ship cannon’s main cannon—not exploding is fine, but if it explodes, it must be effective!

In Qu Jianlei’s reserves, there weren’t many large antimatter space mines; he forgot where he obtained them from.

Big Head Butterfly hesitated slightly, "Can we rely on luck for this?"

"It’s not much use keeping them," Qu Jianlei replied indifferently; objects without much usefulness shouldn’t take up space?

They’re not treasures to be preserved as a foundation.

Big Head Butterfly turned slightly, "They can be sold for money."

"Take it easy," Qu Jianlei was a bit unbearable, "Proceed with the planting quickly, space mines also need time to conceal."

After space mines are planted, they need some time to adapt to the surrounding space environment for maximum concealment.

Although this mainly doesn’t have much of a function, any little concealment is better than none.

It didn’t take long after the space mines were planted before, against all odds, the first pursuing starship collided into it.