[Super-Fused Yu Xian, Combat Power: 950]
The following day, inside the training room, Yu Xian completed the fusion and fell completely silent as he looked at his combat power.
He had imagined that he would one day reach the Li Rank, but he had never expected it to come so quickly. Even though he was still fifty points shy of the Li Rank, it truly was just a single step away.
If he wanted to, he even had ways right now to push his combat power up to 1,050.
"We're so strong after fusing! Big Brother, Big Sister, can we strut around Crescent Bay without fear now?" Little Nora asked happily upon learning their combat power.
Niman smiled and said, "Not just yet. Whatever you do, don't underestimate Crescent Bay. On the surface, Star-rank powerhouses are the absolute limit of Crescent Bay, but who knows what's hiding in the shadows."
In the past, she had also thought Crescent Bay was nothing special—just a pond overrun by a bunch of toads croaking all day long.
However, Little Nora's experience had made her realize Crescent Bay was not as simple as it appeared on the surface. That mysterious powerhouse who had fed Little Nora was definitely an existence above the Cosmos Rank—perhaps even a... Mighty One.
After all, even she could not have triggered Little Nora's atavism so effortlessly. Furthermore, the Victorious True King Bird was clearly an extraordinarily powerful bloodline. She could not even trigger Little Nora's atavism into a phoenix, let alone something like that.
"Isn't the reason strong people are strong simply because they're stronger than us? And since they're stronger than us, if they don't want us to discover them, how could we possibly find them?" Yu Xian said with a chuckle, stringing together words like a tongue-twister.
Nora chimed in right on cue, "Little Nora, even if we keep getting stronger and can strut around Crescent Bay without fear, we can't act recklessly. We won't bully others unprovoked, but if anyone tries to bully us... that's another story."
"Alright, let's begin today's training. This time, we'll practice rapid fusing, switching, disengaging, and combined strikes," Niman offered, bringing the topic to a close with a smile.
Yu Xian nodded. "Let's begin!"
The moment he gave the word, Muse promptly took control of the training room's energy simulation system, causing monster after monster to rapidly materialize.
Next, Yu Xian and his companions began battling the monsters, repeatedly fusing and separating. In the heat of the fight, Niman separated from his back; Yu Xian caught her hand and hurled her forward with force. In an instant, she spun through the air, circling behind the monster to form a pincer attack from front and rear.
Once the strike landed, they swiftly fused back together.
Their fusion could actually take place across considerable distances. As long as the light radiating from each of them touched, they could rapidly fuse, with one side transforming into light and melding into the primary host. They had even developed this method into a technique for dodging enemy attacks.
For example, if an enemy slashed a sword toward Yu Xian and he lacked the time to dodge, he could choose to end the fusion. Once he and Niman separated, their positions would shift, with the original position split between them.
This allowed them to neatly evade the incoming blade. As long as they mastered the direction of separation, it was far faster than conventional movement.
Of course, this demanded extraordinary tacit coordination. Without training to the point of handling any situation, things could easily go wrong, which was why Yu Xian and the others practiced whenever they had a free moment.
A technique like this was not something that could rely on coded signals.
There was simply no time to exchange signals. Only when a single motion or a minute gesture was enough for each to know what the other was thinking could it be executed seamlessly in real combat.
Yu Xian and the others trained for an entire day before walking out of the training room together, each heading back to their rooms to shower and rest.
Though Yu Xian was not exhausted, the others grew tired, particularly Little Nora and Little Huangquan—they were still young and needed proper rest. Furthermore, the baby girl conjured by Little Nora had been left in Muse's care during their training and now required Niman's attentive care.
Unable to sleep, Yu Xian showered and then headed straight for the warship's bridge.
The Aska indeed possessed a bridge, and an exceptionally spacious one at that. Niman was seated in one of the chairs bottle-feeding the baby, while Muse stood at the console monitoring the ship's status.
"Muse, how far are we from the signal source?" Yu Xian asked, taking a seat beside Muse with a cup of tea in hand.
Muse replied, "Captain, the Aska is thirty trillion light-years away from the tracker's signal source. At present, no stable spatial regions can be detected in this sector, making spatial jumps impossible. A conservative estimate indicates we still require—"
"Wait, wait, wait, hold on. How can we be that far off?" Yu Xian interrupted with a frown.
He did not even need his Super Brain to realize that if the distance was thirty trillion light-years and the Aska was flying at near-light speed, catching up to the signal source would conservatively take well over thirty trillion years.
Obviously, they could not afford that kind of time; otherwise, by the time they caught up, the trail would have gone completely cold.
"According to the analysis, someone is destroying stable spatial regions. This directly prevents us from performing spatial jumps, thereby widening the distance between us and the signal source," Muse replied.
Yu Xian's eyes widened instantly. He looked at Muse and asked, "Someone is destroying stable space, and you didn't tell me?"
"Because according to the analysis, even if Muse informed the Captain, the Captain would be powerless to do anything about it," Muse replied truthfully, not sparing Yu Xian's feelings in the slightest.
Yu Xian opened his mouth, but there was truly no refuting that. He was indeed powerless.
With the other party having already shattered space, what could he do? Aside from impotent rage, all that was left was more impotent rage.
"Can you analyze who destroyed it?" Yu Xian asked after a moment of silence, his tone distinctly disgruntled.
If he ever caught whoever it was, he would absolutely twist their head off and kick it like a ball. It infuriated him to no end.
"Based on an analysis of the residual spatial fragments, the saboteur used spatial shock bombs. Given their exorbitant cost, the user must be exceedingly wealthy. Beyond that, there are no further clues, so Muse cannot analyze further," Muse replied.
Exceedingly wealthy.
Departing one step ahead of them and wrecking space along the way.
The more Yu Xian heard, the more convinced he became that this unscrupulous bastard was almost certainly Hai Liwei. It was bad enough that the guy hadn't taken him along, but smashing the stable space after using it was simply crossing the line.
Of course, Yu Xian could also guess Hai Liwei's line of thinking.
After all, if Yu Xian could find out so quickly what sort of character Aska was, how could Hai Liwei not know just how wicked Aska truly was?
Hai Liwei was not worried about others having trackers, because as long as he set off first, he could sever the path behind him, leaving any pursuers helpless even if they wished to give chase.
It was just that Hai Liwei's stunt had ended up screwing over Yu Xian instead.
Feeling rather helpless, Yu Xian looked at Muse and asked, "Are there any other options?"
"We can scan for the nearest broken world and utilize it to perform a spatial jump. However, this action carries unknown risks and requires the Captain's authorization," Muse replied.
Hai Liwei could destroy those smaller spatial areas, but a broken world—no matter how dilapidated—remained an immense realm. Even if Hai Liwei wished to destroy it, he lacked the power to do so.
Otherwise, Hai Liwei would not be a Star-rank powerhouse, but a Cosmos-rank one.
Chapter 269