CHAPTER 312: CHAPTER 312 NOBLE SACRIFICE ()

A deafening crash echoed through the entire hall. In terror, the members of the Venerate Saints Monastery "captured" by the walls, floor, and control consoles saw part of the Control Hall descend from the ceiling, crashing directly onto the Sage’s head.

The trapped cultists struggled violently, attempting to break free of the iron restraints, but only felt the shackles growing heavier. A rage—emanating directly from the now sentient ship, seemingly soaking every wall, pipe, and line here—was rising from all directions.

Then, the pipe that had descended from above was slowly lifted by someone.

The white-robed Sage stood up. With each subtle movement, his body became increasingly taller and stronger. When he first emerged from beneath the pipe, he was a tall, thin old man, but when he straightened up, he had transformed into a majestic warrior over two meters tall, with a physique so perfect it resembled a heroic statue.

The wrinkles symbolizing old age faded, the sunken cheeks grew full and lustrous, and the once overly loose white robe now fit snugly as a short gown. He looked up at the steel-cast face on the wall, bright blue sparks of electricity dancing between his beard and hair, his expression awe-inspiring and fearless, carrying an aura seemingly of a deity of the mortal world.

He stepped forward, thunder erupting underfoot: "The greatness and necessity of the Path of Venerate Saint are beyond your comprehension!"

A cultist trapped in the iron cage suddenly became excited. Despite being bound, he shouted loudly, "The Sage has completed the ultimate transformation! We are saved!"

Other members of the monastery in the hall were also thrilled at seeing the Sage’s current form, as if witnessing the descent of a savior before them. Even though they couldn’t comprehend how the Sage could resist a ship alive and antagonist to everyone, they cheered, feeling hope rekindle.

Yu Sheng said nothing, but instead tore two pieces of iron from the hall walls, hurling them like cannonballs at the massive white-robed old man while softening the ground beneath him, disrupting the hall’s gravity, and transforming everything he could control into means of attack and entangle, unleashing an offensive.

Thunder erupted in the hall, iron rained down like a tempest, while the white-robed giant soared amidst the chaotic gravitational field, commanding thunder to face the storm of iron. A rocky texture appeared on his seemingly flesh-and-blood body, enduring the iron blocks pelting him, releasing a powerful thunderclap at the face on the opposite wall.

Yet, this meant nothing to Yu Sheng.

His body now was the entire ship, and the face in the hall was merely an "interface" for communication.

Thuderbolt Power exploded on the wall, turning into vast swathes of electric light and scorching molten marks, flowing across the metal surface. Yu Sheng’s face was melted and deformed in the thunder, then faded, yet in an instant, eyes opened on the ceiling, overlooking the floating Sage.

"You don’t seem to care much about your ’comrades’ survival either," Yu Sheng said leisurely.

A few members of the monastery trapped in the hall’s walls had been charred by the aftermath of the Thunderbolt Power, now reduced to piles of carbon amidst the metal-formed cages, emitting wisps of smoke.

The cheering in the hall gradually subsided.

The robust old man, wrapped in thunder, merely turned around, looking fearlessly at the now even larger face on the ceiling: "This is also a noble sacrifice—"

The next second, his already enlarged body suddenly swelled violently once more, illuminated by even more severe lightning!

The massive body exceeded the limit of "robust," muscles bulging into grotesque and terrifying masses, limbs extending and deforming, even the skin rupturing inch by inch. Blinding lightning scorched the flesh beneath, flowing and dripping like some viscous fluid. The symbolic white robe of dignity and status turned to ash, and within a few breaths, the "Sage" transformed into a mass filled with electric light, an unrecognizable mutated giant beast, coarse bolts of electricity erupting from his limbs, sweeping across the hall’s floor, turning a dozen more monastery members into carbon with the aftermath.

"It’s all a noble sacrifice!"

Yu Sheng’s ventilation fans drew a sharp breath of exhaust from the reactor: "What the hell, you’re killing your own people more fiercely than I am?!"

Exclaiming, he didn’t idle. A series of thunderous roars resounded throughout the hall, the ship’s structure linked to the cabin rapidly changing. Metal was being extracted, transferred, and shaped, and two giant palms instantly formed from the side walls, clapping toward the floating mutated giant beast!

He needed to find a way to quickly deal with this increasingly powerful and mentally unstable old man; otherwise, the cultists here would be killed off by him!

The metal palms clapped together with a thunderous roar.

However, in just the next second, blinding electricity shot from within the palms. Under Yu Sheng’s astonished gaze, he saw the two palms being slowly pried apart, bright white hot materials dripping from the air like blood. The thunder-encircled mutated giant beast reappeared before him—the beast had completely lost its original shape, even as if smashed flat by the previous clap, now forcibly reshaped.

From the swollen, writhing mass sprouted seven or eight arms, prying open the closed metal palms bit by bit.

A roaring voice emerged from within the electric light—

"They are unstable after multiple iterations, not yet ascended to be loyal and steadfast noble beings—it’s better for me to send them prematurely to be alongside the sages, while their souls remain pure, rather than let them disgrace themselves by revealing secrets to the enemy!"

Yu Sheng: "...?!"

Yet what surprised him even more was that those surviving members of the monastery in the hall, after hearing the Sage’s declaration akin to a death sentence and betrayal, instead of being angry or shaken, began to shout—

"Embark on the Path of Venerate Saint!"

"Martyrdom! Martyrdom! Martyrdom!"

"Salute to you—witness the way of perfection!"

A fervent, ecstatic, and chaotic atmosphere filled the hall, leaving Yu Sheng utterly shocked. It was his first time witnessing such a frenzied and disordered scene, where the irrational path of rampant destruction was pursued with vigorous zeal under the guise of "belief." Right at the next moment, he noticed that a far fiercer lightning burst from the abnormal giant beast with its massive palms spread wide.

"Its" body was swelling rapidly, and something was about to burst from within.

"This too is a noble sacrifice!"

Yu Sheng: "What the hell!?"

Though he couldn’t fathom how much black technology this Venerate Saints Monastery possessed or understand how a living person could transform into such a form in such a short time, Yu Sheng was certain of one thing—once this Sage orb exploded here, not a single cultist in the entire hall would survive, and it could even blow the ship’s central structure to smithereens!

He didn’t have the confidence to repair this place after such massive destruction—this was a far cry from reconnecting a few pipes and wires.

So he unhesitatingly opted for the backup plan of the backup plan.

At the end of the Control Hall, a heavy polymer porthole emitted a sharp tremor, and then suddenly burst open with a large hole.

Accompanied by the ear-piercing alarm of gas leakage and the fierce wind that swept through the hall, the ship’s interior space faced the vacuum of space directly, with an astonishing suction emanating from the rupture. At the same time, a gigantic pipe crashed down from the ceiling, sweeping horizontally like a baton, striking the rapidly swelling mutant beast with incredible force.

"Off you go!"

The "Sage" let out an already dissonant roar amid the gale; due to the sudden change in air pressure, his final scream sounded bizarre and terrifying. However, in the face of the uncontrollable gravity, powerful impact, and the terrifying suction of the space vacuum, this monster ultimately couldn’t stabilize itself, being hurled out of the "Order Pillar" like a cannonball.

In the next second, the broken porthole was swiftly repaired, and before the surviving members of the Monastery in the hall died from vacuum and hypothermia, Yu Sheng promptly sealed up the hole on the spacecraft.

His gaze then immediately turned outward.

The mutant beast flung into space continued to speed away from the Order Pillar in the vacuum, with its entire body covered in glaring electric light pulsating like a violently beating heart. As Yu Sheng watched it fly farther away, he was already prepared to brace for an imminent explosion impact—though there shouldn’t be any shockwaves in space, the impact from such a massive burst of energy at close range wouldn’t be trivial either.

He steeled his nerves.

The mutant beast, formed from the Sage, contracted violently a few times, then continued to fly farther away, farther away...

And it really just kept flying farther away.

Moreover, it was accelerating—in the end, it turned directly into a streak of light streaking across the stars.

Yu Sheng: "...?"

...

"A noble sacrifice, a noble sacrifice... Bearing infamy is also a sacrifice..."

In the depths of space, the mutant beast contemplated in rage, enduring immense pain from the intense radiation and low temperature in the cosmic environment, but he knew he had survived that terrifying Ghost.

From the formless mass of flesh, a slender limb emerged, tightly gripping a talisman: a ruby embedded within double concentric rings glowed brightly.

He injected his thoughts into this beacon.

"This, this is Babor-3, requesting... requesting to expend a grace protection, any coordinates will do, I’m... I’m dying... I’m carrying crucial information!"

A flash streaked across the pitch-black deep space, and "Sage" Babor-3 vanished into the vastness of space.