Taking the opportunity, they posed the question that had been burning in their minds to the weary-faced commander.

“General, these attacking creatures seem to be of fixed types, and they appear…” Jie Ming chose his words carefully, “…as if they are some kind of mass-produced cannon-fodder units?”

The commander gave Jie Ming a surprised glance, clearly not expecting a “technical consultant” to notice that detail.

He nodded, his tone heavy. “Correct. These are nothing more than their expendable vanguard. The real trouble comes from the higher-intelligence ones farther back—the main ‘blue-skinned devils’ who pilot those bizarre vehicles. They are the true commanders and the truly difficult opponents.”

“Blue-skinned devils?” Rex seized on the term at once. “Are there any specimens or captives we could study?”

“Hmm. The name comes from their blue skin. We’ve recovered some wreckage, but never much; they seem to have self-destruct mechanisms, or their comrades retrieve them quickly. It’s extremely difficult to obtain an intact research sample.” The commander shook his head. “We don’t have any on hand right now.”

This left Jie Ming and Rex disappointed.

For the next few days, they behaved with unusual obedience.

They made no further requests to visit dangerous zones, instead quietly analyzing the observational data provided by the base.

Occasionally, under absolute protection, they conducted environmental parameter collection on the base perimeter.

It wasn’t that they didn’t want more data; they were simply well aware that, suppressed to the level of ordinary mortals, stepping onto the battlefield would be no different from suicide.

Their “cooperation” and “professionalism” earned the commander’s favor, and security around them gradually relaxed.

To satisfy their stated need for “more detailed battlefield environmental data,” the commander even arranged for an experienced, well-equipped squad to escort them to a region relatively close to the front line that had just seen a small clash, allowing a “field survey.”

Yet during this very survey, the unexpected happened.

“Alert! Enemy attack!”

Amid the shrill alarm, Jie Ming and Rex nimbly took cover behind the escort squad.

Only after confirming no ambush on their side did they cautiously peer through remote observation devices at the so-called enemy.

It was a group of about a dozen “alien” units—a mix of several Meltcore Hound-like creatures and two crude, insect-limbed walking mechs.

For some reason this squad had slipped through the forward warning net and appeared on a flank hillside, running straight into the escort team.

The enemy seemed equally surprised to encounter opposition. Though the two walking mechs hadn’t yet reacted, the surrounding bio-beasts had already assumed attack postures.

“Protect the technical personnel!” the escort captain roared.

The well-trained soldiers instantly fanned out into a semicircle.

Energy rifles spat searing beams; automated turrets rapidly unfolded from the transport vehicles, forming an impromptu defensive line.

Combat erupted suddenly and fiercely.

Fireballs spewed by the Meltcore Hounds burst into brilliant, deadly halos against energy shields. The mechs’ rapid-fire energy weapons plowed scorched furrows into the ground.

Thanks to superior firepower and equipment, the escort squad firmly held the upper hand.

Precise marksmanship and seamless coordination quickly suppressed and annihilated the isolated enemy squad.

The entire engagement was thrilling yet ultimately safe; under the soldiers’ tight protection, Jie Ming and Rex barely felt threatened.

But their eyes were locked on the two walking mechs that had been priority-targeted and now lay paralyzed and smoking.

Combat ended. The soldiers began sweeping the battlefield.

They cautiously inspected every “corpse” to ensure no lingering threat.

“Sir! One of the mechs has its core destroyed, but the hull is relatively intact!” a soldier reported loudly.

Jie Ming and Rex felt their hearts leap. They exchanged a glance, and Rex immediately requested of the captain, “Captain, this relatively intact enemy vehicle is of immense research value! It might help us discover their weaknesses. Please allow us to bring it back to base for analysis!”

The captain looked at the two “shaken yet duty-bound” technical experts, then at the strange mech—damaged but structurally mostly whole.

After a moment’s consideration, he nodded.

Truthfully, he didn’t expect they would find anything new; the military had studied “blue-skinned devil” technology countless times.

But he also knew how insatiable researchers’ curiosity could be. Since the transport could haul it back with little extra effort, and—more importantly—having the thing meant they could end this boring escort duty early, he agreed.

With the soldiers’ help, the alien mech—reeking of burnt oil and something strange—was carefully loaded onto the transport and brought to a classified research warehouse at the rear base.

With the commander’s tacit approval, the two immediately threw themselves into dissecting the machine.

When they pried open the twisted armor, the cockpit revealed the remains of a pilot long devoid of vital signs.

As the commander had said, it was a non-humanoid creature.

Its skin was an unnatural indigo blue. Slightly slimmer than the average human, with a proportionally larger head. Facial features were seventy to eighty percent human-like, yet it possessed many octopus-like appendages and no visible hair.

However, when Rex used the base’s medical scanners for an in-depth autopsy, they made a far more shocking discovery.

“Jie Ming, look here!” Rex pointed at the holographic projection of the creature’s internal structure, his voice trembling with suppressed excitement. “Beside its circulatory system—this parallel network of conduits that resembles a neural net yet is distinctly different… this structure, these potential node placements…”

Jie Ming stared intently. As a wizard, he was intimately familiar with how energy flowed through living bodies.

The complex meridian-like system before him, though differing in details from any cultivation system he knew, was unmistakably designed for the efficient guidance and containment of some form of transcendent energy!

In other words, this was a physiological foundation inherently capable of spellcasting!

This species was very likely born with the potential for supernatural power.

Only under this plane’s unique suppressive rules had that innate advantage been nullified, leaving them helplessly outmatched by humanity.

Jie Ming and Rex locked eyes, both seeing the same realization in the other.

“During all my travels, aside from a very few exceptions, the dominant species on every planet has still been human,” Jie Ming said suddenly.

“Given this situation,” Rex murmured, “the primary civilization of this plane’s ‘natives’ is almost certainly the human society we currently inhabit. And these ‘aliens,’ including all those earlier cannon-fodder creatures… any non-humanoid lifeform is deliberately designated by this plane’s ‘system’ as the ‘enemy faction.’”

After all, the living conditions of humans and other races were worlds apart. And according to Jie Ming’s records over the years, humanity faced more than one alien species in the news.

Such an obvious disparity in living standards—unless the entity behind the curtain had peculiar preferences—meant the mastermind of this plane treated humanity as the protagonist.

“But why?” Rex pushed up his glasses; cold light glinted across the lenses. “With the capabilities this system has demonstrated, maintaining absolute peace, even forcing a grand unity of all races, would be child’s play. Why go to the immense trouble of orchestrating a perpetual, seemingly meaningless interstellar war?”

Jie Ming could only shake his head regretfully.

This new question, of course, had no answer yet.

But for explorers, the question itself was a signpost pointing toward truth.

At the very least, Jie Ming and Rex now knew for certain: this war was not natural. It had been deliberately designed.

And the purpose behind designing this war might well be one of the critical keys to unlocking the entire mystery.