Chapter 1383: The Alien Space

At the top of the stairs leading to the upper level of the observatory, the door stood silently before Gawain and the others. It was forged from some unknown alloy, its once-smooth coating now chipped and faded. The inevitable wear and tear seemed to silently recount the sweeping changes of seven centuries to those who beheld it.

“Touching the door activates an authentication system,” Philip explained from the side. “If authentication fails, it won’t trigger any alarms or security measures; the door simply remains locked. We never figured out where its power source is—probably all on the other side. To be safe, we didn’t try to provoke it further.”

Diana stood before the door, staring at the weathered surface with a distant look. Then she furrowed her brow slightly. “I… actually remember this door. The director and the chief scholar rarely allowed ordinary guards into the observatory, but I have extra analytical functions, so sometimes I helped organize data here…”

“Do you remember how to open it?” Amber glanced at Diana skeptically, as if doubting this ancient android’s patchy memory. She couldn’t help but mutter, “If you’re stumped, I can try to figure something out…”

“I only recall that human staff needed a card to open this door. Guards with authorization, like me, only need to…” Diana murmured softly, almost to herself, following some inner prompt as she reached out and pressed her hand against the center of the door.

The next moment, everyone present heard a faint sizzling sound from both sides of the door. A stream of flowing light shimmered across the panels, quickly converging into a glowing green symbol. Then, from somewhere, a heavily distorted, crackling voice echoed out:

“Beep—Employee card authentication successful. ID EX-800, Senior Guard Diana. You have been absent without leave for 270,365 days, incurring a penalty of 26,000,070 Lu Lang. Your leave is canceled until Imperial Year 3018. For inquiries, please contact your supervisor…”

The garbled broadcast was heavily interrupted and crackled, spoken in archaic Khazad-dûm language from seven centuries ago, with many words pronounced quite differently from today. Amber froze, tugging on Gawain’s arm. “Hey, hey, what’s that door babbling about? Why did Diana’s expression suddenly change…? Did she always have this much range in her face?”

“…Don’t mind it. It’s just an old system running automatically for centuries, producing errors,” Gawain said, his lips twitching as he struggled to keep a calm expression. Then he glanced at Diana. “Are you alright, ma’am?”

“I didn’t expect…” A sudden warmth rose behind Diana, accompanied by a faint buzzing from within her. “Even after seven hundred years, it still sounds so terrifying…”

“Ahem, don’t take it to heart. Besides, you don’t have to make up for those hundreds of years of absence,” Gawain coughed twice, then noticed a thin crack forming along the door’s edge. “Anyway, it looks like the door’s open…”

As he finished speaking, Diana adjusted the state of her core processor and gently pushed forward—the massive door, forged from that mysterious alloy and unusually sturdy, swung open with a harsh metallic screech. Beyond it lay a dim, murky darkness, as if filled with chaotic mist, stretching out before the group on the platform.

Gawain leaned forward to peer into the gloom. Even with his extraordinary vision, he couldn’t make out what lay inside. A faint, elusive haze seemed to block his view. This abnormal scene immediately put him on alert. “This is the ‘observatory’ on the other side? Something feels off… Philip, toss something in.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.” Philip nodded promptly, taking a portable arcane network terminal from a nearby soldier. Carefully, he placed it at the threshold and then used the scabbard of his officer’s sword to push it through the door.

Under everyone’s watchful eyes, the device—powered on and glowing faintly blue—passed through the doorway, then seemed to dissolve into the darkness, swallowed by the thin mist without a trace.

Philip frowned, then glanced at another arcane terminal set up on the platform. The rune on its base glowed faintly, but the holographic display above showed only static interference. “The terminal we sent in is still running and undamaged, but it can’t transmit any images back. There must be strong interference… or maybe it’s just too far away.”

He looked down at his sword’s scabbard. When he pushed the terminal inside, about a quarter of the scabbard’s length had also been swallowed by the darkness, but he had pulled it back without resistance. After careful inspection, there was no sign of damage or any lingering curse or magical corruption.

“…There’s definitely something strange beyond that door. It’s like a veil blocking our view, but objects can be sent through without harm,” Gawain observed thoughtfully, noting Philip’s findings. “Some kind of shield? A protective measure?”

Philip then tested again with another terminal. He set it to recording mode, tied it to a long pole, and sent it through the door. Minutes later, he retrieved the pole and the terminal intact. But when they eagerly played back the footage, all they saw was a dazzling blur of flickering light—classic interference.

“Looks like the energy readings we detected outside the observatory really are leaking from here,” Philip said gravely. “Behind the door is a high-intensity energy field. The arcane terminal can’t operate inside it. Small leaks from this field are what the explorers outside picked up as periodic signals. But it seems this field doesn’t harm physical bodies directly… it just disrupts magical functions.”

“Did the observatory ever have such a powerful energy source?” Gawain asked Diana immediately.

“No,” Diana shook her head. “The observatory only had various observation and recording devices, plus a large-scale magical filter array. All low-power equipment.”

Gawain frowned, about to ask more, when Amber’s voice suddenly cut in from the side. “Enough talk. I’ll go check it out.”

Gawain turned, surprised to see the half-elf’s unusual enthusiasm. When had she become so proactive? In the past, he always had to drag her along or practically throw her into situations like this. Now she was eager to take the lead?

“What’s with that look?” Amber noticed his gaze and crossed her arms. “You brought me here to scout ahead, didn’t you? Or are you just feeling low on blood pressure and want me to chat you up to fix it?”

Hearing her shameless self-awareness, Gawain confirmed that this was indeed Amber—no unlucky soul from another world had possessed her. Still, he couldn’t help but mutter, “I never thought you’d be so cooperative. You’ve never been this willing before…”

“Obviously, it’s better I go first than you tossing me in later,” Amber rolled her eyes. Then, her form began to blur, surrounded by flickering shadows and light. She turned and strode toward the door leading to the upper observatory. “I’m going to scout ahead…”

Before anyone could react, her figure vanished into the veil-like darkness. Gawain felt a twinge of unease—but he trusted Amber’s top-notch escape skills and survival instincts. Whatever danger lay beyond, she’d be back in a flash.

Barely two or three seconds after Amber passed through the veil, the group’s vision flickered. A shimmering, shifting light burst out from the door, and Amber tumbled onto the floor, shouting loudly, “Oh man, it’s crazy over there! You’ve got to come see! I don’t have the words for it!”

Those guarding the door exchanged glances. Before anyone could move, Philip stepped forward, hand resting on his sword, eyes cautious. “What does Article 7, Section 17 of the Imperial Charter say?”

Amber blinked, then glared. “Uh? How am I supposed to remember that?”

Philip visibly relaxed, and Gawain asked, “What do you usually call me? I mean, when you slip up.”

Amber shrank back, glancing nervously at Philip’s sword. “If I say that word, he’d probably just cut me down right here…”

Gawain finally exhaled and ruffled her hair. “It’s a necessary formality. You understand, right?”

“I get it, I get it. This place is weird—who knows what happens to explorers who go in and come back? Plenty of powerful adventurers have been wiped out here,” Amber said generously, waving a hand. “As for the other side, it’s not dangerous, but it’s… a very strange place. Definitely not part of normal space. You’ll see for yourselves.”

Gawain looked up to see Diana nodding slightly in agreement. Then he stepped forward, leading the group through the strange door.

The moment darkness enveloped them, he felt as if passing through a cool veil, a tingling like electric shocks crawling across his skin. The rapid shift in atmosphere made him realize they were crossing some kind of “discontinuous spacetime.” The sensation was familiar—he’d felt it before, deep within the Eternal Storm, when entering the still “Gods’ Battlefield,” a strange experience of stepping into an alien dimension.

Then, as he took a second step, the darkness vanished in an instant. Before everyone’s eyes, the space suddenly opened up in brilliant clarity.

Gawain’s eyes widened.

He found himself standing on an immense circular platform. At first glance, it resembled the upper level of an observatory—but it was anything but normal. The surrounding walls and the hemispherical dome that should have crowned the space were torn to shreds by some unknown force. Massive chunks of wall and roof debris floated weightlessly around the platform, spinning slowly like a vortex in midair. Beyond these shattered fragments stretched a sky suffused with chaotic hues—a surreal, filtered purplish-red backdrop that bathed everything in an unmistakably alien atmosphere.

Directly above this otherworldly space, however, Gawain saw a patch of starry sky clearer and more brilliant than anywhere else. It was as if the purple-red sky had been rent open like a curtain, revealing a jagged tear through which countless stars twinkled.

That starry expanse should have been breathtakingly beautiful, yet here, in this bizarre realm, the only thing that appeared normal—the starry sky—felt the most unsettling of all.

“This is…” Philip’s voice came from behind. The young imperial general had followed Gawain into the space, and the strange scene before him made his eyes widen. His gaze first landed on the enormous fragments of the observatory’s upper structure, spinning like a whirlpool in the high air nearby. “Those are pieces of the observatory’s upper level? But when we looked from outside…”

“From outside, the observatory was intact. Its upper level was clear and whole,” Gawain said in a low voice. “But here, we see a shattered observatory, as if the entire structure has fallen into a warped dimension…”

Amber swallowed nervously and looked up at Gawain. “You know more about this. What do you think is going on?”

“Maybe… this is some kind of temporal-spatial mirror, a ‘copy’ of the Vipland Observatory generated at a twisted node in space-time. In this distorted reality, the observatory has been destroyed. Or perhaps this place is like a shadow realm, where the real observatory has produced a flawed, overlapping phantom. Or… someone might have deliberately created this abnormal space,” Gawain shook his head. “There are as many theories as you want, but none really matter. The key is the one among us who might hold the clues—Ms. Diana. Do you recognize this place? Any ideas?”

Diana stepped through the door. The door still stood where it should, but the walls around it were gone. It hung alone in the air like a strange portal to another dimension. Beyond the door lay only darkness.

She looked up at the uncanny surroundings, surprise flickering across her face. Then she whispered, “This… this really is the observatory. I still recognize its shape. But why has it become like this…”

She muttered to herself in confusion, then unconsciously moved forward toward the center of the platform. There, at the heart of the space, a hazy glow gathered, as if guarding some secret and blocking their view. Gawain had seen the glow earlier but hadn’t dared approach. Now, seeing Diana step forward, he couldn’t help but warn her, “Be careful, Lady Diana—”

His words were cut off.

A sudden hum of energy filled the air. The hazy glow condensed sharply right before Diana, interrupting Gawain’s warning and putting everyone instantly on high alert. But Diana’s eyes caught sight of a figure gradually emerging from the misty light—one she recognized.

“Sir Scott? Director?”

(End of chapter)