Holy Calendar, 11XX.

The last two digits are too blurred to be visible.

Erin rubbed her head, trying to decipher those numbers at the bottom of the page, thinking seriously for a few seconds before suddenly raising her head: "What is the Holy Calendar... Did the Venerate Saints Monastery come up with their own calendar?"

"This ’Holy Calendar’ has nothing to do with the Venerate Saints Monastery, it’s a universal calendar used by some major Civilization Circles outside," Yu Sheng waved his hand, seemingly reminded of something, his expression gradually taking on a hint of seriousness, "This is something from hundreds of years ago..."

Erin was stupefied, suddenly widening her eyes slowly: "Hundreds of years ago? Didn’t you just say this place might have been abandoned only a few years ago—how can this booklet survive in this harsh planetary environment for hundreds of years?!"

Yu Sheng did not answer immediately, he stared at the booklet in his hand for several seconds before casually placing it on a dust-covered table, then stood up, dusting off his clothes, his gaze sweeping around the surroundings.

An abandoned Alien Planet dwelling pod, a cold and dead ’Deserted Star’, a book not known to belong to anyone, and the suspicious records in it—all of these belong to a certain day in Holy Calendar 11XX.

Erin suddenly jumped from Yu Sheng’s shoulder onto the table, she ran to the "journal" from hundreds of years ago, flipping through it curiously, after a while, her not-so-bright puppet head seemed to finally wake up to the situation.

"Wait, wait... This place can’t really be..."

Yu Sheng suddenly turned and walked towards the outside of the dwelling pod.

Erin glanced over and suddenly panicked, jumping hurriedly to the ground: "Hey, hey wait for me! My legs are short..."

Just halfway through shouting, Erin saw a flash of white beside her, Hu Li in her little fox form was running after Yu Sheng, so her short legs immediately sped up, rushing over to grab the fox’s tail: "Take me, take me..."

By this time, Yu Sheng had already rushed to the clearing outside the dwelling pod, lifting his head to look at the sky, seeing only the gloomy and murky clouds—an atmosphere thick and unfit for human breathing enveloping this land—

It is now a certain day in Holy Calendar 11XX, and this remains a cold, lifeless planet, where a group of unknown pioneers has yet to gain a foothold, a force capable of changing the planet’s appearance is still slowly growing, and the nameless Dark Angel still lurks in the depths of space while the chosen ’proxy’... is still drawing power from that knowledge emanating from the depths of space.

Luna walked out from a nearby building when Yu Sheng was checking that dwelling pod; she was also inspecting the situation elsewhere in the camp: "There’s a communicator, with backup power still running, but... not receiving any signals."

Hu Li also walked over, nudging against Yu Sheng’s feet.

"Fire a missile into the orbit," Yu Sheng said casually, "Shoot it as high as it can go."

"Okay~"

Hu Li responded with an agreement, turning around to place Erin back on the ground, then her fluffy large tail launched up into the sky—silver-white fox tail spewing bright propulsion flames, disappearing into the thick clouds in an instant.

Shortly after, Yu Sheng vaguely saw a distortion deep within the clouds, followed by Hu Li raising her head: "Savior, the connection broke!"

Yu Sheng thoughtfully withdrew his gaze from the sky.

"...This is indeed the Saint Realm, at least from the relative coordinates of the celestial bodies, that Dark Star Cruiser landed on this planet," he said softly, "But we arrived too early, hundreds of years early."

"Whoa damn... Is that really the case?" Erin widened her eyes, "No, how does this work... What’s the principle behind it all?"

Hu Li suddenly perked up her ears: "Wait, if that’s the case, can we intercept and kill the first generation Hidden Monastery Sect followers here?"

The demon fox girl’s statement made even Erin’s eyes light up: "Hey? Seems like that’s the case, doesn’t it?"

"... I don’t know what’s actually happening on this planet, but things might not be that simple," Yu Sheng said, slowly shaking his head, "We flew all the way from the mountains, with both White Cut and Salt Roasted scouting along such a vast range, have they discovered signs of other humans?"

"Well, there certainly haven’t been any..." Erin said hesitantly but then lifted her head again, "But they might have gone elsewhere, right, since this so-called Camp 17 has been abandoned..."

Yu Sheng did not speak, recalling the tail that Hu Li launched into the sky and lost connection with shortly after, and then remembered flying over the mountains on Hu Li’s back, seeing the massive fog wall circling the horizon.

"Launch a tail towards that direction again," he raised his hand pointing towards the distance, and then pointed in another direction, "And launch one in this direction too."

Two Fox Radish Missiles, spewing propulsion flames, soared into the sky, disappearing into the horizon in the blink of an eye.

Then, shortly after, Hu Li raised her head: "Those two tails lost connection too, Savior."

Listening to this, a look of no surprise appeared on Yu Sheng’s face.

"...As expected, this is a defense system, though I’m not sure if it’s active or passive," he said slowly, "This is not part of a complete spacetime, but some kind of... trap. We are intercepted by a Time Barrier."

For a moment, the scene fell into silence—Hu Li contemplating, Erin and Luna not understanding due to education gaps.

"Does the Hidden Monastery really have this kind of technology?" Hu Li finally broke the silence, with disbelief in her voice, "If they had such abilities, would they need to hide like mice in the Lawless Star Region?"

"I also don’t think they have that technology," Yu Sheng said with a serious expression, "but... adding the Gate of Eden to the equation complicates things."

Erin: "...Whoa."

Actually, she still didn’t understand the "Time Barrier" part—but the moment she heard the term "Gate of Eden," she knew things had gotten big.

Because she truly knew how powerful the World Bridge was!

...

The ominous circular structure stood on the ground, forged from alien alloys into a pale golden ring and supporting framework like a crown of heaven and earth, connecting mountains and plains, piercing the thick clouds, with its top comprising two semi-circles extending into several sharp "towers," those towers even pierced through the clouds, emitting a dazzling brilliance in the sunlight.

A deep, pleasant humming sound spread from the surrounding area of the circular structure, continuously echoing across the plains and mountains, the massive energy transmitted from the "Holy Furnace" was ceaselessly injected into the Rift Generator, and at the center of that ring, an unstable twisted light screen was slowly growing at a speed imperceptible to the naked eye.

A high-level Priest arrived on the platform and bowed: "Holy, the Gate of Eden has entered the activation state, it is currently stable."

"Hmm, very good."

The Holy slightly nodded, his lips curling into the usual gentle smile, he instructed others to continue to stand by around the platform, and then stepped forward.

The gigantic "Gate of Eden" stood before him, the power capable of tearing open the world barrier, changing the order of time and space, was surging within its grand doors.

He raised his head, gazing at the blurred, floating light screen at the center of the ring—he could clearly feel its presence, feel its power permeating the entire planet, not just spatially, but even temporally permeating this planet.

Its existence was "extending," first from this moment extending into the past, and once the gate was fully activated, it would extend into the distant future as well.

A bridge required "pillars"—it needed to firmly root in the foundations of time and space to possibly stably and correctly reach the other side.

The Angels’ attempt to build the World Bridge failed because their world was already destroyed, and a destroyed world did not possess a meaningful timeline. Even though they repeatedly sacrificed themselves to become anchor points, desperately anchoring the "starting point" of the World Bridge, they couldn’t provide it with a stable temporal and spatial foundation—when that rootless bridge fell from the void toward the real universe, its fate of failure was already sealed.

But the Gate of Eden was different.

The Holy reached the end of the platform, where a temporary device was installed in front of the Rift Generator, as he approached, the device emitted a slight friction sound, slowly turning towards him.

Like an obelisk, the pale golden container prominently "embedded" a body—or strictly speaking, a head and a partial torso structure containing only necessary organs.

Colander was embedded among numerous life support tubes and cables, Spiritual Enhancement Agents were continuously pumped into his circulatory system, his head was fixed by hundreds of dense probes, and his eyes had been burned into two hollow sockets by powerful Spiritual Energy, yet two bright flames danced in those empty eye sockets, brighter than any eyes.

A large dose of neuro-drugs was directly injected into his brain, the probe-fixed head trembled slightly, a few mumbling sounds akin to dream talk escaped from his mouth, and as the entire device fully turned, with his flame-lit eyes no longer able to continue gazing in the Gate of Eden’s direction, Colander seemed to awaken, he began to shake his head nervously, the mumbling swiftly became clear, tinged with fear—

"I, I can’t see it anymore! Let me look at it, let me look at it!"

"Colander, it’s me." The blond man said gently.

Upon hearing this voice, Colander instantly calmed down: "Holy, ah, it’s you..."

"Yes, it’s me," the blond man slightly bent down, "How’s the situation with the gate? What did you see?"

"I... saw it grow as your blueprint planned, roots strong, branches flourishing," Colander said slowly, a smile on his face even in semi-consciousness, "and just as you predicted, some unknown interference seemed to attempt to approach the gate, now the source of interference has fallen into the time abyss created by the Gate of Eden."

A fleeting change seemed to flash across the Holy’s face, but he quickly resumed his usual gentle smile: "It seems right to appoint you here for the alert task, Colander, you have sacrificed greatly to illuminate us with your eyes."

"This is all a necessary sacrifice on the Path of Venerate Saint," Colander slowly said, then seemed to gain clarity, "I, have I indeed gained further qualifications with this?"

"...Of course, as a glorious act deserves glory," the Holy stated calmly, "I reaffirm—’source of interference’ has indeed fallen into the time abyss, correct?"

"Absolutely true—the voice of the Gate of Eden resounds in my soul, I personally witnessed the power once cursed me fall into the depths of time; they can’t escape, nor can they relay messages out..."

...

Shuji, high orbit above, somewhere in Black Stone Station.

Luo Zheng stood by the communicator waiting for news.

Yu Sheng directly pushed open the door and walked in: "Luo! Something’s happened!"