Lu Yin immediately went to the Infinity Empire, only to be disappointed.

While the Infinity Empire confirmed that it was possible to perform the necessary calculations with technology, the Infinity Empire’s current level of technology was insufficient for the task. They needed to advance several more tiers before they would be capable of performing the calculations needed for the Mirrorlight Art, which caused even Lu Yin’s head to ache.

After all, the calculations he was currently on was for the 138th layer. The calculations needed at that level was enough to make even a Dukkhan feeling dizzy. The current Infinity Empire was unable to help at all.

Lu Yin thought of the technological fishing civilization.

If only the Infinity Empire had the same level of technology as that civilization.

Lu Yin decided to continue building the wall in his heart. Once he broke through to the Immortal realm, he would experience a complete transformation. Then, it would be easy to deduce further layers of the Mirrorlight Art.

Also, there was Heaven’s Sight’s sight power. It was increasing far too slowly, but there was also no need to deliberately cultivate it.

In the blink of an eye, a hundred years passed. Outside the Gate of Laws, Master Ku Deng was surrounded by his heartlamps. His entire body was practically pressed against the Gate of Laws, as he was still wary of a sneak attack from the strange birds.

The heartlamps were his world. When he released them at full power, even if he was attacked by an Plume Immortal that was stronger than him, it would not be able to erase him instantly.

After all, he was an Immortal as well.

The heartlamps extinguished in one place, only to light up elsewhere. They illuminated Ku Deng as he sat alone at the bottom of a rift. All the while, his eyes remained fixed on the endless expanse before him. He did not dare to relax for even a moment.

The Aevum Inch was always dark. Even with his heartlamps spread everywhere, it was impossible to light the cosmos.

Suddenly, a heartlamp went out. Ku Deng peered into the distance. The void twisted. Something was coming.

It was not a strange bird. If those creatures appeared, they would appear instantly, right beside him.

Even as that thought passed through his mind, countless sharp objects that looked like enlarged needles shot towards him. Ku Deng’s expression changed. This was bad; that technological civilization had found them.

He threw out a palm strike. Heartrift power pushed the void away, crushing space itself. The enlarged needles met the compressed void and instantly shattered.

Suddenly, the void to both his left and right started to flow away from him. The first thing that Ku Deng thought of was Cosmic Shear. While he had never personally witnessed the attack, Lu Yin had shared everything that he knew about the technological civilization’s weapons with the Immortals, and he had made sure that Ku Deng in particular was familiar with the information. Lu Yin had always known that humanity would be found by the technological civilization sooner or later.

He simply had not expected it to happen so soon.

An agreement had already been made that, if the technological civilization ever found the Gate of Laws’ location, whoever was standing guard would immediately return and then destroy the Gate of Laws.

Ku Deng passed through the gate without hesitation, leaving the region. A moment later, massive, enlarged needles shot through the Gate of Laws, piercing the universe on the other side.

After passing through the gate, Ku Deng swung a hand and smashed the enlarged needles. When they shattered, he discovered that they contained some spherical objects with flickering lights. He immediately struck again, smashing all of the spheres.

At the same time, Green Lotus and the others all sensed the abrupt commotion near the Gate of Laws. Master Qing Cao was the first to react. As he was already in Spirit Nidus, he immediately hurried over.

Far beyond their human civilization, the instant that the spheres passed through the Gate of Laws inside the enlarged needles, the lights on the sphere that was closest to the human civilization flickered. The two spheres’ flickering had the exact same frequency, and even though Ku Deng had smashed the spheres immediately, for the technological fishing civilization, that brief moment was more than enough.

Bang!

The Gate of Laws shattered, destroyed by Green Lotus. When Ku Deng passed through the Gate of Laws and smashed the technological spheres, Green Lotus had moved through karma, arriving even before Master Qing Cao. Without hesitation, the Greater Sancte had smashed the Gate of Laws to pieces.

Ku Deng had never encountered the technological civilization, but Green Lotus had seen them twice before, and he had even been attacked by a Crystal Fall. A glance was enough for him to tell that the needles that had arrived through the Gate of Laws belonged to that same technological civilization.

Their human civilization could not be found by that technological civilization.

Shattering the Gate of Laws meant destroying a possible path of retreat for humanity, but that was a better price to pay than being found by the technological civilization.

Ku Deng and Master Qing Cao stared at the shattered remnants of Gate of Laws, momentarily dazed. One had stood guard on the other side of the Gate of Laws for many years, while the other had always cared about the gate and had even wanted to open it but had never been able to.

The Gate of Laws was gone.

In the region of the Aevum Inch where the shattered Gate of Laws had once connected, in the depths of space far away, massive oval lights hung in the Aevum Inch. There were six in total, which was two more than when the technological civilization had attacked the Seal-Eater Civilization.

The multiple Crystal Falls had been fired by those massive vessels.

“The gate is shattered. We can no longer travel to that civilization via the gate.”

“Hopefully, we can establish a connection. When we attacked the Seal-Eater Civilization earlier, we released probes at the very beginning. Those probes are moving in all directions from that point in space. If this civilization is in the same region of the Aevum Inch as the Seal-Eater Civilization, their location will be found one day. As long as two probes are able to connect, the remaining probes can be guided to the location, and then we can search for a second connection with our territory. Finally, we will be able to find this civilization.”

“No civilization can use the empire! This civilization used the empire three times, and they will pay for it.”

“The empire has long been prepared. Research on how to deal with that kind of rapid movement is already underway. It will certainly succeed.”

“Then let us wait.”

***

Meanwhile, within human civilization, Green Lotus had already destroyed the Gate of Laws, but in the Tianyuan, Lu Yin still had not noticed.

However, just moments later, the Infinity Empire sent a message, informing him that the mechanical sphere had reacted.

Lu Yin hurried to the Infinity Empire.

He had recently hoped to use the Infinity Empire’s technology to calculate more layers of the Mirrorlight Art, but the empire lacked the capabilities. Instead, Lu Yin had left the mechanical sphere that he had obtained from One-Eye behind, the one that the scavenger had used to contact the technological civilization. Lu Yin hoped that the Infinity Empire would be able to extract something useful from the piece of technology.

It had only been 100 years since handing it over, and yet the sphere had suddenly reacted.

He arrived in the Infinity Empire, and Elder Huan solemnly informed Lu Yin that the sphere’s reaction indicated a set of coordinates: their human civilization’s coordinates.

“During the last hundred years, this sphere has provided a bit of help in regards to our technology. While we still cannot fully understand it, we have learned some things. It just received a set of coordinates.”

Lu Yin’s expression turned grave. Those were humanity’s coordinates.

According to Elder Huan, the coordinates came from a direction aligned with the Nine Odysseys Megaverse, forming a positional lock with the sphere. Another sphere had already locked onto that location, and it was precisely because that sphere transmitted the coordinates that this sphere was able to receive them.

Lu Yin immediately went to the Nine Odysseys Megaverse. Only then did he learn that the Gate of Laws had been destroyed. The technological civilization had found humanity.

There was no time to think. Lu Yin took his own sphere and started searching for the one that had broadcast humanity’s coordinates. He had to find it. These spheres were the technological civilization’s fishing method; they were searching for this human civilization.

If this had happened before he started cultivating the Mirrorlight Art, it would not have been easy for Lu Yin to find the sphere. Knowing an approximate location was one thing, but if he could not see the location, it would take him a very long time to reach it. However, with some measure of mastery of the Mirrorlight Art, as long as he could confirm the position and look at his destination, he would see that sphere.

He quickly found it.

Glancing down at the sphere in his hand, Lu Yin crushed it with one squeeze.

The Infinity Empire had failed to fully analyze the sphere, which meant that they could not safely prevent it from transmitting humanity’s coordinates. The only choice was to destroy it.

The sphere that Lu Yin crushed had only been capable of receiving the broadcast coordinates, and it did not broadcast them itself.

However, since there was one sphere, there had to be others.

There was no doubt that the technological civilization’s sudden attack had been pre-planned. The sphere had obviously come from the Seal-Eater Universe. When Lu Yin destroyed the vessels that the technological civilization had sent to attack the Seal-Eater Civilization’s megaverse, he had also swept through the area. In the years since that time, Old Five and others had searched for any traces of the technological civilization, but they had never found any.

There was only one possibility: the technological civilization had launched the spheres long before destroying the Seal-Eater Civilization.

This meant that, even before attacking the Seal-Eater Civilization, and long before Ku Deng had been attacked, everything currently involved had been part of the technological civilization’s plan.

From the moment they attacked the Seal-Eater Civilization, they had launched the mechanical spheres to serve as signal relays to pinpoint the coordinates of human civilization. After that, they had waited a while before attacking Ku Deng, and the exact moment that the man retreated back into human territory, spheres had been thrown through. Even though Ku Deng had smashed those spheres quickly, for a technological fishing civilization, that brief opening had been enough to broadcast a signal.

By establishing a connection to the relays that had been sent out long ago, they were able to confirm human civilization’s coordinates. Then, those same relays would be used to transmit the coordinates back to other spheres, which would gradually determine the exact location of human civilization.

Lu Yin let out a breath. He had used the technological civilization three times, and it had worked out each time, but the technological civilization was not stupid. They had used his own methods against him in order to determine his human civilization’s coordinates.

No civilization could ever be underestimated, especially not a fishing civilization.

Lu Yin had never underestimated them, and yet they had still found a loophole.

It could only be said that no one could perfectly calculate everything without error. There would always be an opponent who would find a way to upset one’s plans.

Also, at the exact moment that Lu Yin found the relay sphere, the signal it had been transmitting went dark. This meant that the remaining spheres were no longer releasing signals, but that did not mean they had stopped operating. They were simply doing this to avoid being found.

“Our position has been leaked. All we can do now is hope that the technological civilization isn’t able to receive signals from here,” Lu Yin reported.

Awe Gate replied, “They shouldn’t be able to. It’s too far a distance.”

Green Lotus looked solemn. “They are a fishing civilization. Since they have taken action against us, they can’t be unprepared. Also, are we really as far from that technological civilization as we truly think we are?”

“An Plume Immortal once teleported from here to the region the Gate of Laws was connected to in order to ambush Senior Ku Deng. It took a long time, about twenty years, but was that bird teleporting for all twenty years? Obviously not.” Lu Yin said. “I had Ancestor Lu Yuan draw the Immortal Lord over, and it’s been many years since then. Still, the Thread of Heaven that we learned about through the Immortal Lord’s karma was only about 200 years of travel away. Given Luo Chan’s ability to teleport, that distance could have been covered quickly, certainly faster than twenty years.”

“So, we cannot truly determine the distance separating us through that bit of time.”

Blood Tower’s tone was heavy, “The distance cannot be determined, but it is undoubtedly further away than the Thread of Heaven that Little Eighteen is heading towards. To our knowledge, not even fishing civilizations can communicate across such a vast distance.”

Green Lotus nodded. “That is correct. What we must do now is prevent the technological civilization from shrinking the communication distance.”

“There are more of those mechanical spheres and not just a few.” Mister Mu interjected.

Lu Yin’s gaze flashed. “I’ll search for them. The Mirrorlight Art lets me see extremely far away. If those spheres are trying to make contact with the technological civilization to confirm our location, they will definitely have to get closer to our megaverses. I don’t believe that I won’t be able to find them by circling our territory repeatedly and searching for them.”

Everyone fell silent. This was the only method.