135: The laser activates the spark! The holographic star map unfolds—it's a sword of Damocles!

Eight hundred meters deep in the ocean, above the silent wreckage of a battlefield.

The black iron hovered quietly beside the corpses of the two Ark submarines, like a colossal beast that had just returned from a hunt.

Over a dozen octopus-like engineering robots swam out from the belly of the black iron.

They wielded laser cutting arms and mechanical pincers.

They skillfully dismantled the power plant sections of the "Judgment" and the "Redemption".

Concentrated uranium fuel rods, emitting a faint blue glow, were extracted intact, one after another.

They were then sent into the black iron's storage bay—the most delectable "supplement" for this steel leviathan.

Meanwhile, inside the black iron's mess hall, another form of "consumption" was taking place simultaneously.

*Crunch, crunch.*

Jiang Ran sat at the dining table, his movements elegant yet astonishingly fast.

The stack of empty plates before him already resembled a precarious little tower.

A synthetic high-energy beefsteak weighing a full two kilograms.

In his hands, it was like a small biscuit, disappearing into his mouth in just a few bites.

Immediately followed by three tubes of high-concentration glucose gel.

It was a dose meant to save an ordinary person's life, yet he downed it all in one go like a beverage.

*Gulp...*

Old Chen, sitting to the side, watched this scene, holding half a steamed bun he'd forgotten to bite, his eyes wide as saucers:

"B-Boss, how many meals is this for you?

This must already be three days' worth of your normal intake, right?"

"My body is severely depleted."

Jiang Ran swallowed the last morsel of food, feeling the terrifying churning in his stomach that seemed capable of digesting even steel, before finally letting out a long sigh of relief.

The battle earlier, which lasted less than ten minutes, seemed effortless and casual on the surface, but the actual expenditure was staggering.

That "Supercavitating" movement, the full activation of "Thermal Vision," and the "Super-Regeneration" after withstanding bullets.

Each one was a major energy consumer.

His body was now like a precise nuclear reactor.

Although its output power was off the charts, its demand for fuel was equally astronomical.

"The law of conservation of energy applies everywhere."

Jiang Ran wiped his mouth and glanced at the health monitor on his wrist.

The blood glucose value on it had finally risen from the red "critically deficient" back to the green "normal level."

"It seems besides nuclear fuel, we'll need Logistics to stock up on more high-calorie compressed rations in the future."

Jiang Ran remarked with a hint of self-deprecating helplessness, "Otherwise, I might starve to death before getting killed in battle."

Right at that moment.

*Beep—*

The communicator on the mess hall wall suddenly activated automatically, and Su Qingyu's face, perpetually sporting dark circles, appeared on the screen.

Her background was a chaotic stream of data and various blinking instruments.

"Finished eating?"

Su Qingyu's voice sounded somewhat hurried, even carrying a trace of unusual excitement:

"If you're done, come to the core lab immediately."

"What? Did you crack the Ark crew's logs?" Jiang Ran stood up.

"Something more important than that."

Su Qingyu turned slightly, revealing the object restrained in mid-air by an isolation field behind her—

It was the deep-sea Spark, codenamed No.06, previously excavated from the Radiation Sea Lizard's body.

At this moment, that originally quiet, dark-red crystal.

Was vibrating at an odd frequency, projecting complex light patterns around it.

"I just tried using high-frequency lasers to stimulate its internal structure, and the result... it gave me a surprise."

Su Qingyu stared at the screen, her gaze burning:

"Jiang Ran, get over here."

"I think what we found isn't just a battery."

"We found a map."

...When Jiang Ran entered the core lab, his first thought was that he had walked through the wrong door.

The lab, usually brightly lit and filled with the noise of various instruments, was now plunged into darkness.

All lighting had been manually shut off, leaving only a single spotlight shining on the central isolation platform.

"Close the door. Don't turn on the lights."

Su Qingyu's voice came from the darkness, sounding cautious and grave.

Jiang Ran complied and shut the hatch. With the soft sound of the airtight seal engaging, the entire room fell into absolute darkness.

"Watch."

Su Qingyu's fingers slid gently across a glowing touchpad.

*Zzzzt—*

An extremely fine, almost invisible blue-violet high-frequency laser shot from emitters around the room.

It converged precisely on the dark-red crystal suspended in the center of the magnetic field—the No.06 "Spark."

The next second, a strange spectacle unfolded.

That crystal, which originally merely served as a "backup heart" inside that ugly sea lizard.

Under the laser's stimulation, did not release destructive thermal energy.

Instead, like a crystal ball being illuminated, the previously murky red fibrous material inside suddenly clarified and became transparent.

Immediately after, countless fine beams of light refracted from within the crystal.

They pierced through the isolation field, projecting onto the lab's ceiling, walls, and even the floor.

"This is..."

Jiang Ran's pupils contracted slightly, and he instinctively held his breath.

He no longer felt like he was inside a steel warship eight hundred meters deep, but rather as if he were adrift in a vast, boundless cosmos.

Those points of light were not random noise; they were stars arranged with rigorous logic.

Orion's Belt shone overhead, Sirius glowed with a deep blue light to the left, and the distinctive dipper shape of the Big Dipper... This was a holographic star map.

An extremely precise, ancient star map that even marked the orbital paths of celestial bodies.

"Incredible, right?"

Su Qingyu's face, illuminated by the starlight, was filled with fascination:

"We always thought 'Sparks' were just some kind of high-density bio-energy crystal, organs evolved by those mutated monsters."

"But it seems we were all wrong."

She reached out, her fingertips passing through the projection of a phantom star:

"This isn't a product of natural evolution.

No biological organ could evolve such a projection function."

"This is a technology.

A long-lost nanotechnology capable of etching vast amounts of information into biological crystals."

"That sea lizard was merely a custodian, or rather... a living container."

Jiang Ran gazed at the starry expanse, his eyes gradually deepening.

In this post-apocalyptic world, drowned by seawater, where humanity could only cling to survival in the ocean depths, looking up at the stars had become a luxury.

Thick clouds and endless seawater blocked all sight.

Yet this "Spark," buried deep in the ocean floor, recorded the sky that originally belonged to humanity.

"What is it trying to tell us?"

Jiang Ran turned to look at Su Qingyu, "This isn't just a pretty wallpaper, is it?"

"Of course not."

Su Qingyu took a deep breath and adjusted the laser frequency again, "If it were just a star map, it would be meaningless.

But if you overlay the current Earth coordinates onto it..."

"...you'll discover it's a key."

*Hum—*

As Su Qingyu operated, the holographic projection in the center of the lab changed once more.

Beneath the starry sky, a massive, pale blue sphere slowly materialized—

It was a model of Earth as it was now, with the vast majority of its land submerged.

Su Qingyu made a grasping motion in the air, as if kneading a ball of light.

The star map, originally diffused across the entire room, rapidly contracted and curved, finally perfectly overlaying itself onto the Earth model.

"Look here."

Su Qingyu pointed to a blinking red dot in the central Pacific on the Earth model.

That was their current coordinates, the location where they hunted that Lv5 Sea Lizard and obtained the No.06 Spark.

And on the overlaid star map, this position corresponded precisely to that deep blue star—"Sirius."

"These 'Sparks' left behind by the ancient civilization are not independent of each other."

Su Qingyu spoke rapidly, her voice trembling with the thrill of discovery:

"There exists some kind of hidden connection between them, based on quantum entanglement.

No.06 isn't just an energy core; it's more like a 'node beacon' within a network."

"When activated, it illuminates its own position on the star map while also indicating the directions to other nodes."

At this point, she turned her head, looking at Jiang Ran with a meaningful glint in her eyes:

It's like the ancient beacon towers.

Light one, and you can see the next.

"So, where is the next one?" Jiang Ran stared at the model, cutting straight to the point.

"Here."

Su Qingyu's finger traced through the air, pointing at the brightest, most stable star in the star chart—the Polaris.

The light from this star was far more intense than that of Sirius, which represented No.06.

Its projected position on the Earth model.

was not in the depths of the ocean, but at the edge of a continental shelf somewhere to the northwest.

A slender ray of light connected "Sirius" and the "Polaris," forming a clear navigational guide.

"The signal strength here is more than ten times that of No.06."

Su Qingyu looked at the light point, her expression grave:

"According to the star chart's encoding rules, the codename represented by this Polaris is—No.03."

"If No.06 is just a border watchtower, then this No.03..."

"...is a core fortress."

Jiang Ran looked at the endpoint connected by the light ray. For someone who had lived in this world for a long time, that location was not unfamiliar.

In fact, one could say it was a place filled with death and legends.

"Have the coordinates been parsed?" Jiang Ran asked.

"Yes."

Su Qingyu pressed the final enter key on the keyboard.

The latitude and longitude numbers on the screen jumped frantically, finally settling on a specific set of values.

When these coordinates overlapped with a world map from the old era, a name that was once glorious appeared before their eyes.

"35 degrees 41 minutes north latitude, 139 degrees 46 minutes east longitude."

As Su Qingyu recited these coordinates precise to the minute.

The holographic projection of the Earth model rapidly zoomed in, penetrating the thick layer of blue seawater.

It locked onto a long, narrow island arc on the eastern side of the Asian continent.

It was once one of the world's most prosperous metropolitan areas, but now only a high-risk zone marked in red on nautical charts remained.

"This is..."

Old Chen, who had just entered the lab, leaned over for a look, his face instantly changing: "Tokyo?"

"Correct, the Tokyo metropolitan area from the old era."

Su Qingyu nodded, lightly tapping to bring up a more detailed sonar scan image:

"After the great tsunami and tectonic movements, this area didn't completely slide into an oceanic trench like other coastal cities.

On the contrary, due to plate compression, the foundation here was actually uplifted."

"So, present-day Tokyo is a 'half-submerged' dead city."

On that scan image, one could clearly see countless massive columnar shadows standing like tombstones.

Those were the thousands of skyscrapers from the old era.

Some were broken in half, others leaned against each other, resembling a primitive jungle made of steel.

Quietly standing on the shallow continental shelf at depths of two hundred to five hundred meters.

"In the Hunter's Guild intelligence network, this place has a more resounding name—the 'Far East Dead Zone'."

Jiang Ran looked at the complex ruins terrain, his brow slightly furrowed.

He certainly knew of this place.

It was a forbidden zone for all deep-sea divers.

Unlike the open deep sea, this place was filled with deadly obstacles.

The still-electrified high-voltage submarine cables, glass curtain walls that could collapse at any moment, and the terrifying "cutting turbulence" generated by ocean currents passing through gaps between buildings.

Turned this place into a giant meat grinder.

"This place is notoriously sinister."

Old Chen swallowed hard, clearly having heard many rumors: "I heard many exploration teams went in before, hoping to salvage some old era gold or tech. Ten went in, not a single one came out.

They say the waters there... are full of 'ghosts'."

"Not ghosts."

Su Qingyu coldly interrupted him, pointing at the bright red dot representing No.03 in the center of the ruins:

"They're Guardians."

"Since a spark of No.06's level had Radiation Sea Lizards guarding it.

Then, as a higher-tier node, No.03—within this steel maze it resides in—must be infested with something we cannot even imagine."

"Moreover..."

Su Qingyu zoomed in on the image, pointing at the faint layer of bluish-purple mist drifting between the skyscrapers:

"The electromagnetic field intensity in this area is five hundred times that of normal sea areas.

Any submarine relying on precise electronic equipment entering will have its radar and sonar instantly rendered blind."

"It's a natural electromagnetic maze."

"To obtain No.03.

We'll have to pilot the black iron through this steel jungle filled with high-voltage electricity and monsters.

Playing a game of blind man's bluff where we could get electrocuted at any moment."

"But high risk often accompanies high reward."

Su Qingyu's finger swept through the air, closing the dazzling terrain map.

Instead, she pulled up a recently decrypted encrypted document.

It was the core log extracted from the black box of the "Judgment" wreckage.

"I incidentally cracked that classified Ark file just now.

Combined with this star chart, I discovered an astonishing fact."

Su Qingyu looked at Jiang Ran, enunciating each word clearly:

"The Ark organization is frantically searching the world for these 'sparks,' not for clean energy at all.

Nor is it to create stronger mutated beasts."

"They're looking for... a remote control."

"A remote control?" Old Chen was stunned, "To control what? A TV?"

"To control 'Heaven's Judgment'."

Su Qingyu pointed at the line of small red text beside the No.03 spark on the screen—

"[Project Damocles: Ground Control Node]".

"At the end of the old era, before sea levels rose, humanity once deployed an ultimate defense system in the outer atmosphere—the 'God's Rod' orbital kinetic weapon system."

"Dozens of metal rods cast from high-density tungsten-titanium alloy were suspended on near-Earth orbit satellites.

Upon receiving an order, they would rely on gravitational acceleration to fall, impacting the ground at speeds several times the speed of sound."

"Their destructive power is comparable to tactical nuclear weapons, but without radiation, and they are impossible to intercept."

Su Qingyu's voice echoed in the deathly silent lab, carrying a chilling coldness:

"The Cataclysm destroyed ground communication stations, causing all these satellites to enter a dormant, silent state."

"And No.03, this node deep within the Tokyo ruins.

is likely the key to restarting this orbital system, or perhaps a surviving ground guidance station."

Hearing this, Old Chen drew a sharp breath, the half-steamed bun in his hand falling to the floor with a plop.

"So you mean... whoever gets No.03, in this world where we can only fight with ships,

will have the ability to summon meteors to crush their opponents at any time?"

"Exactly."

Jiang Ran took over the conversation.

He looked at the red dot flashing in the Tokyo ruins on the holographic projection; the laziness in his eyes had long since vanished.

In this chaotic deep-sea world, a warship's tonnage and cannon caliber are certainly important.

But if one masters the starry sky above... that is a dimensional overpowering.

"This is no longer just an expedition."

Jiang Ran turned and strode towards the command console, his voice low and powerful:

"This is a war to seize the 'Right of Coronation' in this post-apocalyptic world."

"Whoever masters that Sword of Damocles hanging overhead will be the true master of these seas."

Following his command, the black iron's long-dormant engines roared to life, its massive propellers stirring up violent vortices in the deep sea.

"Old Chen, take the helm."

"Su Qingyu, calibrate the coordinates."

Jiang Ran stood at the forefront of the bridge, his gaze seeming to pierce through the deep waters, directly targeting that once-prosperous, now-dead Eastern metropolis:

"Full speed ahead."

"Destination: Tokyo Ruins."