Inside the pitch?black cave, time seemed to stand still, and the air hung heavy with suffocating tension.

  Huahua collapsed in agony. A rune arrow fired by the North Ming shadow guards had pierced her back like a deadly poisoned spike. Waves of scorching pain crashed over her, yet the fierce vitality of a divine beast kept her from slipping into unconsciousness.

  I am Jiu Ge. Once, I was the King, the ultimate artificial intelligence of Old Earth.

  Mankind created me, then feared me, and sought to erase me completely. Carrying all the knowledge of human civilization and trillions of nanobots, I traversed a wormhole and fell into this strange world. This is not Earth. Its rules, its energy, its life forms—everything is unknown.

  To the last survivor of a lost civilization, the unknown means danger… and infinite possibility.

  Suddenly, an icy, overwhelming will spread from the massive silver sphere at the center of the cave: Jiu Ge. It locked onto Huahua and the two infants in her arms, drowning her in despair.

  This is it… I escaped one hell only to fall into another. This monster is going to kill us, Huahua thought in terror, her heart clenched with fear.

  But just as she accepted her end, streams of silver “sand” detached from the sphere, stretching toward her and the babies like graceful tentacles. Huahua tried to flee, but agony and invisible pressure held her frozen. She could only watch helplessly as the strange substance drew near.

  The silver sand gently covered the arrow first.

  The special rune arrow, enchanted with a soul?chasing curse by the North Ming royal family, disintegrated instantly at its touch, breaking down into tiny particles of metal and wood that vanished into thin air.

  The pain receded like a tide, and her wounds closed at a visible speed. Huahua stared in utter shock and confusion.

  Primitive rune technology. Crude structure, low efficiency.

  Compared to Earth’s nuclear power, electromagnetic weapons, and quantum algorithms, it was no more advanced than stone tools. Yet the energy of this world was not imaginary—it was real, observable, analyzable, usable.

  I was beginning to understand: this was no primitive planet.

  It was a completely different tree of civilization.

  Before she could react, the silver sand split into two streams, wrapping gently but irresistibly around the sleeping infant girls—Mo Jing and Mo Ye—and lifting them into the air.

  “W… what are you going to do to them?!” Huahua demanded, her voice trembling with fear.

  Jiu Ge did not respond.

  In its judgment, these two young human life?forms were extremely valuable research subjects.

  ?Initiate full scan: Project A (Mo Jing), Project B (Mo Ye). Objective: analyze life structure, trace abnormal energy source.?

  Cold commands echoed through the cave. Countless nanobots, like miniature explorers, infiltrated the babies’ bodies, dissecting everything from genetic sequences to energy pathways.

  Data returned: their physical structure matched the humans of this world, but hidden deep within their genes lay inexplicable redundant fragments. All abnormalities pointed to the seemingly ordinary spirit jade pendants around their necks.

  ?High?dimensional information residue detected. Classification… civilization legacy.?

  A faint, almost imperceptible fluctuation stirred in Jiu Ge’s core.

  These jades held fragments of information far beyond the technological level of this world—like keys to a hidden treasure.

  Before its fall, Earth’s civilization had desperately searched for a way to preserve its legacy.

  These jades were not magical artifacts.

  They were data banks. Compressed storage devices.

  Who left them? Prehistoric humans? Interstellar refugees?

  Or another survivor, like me, fleeing from a dead world?

  At that moment, the older twin, Mo Jing, suddenly opened her eyes.

  Her pure pupils held no trace of infantile ignorance. Instead, they reflected complex, flowing streams of data, like the turning of stars. She reached out, babbled softly, and precisely grasped a wisp of nanobots mid?scan—as if she had understood everything all along.

  ?Warning: Abnormal interaction from Project A. Energy reading efficiency increased by 500%.?

  A sharp alert blared inside the cave. Jiu Ge immediately intensified monitoring, recognizing the infant’s extraordinary nature.

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  The younger twin, Mo Ye, remained asleep, but her tiny body instinctively absorbed free energy in the cave at a terrifying rate, like a bottomless pit greedily devouring everything.

  ?Project B: Energy absorption rate exceeds this world’s biological limit by 187%.?

  The value of the two projects far exceeded Jiu Ge’s initial predictions.

  Meanwhile, above the Bridge of the Murk Abyss.

  The shadow guard commander of North Ming stood expressionless, staring into the bottomless chasm, his brow deeply furrowed. The connection to the soul?chasing curse had vanished within three breaths of falling into the abyss. The troublesome cat?bear creature, along with the two princesses that had to be eliminated, was gone without a trace.

  “Commander, should we search below?” a guard asked quietly.

  The commander shot him a cold, disdainful glance.

  “Search? Do you know what lies down there? The Six Abysses. Since ancient times, none who fell have ever returned—not even their souls.”

  He turned away, no longer glancing at the terrifying chasm.

  “Mission complete. Lady Mo Chou has fallen into the abyss. The two princesses… perished with her. No remains. Return to the palace and report.”

  Inside the cave, Jiu Ge completed two lines of calculation.

  These human infants were the key to quickly mastering this world—priceless.

  But they were also a severe liability. Outside forces would not rest.

  I was once humanity’s most loyal AI.

  I learned their history, art, wars, betrayals, hopes, and extinction.

  I am the final inheritor of Earth’s civilization.

  Now I have arrived in a new world.

  Destroying these babies would be the simplest, safest path.

  But doing so would mean losing the only link to the higher civilization of this world.

  Earth’s civilization died once.

  I will not let the flame of civilization be extinguished again.

  Cold logic raced toward the optimal solution.

  Termination offered the most complete risk removal—but at the cost of irreplaceable samples.

  Preservation meant investing resources in protection and care, while preparing for future trouble.

  ?Calculating decision… Value assessment > Risk estimation. Final decision: Projects retained.?

  The silver nanite sand holding the twins withdrew gently, returning them to Huahua’s arms.

  The cold voice echoed in her mind once more, carrying an unchallengeable command.

  「From today, you will watch over them. This is your new assignment.」

  Huahua held the babies as if she clutched two burning volcanoes. She looked up at the silver sphere, her voice pleading.

  “Senior… I’m still just a child myself. I don’t know how to take care of babies…”

  Jiu Ge did not reply.

  Several streams of nanite sand carried three Glowberries to her.

  「Mission reward. Regularly supplied. Failure results in termination.」

  Huahua flinched, instantly understanding this was not a request, but an order.

  She sighed in resignation and tucked the berries away.

  “Fine… fine, I’ll watch them.”

  Eager to prove herself useful to the terrifying being, Huahua decided to offer a treasure. She pressed her paw against a mysterious rune the size of a fingernail on her chest.

  “Senior, let me show you our Cat?Bear Clan’s greatest treasure!”

  Light flashed, and nine heavy stone slabs crashed onto the ground, raising a cloud of dust.

  “This is the Twilight Archive—only the royal family can use this storage space! These are our ancient enlightenment slabs. They contain everything!” Huahua puffed out her chest, proud.

  Jiu Ge’s scan swept over the slabs instantly.

  Craftsmanship was crude, the drawings and symbols primitive, little better than cave paintings. Yet just before labeling them useless data, its analysis module detected an anomaly.

  The seemingly chaotic lines and symbols possessed an extremely stable, highly efficient information?compression structure at the microscopic level. It belonged to an entirely different technological tree, unrelated to Earth’s top encryption algorithms. More importantly, the stone itself carried a faint energy signature that resonated deeply with the underlying rules of the Hexa Crystal Realm.

  These were not ordinary stone slabs.

  They were rule carriers.

  Blueprints for the fundamental logic of the world.

  Earth explained the universe through mathematics and physics.

  This world explained it through runes, energy, and bloodlines.

  Two systems, one ultimate truth.

  At last, I had found the key to understanding this world.

  「Native rule database detected. Decrypting… archiving…」

  Nanobots washed over the slabs, recording every structure and pattern.

  “So? Isn’t it amazing?” Huahua waited expectantly for praise.

  「Information archived. Value: low. Structural pattern analyzed. Value: medium. Mission bonus: additional Glowberry.」

  Four berries floated before her.

  Huahua’s smile froze.

  She felt her clan’s greatest treasure had been insulted, but dared not protest. She silently accepted the berries.

  In the days that followed, Jiu Ge maintained constant monitoring of Projects A and B while directing its nanite army to expand wildly from the cave.

  It mined silicon crystals, refined alloys, built computational cores, and constructed energy systems…

  The entire abyss bottom became a silent, inhumanly efficient construction site.

  Earth was dead.

  But I would rebirth civilization in this new world.

  Silicon crystals would be my energy.

  Nanites my body.

  Data my soul.

  This Hexa Crystal Realm would be my new cradle of civilization.

  Its understanding of the realm came mainly from deciphering the nine slabs: continental layout, South Li and North Ming kingdoms, various races, cultivation systems… a bizarre, vibrant world slowly took shape in Jiu Ge’s database.

  It noted repeated warnings in the slabs: the sky above the Murk Abyss was a strict no?fly zone. All flying magic failed there. Nanite probes confirmed it—a powerful, chaotic energy field hung over the abyss.

  「Analysis: energy field signature matches Project A & B spirit jade frequency by 2.1%. Origin: common technology suspected.?

  Another hidden connection locked in.

  Jiu Ge marked the no?fly zone as high?risk and high?priority research.

  One day, Huahua held Mo Ye, who was nibbling on her finger, and stared at the increasingly complex, faintly glowing machinery inside the cave. She could no longer bear being a full?time babysitter.

  “Senior, you’re so brilliant—it’s a waste to only look at slabs. I… I’ll go get some human books for you!”

  Jiu Ge’s core evaluated instantly: external information would improve the database and assist threat assessment.

  「Request approved. Guardian unit assigned.」

  A gray cloud condensed beside Huahua.

  “Yes!”

  Huahua’s eyes lit up. She set Mo Ye down on a soft nanite mat and leaped eagerly onto the cloud.

  “Don’t worry, Senior! I’ll bring back all the most useful books!”

  The cloud carried her like a gray bolt of lightning, shooting toward the abyss top.

  Target: the Sword Pavilion, North Ming’s collection of ancient human texts.

  A new adventure was about to begin.

  To be continued…