After seeing them off, Zhong Yun piloted the spacecraft along the predetermined route. Time passed, and by all rights, they should have returned to their original location, but they hadn't.

He then realized the star map was also malfunctioning. They couldn't pinpoint their location; they had no idea where they were.

This meant they were lost.

The star map is the single most crucial tool for cosmic navigation; without it, one cannot avoid becoming disoriented. To be lost in the void is practically equivalent to seeking death.

If you lose your way in a desert, you stand a good chance of survival by picking one direction and walking consistently forward. But being lost in space is no more likely to lead you to a populated planet than finding an administrative star among the cosmos—both are like searching for a needle in a haystack.

A star map fails because the vessel has suddenly entered a region outside its charted coordinates. Only by returning to charted space can it be made functional again.

Yet, several days had passed, and they hadn't returned to where they started.

This is because the universe is filled with various gravitational forces—from stars, planets, even comets. In reality, a spacecraft's flight path can never be a straight line. Even the slightest gravitational pull can knock a vessel off course, and a deviation of just 0.01 degrees in trajectory means you will never reach your destination.

One of the star map's primary functions is to correct the heading, ensuring the ship travels in the correct direction. This directional adjustment is performed every half hour as a measure to conserve energy.

Consequently, over ninety percent of the time during a deep-space voyage, a spacecraft is actually moving in the wrong direction. It is only through the star map’s constant recalibration that the ship can arrive at its intended destination.

The failure of the star map was a nearly catastrophic blow to the vessel.

Fortunately, the probes were still functional. Zhong Yun maxed out the power output of the Mercury's sensors. This allowed them to detect the precise conditions within five thousand kilometers, the presence of high-density metal objects up to ten thousand kilometers away, and any violent energy fluctuations within a million kilometers.

Even with this capability, the chance of finding any inhabited location remained slim because the universe is simply too vast. A million kilometers, in the context of the entire cosmos, is no different than a single atom.

The two ships drifted aimlessly for a full month. Zhong Yun had no idea where they had ended up. The spatial sensors were also offline, rendering communication with the outside world impossible.

The ominous feeling in his gut grew stronger. Being lost in space is a terrifying prospect. Zhong Yun had experienced it once before, and though he now possessed the advanced Mars and Mercury, the sense of mounting anxiety had not diminished one bit.

Even Xiao Ling was helpless. This represented a tremendous shock to Zhong Yun. Until now, Xiao Ling had always seemed omnipotent, but the loss of his greatest asset left him feeling distinctly unnerved.

Zhong Yun ceased all his training routines, spending his days confined to the Mercury's main control room, obsessively studying potential escape strategies.

After a month of aimless drifting, Zhong Yun made a grim resolution: he would change tactics. He would proceed methodically and attempt to fabricate a new star map. The map hadn't failed due to a machine malfunction; it was simply unable to fix their position within the charted framework.

The Mercury was designed as an exploration vessel, equipped with extremely advanced stellar cartography instruments. While recreating a star map would be an enormous task, it was infinitely preferable to flailing about like a headless insect.

As for provisions, the Mercury housed a food synthesis unit. These synthesized meals were primarily carbohydrates, and the elements required to construct carbohydrates were abundant throughout the cosmos, supplemented by necessary proteins and vitamins.

The output was more than sufficient for their contingent of eight thousand people. The only pressing issue was power. While both the Mars and Mercury still held substantial energy reserves, those reserves would eventually deplete, necessitating strict conservation measures.

Simultaneously, he deployed the external charging panels. The universe was saturated with various types of radiation, all of which could be converted into usable energy. While the energy captured couldn't fully offset consumption, it was considerable nonetheless.

Given the vast reserves held by the two ships, this drain was negligible. However, there was a trade-off: deploying the charging panels drastically reduced the vessels’ defensive capabilities.

Therefore, Zhong Yun only activated the charging panels on one ship at a time, keeping the other vessel on high alert against any unforeseen incident.

Because the star map creation process demanded precision, the ships maintained a slow velocity. It was fortunate that the system was fully automated; otherwise, Zhong Yun, alone, would have been completely overwhelmed. He dared not allow the 'Six-Man Team' to assist; he wouldn't permit unauthorized personnel into the control room.

Another half-month elapsed in this manner. One day, Zhong Yun brought the Mercury into proximity with a planet—an ordinary world, utterly unsuitable for human habitation. It lacked an atmosphere and possessed a hostile environment.

Zhong Yun had come here to gather samples because Xiao Ling had detected an anomaly in the elemental distribution. While collecting samples of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen from an asteroid to synthesize food, Xiao Ling inadvertently discovered that the planet held an extraordinary concentration of metallic elements, particularly rare metals, whose abundance was staggeringly high.

Subsequent collections from several other small asteroids yielded similarly high metal concentrations. Once could be coincidence, but multiple identical results suggested that this entire sector was an enriched metallic domain.

The sheer volume of rare metals available was enough to make even Xiao Ling gasp in astonishment, and the rarity was compounded by the vast geographical spread. If this mineral belt were discovered, it held the potential to ignite wars between nations, given how tempting these rare resources were.

Upon approaching the planet, the Mercury deployed its remote-controlled collection drone, which landed on the surface to gather rock samples before commencing subsurface exploration. The collection drone was equipped with heavy-duty drilling apparatus, first boring one hundred meters down for samples, then continuing deeper.

At a depth of five thousand meters, the drill bit struck something, and the drilling mechanism reported catastrophic failure.

Zhong Yun, receiving the report, was slightly surprised. He had reviewed the manual, which boasted that the drill possessed formidable penetrating power, capable of breaching anything save for the handful of hardest alloys. Even the hull of a spacecraft could be perforated given sufficient time. (These were the machine’s advertising claims.)

What on earth was buried beneath the surface that could resist such force?

Zhong Yun dispatched the probe robot from the collection vehicle. The results were perplexing: the rover’s scanners indicated only a large, ordinary rock formation below.

This made no sense. Zhong Yun commanded the robot to retrieve the rock, but the report indicated the specimen was too large to be extracted.

What kind of rock was it? Zhong Yun was intensely curious about what surprises this planet might hold. Rubbing his hands together, he equipped the drill with a spare bit and initiated drilling anew.

Five minutes later, the drill bit failed again. Zhong Yun was shocked. He specifically queried Xiao Ling about which natural substances that drill was incapable of penetrating.

Xiao Ling’s response was that any rock possessing that degree of hardness would inherently possess a value beyond measure.

Zhong Yun, determined, unleashed dozens of excavation robots at once, intent on unearthing that rock for examination.

The excavation continued for seven days. Zhong Yun would never normally waste this much time, but this subterranean discovery held him captive. He harbored a vague, compelling feeling that this astonishing find might be the key to their escape.

Zhong Yun had initially expected to unearth the rock within a few hours, but soon realized the sheer, unimaginable scale of the object he called "rock."

The excavation machinery had carved out a colossal pit nearly a thousand kilometers in diameter, yet they still could not see the end of this "rock."

Zhong Yun could not restrain himself any longer and piloted the Mercury down for a closer look. The sight that greeted him caused him to startle violently: this was no rock at all. The surface was perfectly smooth and level, and this flatness extended over the entire square thousand kilometers. This could not possibly be a natural formation.

There must be a secret buried here, Zhong Yun mused.

Could it be, like the Mercury, a spacecraft buried beneath the surface? He desperately wanted to know.

But he was powerless against this "rock." Neither the high-energy ion cannon nor his own ion-oscillation blade, capable of delivering eight thousand units of destructive energy, could leave even the faintest scratch on that uniformly smooth surface.

This only intensified Zhong Yun’s curiosity. He committed every last excavation robot to the task.

Seven days later, they still had not reached the perimeter of the smooth "rock." He had no idea how immense it truly was.

Zhong Yun settled in for the long haul, refusing to abandon the site until he uncovered what this thing was. At the very least, it offered a secure location for the ships to rest and resupply.

The raw crystals had been in his possession for some time, but the urgency of their journey had prevented him from stopping to install several into Xiao Ling. Every time a new crystal was installed, Xiao Ling would undergo a full reboot, and upon restarting, he evolved, becoming exponentially more powerful with each cycle.

Zhong Yun pinned his hopes on this next reboot enabling Xiao Ling to devise a method to escape this cursed location. He had thoroughly scouted the vicinity and deemed it relatively safe. Thus, he chose this opportunity to install new crystals into Xiao Ling.

He selected the two hundred finest quality crystals to upload. He had intended to install all five hundred-plus crystals at once, but Xiao Ling had advised against it, warning that rebooting with too much data would drastically lengthen the process, potentially delaying the recovery for an immeasurable time.

Xiao Ling projected the current reboot cycle to take two months. During this period, the Mars would remain unmanned and docked at the planet.

Zhong Yun, piloting the Mercury, patrolled the surrounding space, his vigilance never slackening. During this time, he ate and slept right there in the command chair.

Days turned into weeks, and the excavation of the "rock" showed no sign of conclusion. The volume of excavated soil was now nearing the height of a Himalayan mountain.

Even the sophisticated mineral surveying equipment had become useless near this anomaly. It could no longer differentiate the "rock" from its surroundings, as if they had somehow merged into a single entity.

Zhong Yun found the situation increasingly fascinating.