The Record of Unusual Creatures

Panda Novel

The dark and cold space was filled with an unnatural chaotic mist. Deep within that chaotic mist, which could even block the sight of a demigod, a planet covered in pale light stood silently there. While there was no sun near it, a layer of divine power allowed the planet to brim with life.

Above the planet, the chaotic mist suddenly roiled as a glowing vortex slowly opened. An argent starship silently slid out of the gate and approached the planet beneath it.

Looking at the real-time images from the cameras outside, and the planet, which had split into half but was still brimming with life, Hao Ren gasped in amazement. While this was not the first time he had seen L’Haronne’s state, the planet, recreated in the dream world of the gods never failed to awe him every time he laid eyes on it.

“Unbelievable… The power of the gods sure is unbelievable.”

On the ship, only three “people” followed him: Vivian, Lily, and Rheia’s projection, which she used to move around.

Such a team composition was rather rare, but Hao Ren thought it was more than enough, and compared with his misadventure into the dream of L’Haronne previously, the current L’Haronne was a pretty “safe” planet. The real L’Haronne was a planet reborn from the powers of the goddess of creation. Even though the goddess herself did not understand much of the planet’s workings, they were sure that the planet did not have any deadly threats. And in a low-danger environment, they did not need a full team for an investigative foray.

Hao Ren had actually planned to just travel with Vivian, but Lily found being at home too boring and threw a tantrum to come along. As for Rheia… she was not a member of his team, so when she decided to send her projection over, no one could stop her.

Besides, she was the one recreated L’Haronne in the dream. Since it was done subconsciously, Rheia was not entirely sure of the process. Nonetheless, she still had a basic understanding of the planet and could be of great help if she went along.

Lily sat in her chair as she stuffed her face with popcorn. “Will there be any clues about the Mad Lord here?”

“It is very hard to say,” Rheia responded. “The original L’Haronne has long been destroyed, and this one was forcefully recreated in my dream by my own will. Whether this recreated planet retained much of the original planet’s data is unknown. We are practically just trying our luck here because a big clue is potentially dangling right before us. We cannot just leave it on the planet, right?”

While they spoke, the Petrachelys approached L’Haronne’s atmosphere. A layer of glowing light blue “membrane” floated there, separating the atmosphere from the dark chaotic void. It was the divine barrier created by Rheia’s will 10,000 years ago.

It was this barrier that twisted reality, rewrote history, and restored an already-annihilated planet by force into its original state.

Nolan carefully navigated the ship to close in on the simple yet terrifyingly powerful divine barrier. Her piloting had never been that slow and steady.

The ship’s energy shields finally made contact with the divine barrier, and when the two touched, a small ripple formed. But as the ripple expanded, the entire atmosphere lit up before Hao Ren’s eyes. The divine membrane seemingly solidified and crystallized, as though trying to stop an intruder from entering. Despite that, the change did not last long, and the expanding ripples soon calmed down. The crystallization faded away while the ship safely entered L’Haronne’s atmosphere.

Only then did Hao Ren heave a huge sigh of relief. He was wondering if his Mr. Kablooey monicker was taking effect again, and he almost called for Nolan to engage emergency ascent. Alas, it was just a false alarm. “F*ck… What was that about?”

Rheia was shocked by the occurrence too, but as an expert with divine powers (even at primary school level she was still better than most), she very quickly got an idea. “This barrier wards off the Chaos in space. Our ship came down from the Realm of Chaos and may have had some traces of it when we made contact with the barrier. But it was quickly purified so there should not be any further problems.”

“Be careful.” Hao Ren nodded. “This planet defies common sense.”

Lily clapped her hands, looking excitedly at the railing in front her as a clear sea of clouds appeared on the holographic projection. “No worries Mr. Landlord! I’m very adaptable!”

“Ugh… That’s not the kind of common sense I was talking about… Hmm? What is that?”

The clouds above L’Haronne were getting closer, and they could even see the lightning and rain among the clouds. Beneath the roiling clouds, Hao Ren saw something else.

A ship—a ship flying above the sea of clouds, transportation created by the people of L’Haronne—was darting among the clouds as its silver hull and fully-extended sails glistened like a shiny shell. That allowed the seemingly not so high-tech flying contraption to appear more aesthetically pleasing. However, by the side and rear of the ship were three crude gray vessels pursuing it like a pack of wolves. The three gray warships had paintwork that looked like storm clouds as their triangular hulls and terrifying sail-like objects allowed them greater maneuverability compared with the white flying ship. Time and time again they caught up with the escaping white ship. Throughout the whole ordeal, a series of tiny flashes leaped between the ships, a clear sign of combat.

While the three gray warships were only about a fifth of the white ship’s size and looked almost decrepit, they were having the upper hand in the pursuit. The combat vessels swarmed the massive but lumbering civilian ship, putting it in grave danger. Under their relentless attacks, the beautiful white ship had burnt marks all over it and part of its sail was torn from the mast, hanging limply by the side of the ship while its counterfire lessened. It was almost as if it was taking a one-sided beating.

“We sure can’t escape trouble, huh…” Hao Ren smacked his forehead the moment he saw the images on the screen. “Is there a bloody war?”

“First of all, we’re flying in the atmosphere, using advanced equipment to gather data. We’re able to detect everything within this part of the hemisphere, so detecting an event like that is pretty normal.” Nolan’s projection appeared on the bridge as she said with a deadpan face, “Second of all, based on the mainframe’s analysis, the fighting below is probably not part of an actual war, more like a pirate raid. And lastly, if this continues, that white ship will be done for in an hour.”

“Let’s go down to help it,” Vivian said without any hesitation. “We can gather information from the people we rescue.”

Lily looked at Vivian in excitement. “We don’t have to go in all sneaky this time?”

“We’re not infiltrating hostile territory, and it’s not like this is some forbidden place or anything.” Hao Ren shrugged. “We don’t have to be that careful.”

Even as he said that, Hao Ren added, “Of course, let’s not draw too much attention. My plan is to make contact with a few locals and understand the situation on this planet before we communicate with the upper echelons. If we make too much noise, we might be taken as alien invaders, and before we can even get any info, we’ll probably get fell upon by superheroes with their underpants outside.”

Lily tilted her head from the left to the right. “If we were to run into such things, might as well just call Y’zaks here. I remember him saying that he pulled his demon king schtick many times during his younger days. He’s a veteran…”

Hao Ren was speechless.

Above the clouds, the argent starship adjusted course and started to head directly toward the four ships.

Kant the One-Eyed Dragon’s mood was particularly foul that day.

As the infamous pirate of the Riptide Sea, Kant was a happy person most of the time. He knew his craft was dangerous, and its dangers were not limited to the Royal Navy, well-armed merchant groups, the wild winds of the World Scar, or some of his crew members getting the bright idea of mutiny. These dangers were things a pirate would face on a daily basis, and anyone could turn a deadly pirate into a dead one. Knowing that, Kant held a very strong belief.

And that was to embrace each day happily.

However, he just was not able to get into the mood on this particular day.

He had just accepted a business deal, one that would allow his family to live in golden mansions as well as dresses for ages to come, and the business involved taking on a simple civilian vessel. Obviously, the elegant vessel had some surprising teeth to their firepower, but that was not his concern. The thing that was troubling him was… the business. It was just too good to be true.

When the difficulty of a “business” was way below a client’s payout, it usually meant bad news.

As an experienced pirate, Kant had already sniffed out a number of things that did not seem right; like how the client just gave him a shocking amount of payment upfront and how the client also supplied him with a good number of high-grade items, which could not have been obtained through normal means. The items included the magic core of flying ships, main cannons, and shield generators. All their identification markers had been wiped out, but they were clearly in the style of an elven smith. The items became the core of his ships, and after they were installed, Kant’s vessels were pretty much transformed into full-fledged battleships aside from the hull. The client even gave specific mission requirements, whereby the ship should only be attacked after they left the White City Federation and crossed the World Scar. Once the ship managed to enter the imperial territory, the attack had to be called off regardless if it was successful or not…

Kant was pretty sure that some major powers were at play, and he along with his pirate fleet were just cards in the battle. It seemed like they were cards that could be easily discarded at any time.

Plus, even he could not figure out which powers were behind this, it was pretty obvious what sort of role his fleet was playing in the game.

Nevertheless, he could not reject.

Kant reflexively touched his eye patch. That was the price of rejecting a “big business” his first time around. The price included the pirate fleet he previously led and his original name, as well as identity.

The great pirate’s head started to ache.

He tried to think of a way out. The pirates in the raid were just a pre-show, and the main event was certainly being directed by the greater powers at play. How would they appear? Would it be a pirate-hunting fleet? Or an armed noble vessel? Or a ‘mysterious battleship making an “accidental” appearance?

While these possibilities had just appeared, he needed to get his men out of the place and into the Cloudmist Summit, the faster the better. There would be enough supplies and backup ships there, in addition to a teleportation gate to the secret harbor. That was the way out, which Kant left himself.

But would those greater powers at play allow him to get out?

The great pirate felt his headache getting worse.

The white ship was still fighting on stubbornly. She was a very beautiful ship, and seeing her wither away under the attacks of his ships was something regrettable. Kant even started to think that if the ship had some hidden trump card and blasted its way towards the Dragon Empire, it would be for the best. That meant the situation engineered by those powers at play would encounter a problem and be aborted prematurely. He and his fleet no longer needed to be embroiled in this deadly dance of daggers. And that beautiful ship… she could go on flying beautifully.

However, it was clear that the ship was on her last legs as a bright flash blasted out of its mid-hull. That was a sign of the magical core overloading and exploding.

The great pirate massaged his head. He knew that a decisive moment was upon him and felt his headache intensify, which had been a problem all thanks to his single eye. It was also worsening by the day.

An argent “flying ship” burst through the clouds at that very moment.

She joined the fray from above, and Kant was initially unaware of the ship’s sudden appearance. By the time he noticed the change in the light, the intruding argent ship had already crashed into the fore of the pirate ship. The powerful crash ripped the enchanted dragon bones and tore half of the cabin apart. Kant was only able to slightly turn his head before the ship flew out alongside his shattered cabin.

Year 221 of the Glorian Calendar, a group of outsiders visited this closed world. They uncovered and resolved a hidden danger, revealing the truth of the world and bringing true revelation.

They also cured Kant, the great pirate’s headache along the way.