The sky of the Blue Star no longer bore dense, void-like rifts.
However, from this day forward, the Blue Star also lost its distinction between day and night.
Above the milky white firmament, a golden sun, radiating a gentle luminescence, was slowly bestowing power incomprehensible to ordinary people upon the entire world.
This was the Source, reversed from tens of billions of experience points under the system's might.
The Source was not a Great Source, incapable of fundamentally elevating the world's status, but in this critical moment, it could help the world endure a little longer.
Inside the Starfire City's council hall,
The Legion Commanders and officials had already gathered.
A day had passed since the cataclysmic battle against the Dark Demons' invasion.
The sun in the sky no longer set, and the ice-blue shield that had enveloped the entire Great Yan had vanished.
In truth, no one knew exactly what had happened, as even a glimpse of the previous battle was terrifying beyond mortal observation.
But the uncontrollable sorrow and fear that had once appeared in their hearts, along with the entire world's frantic trembling, told them that unimaginable upheaval had likely occurred.
In the conference room,
Chen Luo sat at the head of the table, with Dragon Girl standing beside him.
As Chen Luo spoke, everyone's expressions gradually grew more solemn.
When his account was finished, the atmosphere in the room had frozen to an absolute zero.
Zhuge Yun was the first to break the silence, his hands trembling as he adjusted his glasses:
"Commander, so our world will perish in eleven months?"
Chen Luo nodded calmly. "Based on the current rate of attrition, if nothing unexpected happens, our world will be completely devoured by the Mid-Layer Void in eleven months."
Zhuge Yun slumped back into his chair, utterly incapable of speech.
He had experienced such powerlessness when facing the Undead Legion and finding nuclear weapons ineffective.
And after half a year of preparation, with the Great Yan's strength having ascended several more levels, they now encountered an even more desperate situation.
It was not humanity, but the entire Blue Star, that would be crushed into dust by the endless void of the Mid-Layer Void.
The atmosphere in the conference room grew increasingly heavy. Most of the officials, like Zhuge Yun, had fallen into utter despair.
However, the Legion Commanders, the first veterans to follow Chen Luo, did not succumb to despair. Instead, they cast looks of expectation towards Chen Luo.
Chen Luo did not disappoint them. He slowly raised his right hand, and a magnificent, multicolored cube, constantly shifting its shape, materialized in his palm.
Anyone who saw this cube would be subconsciously drawn to it, as if it contained the most precious existence in the world.
"The only way to save the world now is to obtain a new Great Source, allowing our world to advance once more!"
"The Great Source is the origin of a world. To obtain a Great Source means we must plunder a brand new world!"
"And this... is a World Coordinate!"
...
Time rewound a little earlier,
Chen Luo had first presented this World Coordinate, which he had obtained long ago, to Dragon Girl.
It was one of the mission rewards he had received while clearing out the entire East Sea City.
[World Coordinate]
[Type]: Special Consumable (X-rank evaluation exclusive drop)
[Effect]: In the void, guides you to a new world. Upon arrival, a targeted world mission will commence.
[Usage Condition]: Possess the exclusive title "Void Crosser."
[Description]: All began because of it.
It had been nearly half a year since Chen Luo obtained this item named "World Coordinate," and he had almost forgotten its existence.
In Chen Luo's consciousness, the equipment previously dropped had long since been incorporated into the Legion system as rewards over the past half-year.
After all, the attribute bonuses of those equipment were insufficient to affect Chen Luo, who was already at the Domain level.
By the time of the Dark Demons' world-ending battle, Chen Luo's consciousness contained only a handful of items.
Among them was this wondrous "World Coordinate."
In fact, when Chen Luo had battled Dragon Girl yesterday and stepped into the Domain level, he had already gained the ability to traverse the Upper-Layer Void—the River of Void.
Now, holding the World Coordinate, Chen Luo felt a greater sense of clarity.
Within the void, worlds were more numerous than the grains of sand in the Ganges.
There were life-bearing planets like the Blue Star, completely sealed continental worlds, and even peculiar worlds where multiple layers of existence overlapped.
Some worlds possessed advanced civilizations, where interstellar travel and mechanical ascension had become reality.
Some worlds were rich in spiritual energy, where seeking immortality, cultivating the Dao, and transcending tribulations were the mainstream.
There were also worlds that were utterly desolate or sparsely populated.
The void was endless, and myriad worlds were merely a conceptual notion.
Even Dragon Girl, as a child of the void, who had wandered in the void for tens of thousands of years, only encountered so many new worlds after entering the game.
Otherwise, in most cases, Dragon Girl could only drift aimlessly in the boundless void.
And among these numerous worlds, only those that nurtured life were the worlds pointed to by the "World Coordinate."
They were also worlds capable of nurturing "Great Sources"!
Most importantly, Chen Luo had never understood what the targeted mission mentioned in the "World Coordinate's" effect referred to.
But now, Chen Luo had a vague suspicion: perhaps the means to seize a Great Source lay within it.
....
Upon hearing Chen Luo's explanation of the World Coordinate, the eyes of the assembled individuals gradually lit up.
With the possibility of traveling to a new world, their mother world might still have hope!
However, Zhuge Yun frowned and raised a hidden problem:
"Commander, the World Coordinate only provides your location, but it won't help you traverse the void, will it?"
"The location we are currently in, according to your words, is the Mid-Layer Void, a place where even you cannot directly survive?"
"Moreover, the distance between worlds should not be any shorter than the distance between life-bearing planets in the Material Realm, right?"
The lively scene suddenly fell silent.
How far apart were potentially life-bearing planets in the Material Realm?
Taking "Proxima Centauri," a potentially habitable star, as an example, it was about 4.22 light-years away from the Blue Star.
To put it more concretely, this distance was approximately 266,872 Astronomical Units,
And each Astronomical Unit was about 150 million kilometers, which is also the average distance from the Blue Star to the Sun.
Within the Mid-Layer Void, the distance to a world would certainly differ from that in the Material Realm.
But even so, this distance was highly likely to be more than what could be covered in a mere eleven months.
Not to mention, Chen Luo also had to successfully obtain the Great Source and return to his mother world.
The so-called solution, in the face of this problem, seemed to have once again become a dead end.