Chapter 1 The Heidiga Star System

Colton Star Cluster, a contested zone – the Heidiga Star System.

Six star cluster civilizations, including the Godora civilization, all wanted to occupy the Heidiga Star System, stationing troops in their respective controlled areas, creating a tense stalemate with constant friction.

Outside the military zones of the six civilizations, the Heidiga Star System was sparsely dotted with transit station planets serving interstellar travelers. Due to the ambiguous jurisdiction of the Heidiga Star System, these transit stations became a gray area, a haven for all sorts of characters. Not only were there scavengers, space pirates, and fugitives, but even military officers from the six civilizations would occasionally come to the transit stations to enjoy themselves, without interfering with each other.

Orange Star Transit Station was such a gray area, and at this moment, a group of players was active there.

Haotian, Mingyue Changzhong, Flash Fried Rice, and others walked on the dirty and noisy streets, accompanied by a dozen people. Some were professional players from the Changkong Club, and the others were players from the Jiangcheng Club. Kuangdao Nujian led his teammates to work with Changkong.

Both sides had accepted the same hidden chain quest, and the last stage of the quest was at the Orange Star Transit Station. Kuangdao and Haotian were good friends, so they hit it off and the two teams traveled together.

Two years had passed in the game. Due to Kuangdao's stellar performance in the first league, the Jiangcheng Club built a new team lineup around Kuangdao as the core. Most of Kuangdao's teammates were newcomers and were still in the running-in period.

The second Star Sea Professional League was already being planned, and the hype had been going on for some time. News from the *Star Sea Times* revealed that there would be new changes to the competition system this time, and the official start would be in a while. All the teams were preparing intensively.

More than a year ago, players from other novice planets had finally entered interstellar space. Professional players had reached the level 90 cap, and skills, equipment, specialties, special items, and so on were all key points in the pre-match preparation stage for professional players.

Changkong and Jiangcheng's cooperation was aimed at the rewards of the hidden quest.

As the core of the team, Kuangdao was under great pressure. He wanted to achieve good results to prove himself and not let the club down, so he didn't let go of any opportunity.

"Captain, the person we're looking for is hiding on this planet, how do we find him?" Xie Xiaojian said to Kuangdao.

Xie Xiaojian was Kuangdao's teammate, a talented professional rookie. In the entire Jiangcheng team, only Xie Xiaojian's skills were remarkable, barely able to act as a capable assistant. As for the other teammates, in Kuangdao's eyes, they could only be considered mediocre blue-collar workers.

"The last stage of the quest must be very difficult. The quest prompt tells us to find clues ourselves. According to experience, entertainment venues in this kind of gray area have a lot of circulating information. We can start from these places," Kuangdao pondered.

At this time, the captain of Changkong, Haotian, spoke up with a low voice.

"Let's talk about finding clues later, let's worry about safety issues first."

Hearing this, everyone looked around. Pedestrians wearing various rough combat suits were staring at them with fierce and sinister expressions, their eyes ill-intentioned, constantly scanning the exquisite combat armor and weapons on the players, seemingly intending to rob them.

In the vision of Haotian, Kuangdao, and other players, most of the pedestrians around them were red-named, representing hostility, and the rest were neutral yellow-named. There was not a single green name to be seen.

"Space pirates or scavengers..."

Everyone's expression remained unchanged. They were used to fighting monsters. As Black Star mercenaries, they had killed countless space pirates in the past two years.

Kuangdao's body flashed with bright yellow Machinery Force. A helmet appeared, covering his head. The armor transformed with a series of clicks, various structures appearing, turning into a set of blue and yellow heavy combat armor, its style resembling ornate knight armor.

This was a weakened version of a general-grade armor, named 【Mountain】, a pink rare equipment. It was funded by the guild and custom-made from Han Xiao at a great price. At the current level of the players, 【Mountain】 was a top-tier equipment.

Then, he took off the long box on his back, and the Machinery Force activated. The box quickly transformed into a long-handled heavy melee weapon with an axe blade and a cannon muzzle. This was a modified version of the Slicing Cannon, with a size close to half a person.

The others turned on their combat modes, and their equipment was varied. Even the worst equipment was purple. The club guild served professional players, using the guild to support the team, so naturally they were not short of money. Their equipment level had always been the top among the player groups, so it was normal for them to attract the covetousness of space pirates.

The atmosphere suddenly became tense, and the two sides confronted each other.

The group of space pirates grinned, about to make a move, when suddenly one member's face changed drastically, and he hurriedly shouted, "Stop, don't do it! They're from Black Star!"

As soon as he finished speaking, the sinister expressions of the space pirates suddenly disappeared, and their faces changed abruptly. One second they wanted to pounce on them, but the next moment they hurriedly retreated, quickly distancing themselves, and then carefully examined the players' armor, their eyes slowly widening.

On the armor and weapons of the players, in hidden places, was engraved the same symbol, a round black circle, outlined by a white edge, with four straight rays distributed in a cross shape, separated from the circle by a short distance, representing light. It looked like a black star radiating light.

None of the space pirates present didn't know what this symbol represented.

This was the logo of the Black Star Army!

All the space pirates revealed expressions of fear and dread, hesitant to move forward, not daring to attack.

At this moment, a powerful voice echoed from the other end of the street.

"Hmph, it seems to be very lively here."

Everyone turned their heads to look, and saw several officers wearing Godora uniforms slowly walking over, their cold eyes sweeping over all the space pirates.

In the eyes of the players, the suddenly appearing Godora officers were the only group of friendly green-named characters within sight.

"Friends of the Black Star Army, do you need help?"

The leading Godora officer twisted his neck, his expression stern.

The space pirates, who had been extremely ferocious just now, instantly turned into trembling white rabbits. In the Heidiga Star System, there was an iron rule that absolutely could not be violated, that was, no one could attack the officers of the six civilizations, otherwise the garrison would not mind wiping out the gray area.

The entire Colton Star Cluster knew that the Black Star Army and the Godora people were allies. These space pirates regretted it greatly. They had kicked an iron plate they couldn't afford to provoke. It was really bad luck.

"Run!"

The space pirate gang scattered in all directions, like stars in the sky, fleeing in panic.

The players seemed to be used to this scene, and they all put away their weapons, not wasting time chasing these small monsters.

The Godora officers didn't make a move either. They nodded to the players, turned around, and left. The intention of these officers was very simple, it was purely because they saw people from the Black Star Army, so they came to help.

The two camps were allies, and Black Star was the recipient of the highest honor of Godora. As a member of the Black Star Army, they could get extra help wherever there were Godora people. The Black Star network that the players joked about had gradually become a reality.

...

One tall and one short space pirate fled far away, turning their heads to make sure no one was chasing them before they dared to stop to rest, holding their knees and panting.

"Huff... I thought I was dead just now, luckily they didn't chase after us." The short space pirate wiped away a cold sweat.

The tall space pirate nodded repeatedly, his face full of relief after surviving a disaster.

Nowadays, in the few star systems around the Gadon Star System, except for those star cluster civilizations, basically no force was willing to provoke the Black Star Army.

"Luckily we're just a small gang, without a bounty, otherwise it would have been miserable." The short space pirate's chest rose and fell.

"It's really fortunate that we haven't been wanted yet." The tall space pirate smiled bitterly, not knowing whether to be happy about it.

Among the space pirates, there was a saying that could be summarized as – Better to meet the Dragon Emperor than Black Star!

The Black Star Army had risen at an alarming rate in the past two years. One of the reasons was that they also worked as space pirate hunters. Around the Gadon Star System, all the large space pirate gangs were the prey of the Black Star Army. One space pirate gang after another was destroyed, and all the warships were seized. It was conservatively estimated that at least four hundred warships were snatched by the Black Star Army.

The space pirates in the surrounding star systems were all in danger. Some large space pirate gangs joined forces to target Black Star for an assassination in order to protect themselves. However, they didn't expect to fall into an ambush instead. Black Star seemed to have predicted the enemy's actions. Millions of mercenaries were thrown into the battle, and the scene was amazing. In the end, the allied space pirate gangs were wiped out in one fell swoop.

Although they caught a lot of big space pirates, most of them didn't know where Black Star had hidden them. Only a small number of them were taken out to exchange for bounties, and they all became inhuman. No one knew what kind of ravage and abuse they had suffered from Black Star. It was said that once Black Star took a prisoner to exchange for a bounty, and the staff at the office couldn't recognize the prisoner as the wanted target, they were completely two different people.

After the news spread, countless space pirates were terrified, and they all thought that Black Star had some special hobby for space pirates. Black Star instantly became a hundred times more ferocious in their eyes. The saying "Better to meet the Dragon Emperor than Black Star" spread at that time and was strongly recognized by the vast number of space pirate comrades.

The Dragon Emperor Ames was neutral, but her foreign armed forces targeted space pirates. They would rather fall into the hands of Ames than Black Star.

As a result, the space pirate gangs near the Gadon Star System fled one after another, and the security of several star systems became better than ever before. Now, only small-scale, third-rate space pirates remained.

"I didn't expect people from Black Star to appear here. Could it be that the Black Star Army is not satisfied with monopolizing the business of the Gadon Star System and wants to expand to Heidiga?"

"Who knows, it's not impossible. In these nearby star systems, besides those star cluster civilizations, what force is willing to provoke the Black Star Army? They're already dominant."

The two breathed for a while and continued to run away.

...

Kuangdao and Haotian's groups were looking for clues at the transit station. After a few hours, they finally pieced together the clues for the last stage of the quest.

Everyone came to a remote scrap repair station. The quest target was a disabled repairman with deep wrinkles who had lost both hands and replaced them with mechanical prosthetic arms. He was repairing a badly damaged communicator. His appearance and temperament were very ordinary.

However, in the information detected by the players, the danger level of this repairman named "Ronaldo" was surprisingly the highest, "Extremely Deadly". Obviously, he was a hidden master.

Haotian and Kuangdao exchanged glances and pushed Mingyue Changzhong out. This guy's charm attribute was the highest among them, making him the most suitable for communicating with NPCs.

Mingyue Changzhong took out the quest item and handed it over, asking politely, "Hello, we were asked to deliver this to you."

They had accepted a hidden quest to make a special trip to hand over the quest item to Ronaldo, which was a letter.

Hearing this, Ronaldo raised his eyelids, glanced at everyone, put down the machinery in his hand, and said lightly, "Who are you people?"

"We're from the Black Star Army."

"Black Star Army?!"

Ronaldo's eyes changed slightly. He put away his nonchalant expression and said in a deep voice, "I've heard of you. It's said that Black Star is a very powerful mechanic. It's a pity that if it were a year ago, when I still had my hands, I would have really liked to spar with him."

Kuangdao and the others were shocked.

Han Xiao was an A-level Super, and since this person dared to say spar, then he should also be an A-level. This hidden quest seemed a bit unfathomable.

"Don't be in a hurry to leave, let me see what's written in the letter."

Ronaldo lowered his head and opened the letter, which was full of codes. He lived in seclusion here, and for some reason, he only used primitive methods such as letters to transmit messages.

The players waited for a while. After Ronaldo finished reading the letter, he sighed and said with emotion, "It's really turbulent. A new storm is coming. Alas, tell your employer that I've retired and won't accept any recruitment. I just want to live here quietly. No matter what kind of shock occurs in the Shattered Star Ring, it won't affect me."

The player panel prompted that the target of the last stage of the quest had been changed to reporting back to the employer. At that time, they could receive their rewards, but these professional players didn't leave immediately. They were very sensitive to hidden plots. Hearing Ronaldo's words, they all realized that there was information that could be dug deeper.

"I don't know what you mean by the storm?" Mingyue Changzhong asked.

Ronaldo glanced at him, seeming to find Mingyue Changzhong more pleasing to the eye, and said, "Haven't you noticed that in the past year or two, the situation in the Shattered Star Ring has become more and more turbulent? The seven star cluster civilizations all have strange actions. This is a strange omen. The vortex is slowly taking shape. It's just a brewing stage now. When it emerges, the entire Shattered Star Ring will be drawn in, and no force will be able to stay out of it."

Everyone was confused. Their scope of activity was temporarily limited to the several star systems near Gadon, and they didn't have much experience with the turbulence in the Shattered Star Ring. After all, the scope of their main activities was not large enough.

Some players also explored more distant new maps, such as going to another star cluster, but the time spent was not proportional to the gains. Most of the time, they could only look at the scenery and make a wasted trip.

The Star Sea was extremely vast, and the Shattered Star Ring alone was already very large. Finding quests by running out alone was like finding a needle in a haystack. On the contrary, there were countless mercenary quests to choose from in the Black Star Army, and they were bound to gain something, making the goal clearer.

Mingyue Changzhong continued to ask, and Ronaldo said in a deep voice, "No one knows the goals of those star cluster civilizations, but all the disturbances are not coincidences. I guess there is a transcendent force behind guiding the changes in the Shattered Star Ring."

"Transcendental forces, are they the three cosmic civilizations that have only appeared in the background stories for the time being, or other guys..." Everyone looked at each other and speculated in a low voice.

The players didn't know about the Overlord Gathering, so they naturally didn't know the inside information, but it didn't prevent Kuangdao, Haotian, and others from vaguely feeling that this news might be related to the plot of the next version.

After all, this wasn't the first time. During the 1.0 version, Black Star revealed the Mutant Disaster of 2.0.

Everyone looked happy, knowing the clues of the next version in advance might give them a great advantage.

At this moment, Ronaldo suddenly remembered something and said, "By the way, you are Black Star's subordinates, please hand something over to him for me."

Everyone was stunned when they heard this, then nodded. This was obviously a new quest.

Immediately afterwards, Ronaldo took out paper and pen, wrote a series of Interstellar Common Language characters on the paper, and handed it to everyone.

Mingyue Changzhong took it suspiciously, and the panel prompted him to get a 【List of Names】.

"What is this..."

This time, even Kuangdao couldn't help but ask.

"This is a list..." Ronaldo's tone was heavy, seeming to have thought of some bad memories. He grabbed the position of his severed arm, and an expression of anger and fear flashed by. He added in a low voice, "A hit list."

"Uh, why do you want us to hand it over to Black Star?"

"Because... he's on the list too!"