Chapter 393 Escape

Hearing the data terminal's scream, Hao Ren was shocked: "It escaped?! Isn't it right here?"

"Its consciousness is gone!" The data terminal slammed its horn against the container's outer shell. "The brain monster left its physical body, but its consciousness is gone! It's empty inside, just a lump of ordinary pork belly!"

Hao Ren grabbed the data terminal. "Stop trying to disgust me when you're already so busy—can you trace its escape route?"

"No, we never expected the brain monster to have such means," the data terminal said as it connected itself to the lab's mainframe, instantly accessing all the monitoring logs. "...We were careless. The brain monster's mental skills are unparalleled; they don't necessarily need another body to transfer their consciousness. This guy must have uploaded its soul through some kind of wireless connection... We thought the protective crystal was foolproof, but it can only stop the brain monster from invading other people's bodies, not prevent its consciousness from slipping out of here."

"It must be because it wasn't closed off enough..." Hao Ren frowned, the brain monster's incredible escape method also greatly surprised him, but at least he can be considered well-informed now, and immediately accepted the fact and quickly reasoned out the origin of the reasons, "Wait, if it could escape by uploading its consciousness from the very beginning, then why did it wait until now to run? Wasn't the best time for it to escape when we first came to the Dream Plane?"

The surface of the data terminal shimmered, and a large amount of data flowed from the holographic projection around it: "It must have been waiting for an opportunity, because the laboratory's monitoring was very strict before, and unauthorized information flow was easily monitored... That's right, it was when Ieva went crazy before!"

Hao Ren immediately realized what the problem was.

When Ieva went crazy before, the Petrified Tortoise platform almost transferred all the power output of the power furnace to the shield and engine. At that time, the facilities in other parts of the ship were only maintained at the minimum level of operation, and most of the equipment in the laboratory was also turned off, leaving only the necessary security procedures to monitor the equipment here. The brain monster must have escaped during that time.

"We need to improve our assessment of the brain monster's perception. It has the ability to perceive the moment when these monitoring devices are slack," Hao Ren said, grabbing his hair with a frustrated expression. "And we can't use this kind of conventional laboratory to imprison brain monsters anymore. They must be imprisoned in closed containers like the Core Research Station."

The data terminal shook its body. "Let's wait until we catch another brain monster."

"Hopefully, O'phra's side will be more reliable," Hao Ren shrugged helplessly. "Tsk, it had to happen at this time. I still have a lot of reports to write... I feel like these brain monsters are even more difficult to deal with than the First Borns."

At this time, the laboratory door silently slid open to both sides, and Lily tiptoed in carefully like a thief. After discovering that no one was going to chase her out, she immediately happily trotted to Hao Ren's side: "Landlord, Landlord, I'm here to join in... uh, I'm here to help! What's the brain monster doing?"

Vivian also walked in behind Lily. She rolled her eyes helplessly at the husky spirit, obviously being dragged along.

Hao Ren spread his hands. "Nothing—the thing ran away."

He then told the two girls what had happened, which greatly surprised them. Lily drooped her ears. "Ah ha, I thought there was something fun again. So what happens next? Is this brain monster useless?"

Vivian thoughtfully touched the outer shell of the container, looked at the brain monster inside, and nodded: "Actually, I wanted to say I can make brain flowers..."

Hao Ren was sadly thinking about his performance, but when he heard Vivian's words, he almost fell to the ground while holding the wall: "Vivian... Vivian, take it easy! I've already decided not to eat dinner, what else do you want to do!"

Even Lily looked at the bat spirit with a dazed expression, then turned to look at the brain monster: "This... is too challenging even for me."

Vivian shrugged. "I'm just kidding. I'm not a pervert. I don't even eat people, let alone the brains of giants."

Hao Ren finally breathed a sigh of relief, turned his head and looked at the brain monster's corpse: "But this brain has mutated too severely. If I hadn't seen the scan images of those giants with my own eyes, who would believe it was once a humanoid creature."

After considering how to deal with this brain monster, Hao Ren took out his containment box from his portable space and put the lump of meat that had lost its soul and only had physiological reactions into the box. He decided to take this to Raven 12345 as a compromise.

After finishing this, he announced the end of the Aio incident and prepared to return home.

Of course, according to the rules, he set up a portal before leaving. There was no land on this planet, and the only few offshore platform ruins were also destroyed when Ieva went crazy, so the portal was set up in the deep sea, with a simple metal protective cabin outside. It can be expanded if needed in the future.

The Petrified Tortoise left Aio's orbit. Everyone watched as the shining water planet slowly turned into a crystal clear blue ball behind the spaceship, and then entered hyperspace. The Sea Serpent Queen and Shaqira and Soma stayed on the observation platform at the rear of the spaceship. After seeing their home planet disappear into the darkness, they didn't leave. Hao Ren and Nangong Wuyue came to the platform to find them and found that the three sirens were still staring at the rear of the spaceship in a daze.

Hao Ren casually asked, "What's wrong? Do you want to stay?"

"A little bit," the Sea Serpent Queen sighed, "When I was immersed in the sea of Aio, I felt a wonderful sense of peace, which I had never felt on Earth—not even the water inside the Nasaton water dome gave me such a strong feeling. It seems that sirens are a race that can remember the smell of their homeland very well... We are ultimately from that planet."

Nangong Wuyue gently swayed her tail and wrapped the tip of her tail around Hao Ren's arm: "I also have a bit of this feeling, but it shouldn't be as strong as Her Majesty the Queen."

Shaqira looked at Hao Ren expectantly: "Can we stay? Or can we bring the news back to Nasaton and let some sirens who are willing to return to their hometown come over? They can rebuild their home in Aio, that planet needs to be rebuilt."

"I understand, I understand how you feel, but this isn't up to me," Hao Ren spread his hands. "The surface world and the Dream Plane are in a fragile state of balance, and every act of crossing the wall of reality must be strictly monitored. Of course, theoretically, entering the Dream Plane from the Alamanda Rift is safe, but I can't guarantee that hundreds of thousands of immigrants will still be safe. And there is also a hidden danger: the Dream Plane is not peaceful."

Seeing the doubts on Shaqira and Soma's faces, Hao Ren sighed: "You thought the brain monster that Nasaton encountered was already a big crisis? Let me tell you the truth, there are things here that are several times more dangerous than brain monsters, and their hatred for all creatures is more serious than brain monsters. At present, I haven't figured out the ability limits and activity patterns of those guys, so I don't rule out the possibility that they will harass Aio. Of course, they may not find Aio, but for safety reasons, I still don't recommend that you come back to settle down."

Hao Ren didn't say something clearly: he already had enough troubles, and he really didn't want to add more troubles, and the First Borns staring at the sirens who immigrated back was undoubtedly the biggest of all the troubles. He was so busy every day, running around in two worlds as a nanny, who could bear it!

But he understood the thoughts of these mermaids and mermaids very well. If the Dream Plane is peaceful in the future, he would be happy to help these girls move back—anyway, he had moved a billion people...

After listening to Hao Ren's explanation, the Sea Serpent Queen nodded understandingly: "Sorry, I've caused you trouble."

After that, there was no more conversation. Everyone returned to the Alamanda Transfer Station, and after stowing the Petrified Tortoise, they returned to the deep sea of the Pacific Ocean via Andre's castle.

The Nasaton's alarm had been lifted, and the deep-sea city was undergoing intense and busy repairs and restoration. The previous century of chaos and a fierce battle caused damage to many functions of the city. The collapse of the palace was secondary. The equipment that had not been maintained according to regulations for a hundred years was the most fatal. Almost the entire city needed to be completely overhauled. But no matter what, the bad times were over, and things will get better soon.

"The first thing is to restart the Great Shield Wall," the Sea Serpent Queen looked at the sea abyss above Nasaton, and lightly spit out a string of bubbles, finally completely taking her heart back from Aio, "I'm not at ease letting the city be exposed to the earth like this... sirens are a cautious race."

Nangong Sanba nodded: "Well, I know, that's called being cowardly."

He was slapped away by his sister with her tail on the spot.

"Seriously, don't you plan to stay here for a few more days?" Shaqira looked at Hao Ren. "If you're not used to underwater living, we can create a dry area for you. Everyone in Nasaton hopes to have more contact with you, and there are still many people who want to apologize or thank you—they are all those soldiers who were controlled and the citizens who were rescued."

Hao Ren smiled and looked up: "Maybe next time if I have the chance... I still have a lot of things to do. Oh right, this is for you."

As Hao Ren said, he handed a shiny silver-white metal plate to the Sea Serpent Queen.

"What is this?"

"Your history and writing," Hao Ren nodded, "Part of it was extracted from Ieva's memory, and part of it was compiled by me from the translation lexicon. I think you will definitely need this. The method of use is very simple, just use direct mental connection, it has a holographic projection function."

The Sea Serpent Queen solemnly gave Hao Ren a salute and pressed the data disc to her chest: "Thank you. From now on, no matter how the generations change, you will be the best friends of the siren race."