Chapter 1 The Campbell Nebula

Due to the Campbell people’s powerful pioneering ability, the entire Campbell Nebula was within the sphere of influence of this new civilization. The nebula's edges were home to the Kabala United Kingdom and a series of other territorial powers. Hao Ren turned the ship's external monitor towards the nebula's core, where he saw two enormous flashes, looking like two unprecedented suns hidden in the cosmic dust. Thalam explained that it was a unique sight in their nebula. A million years ago, after some space spectacle, two star-forming cores in the nebula had exploded. Hundreds of thousands of suns collided and squeezed together, forming these two bright clusters of light. The Campbell people had been trying to study the conditions inside the light clusters, but without success.

"It's too hot there, the radiation is too strong, and the gravitational environment is too complex," Thalam said cheerfully, his large head bobbing up and down as if it were good news. "Few races have such a unique advantage: such a profound and difficult mystery right on our doorstep. It brings us great joy, oh, and a little trouble too. The living environment near the light clusters isn't so good. Spectacular, isn't it? But it's two million light-years from Earth... well, humans probably won't see that spectacular explosion for another million years—if their observation technology doesn't improve."

Thalam remembered that Hao Ren came from Earth, so he added that last sentence. But Hao Ren only thought one thing: these little green men were truly the universe's most skilled death-seeking explorers. It was the first time he'd heard of someone being so happy about having a big bomb on their doorstep...

The ship didn't head straight into the nebula's interior, but cruised through its sparse outer atmosphere for several light-years before arriving at a relatively desolate and dark area of space. This was far from the Campbell civilization's information highway and belonged to the territories of the territorial powers. Hao Ren saw the ship's communicator automatically switch from the official Campbell civilization channel to a new channel with lower capacity. A line of welcome words popped up on the communicator's holographic projection: "The Kabala United Kingdom welcomes unregistered visitors from outside the civilization circle. We welcome equally peaceful races with peaceful intentions. With blessings from the Campbell people, we hope you die very far away."

"Seriously, how did you ensure you didn't start a fight the first time you contacted other races?" Hao Ren looked at Thalam with great curiosity. The latter patted his head: "I don't know, but it's said that the Campbell ancestors had a smooth first contact with an alien civilization. We greeted them in our traditional way and received the same enthusiastic response from them. After the initial contact, we established a solid friendship and deep consensus—although there seemed to be some problems later. But history books record it as a 'textbook standard of successful diplomacy.'"

Hao Ren: "..." He thought these happy little green men must have misunderstood something!

The ship finally arrived at a planet with alternating bands of light blue and light purple. The planet orbited an aging, orange sun. The star system had four planets, but three were gas giants. Thalam's territorial star was the only habitable place. The territorial star had received notice from their leader, and three ships rose to meet the Giant Tortoise Rock Terrace. Under the guidance of these escort ships, Hao Ren and the others passed through the planet's dense atmosphere and landed smoothly next to a huge alien city—the ship's landing center was far from the city center.

Lily was the first to jump out of the ship. She had already seen a large group of little green men gathered around the landing platform, so she couldn't wait to be the "first Earth dog to set foot on a little green man's planet" (of course, she called herself an Earth werewolf). Anyway, she was always the first to jump out on every alien planet, and even Vivian was too lazy to compete with her now. After jumping out, the husky girl waved her arms vigorously at the little green men: "Oh, hello everyone! Thanks for your hard work! I'm from Earth..."

Hao Ren knocked her on the head from behind: "Be reserved, we're here on official business."

Vivian sighed: "Accept your fate, you can't expect to walk in front of a husky when you take her out."

Hao Ren had developed a habit of observing the local architecture whenever he arrived in a new environment. This allowed him to quickly understand a race's general character and way of life. He saw that the Campbell people's architectural style was typically simple and efficient. The buildings around the landing field were all assembled from easy-to-assemble metal or prefabricated concrete parts. The colors were monotonous, but because these prefabricated parts could be combined in various ways, they varied greatly in shape, so the place didn't seem lifeless. This free combination was reflected everywhere. A square house would sometimes be abruptly next to a round tower, and a spaceship engine might be hung on top of an ordinary residential building as a decoration, as if the designers were also very casual when building these houses. This probably reflected some of the Campbell people's characteristics: freedom, unrestrainedness, not sticking to formalities, and only caring about whether things were good enough. As long as the basic functions were met, they wouldn't pursue any details too much.

A large group of little green men were already waiting here to welcome their leader and the inspectors representing divine authority, but this welcoming party wasn't as carefully organized or luxurious as those on Earth. In fact, the scene here was more like a crowd of citizens who had heard there was excitement somewhere and spontaneously gathered to watch. Little green men in various clothes huddled together at will. Apart from some necessary staff maintaining order, they had no unified banners, no uniform welcome slogans, and didn't even come up to offer flowers. They were just a large group of people noisily clamoring to see what the inspectors looked like...

However, Hao Ren was very happy with the Campbell people's unrestrained and rough style. If there was really a line of Campbell girls standing there to offer him flowers and hugs, he might not be able to resist those huge green faces...

Thalam and his men stepped forward and dragged a few senior officials out of the crowd, chattering a lot of words, basically exchanging greetings and briefly discussing the recent situation. Then Thalam beckoned Hao Ren forward: "Inspector! This is the person in charge of the 'observation facility.'"

Hao Ren was already confused at this point. He saw that after Thalam walked together with a group of little green men, he couldn't tell who was who. Before his eyes, there was only a large area of ​​almost cloned green heads shaking back and forth. Not to mention recognizing people, he couldn't even tell the difference between men and women. It was only when Thalam called out to him that he finally managed to identify the planet's administrator from the crowd. Then, without even daring to blink, he quickly ran up and grabbed the other person's hand: "Easy, easy, let's get down to business directly."

He was afraid that if he blinked or let go, he would confuse Thalam with the other little green men again... The planet's administrator was wearing clothes that were not much different from others. He estimated that at least a hundred people on the scene were wearing the same style of clothing as Thalam!

"Oh, I like this kind of alien!" The little green man, whom Thalam called the "person in charge of the observation facility," stood next to him. He or she looked at Hao Ren with satisfaction. "You're much better than those aliens who are too rule-bound. Come on, I've prepared the car, let's go to the observation facility now."

The person in charge led Hao Ren and the others to a long hovercar, but Hao Ren immediately discovered a problem: Izhaks couldn't get in!

The little green men's vehicles were specifically designed for their size. Official vehicles might be a little more spacious, but they were limited. An ordinary Earthling like Hao Ren could barely squeeze in, but a macho man like Izhaks had tried for a long time at the car door and only managed to fit in one leg. The great demon took his leg out of the car, scratching his head: "It's a bit cramped."

Izhaks was simply a giant to the Campbell people. The little green men had long been curious about this huge creature. At this time, a circle of little green men standing closest to him craned their necks and looked up as Izhaks moved. It was not easy to keep those huge heads balanced, and several of them fell over on the spot because their heads were too heavy. Seeing this situation, Hao Ren smiled awkwardly and released his new car from his dimensional pocket: "Let's just drive our own car..."

From the outside, the Big Dipper was still not suitable for Izhaks, but this thing had a huge internal space. It was no problem to fit everyone in. So, a moment later, a Big Dipper was seen speeding along the wide avenues of the aliens, leaving a trail of dust...

Soon everyone arrived at the "observation facility" that housed the sacred relic and served as the residence of the four ascetic monks.