Chapter 386

Chapter 387: Launch

No matter the small hiccups, the final decision was that Immortal Yuan Hao would board the Otherworldly Hotel with Xuan Che. They would travel with Yu Sheng to the Border and the planet Sentinel Silence to look for Yun Qing Zi and the Black robed Cultivators.

To be honest, Yu Sheng actually valued Immortal Yuan Hao’s “rich experience with navigation accidents.”

He trusted his own piloting and the ship’s advanced performance, and he believed both were enough for this small Border trip. But this was still his first time flying a ship to somewhere tens of thousands of light years away. The last time he brought the ship back to the Valley didn’t count as “navigation” at all. He just opened The Door and teleported it over. This time he was going to complete a full, real voyage.

A long trip can always bring “real world problems.” Having an experienced long range traveler along helps everyone feel safer.

Once the Bureau’s ship crew finished handover with the team running the spaceport, the Otherworldly Hotel completed its final preflight checks.

Just as they were about to board, a familiar presence appeared nearby and made Yu Sheng stop walking.

He looked toward it and saw several Shadow Wolves leap out of the shade. The strongest “alpha” carried a familiar figure in red.

Yu Sheng raised a brow and asked with a smile: “What brings you here?”

“I came to see you off and to watch a ship launch,” said Little Red Riding Hood as she rode up on the wolf, a faint smile on her face, “keeping Rapunzel at home was not easy.”

“I was wondering why that girl wasn’t here,” said Yu Sheng, laughing, “if she were on site, she’d roll on the ground until she got a tour of the ship.”

“I know you’re going to do serious work, so I couldn’t let her make a mess,” said Little Red Riding Hood casually, “her original plan was to hype everyone to come watch and even bring the dollheads. She called it a ‘kindergarten space study trip.’ When I heard that, I had the royal Summoning call a few guards to lock her in her room.”

Yu Sheng shivered at her description, and his mind filled with a scene: [A line of kids in little yellow hats and water bottles boarding the ship, led by a bunch of twelve and thirteen year olds. Rapunzel, Snow White, and the Mermaid causing chaos. After launch it would only get worse. If one child equals one hundred thousand questions, I’d be facing a few million whys.] He swallowed and added another thought: [With all subsystems offline, the Otherworldly Hotel is basically a drum Washing Machine with an engine welded on. That would make me a guy piloting a Washing Machine full of human kids into the dangerous Border. Even an Immortal with tons of accident experience could not handle that.]

Thinking that, Yu Sheng broke out in a cold sweat and looked at Little Red Riding Hood with real gratitude. In a Fairy Tale crew that was getting more and more free spirited, it was a blessing to have a calm and steady Little Red Riding Hood catching the falling knives. With Rapunzel’s hyperactive, fearless nature and three ideas per second, the whole Fairy Tale Organization might already have flipped the table by now without her.

“Travel safe,” said Little Red Riding Hood with a warm smile from the wolf’s back, “if you need help, I’ll be there.”

Yu Sheng came back to himself, met the red clad girl’s smile, and slowly smiled back: “Alright, we’re off. The brats are all yours.”

“Okay, bye bye,” said Little Red Riding Hood.

A hatch that was also The Door opened under the Otherworldly Hotel, and Yu Sheng’s group stepped in as their figures vanished into its depth.

He had planned to pull open The Door straight to the bridge, but he decided a first official voyage needed some ceremony. So he boarded by the proper hatch.

Moments later the tower standing on the spaceport’s pier began to rumble, and the whole “tower” trembled.

After a long sleep, the core System woke again. The Reactor shifted from low power standby to normal operation. Surging energy flowed into engines and antigravity units, and the ship’s outline turned faint and transparent.

Then the ship’s rear emission grids lit one after another. The huge triangular emblem on the mid hull came alive. Without deafening thunder or storming exhaust, the starship built with Holy Revere Hermitage dark tech rose slowly from the pier. As the Antigravity Devices gave off a low, solemn hum, it climbed higher and higher toward the Valley Otherworld’s sky boundary.

At that special height the ship blurred into a phantom. A Door like a Space Rift flashed inside it. The hull flipped and twisted around the Rift for an instant and slipped out of Little Red Riding Hood’s sight without a sound.

An instant too short for human senses later, the Otherworldly Hotel entered real space, appearing near the Grand Void Spiritual Axis in a clear patch of sky.

This was the spot Foxy had passed when they once headed for Nethermoon. There was nothing nearby, so Yu Sheng had chosen it as the “exit port” to release the ship.

“Control System nominal. Reactor nominal. Energy management and feedback nominal. Grid load at thirty percent. Engines nominal. Hull sensors partially offline. All subsystems offline,” droned the ship’s control System, reporting parameters after wake up.

The low hum rolled through the hall as one control seat after another rose from sleep. Holograms lit up before each station, filling with dizzying graphs and data. On the other side, the giant Observation Window opened. Armor plates slid away, and a faint blue shield shimmered over the window. Beyond it, the horizon of the Grand Void Spiritual Axis glimmered, and far off lay the deep quiet of endless stars.

Irene shot from the Control Hall like a little rocket, climbed onto the lip of the Observation Window, and almost pressed her face to the charged composite: “Wow! Hahaha, it’s space!”

“It’s not your first time in space,” said Yu Sheng from not far away, “why so excited?”

“It’s different,” said Irene as she bounced along the window’s platform, her small face shining, “this thing really took off. It’s our own ship. Not rented, not borrowed, not hitchhiked.”

“Okay okay, I get it, but stop bouncing in front of me. I’m already dizzy,” said Yu Sheng, standing behind the captain’s seat and looking helplessly at the overexcited doll, “Luna, grab her.”

A second later Irene’s scream rang across the bridge: “C Buckle! I’ll fight you!”

She didn’t win. Peace returned to the bridge.

Yu Sheng exhaled, fought through the brief vertigo from bringing the ship out of the Otherworld, and sank his will deeper into sync with the Otherworldly Hotel.

Foxy stood beside him, worried: “Benefactor, are you alright?”

“I’m fine, just dizzy, but way better than last time,” said Yu Sheng, waving his hand, “to pull the ship out of the Otherworld I have to use Teleportation. It’s basically opening a massive Door and dragging it out. Because I’m one with the ship during Teleportation, I get this illusion that my insides and outsides keep flipping.”

Foxy thought hard, twitched her ears, and said: “I don’t get it.”

“No big deal,” said Yu Sheng with a smile as he ruffled the fox’s head. He sat in the captain’s chair and pulled out a thick manual: “Let me see how we do this. The traffic code says… okay, start the regular engines, apply thrust to leave the planetary gravity well. Safe navigation rule thirty six: you must be well clear of spaceport facilities and near star deceleration zones before you can start the Jump Drive.”

As he spoke, he raised a hand and slowly turned his palm as if feeling something, then closed his fingers.

The ship’s navigation lights came on.

“Turn on lights before acceleration. If other spacecraft are nearby, also turn on the anti collision outline projection and the presence indicator,” he read, then stopped, looked toward a corner of the hall, and asked: “Hey, experts, what’s a presence indicator?”

A few Special Affairs Bureau techs were sitting at the monitoring stations. The baldest one looked up at once and said: “This ship doesn’t have presence indicators. Those go on small ships. A starship like the Otherworldly Hotel has enough presence when the engines spool up.”

“Oh, got it, like those tall flagpoles strapped to little mine carts. Big ships don’t need them,” said Yu Sheng, nodding. He brought the main acceleration engines online. As a deep vibration rolled through the bridge, he lifted the manual again with a serious face: “Let’s see the next page.”

Xuan Che watched, his expression stiff, then slowly turned his head to look at Immortal Yuan Hao and whispered: “Elder senior uncle…”

“Don’t worry, Che,” said Immortal Yuan Hao, his face a bit stiff too but steadier than Xuan Che’s, “your senior uncle has very rich experience with navigation accidents. Wilderness survival too.”