Chapter 87: Karajan
Translated by Addis of Exiled Rebels Scanlations
Editor: Karai
“Huh?” Ika turned her head to look at the Spiritual Monarch, blinking her eyes. “Your Majesty… Spiritual Monarch, I don’t understand, I need to…” he said, glancing around to confirm the situation. But the Spiritual Monarch’s soft sigh interrupted the rest of Ika’s sentence, “Your name is Ika Igor, right?”
Ika nodded obediently, her attention shifting from her intertwining black and white tails to the Spiritual Monarch.
“What are you doing here?”
“I…” Ika was about to answer but noticed the Spiritual Monarch taking a few steps forward. The previous words weren’t truly asking why he was here but expressing surprise and disapproval at his appearance.
“Go back.” The Spiritual Monarch placed a hand on Ika’s shoulder, and he felt a force pushing him back. His consciousness plunged into boundless darkness as his body uncontrollably fell backward, losing all sensation.
After Ika’s figure vanished into the spiritual realm, the golden waves formed by Ye’s waves and Yan’s particles calmed down. The Spiritual Monarch returned to Lin Xu’s bedside, gazing at Lin Xu’s profile with a heavy look. A few minutes later, the Spiritual Monarch bent down and stroked Lin Xu’s cheek.
Lin Xu wouldn’t perceive a presence from the spiritual realm touching him, but the Spiritual Monarch could feel the sharp jawline and cheekbones of Lin Xu. During this time, Lin Xu had been regularly consuming crystal cores and dragon clan crystals.
Part of the crystal cores discovered by the expedition on Earth had been secretly used by Heinrich to feed Lin Xu. The expedition members assumed Marshal Chu wanted some pretty Earth souvenirs to take back to the Empire, and after keeping enough for research, the rest were sent aboard the Victoria.
With this “misappropriation of public property” feeding method, Lin Xu’s physical condition gradually improved. He regained much of his muscle mass, far better than when he was on Endymion, though not yet at peak condition.
However, in the eyes of the Spiritual Monarch, Lin Xu seemed like a pitiable child away from home, lacking clothes and food. His eyes overflowed with compassion and reluctance. This made the divine and wise face show a fitting expression of pity.
The two rabbit-cats between Heinrich and Lin Xu couldn’t understand such complex emotions; they only felt an indescribable sense of threat permeating the room. At this moment, this threat was touching their master’s chin! Right next to his fragile human throat!
Snowy’s fur stood on end, doubling its usual size. It no longer emitted its usual cute whimpering sounds but let out a hoarse growl, arching its back as if ready to attack at any moment. When close to humans, rabbit-cats seemed like the most docile, unconditionally loving creatures in the world, but in the wild, they were top predators on Endymion.
Blackie, behind Snowy, chose a different strategy. It lifted a paw and fiercely stomped on Heinrich’s arm, trying to wake him up. But Heinrich, used to the two rabbit-cats causing trouble at night, only assumed one of the little things was having a late-night party. Without opening his eyes, he pressed down on Blackie’s head and tucked it into the blanket.
The Spiritual Monarch watched the wriggling bundle under the blanket with a slight smile, then picked up Snowy by the ears. Snowy flailed in mid-air, its paws kicking wildly. A small slip of the Spiritual Monarch’s hand caused Snowy to fall back onto the bed.
Lin Xu was startled awake for a moment. When he opened his eyes, the Spiritual Monarch couldn’t help but hold his breath, even though his form didn’t actually breathe. The darkness of the universe enveloped the Victoria, with only faint starlight shining through the porthole. No danger appeared in the pure darkness.
Lin Xu closed his eyes, grabbed Snowy’s ears, and subdued the night-owl rabbit-cat. Snowy continued to wail, and Lin Xu skillfully stuffed two fingers into its mouth to muffle the sound. He then snuggled deeper into the blanket, resting his forehead on Heinrich’s shoulder.
Heinrich adjusted his arm to make Lin Xu more comfortable. Even in his sleep, his silver dragon tail tightly entwined the mermaid tail, the tip of the tail under the blanket lightly brushing against Lin Xu’s waist with each breath.
Lin Xu must really like this man to sleep so trustingly and peacefully. With this thought, the Spiritual Monarch’s aura became calm. He quietly watched Lin Xu, sparing only a little attention for Heinrich, until Lin Xu’s breathing returned to the steady rhythm of sleep. Snowy escaped from Lin Xu’s grip and, along with Blackie, cautiously watched the Spiritual Monarch from the pillow.
The Spiritual Monarch pondered for a moment, then moved his fingers at his side. Golden waves surged to the edge of his robe, forming the shapes of two rabbit-cats. With a flash of light, the rabbit-cats came to life!
They sniffed around the Spiritual Monarch’s feet. The Spiritual Monarch looked at the two cuties, smiling as more rabbit-cats of various colors appeared in the spiritual realm, not just black and white. Calico, tortoiseshell, tabby, and more…
A group of long-eared rabbit-cats surrounded the Spiritual Monarch, rolling and cuddling. The Spiritual Monarch watched them, his heart pounding with joy. It turned out he and Lin Xu had the same taste.
He first sat down, picking up a few rabbit-cats, then lay on the ground, sleeping among the fluffy, soft creatures that ran, jumped, and squeezed around him, warm and lively. When another humanoid entity appeared in the spiritual realm, he looked at the Spiritual Monarch buried in a den of rabbit-cats, momentarily confused.
“Spiritual Monarch.”
“Hmm, I’m here.”
The Spiritual Monarch, holding two tabbies and a white long-haired cat, didn’t get up and continued to lie on the ground. The newcomer had to walk to the Spiritual Monarch’s head, looking down at him and the surroundings.
Realizing he was now on the bed, the newcomer covered his eyes in horror. “Spiritual Monarch, is it appropriate for us to be here!?”
What are they doing with their tails entwined? The Spiritual Monarch chuckled lightly, not minding being looked down upon. A tabby rabbit-cat licked his cheek, and he smiled, asking, “Karajan, what’s the situation?”
“You know what I’m thinking, why ask?” Karajan replied. The next moment, he found an orange rabbit-cat placed in his hands. The soft, fluffy feel made him sigh in contentment. He put down his hand covering his eyes, cradling the rabbit-cat, and turned his back to the cuddling couple on the bed.
“I thought you wanted to be treated as an independent entity for conversation,” the Spiritual Monarch said. “Did you help the humans fix their starship?”
Karajan nodded with a heavy heart, exhausted from working alone for so long. Three hundred years ago, he wanted to leave the Spiritual Monarch to see the world. The Spiritual Monarch agreed, but his small vessel got stuck in the Kuiper belt, unable to go anywhere, utterly bored.
After being picked up by humans, he was confined to a small space, unable to see the outside world. Finally returning to the Solar System, he used the sun’s gravitational lensing effect to send his location to the Spiritual Monarch.
But upon arrival, the Ye’s waves and Yan’s particles, amplified by the gravitational lensing, severely impacted the humans’ technology. Fortunately, the Spiritual Monarch arrived in time to control the spread, preventing a catastrophe.
Before returning, the Spiritual Monarch required him to help the humans repair the damage caused by the Ye’s waves. Working alone was exhausting; he just wanted to go home now.
“Want to go home?”
“Yeah.” Karajan responded but sensed the Spiritual Monarch’s different intention. “Spiritual Monarch, aren’t we going back?”
“I’m not sure, haven’t decided yet,” the Spiritual Monarch said. “You come back first, rest a while.”
“Okay.” Karajan moved closer to the Spiritual Monarch but suddenly asked, “Will there still be these little things when we go back?” He lifted the orange rabbit-cat in his hand.
“If you want them, there will be. You don’t need to ask me.”
Karajan nodded happily and continued approaching the Spiritual Monarch. When his toes touched the Spiritual Monarch’s arm, his figure disappeared into the spiritual realm as if absorbed into the Spiritual Monarch’s body.
The golden waves surged and calmed, rising and falling, but the real world remained silent in the darkness, with only cold starlight reflecting on the scales.
***
Ika felt his consciousness enveloped by a thick, black cotton of ink, aware of his thoughts but unable to control his limbs. In his mind, he counted the seconds as this state persisted for over an hour before beginning to improve.
When he was fully awake and able to move his muscles again, he suddenly realized that the self-made connectors had been removed at some point. The headgear and probes were placed aside, with no bloodstains on the needles, as if they had been wiped clean.
The gleaming needle under the light reminded Ika of the spinal wound, though he felt no pain whatsoever. As he reached back, the coarse needle wound had already healed.
If Ika hadn’t reviewed the monitoring records, confirming that he had indeed lain on the operating table and personally donned the headgear and probes, he might have suspected that seeing Spiritual Monarch was just a dream.
But some of the monitoring records had turned into snowflakes and garbled characters, the signal disrupted beyond recovery, leaving Ika to only speculate that the Spiritual Monarch had visited.
Apart from the Spiritual Monarch in another time and space, no other presence could navigate freely aboard the heavily guarded Victoria. Did the Spiritual Monarch also heal the wound on his lower back? After drinking a nutrient solution, Ika contacted Godric via encrypted channel, briefly recounting yesterday’s events and his confusion.
“His Majesty let me return quickly. What does this mean? Doesn’t He want humans to upload their consciousness and be with Him?” Ika didn’t understand. “Does He mean to tell me that uploading consciousness is not the right direction for humanity?”
“You’ve seen His Majesty!” Godric was still immersed in shock and delight, not fully hearing Ika’s question.
Ika wasn’t good at Guyding the topic and could only respond to Godric’s exclamation, “Yes, I’ve told you three times already, please stop shouting.”
“And Dr. Lin…”
“It seems His Majesty came to find Dr. Lin. He asked me to be quiet and not disturb Dr. Lin’s rest,” Ika said. “Then He pushed me back into reality.”
“Can I try the method of uploading consciousness to another time and space? I also want to meet His Majesty.”
“I can give you the device.”
“No, I hope to create a more sophisticated device, organize my thoughts, and then meet His Majesty. Ika, can you explain the principles to me?”
“After uploading consciousness, you enter a space composed of entirely new waves and particles, but I’m not clear about the characteristics of these waves and particles.”
He couldn’t articulate the principle. Many of the teachings left behind by the Spiritual Monarch were like this in the whisper teachings, where scientist believers found a vague direction in His words. More detailed theoretical analysis required scientist believers to fill in the gaps themselves.
“Ika, don’t worry. After returning to Haven, I have a fully equipped physics and biology laboratory to verify His Majesty’s Guidance.”
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