**Chapter 699: Divine Armant**
The entire research institute was now completely silent. Tentacle Tree corpses littered the corridors.
One of them had died with its tentacles still plugged into a data port.
“We arrived one step too late,” Alaric said, his voice heavy with regret.
“After locating the institute, we breached the outer shield imdiately, but they had already activated the internal self-destruct protocol ahead of ti.”
He pointed toward a destroyed control room in the distance. “Although we prevented the space station from fully exploding, the toxin elimination system had already released its payload through the life-support pipes before we arrived. The database, logs, and communication records were all physically destroyed.”
Jie Ming glanced down at a still-smoking circuit board and shook his head with a smile. “It doesn’t matter. The souls are gone, but the information hasn’t disappeared.”
He crouched beside the corpse of a young researcher. The corresponding Tentacle Tree was still quite young—its crown tentacles hadn’t even fully matured. He was likely just a low-level researcher who had joined the institute not long ago.
Jie Ming slowly stood up. His spiritual power enveloped the entire space station.
Then, the golden vertical eye between his brows snapped open.
Buzz…
A pale golden radiance spread out like water, swiftly perating every corner of the institute.
**Causal Trace Shadow Technique**, activate!!
At the sa ti, the Fate Subsystem powered up to full capacity.
Causal threads rapidly intertwined in the void, forming a massive network that covered the whole space station.
The residual information imprints left behind by the dead researchers began to surface.
In Jie Ming’s vision, scenes from the space station’s past erged: researchers arguing in laboratories, others recording data around fragnts of armor, and still others constantly debugging so kind of activation program.
These were not mories recorded in souls, but lingering traces of information.
Like footprints in the snow.
Even after the people had left, the traces remained.
Jie Ming’s three eyes swept across all the images simultaneously, breaking down and categorizing the information.
Soon, he spoke again. “They called that armor… the Divine Armant.”
“The Tentacle Tree Civilization was able to leap from an ordinary industrial civilization to a spacefaring one precisely because they discovered the first Divine Armant.”
“Shields, energy weapons, spatial jumps… all their core technologies ca from reverse analysis.”
He paused for a mont, his gaze settling on a particular information fragnt.
“Furthermore… there is more than one Divine Armant. They have discovered similar armors in different star systems.”
“The prevailing theory within the Tentacle Tree Civilization is that these objects ca from so super civilization that once ruled the entire universe.”
Alaric spoke in a low voice, “So the Trifolite Star System was just a decoy. The real core research area has always been hidden deep within the gas giant.”
“Correct,” Jie Ming replied indifferently. He slowly withdrew his spiritual power.
The causal threads gradually dissipated, and the institute fell silent once more.
In truth, Jie Ming was not surprised by this outco.
From the first ti he had encountered the Tentacle Tree fleet, he had already sensed sothing was off.
This civilization’s technological system had severe discontinuities.
Certain fields had suddenly undergone disproportionate leaps.
Their shields and energy weapons were at an extrely low level, yet they possessed spatial technology… even if that spatial technology was similarly crude.
Overall, their technology far exceeded what their materials science and basic industry should have allowed.
It was as if soone had forcibly cramd puzzle pieces that did not belong to them into their own system.
Even more abnormal was their energy level classification.
The asurent standards for Levels One through Five were impossibly precise.
Both the energy thresholds for each level and the underlying logic were highly consistent with the Wizard civilization’s system.
…Or rather, consistent with civilizations that had reached a considerably high level of understanding of the world’s rules.
However, starting at Level Six, their asurent theory suddenly plumted off a cliff.
On the surface, their theoretical and technological levels appeared perfectly matched, but this completely contradicted the normal developnt patterns of civilizations.
In a normal civilization, there would be a gap between theory and practice, but theory should far outpace practice—not exhibit this bizarre synchronized developnt.
There was only one reasonable explanation.
Their understanding of the first five levels ca from a more mature external system.
For anything above Level Six, they could only grope in the dark themselves, resulting in massive deviations.
Now, the answer lay before him.
Jie Ming did not linger. His figure pierced through the ammonia crystal storm belt, transforming into a dark golden streak of light as he descended directly toward the outermost satellite. This area had been designated a “protected zone” by the Tentacle Tree Civilization.
The surface was covered in low-growing purple vegetation. Artificial structures were scarce, consisting only of a few observation stations and large enclosed ecological zones.
The garrison troops here had already surrendered. The Tentacle Tree soldiers knelt fearfully on the open ground.
When Jie Ming landed, every tentacle pressed flat against the earth. Not a single one dared to look up.
Jie Ming ignored them and walked straight into the depths of the protected zone.
There lay an artificial shallow sea.
The abundant ice layers beneath the satellite had been lted, and the water was channeled into low-lying areas to simulate an environnt close to the liquid layers of the gas giant. Dozens of translucent creatures floated in the seawater.
They resembled enormous jellyfish, though their body structures were far more complex.
Their umbrella-shaped bodies ranged from two to five ters in diater. Slender tentacles swayed gently with the currents, and faint bioluminescence flowed across their surfaces.
These creatures lacked complex neural structures and did not even appear to possess intelligence.
Jie Ming stood by the sea and quietly observed them for a while before speaking slowly.
“They should not be this low in intelligence. Evolution does not regress. A species with such complex body structures must once have possessed a nervous system of corresponding sophistication.”
“Unless… soone deliberately shut down their intelligence genes.”
Alaric understood the implication in Jie Ming’s words and added in a low voice, “So these native inhabitants were the true caretakers of the Divine Armant. Indeed, their physiology was originally designed for the internal environnt of a gas giant.”
Jie Ming nodded. “These caretakers were probably not the creators of the Divine Armant, but they most likely had usage rights. The activation permissions for the Divine Armant were probably bound to genetic verification.”
“After the Tentacle Trees found they could not activate the armor, they kept these creatures alive.”
“It wasn’t out of rcy, but because they needed their genes. To make control easier, they deliberately caused this species to regress.”
The jellyfish in the shallow sea continued to drift slowly. They showed no reaction whatsoever to the shore.
No fear.
No curiosity.
They were like empty shells whose civilization mory had been severed.
Jie Ming watched silently for a mont, then withdrew his gaze.
“Arrange for more Black Giant priests to co and garrison this place. Organize all the genetic data from the institute, collect samples from every jellyfish, and maintain the protected zone in its current state.”
“From now on, we are taking over.”
“As for the Tentacle Tree garrison personnel… handle them according to standard prisoner protocols.”
Alaric bowed his head and acknowledged the order.
Jie Ming looked up toward the sky.
Beyond the do, starlight poured down, gilding the edges of his robe’s shoulders with a faint golden trim.
In the distance, the gas giant continued its slow rotation, its ochre storms swirling like enormous vortices across the entire planet.
The Tentacle Tree Civilization had rely stumbled upon a key that did not belong to them.
They had risen by relying on it, yet they had never truly understood it.
And behind the Divine Armants scattered across the universe… clearly hid an even more vast and ancient civilization.
Jie Ming narrowed his eyes slightly.
It seed his subsequent plans would need to be readjusted.
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