Elder Cultivator

Chapter 1014

Despite the field of stealth being her specialty, even Velvet couldn’t explain how every stealth related system worked for their ship. The important part was that it didn’t emit any signals except when entering and exiting subspace, and even then they were minimal. Anyone actively scanning with their energy might notice something, though Velvet could mitigate that with her own techniques.

Stealth in space was actually much easier than in terrestrial locations, because projecting the feeling of a void was actually… expected. Only in the most extreme cases was that risky. For example, if someone could count individual atoms in an area. Even then, their ship took up a small enough area that there would only be an average of a few thousand at most in the general space, far fewer than in any single speck of dust.

The difficult part was replicating the feeling of so little and a random arrangement and movement, if it was required. For the most part, Velvet just did her best to not let anything slip through the cracks as any actual presence would be much more alarming than a random area that really had nothing in it. It could happen, sometimes.

Their route carried the ship through as many uninhabited systems as possible, but just because no sizable portion of people lived there didn’t mean it would be completely barren. Cultivators could randomly be training on one of the planets or around a star, and any capable of doing so were more dangerous.

So far, about a tenth of the systems they had surfaced in had some form of people that might notice them. Individual cultivators training, or passing ships either replenishing their energy or simply traveling at reduced speed through the system because it was easier than navigating around.

This time, it was a few ships flying together. She didn’t immediately recognize the sect, but that didn’t mean caution was unwarranted. “Restrain your energy,” Velvet said, using the ship’s speakers to relay the information. People probably didn’t need to be reminded, but it didn’t hurt.

She adjusted the ship’s systems to be in standby mode, everything not needed to run the stealth systems using minimal power. They were just drifting along now, and they might continue to do so forever. They could drift out of the system and make another jump. The only issue was that they’d done that last time. Deeper into the core of the Numerological Compact they were more likely to run into random others.

Unlike normally, Velvet was traveling with a group. They had no cover story that would suffice if they were revealed, as their ship was obviously made by the Scarlet Alliance. It hadn’t been specifically made to infiltrate the Exalted Quadrant after all, and the tech would have given it away regardless. Even if the enemy didn’t know how it worked- which they might to some extent, given they must have captured some of it by now- it was recognizable. But a sailing ship chassis was just too inefficient.

They simply had to rely on not getting caught. Or, if that wasn’t possible, removing anyone who saw them before they could transmit a message. Velvet watched the passive sensors of the ship while keeping her own open, but there were no changes in the enemy flight pattern or shifts in their energy indicating they were even looking.

Soon enough, the other ships moved on from the system, leaving them free to replenish their energy stores. Once they reached the local sun, they were actually at minimal risk of detection- any star would far outweigh any energy fluctuations they would accidentally make. However, Durff would be disappointed he couldn’t train here. It was too risky.

Velvet turned on the ships active sensors, so they could detect anyone incoming. She couldn’t extend her own energy senses far enough to be relevant except in a very narrow band. To no one’s surprise, space was big. The ship would detect any powerful energy before she did, and even a few moments might prove critical.

The ship beeped. Not an emergency message, but still something worth paying attention to. The logs mentioned ‘energy signature detected’. That could be… many things. But in this case, it shouldn’t be an active cultivator or ship.

Velvet opened up the report, which indicated that it had matched an energy signature with something marked ‘of note’ in the database. Even cultivators couldn’t remember everything, and more relevantly they weren’t always exposed to everything they might one day need to know.

In this case, it would be something Velvet recognized… if she had been close enough to sense it. She had to admit, the ship was good. Though it also helped that it was looking in the right place.

The next jump they were going to make had something of note near the star. It was part of the ship’s programming to detect anomalies. Velvet just hadn’t expected to stumble across that.

“Signature matches the ‘Nighstar sect’,” Velvet mumbled to herself. “Seriously, there?”

It was only a handful of jumps from Citadel territory. Their actual destination was deeper, but from there on every system was at least nominally occupied. They’d need to conserve power along the final leg of their journey, though that was already part of the plan.

Velvet called Koralo to the cockpit. “Formation master. Would you be able to identify something for us?”

“Depends what it is,” the man said. “I don’t believe anything has been picked up by the ship…?”

“In the next system,” Velvet said, gesturing to the readout. “A potential outpost of the Nighstar sect. It might not be worth looking into now but… I feel like finding one out here would prove informative. Since the exact origin of such facilities is… still speculative.” Velvet would personally believe Catarina, of course, but she was wrong about things sometimes. Usually nothing Everheart related, but some things.

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“If I see it up close I can at least verify that it is of the same origin,” Koralo confirmed. “I went to see the outposts we had identified in Scarlet Alliance territory.”

“What do you think it’s doing all the way over here?”

“I’d assume it serves the same purpose as all the others. Unfortunately, we don’t know precisely what that is,” he shook his head. “It might be relevant that they are placed close to major sects. Or, they might be so widely located that it’s coincidence.”

“How would no one have noticed for so long?” Velvet frowned.

“There are some assumptions there. We don’t actually know when these were placed. And, at least a few were noticed.”

“But only recently,” Velvet pointed out.

“Precisely,” Koralo confirmed.

Soon enough their ship was refilled. They weren’t limited by the energy available to be collected, merely how quickly the ships systems could absorb incoming power. They would be able to confirm with their own senses soon enough.

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Technically, jumping near a star was a good way to avoid detection. It was also risky. Sure, the chance of anything going wrong was fairly small for any individual attempt. Even if they tried to drop their ship into a star, the ship's systems would prevent that. Assuming they were working properly.

Velvet didn’t know what the percent chance of failure was. Probably less than a single percent. And maybe they could do hundreds of jumps right next to stars without issue. But if they didn’t have to, there really wasn’t any point. Better to not compound such risks for no reason.

This time they did have a reason, however. Their destination was right next to the star, and while they could have approached closer in realspace from the edge of the system, there was a possibility of people watching. And their suspicions were justified, as they found the planet had a handful of ships present. Complete with cultivators watching over the ships, so nobody tried to steal them away.

Not that many people would be so foolish as to attempt that, since the ships were from the Citadel of Exalted Light- and one or two from the Hardened Crown Sect.

While they were probably overwhelmed by the star’s energy, approaching from outside might have given them a greater chance to be detected. It was also possible there were other ships or cultivators throughout the system, watching. They’d have to be careful on their exit, because entering subspace near a star was even riskier than exiting. It was better to reach the edge of the system.

“Anything you can tell from here?” Velvet asked Koralo. He hadn’t just been waiting in the cockpit the whole time, since even the fast Scarlet Alliance ships took a while to cover the space between systems.

“Not much,” Koralo admitted. “Though I can feel active formations. If we can get closer… well, the ship might be able to do a sufficient reading. I don’t think it would be wise to land.”

“Certainly not,” Velvet agreed. That wasn’t the mission, after all. But as this was already on their path… they had to look. It seemed like a big coincidence, but that was making the assumption that the placement was random. Instead of someone else taking a similar travel path, or otherwise looking for less occupied systems. There might also be far more than they were aware of. Obviously the list of locations they’d found had not been exhaustive. It was just the sort of thing that Everheart would do, to make people think they were safe from… whatever these did. Except they were too obvious. People could just see them.

Velvet wasn’t going to be the one to figure out what they were for though. Probably not Koralo either, certainly not right now.

He took a look at the ship’s readout. “Yes, this energy signature is one thing, but the formation patterns are recognizably the same. Not that I’m saying I fully understand them, but the style is clear enough.”

“Great. We’ll move on, then?”

They maintained their orbit around the star, passively moving beyond the planet and any potential watchers thereon. Velvet set the ship on a path out of the system- it would fly itself, unless she needed to take over due to a combat situation or the like. Though really, it just needed to build up some momentum in the right direction as they shouldn’t be able to run into anything.

Velvet focused on minimizing the ship’s presence. Even as they moved further from the star’s overwhelming presence, she didn’t feel any watchers. That didn’t mean there weren’t any, of course. She might be among the top individuals for stealth, but that didn’t mean she was the best. She didn’t know of anyone more skilled, except perhaps Ratna. Maybe others in the Veiled Brilliance.

Then again, it wasn’t like sneaks tended to get famous, did they? Usually not as much as anyone else, if they knew what was good for them.

There was also the matter of stealth through other means. Velvet knew that if Anton were around, he could avoid her notice not by being good at hiding but by simply being beyond the range she could detect. He could be a system over… maybe more, because he didn’t exactly advertise the very limits of his power, even to people he trusted. Especially since it wasn’t necessary.

Velvet might have been able to pick out Anton’s sensory extensions of his energy, but there was no guarantee of that. She also thought she could hide the ship from them, however, so she had to do her best to maintain that with the assumption that people were looking. They were still deep in enemy territory, and getting deeper.

Hopefully it would be a bit easier to sneak into Citadel territory with their fleets having launched against the Scarlet Alliance. That said, they could still have any number of powerful cultivators still defending their territory. It was unknown how many Augmentation cultivators they had to call upon, but they’d seen enough that those they missed could be a major concern. At best, their group might deal with a handful somehow. Or at least they shouldn’t assume a victory over any but an extremely small group.