Chapter 5: Successful Transition

Time ticked by.

Under Chen Fan's horrified gaze, the soft, glowing point of light began to grow larger, quickly forming into a rapidly spinning ring.

He had no idea what the true nature of this ring was, nor its purpose.

But one thing was certain: this ring was unstable.

It was like a deformed bicycle tire. As the ring spun faster, it began to noticeably distort.

Moreover, as the ring expanded, the surroundings began to twist as well.

As time passed, the ring stopped expanding, and through the increasingly intense distortion effect, a "light sphere" suspended in midair began to form.

At that moment, the distortion effect reached its peak. A miraculous phenomenon appeared before Chen Fan's eyes: the desk, which should have been obscured by the light sphere, reappeared at a strangely warped angle.

Chen Fan's gaze shifted slightly, and the scene before him triggered a memory buried deep within his mind.

After a difficult moment of recollection, he finally remembered some basic astronomy facts he'd come across in his previous life: due to the immense gravitational effects, there was often a gravitational lensing effect around black holes.

In simple terms, the massive gravity warped light, allowing light that should have been blocked to enter the observer's view along a peculiar curved path.

Without a doubt, the scene before him was a manifestation of gravitational lensing!

"So…"

Realizing this, Chen Fan quickly connected the scene in front of him to the strange dream he had experienced.

"That wasn't a dream?!!"

Chen Fan swallowed hard, his voice trembling as he muttered uncertainly, "Cross-universe... ultra-long-distance transmission?!"

As he watched the increasingly unstable light sphere, he felt a cold chill run down his spine.

Wait, you're serious?

Crossing universes is one thing, but why are aliens involved now?

He clearly remembered that in the "broadcast-like" message from his dream, they had identified themselves as the Pan-Universe Human Alliance.

Just the name itself sounded like no minor player.

Perhaps the side effect of that cryptic whisper had made his mind more alert, as all kinds of bizarre questions flooded his thoughts.

Aliens... wait! Can we still call them aliens if it's cross-universe?

And why would this impressive-sounding alliance have anything to do with him? Did they misunderstand something?

Oh, right, they were looking for a missing research vessel…

Could they think that the ship is with him?!

At the thought of this possibility, Chen Fan's previously scattered thoughts suddenly froze.

After a brief moment of shock, he let out a classic exclamation:

"Holy sh*t!!!"

...

Reality didn't give Chen Fan much time to process things.

Just as he realized they might be after the lost research vessel, the already unstable light sphere began to behave strangely.

In a flurry of rapid and intense flashes, a broken, faintly crackling hand slowly emerged from the light sphere, its palm opening towards Chen Fan.

The hand stretched out slowly, with a fragment of an arm still attached behind it.

Blue-purple electrical arcs jumped unpredictably across the arm, emitting a spine-chilling aura—

The electric arcs' intense charge made Chen Fan's hair and body stand on end.

Frozen with terror, Chen Fan stared at this scene that defied all understanding, his fear so intense that he felt like a quail, unable to make a coherent sound.

His mind almost shut down, and all he could think was one thing:

This is the end!!!

Just as he prepared to beg for mercy, the arm that had been extending from the light sphere suddenly lost its support and dropped to the ground with a clank.

The blue-purple electrical effects that had been flickering across the surface of the arm abruptly vanished. Even the unstable light sphere, too, dissipated into thin air in an instant.

The room returned to darkness, and everything that had just occurred seemed like nothing more than a hallucination.

Chen Fan stared at the direction where the arm had fallen, swallowing hard.

After hesitating, he cautiously raised his numb hands, trembling as he made a prayer gesture: "Lord… please grant light to this world…"

It wasn't just shock; his voice felt strange—hoarse with a hint of an electronic undertone.

The dim light above him flickered, driving away the darkness. It revealed the true nature of the arm on the ground:

"…A mechanical arm?"

Chen Fan murmured, his expression strange.

After realizing this, his fear and worry lessened significantly—compared to a flesh-and-bone entity traveling through the void with lightning, a mechanical creation made more sense to him.

He summoned the courage to step forward cautiously, observing the arm in the yellowish light.

The surface of the mechanical limb was covered with a layer of silvery unknown metal. After the earlier impact, the metal had cracked, exposing the intricate wiring and structure inside.

The end of the mechanical arm had a smooth, broken surface.

Clearly, it had been subjected to a high-intensity attack when it broke.

As Chen Fan prepared to examine it further, a faint light emanated from the palm of the mechanical arm.

Before he could react, a fan-shaped beam of cyan light swept across him.

The next moment, an electronic synthetic voice sounded in the room.

Unlike the rigid, robotic voice of the statue, this synthesized voice sounded much more dynamic:

[Surface thought reading successful. Language module configured.]

[Detecting spatial-temporal node...]

[Leap successful. Confirmed arrival at Universe EL13697101!]

[Target identity verification in progress...]

[Target confirmed as signal source!]

[Attempting cross-universe hyperspace membrane broadcast...]

[Warning! No available communication nodes found. Unable to connect to the Dangerous Technology Management Bureau. Attempting to calculate feasible alternatives...]

At that moment, Chen Fan belatedly realized what was happening.

He let out a hoarse cry and staggered back.

He only stopped when his back collided with the solid wall made of concrete and cement.

"You…"

Perhaps feeling that he couldn't just sit back and do nothing, Chen Fan swallowed and shakily asked, "What exactly are you?"

As the palm of the mechanical arm lit up with cyan light again, the electronic voice spoke once more:

[Pan-Universe GT-52 Carbon-based Biological General Purpose Intelligent Terminal.]