YM778.TV Chapter 438: The Mysterious Curse
The life he once lived for duty had now become a life devoted to protecting his wife and children.
Looking at another little one born from her wife, a smile couldn\'t help but appear on his face.
"How cute," Astra said softly, fearing he would wake the baby.
"My genes are indeed top-notch," Alice, his wife, said proudly.
"You\'re still the most beautiful," Astra hurriedly said, knowing how his wife\'s mind worked.
"Hmph! I\'m glad you know!"
"Anyway, you must protect me and our daughter forever; you can\'t look at other women!" Alice warned cryptically.
She knew something was up with her husband.
Although he was devoted and loved her deeply, she saw worries in his eyes, as if he was always wondering.
She felt that one day, her husband might even leave them without a moment\'s notice.
"Don\'t worry, I will be by your side forever," Astra muttered, solidifying his resolve.
Over the years, he didn\'t realize how much he had changed.
From the taunting of his wife, the notifications from his system, and the mission the reincarnation master gave him, Astra was torn, unable to decide.
He now felt that his seniors were right: having a partner was the graveyard of life.
Although one knows it\'s where they end up, they can\'t do anything about it.
Astra\'s love for his wife was overflowing, making his mind clouded and clear at the same time.
Seeing the fruit of their love, Astra decided to live and die in the Etherium Realm.
Although he would still complete his mission, he would never leave this place and abandon his family.
"It\'s good, you must love us forever," Alice said in satisfaction, holding her husband\'s face.
[Agent 7, it\'s time to report...] Neon suddenly reminded.
"Hmm, wait for a while," Astra replied nonchalantly.
After letting his wife and daughter rest, Astra went into the secret room on Star Island.
With a tier 12 barrier array set by his system in place, Astra didn\'t worry about any snooping.
After writing a report he had gathered in the past year, he sent it to Neon.
[Agent 7, your report is getting more and more perfunctory. You\'re not doing your job,] Neon said in dissatisfaction.
As a partner, its evaluation depended on Astra.
Fewer points meant less income.
Neon was a perfect systemized tier 12 treasure.
With consciousness and cognition, Neon still wished to ascend to higher heights and become an ultimate treasure like its predecessors.
"This is as much as I can find. Without much strength, I can only look through public information," Astra said helplessly.
[Hmph! You\'re wasting your time with your wife, that is!] Neon complained.
"This is assimilating with custom. If I\'m different, sooner or later they will spot me," Astra reasoned.
"Anyway, since I can\'t get much information, how about changing the yearly report to once in a decade? No! Once in a century would be better," Astra suggested.
[No, this would make us lose more points!]
"I don\'t care. Just send it and see if HQ agrees," Astra said, not caring about points.
He decided to live here with his wife.
As long as he regained his former strength, he didn\'t care about anything.
[What about your ambition? What about your dreams?]
"I don\'t care. You deal with it."
[You-!]
Before Neon finished speaking, Astra cut it off, going back to bed with his wife.
...
In the Astral Continent, the land of stars, the starting point of star lords, and the land of the Moonlight Empire.
Formerly known as the Curse Continent, the Astral Continent gained its glory as the land of hope and beginnings.
With the consensus of the majority, the name Astral Continent became more and more prominent.
Not only did the name Astral Continent represent the image of the land, but it also represented its ambition.
The sea of stars, the seas of continents, the sea of dimensions—the continent hoped to merge all the lands known in the world.
In the Castle, Maximus watched the replay on the screen with a smile.
"I didn\'t expect this spy to fall so easily," Maximus thought with amusement.
That\'s right, the one playing on the screen is the playback of Astra and his system\'s conversation.
Sensing the message they sent, Maximus hurriedly caught it before it passed through the dimensional barrier.
Deleting some sensitive information, he flicked it back to return to its original path.
All these years, Maximus had been tampering with the information Astra sent.
Although there was not much substance in the intelligence he compiled, if one carefully analyzed it, they might find something amiss and send higher-level spies.
Changing the essence of Astra\'s writing not only hid the Etherium Realm better but he could also feed them false information.
"Done."
The two thought they were very secretive, but the first time they came, Maximus had already spotted them.
When Maximus\'s system was undergoing evolution, the rune programming of his system became loose, allowing him the opportunity to copy it.
Although he couldn\'t deduce it in its entirety, hiding it was easy.
Furthermore, using his familiarity, he could easily sense a system from the same source a dimension away.
Thus no matter how Neon hid, it was like a sun, no amount of cloud could dim its brightness.
As for the tier 12 secret formation array, it was indeed formidable.
Even with dimensional authority, he couldn\'t see through it.
Fortunately, it was not his only reliance.
All over the Etherium Realm were his tiny little eyes the size of atoms.
After hundreds and thousands of years of improvement, the micro surveillance bots he created had already reached atomic size.
Although each surveillance array could only see a meter radius, it was undetectable by any means.
Even with his powerful consciousness, he couldn\'t see it.
If not for the micro surveillance bots bound to his origin, he wouldn\'t even know where they were.
Occupying all the living land in Etherium Realm, no secret could be hidden from him.
Unfortunately, he still failed to conquer the Chaotic Sea.
It seemed that no remote investigative means could cross it.
Once the micro surveillance bots dived into the sea, they would quickly corrode and melt.
Even under the deduction of the Seal of Truth, he couldn\'t pinpoint the origin of this chaotic energy.
What he only knew was that this chaotic energy was the reason for the creation of dimensions, even the Aeon Plane.
It seemed to be a higher energy that created everything.
Sighing at the grandness of the world, he looked through the causality points he accumulated over the hundred years.
[Family and Power System:
Host: Maximus Shadowcrest
Power: Tier 9 (0.000324%)
Physique: Dimensional Source (Origin Grade: 0/Unknown) (Rank 10: 0/100...)
Magnitude of Power: 1.002 billion
Family:...
Time Points: 114,153,235...
Potential Points: 112,583,212...
Causality Points: 10,346]
"Ten thousand? Good enough," Maximus muttered with a sigh.
In over a hundred years, he only earned over 3,000 causality points.
Compared to the billions he needed, it was but a drop in the bucket.
"It seems I need to continue my effort of populating the Etherium Realm..."
In the first years, Maximus couldn\'t even earn 10 causality points every year.
Now, in just a hundred years, the causality points he earned every year nearly reached a hundred points.
This was thanks to the population of Etherium Realm breaking from 700 septillions to 1 octillion.
Nearly doubling the population in just a hundred years gave him a surprise.
This was not ten doubling to twenty, but hundreds of septillions reaching octillions.
Even in his joy, Maximus had allowed Readius and Alabaster to borrow tier-11 knowledge freely.
Their contribution to the Etherium Realm was insurmountable.
Unfortunately, after an explosion of growth, it was beginning to slow down.
The larger the number of children, the harder it is to give birth.
This seemed to be a curse that he could never get rid of.
After giving birth to Asha, none of his wives could conceive another one.
Since he had been exposed to the Virtual Realm, he had been fighting a solution to this curse.
However, no matter how he searched, all he saw was a similar curse preventing the expansion of sentient beings.
The higher the strength, potential, and intelligence, the more powerful this curse was.
Using the Seal of Truth, he searched for the solution and the source of this problem.
Unfortunately, the same thing happened—he found nothing.
Like the chaotic energy, except for the known and common knowledge, he couldn\'t find anything about this curse.
Even the solution—no treasure or technique could be found that could break it.
Some treasures and techniques could only assist, giving a higher chance for a sentient being to conceive the next generation.
Fortunately, his deduction still gave him a clue.
The Origin Manual—if he could deduce and practice this ultimate cultivation manual to perfection, it might have a solution to his problem.