From that simple act alone, Gu Xijiu could clearly tell the suffering that they must have gone through while she was away. The tragic sight pained her. Perhaps, if she had returned within the given time that she was supposed to, the place would not be doomed with this unfortunate incident.

She took a deep breath before making an announcement, "Yes, I am back. I will ask those foreigners to compensate you for all the pain that you have gone through, and I will bring peace back to land." As soon as she was finished, she turned around and returned to the warplane.

In just that brief moment, the news of the return of the Lord was widespread to every corner of Starry Crescent Land. The news had certainly come as a comfort to the brave souls who were still fighting valiantly to protect their land. They were tired and in despair after holding on for so long, but the news came as a powerful boost to their motivation. Their fighting spirit had returned once more.

"The Lord is back, and we shall be saved," they thought. The people of the Starry Crescent Land were hopeful again. 

…

The admiral"s display was still active in the cabin. He looked at her sternly in the eye and said, "How did you know how to use our weapons? Are you one of us?"

Gu Xijiu did not answer his question, but instead, took full control over the warplane and slowly raised it into the air. 

"You are not from earth, are you? You are only pretending to be one of them," she challenged.

"Don"t we look like humans from earth?" He seemed to have been caught a little surprise.

"You do look like one, but perhaps you were not born to be one. I can tell that you have spent some time on earth before, but the way you behave is unlike us."

"How can you know?" The admiral was curious.

Gu Xijiu gave him a tight smile. At first, she thought that these people were humans from the future; it was only until she saw Meng Hui"s pupils in his eyes when he was angered that she noticed an oddity. That instantly sparked her suspicion.

From then on, she tried to infuriate him further, and even scare him. Not only did Meng Hui"s eyes squeezed into tiny slits in times of distress, but his second officer also had the same vertical pupils too. Although the slits only lasted for a split second, Gu Xijiu was observant enough to notice the tiny changes.

In order to find out more, she had to go after the soldiers in Xingyao City to see if the same changes applied to them when in fear. She noticed many of them, too, had vertical pupils in times of distress. Some of the weak ones had the color of their eyes change from emerald green to golden yellow in an instant.

It became clear to her that they were not humans. They were some of the most advanced alien species, apparently.

"Hey, why are you keeping quiet? I want to know how you found out about us." The admiral was eager to know. Smilingly, he acted like he was not annoyed by the fact that their secret had just been uncovered.

Gu Xijiu finally turned around and looked him in the eye. The screen displaying the admiral was almost within touching distance, but he was merely a visual representation. The man could probably be thousands of miles away for all Gu Xijiu knew.

"How did you come here?" This was all that Gu Xijiu cared about.

"Have you heard about the concept of wormholes?" The admiral started to get talkative. "One can use a wormhole to travel from one dimension to another. In fact, one can even travel from one time frame to another."

In other words, the whole universe was all but a huge playground for them to roam around freely with the help of the wormholes. They even had the ability to break through the confinement of time and travel from one era to another.

Gu Xijiu frowned a little as she recalled an article that she once read from a magazine talking about the possibility of earth being visited by some advanced alien species, which was further reinforced by some undecipherable pieces of evidence that these creatures had left behind.

It was not strange for the Starry Crescent Land to have some alien visitors, but she could somewhat tell that there was more behind what she had just heard.