The "Thorny Bird" used the wreckage of the "Traveler" to shield itself, successfully breaking away from the main pursuit of the Bug Race, quietly entering the relatively safe near-Earth orbit of the Jade Stone Star's northern hemisphere.
The sensors on board and the "Ash" processed data from the "Traveler" together painted a hellish scene of the planet at this moment.
On the vast surface of the planet, the areas representing human civilization were largely extinguished or flickering uncertainly, replaced by large patches of ugly dark purple fungal blankets, like poisonous sores spreading on the planet's skin.
In the atmosphere, explosive flashes occasionally lit up, traces of the ongoing battles between resisting human defenses and the Bug Race ground forces.
The global communication network had long since collapsed, leaving only scattered, static-laden, desperate shortwave distress signals.
