Chapter 147: Destination, Undercurrent Fortress
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秒速九光年 update:2022-07-11 17:13
Old Mo thought for a second, then said in a deep voice, “Actually, I know a secret. At the wilderness outside of the Milky Way, there’s a place called Undercurrent Fortress. Somewhere around there, there was a prehistoric civilization’s transportation ship that contained all kinds of robots that crashed there.”
“So in the Undercurrent Fortress market, you are often able to buy all types of robots and related accessories, and they were all salvaged by the locals from the nearby space. Unfortunately, because robots are a big taboo in the Milky Way Alliance, the locals were scared that they would be attacked for selling complete robots, so they all mutually agreed to sell only dismantled parts.”
Han suddenly hesitated, then immediately asked, “Then what about logic chip? Can we buy it at a place like Undercurrent Fortress? After all, robots with logic chip are complete and intelligent, and robots without those chips can only be used as servants.”
Old Mo nodded, “You can naturally buy logic chips there, but it’s not easy. The ruler of Undercurrent Fortress is named Forin and he self-claimed to be the King of Undercurrent Fortress. All the local people living there must bow to Forin’s orders.”
“In order to avoid being attacked by the Milky Way Alliance, Forin defaulted to selling the robot parts trading business but still has strict management over the logic chip trades. Possession or sale or logic chip can all mean death. Many years ago I went to Undercurrent Fort and went through a lot of trouble to get one piece of logic chip.”
“At that time I was picking up two hundred sets of engineering robot parts, and found the disassembled Yuan Yuan at the corner of the container. Perhaps due to that businessman’s oversight, he forgot to remove the logic chip in Yuan Yuan’s head.”
Han said very excitingly, “So, it seems like I must go visit this Undercurrent Fortress place.”
Old Mo said, “I know your personality, even if I advise you not to you will still go. But you have to remember, the galactic wilderness is a place that follows the law of the jungle. All the outlaws that couldn’t make it in the Milky Way Galaxy only has 2 paths, one is to be like Pathless and the others to go to the Oblivion Realm, and the other path is to just wander in the galactic wilderness.”
“If you want to enter the Oblivion Realm, you must receive the permission of the Protector, so only a small fraction of people, like Wuyun and Night Ruins these kind of high-end criminals will get the chance to go to the Oblivion Realm, while the rest of the criminals all gather at the galactic wilderness. In comparison to Oblivion Realm which is run by the Protector, nobody will do anything even if you commit murder or arson there.”
“If you really want to leave the Milky Way to go to the galactic wilderness, you must be very careful. Everything, everyone, even if it’s a little ant in the galactic wilderness, should be treated with caution.”
Old Mo described the galactic wilderness as a hellish place, extremely cruel, but Han still decided to leave immediately to go to this planet in the galactic wilderness named Undercurrent Fortress.
The reason that region is called the galactic wilderness, is because in that large piece of sky, the planets that can support mankind is really too few.
In the Milky Way Galaxy, basically every few transition jumps, there’s a habitable planet. Even in the most rural 63rd star sector, you can find a supply point for human habitation within 20 jumps.
But in galactic wilderness, it’s normal to not see any signs of human life for 10 to 20 days. Once the spacecraft breaks down half way, it’s almost impossible to find a rescue team.
According to the guideline of map, the closest route to the Undercurrent Fortress is through 61st Star Sector, so Han took Old Mo all the way to 62nd Star Sector, found a fairly prosperous planet with human habitation and dropped off Old Mo.
Old Mo will be buying a ship here that’s equipped with a cloaking device, and then fly to Earth. As for Han, he would be making a turn to enter the 61st Star Sector and then enter the galactic wilderness.
At the airport, Yuan Yuan laid in Old Mo’s arms with a reluctant look. Since he is equipped with human emotions, Yuan Yuan appeared to be really reluctant to see Old Mo leave, as if a spoiled child. And Old Mo was excited to tears. Yuan Yuan calls Old Mo his grandpa, and how couldn’t Old Mo always be treating Yuan Yuan as his own grandson.
“Well, well, you guys should leave now.” Old Mo let down Yuan Yuan, bent his knees and said patiently, “You remember, from now on Han is your master, he’s the lifesaver for both of us.”
Yuan Yuan heavily nodded, “Grandpa, don’t worry, I understand. In the future I will try my best to help Han. But, can I go visit you on Earth?”
“No problem.” Han smiled and said, “Earth is my home, although I can’t go back for now, but that doesn’t mean I can’t go back in the future.”
\r \r \r
“Then, grandpa you should take care of yourself, wait for me to go visit you on Earth, wait for me.” Yuan Yuan’s two electronic eyes became a little watery as he said to Old Mo
Shua~
In any case, No. Demon Claw bid farewell to Old Mo and set sail to the new target.
Han really likes Yuan Yuan who’s equipped with human emotions, and he never understands why the Alliance is so determined on wiping out such robots that cares so much about friendship? Han still can’t see Yuan Yuan’s threat to humanity, on the contrary, Han feels that mankind is its biggest threat.
In the cockpit, Han opened his computer and logged onto the Galactic Dark Net.
Now, Han has a deeper understanding of the dark net. Over all, dark net is a place to conduct illegal transactions, and illegal means power!
Han’s fusion beasts, drugs, and even his No. Demon Claw, most of Han’s possessions are illegal existences, but it is these illegal presences that brought Han remarkable fighting power.
Now, the moment Han runs into any problems, he will first go to the dark net to find a solution.
“Master, what are you looking for?” Yuan Yuan brewed a cup of hot chocolate for Han, laid curiously beside Han, tilted his head and said.
Han smiled and said, “I’m looking for a mobile shipyard. These days I have been thinking about how to allow a secret shipyard to avoid being found. If it’s a fixed shipyard, I should put it in the Milky Way, even if I put it in the galactic wilderness it will still not be safe enough.”
“So I thought about a shipbuilding point that’s on the move. We can convert a large cargo ship into a shipbuilding factory that sails as it functions, then coupled with a mobile mining ship, the two can work together. But now I lack the manpower, so even if I can purchase the ships I don’t have enough manpower to deploy. After all, the mobile shipyard and armed mining ship need a lot of crews to run.”
Yuan Yua’s eyes lit up and he exclaimed, “This is really a good idea. It’s best to add another armed conveyor ship to protect the mobile shipbuilding plant.”
Han smiled bitterly and said, “Wouldn’t that require more manpower? The more prudent approach is to mobilize trustworthy brothers from Earth, but now Earth don’t even have enough manpower so I’m afraid that they won’t be able to support me.”
Yuan Yuan pointed at his small body and said, “Why do you need that many people? Master can give me control of the production fleet.”
“You?”
“Ya, as long as the fleet is equipped with communication arrays that are powerful enough, I can issue work orders to the ship through the real-time online system. Whether it’s the convoy fleet or the mobile shipyard, I can control both.” Yuan Yuan said confidently.
Han was stunned, a fully intelligent robot is able to simultaneously control an entire industrial fleet?
But thinking about it, it still makes sense. Controlling starships can be tough, but it’s actually pretty easy as well. When the fleet needs to attack, Yuan Yuan just need to issue attack orders to the ships. Now all the battleships are fully automated, and it can be fully operational according to the remote command.
Do not just look at Yuan Yuan’s small body, there’s actually a super quantum computer inside him that can issue billions of instructions and dynamically adjust according to the real-time battlefield situation!
To some extent, although the artificial intelligence is created by intelligent life, but the computing power of artificial intelligence is far beyond the intelligent life.
Han suddenly realized why the Milky Way Alliance must eliminate artificial intelligence. Perhaps they are afraid of its power.
Yuan Yuan can help Han control an industrial fleet, that means he can also control an entire strategic fleet by himself, or even 100 strategic fleet!
Suppose even if one artificial intelligence goes rogue and plots to overthrow humanity, if it acquires the control of fleets, it will no doubt be certain doom for humans.
But thinking on the contrary, if there is no rebellion of AI robots and they always stand on the same front of Han, then what a powerful support that would be!
Think of this, Han’s eyes lit up.
He held up Yuan Yuan and took a closer look from left and right, and that actually make the little robot a little shy, “Oh my god, you little brat is a rare treasure! If I can have a group of little guys like you and then have a sufficient number of fleets then we can go conquer the entire Milky Way!”
Yuan Yuan was first happy, then his eyes dimmed down and he whispered, “If I’m too powerful, would Master be like other people in the Milky Way Galaxy and be afraid of me? Hate me?”
What?!
Han disagreed, his eyebrows raised up and he said, “Why would I be scared of you? Not use suspicious people, and don’t be suspicious of the people you use. (TL: common saying in China) Besides, I already decided, this time we are going big!”
Since the thought came, then it’s time to take action!
Without saying more, Han went to the second-hand starship market at the border of the 61st star sector, and used 7.3 billion GC to buy a Digger-class armed mining ship.
This is a very common model in the border areas of the Milky Way galaxy, because mining in rural places are not very safe, so the mining ships in border areas are not only armed but its ship hull’s defense is also higher than the ones usually used elsewhere.
The 72 engineering robots left behind by Old Mo became the first batch of employees of the mining ship, while Yuan Yuan became that ship’s commander.
Even the top model mining ship can’t be fully automated and need some workers. For instance, every mining gun needs maintenance every once awhile, and it’s also needed for the mineral separator, smelting purification machinery, controlled fusion reactor, the engine, and all the other equipment.
With No. Demon Claw at the front and the armed mining ship at the back, Han found a remote asteroid and let Yuan Yuan first perform an analysis for the planet to see what minerals can be collected.
“Master, the analysis showed that the planet mainly carries crystal ore which is the material used to smelt tritanium. Testing and maintenance work has been completed, we can now try to mine these minerals.” Yuan Yuan reported to Han.
“Start!”
Han ordered, and then he just saw the boxy armed mining ship approach the asteroid, aligned its 4 industrial mining laser emitters to the ore reserve.
Boom~
The mine gun shattered the surface, then from the mining ship dropped down two giant alloy conduits, where the shattered mineral would get sucked into the mining ship from one and after the separation step the useless slag would come out from another tube.
The warehouse is piling up more and more ores, while the engineering robots onboard under the command of Yuan Yuan began to perform a variety of maintenance for the ship, cooling off the mining gun every so often, flatten out the piles of ores in warehouse in order to store more, and etc.
Han grew more surprised the more he looked, “My god, the robots are truly amazing! Just you and 72 sets of engineering robots are able to control an armed mining ship? If I have more robots, then I can form a super mining fleet and mine more minerals!”
Han quickly halted Yuan Yuan’s experiment and said in excitement, “No need to experiment anymore, I understand robot’s working pattern now. Engineering robots are like workers and you are all the workers and the ship’s brain.”
“Let’s move and head straight to the Undercurrent Fortress, and buy all the robots they have!”