Inspect

"The Swarm still has vast territories, and this is just the tip of the iceberg. The war has only just begun."

"That's right, the war could last a very long time, and we might spend half our lives in it."

"You guys are pretty conscientious, huh? Okay, okay, I hope I live to see retirement."

"That's not easy, unless we fight every war that easily."

"You're overthinking it. The reason this war turned out this way is twofold: first, we had a firepower advantage, and second, we had the fleets of those Outer-Ring Civilizations as shields."

"That's true. The fleets of those Outer-Ring Civilizations can't withstand this kind of attrition. Before long, their fleets will be exhausted, and then we'll have to rely entirely on ourselves."

"Those guys are too poor in terms of population and war potential; they're far from meeting the standards for participating in this level of warfare."

"Hmph, let's not even talk about them. I think that after the Swarm demonstrated its standard forces based on the Dark Energy system, even many of the Mid-Ring Civilizations probably wouldn't meet the standards for combat."

"That's not quite right. At the very least, the Mid-Ring Civilizations acted much better as a shield than the Outer-Ring Civilizations."

"Hehe, that's right."

"There's no need to gloat. If this war continues, the fleets of those civilizations with inferior technology will eventually be exhausted. When we're the weakest on the field, then it'll be our turn to be cannon fodder and shields."

Upon hearing the sailor's words, the people around fell silent. Although they wanted to refute him, they couldn't find a reason to, because what he said was indeed correct.

"Haha, that's a long way off. Maybe we'll have been sunk before then."

"That makes sense. In that case, we don't need to worry about what happens next. Perfect!"

"Shut up, you two jinxes! I'll hold on until the day I retire."

With some self-deprecating humor, the previously dull atmosphere lightened up again, but Sigel, who was operating the equipment next to him, became increasingly serious and solemn.

"What's wrong, Sigel? Hasn't that surveillance camera been repaired yet? To be honest, those robots are much more efficient than us."

"Hey, that's just you. I work really hard; I can do the work of at least two robots."

"If boasting had any power, you could win this war all by yourself."

"Then you've underestimated my fighting power."

"Haha, that's right. If bragging were so powerful, we could go home now and you could handle the Swarm yourself."

"You'd better hurry, or I'll be done before you've even packed your bags."

But their boasting and joking did not ease Sigel's serious expression; he remained intently focused on the instruments in front of him.

Suddenly, a barrage of error messages came from the instrument, silencing the surrounding noise.

"Sigel? What's going on?" Team leader Alikson asked.

"I don't know. The two Engineering Robot we sent to repair the equipment just suddenly lost contact," Sigel said loudly. Suddenly, the instruments beeped again, and Sigel's eyes narrowed. "Sir, another surveillance camera on B5 Level has also gone black. This might not be an accident or a quality issue."

One accident is an accident, but the probability of two accidents happening simultaneously within a short period of time is extremely low; everyone understands this.

"Could we have been attacked by something?"

"Could the Zerg have infiltrated?" Given the current battlefield conditions, if the warship had been attacked from the inside, the first thing that would come to mind would naturally be the Zerg.

"How could that be? Don't over-deify the Zerg; they are not omnipotent," another outsider retorted.

"That's right, our ship is intact, and there are no signs of intrusion at any of the entrances and exits. Don't scare yourselves." The foreigners' viewpoint had previously gained more support, but it was unclear whether they genuinely believed it or were merely seeking psychological comfort.

"Sigel, was there anything unusual in the last footage the Engineering Robot transmitted?" Team leader Alikson asked. With their level of technology, installing one or even several cameras on machinery and transmitting real-time footage was incredibly easy.

"Nothing unusual, team leader. They lost contact suddenly," Sigel reported. "Just in case my investigation was overlooked, I've sent the video to Gwendolyn. I expect to get back the results soon."

"Very good, Sigel, well done." Although Sigel was only a junior crew member, that was because he lacked seniority. However, the young Sigel was a graduate of a well-known military academy, and his professional skills were proficient and formidable, no less than those of seasoned veterans who had served for many years. With such talent, he would probably be promoted to team leader after this war.

He is indeed at the same level as Alikson, and his promotion potential is huge. Who knows, he might become Alikson's superior in a few days. It's only right to praise him a bit now and get closer to him.

Gwendolyn, on the other hand, is the ship's onboard artificial intelligence. The brains of intelligent beings can only receive and process a limited amount of information at a time, so they are bound to miss some things when viewing video footage. However, as long as the hardware and software of artificial intelligence keep up, this problem does not exist. This may be why people are so wary of "Fire," yet also love and hate it at the same time.

"Team leader, Gwendolyn's feedback is back. She searched three times but didn't find any useful information." A moment later, Sigel received a message, quickly read it, and reported to Alikson.

"Send five repair teams to check!" Alikson thought for a moment, then gave the order. Each mechanical repair team consists of two Engineering Robot, so five teams would be ten robots. Such a large-scale deployment is generally used when the ship suffers unexpected damage. It is indeed a waste of resources to only repair two monitoring points.

However, this is not a waste of resources. It is to check the status of B5 Level. If everything is normal, it can only mean that what happened before was really just a low-probability accident.

"Understood, sir!" Sylger nodded to indicate that he understood, and quickly sent instructions to the maintenance team on B5 Level, which was in standby mode.

The boasting and joking around had already stopped. Although everyone was strategically contemptuous of the enemy, they were actually very concerned about the situation on B5 Level. After all, many of them had just sworn to live to retire.

Time slowly passed, and everyone felt as if each day was an eternity. Sigel looked at their expressions with a hint of disdain; these guys were really quite pathetic.