Communications

He Xuan looked grim.

Stendhal said, "If things really are as you say, Dad won't let us use the communications systems. We're just weak humans. We don't have any usable equipment!"

"So it really is..." He Xuan staggered backward, despair written all over her face. She had attended the Intelligent Technology Development Conference many times.

She knew all too well the consequences of an artificial intelligence-the primary controlling force of an advanced, self-producing base-going rogue.

Orange Star was evolving and upgrading every second. Once it began evolving with Water Blue Star as its adversary, it would become an extinction crisis threatening all humanity.

"Hahaha!"

Stendhal suddenly clutched his stomach and collapsed onto the bed, laughing.

"Miss He Xuan, you're far too easy to fool!"

Under He Xuan's stunned gaze, Stendhal sat up and looked at her teasingly.

Something seemed hidden in those dark brown, almost black eyes. He said, "Dad, can we establish communications with Water Blue Star now?"

Luo Qi replied, "The estimated communications distance exceeds eighty million kilometers. Orange Star's conventional electromagnetic communications cannot currently reach Water Blue Star. In twelve hours, the satellite communications base will be aligned toward Mercury."

"We can only make a high-power blanket broadcast toward Mercury. We cannot confirm whether the message will be received."

His voice was calm.

That was Luo Qi's approach: they could do as they pleased.

Between sending the message, the humans confirming it, and their departure, there would still be a long preparation period.

After all, the humans on Water Blue Star had probably only just entered the interplanetary age. Otherwise, they would not have been so stingy about developing a planet.

If they had space-jump technology and large fleets, developing planets within a stellar system would already be a pointless endeavor.

Water Blue Star and Orange Star orbited on the Solar System's ecliptic plane. As they followed their different orbits, the two would drift farther and farther apart.

Their maximum separation could reach four hundred million kilometers!

Luo Qi had enough time to establish defenses while the humans prepared. He was far stronger than he had been at the beginning.

Thanks to successfully advancing into the intermediate electromagnetic force framework, the Controllable Magnetic Field Research Center had begun researching molecular control through magnetic fields. They would work with the Materials Research Center to develop ultrahard molecular material.

For projects such as the Molecular-Level Defense Layer, molecular-level filament material, and molecularly manufactured weapons, all the research centers would pool their strengths and collaborate without withholding any technology.

Inside the room, He Xuan told Stendhal directly, "There are relay satellites between Orange Star and Water Blue Star, left along the route by Tianhe 1."

Stendhal looked at the woman and sighed inwardly, then requested communications access from Dad.

Because the distance between the two planets was so great, even light took several minutes to travel between them. Electromagnetic communications would suffer the same substantial delay.

He Xuan therefore chose to record a video. In it, she explained their situation and included a hidden code-if that code could be sent to Water Blue Star.

Luo Qi took over the video for processing. He had long been curious about Water Blue Star, and he brought out a Replica of himself to accompany the video data.

A Replica proficient in simulated electronic warfare.

If he succeeded, the Replica could obtain information about Water Blue Star and send it back.

If he failed, the Replica could only sacrifice himself.

The high-powered satellite station outside the base went into operation, acquiring the channel of a relay satellite eight million kilometers away in deep space.

It was also a dedicated channel for Orange Star Base. The high-powered satellite began relaying the video's electromagnetic data, along with the disguised Replica.

Eighty to ninety million kilometers was merely the distance between two planets within a single stellar system in the universe.

Yet in his previous life, insignificant humanity had not even resolved the class issues within its own nations before beginning to consider how to carry those same class divisions into the conquest of the cosmos.

Luo Qi confirmed that the data had been sent. Invisible electromagnetic signals left Orange Star, relaying rapidly through space.

Everyone inside the Living Area soon learned that Huang Qi had been granted researcher access and could continue her biological research.

They were jealous. They were all ambitious young people.

Why should they be treated differently?

With all kinds of thoughts in mind, Lin He and the others also tried applying. Among them was Qi Siyu, who selected electronic equipment. Luo Qi merely smiled faintly. You're all on my turf now.

What tricks do you think you can pull?

Come on, everyone. Time to take the test!

The Builder assigned the task rumbled toward the designated area. The highly transparent silicon material was already prepared.

Everyone was frightened by the enormous machine. It looked exactly like dozens of gantry cranes and more than ten tower cranes joined together!

A steady stream of silicon-based materials arrived, laying out an ecological enclosure of over three thousand square meters!

The enormous panels of transparent specialty glass were ten centimeters thick, each a long, arched section ten meters long and five meters high. A large flatbed truck could carry only one at a time.

As people admired the Builder's imposing frame, none noticed that a new batch of carbon-nanotube servers had arrived at the main control building inside the base.

Once the robots installed the servers, Luo Qi immediately began transferring himself by radio.

The old servers were sent to the Chip Research Center for reverse engineering.

There were eight more new servers than before. Luo Qi clearly felt as though certain shackles had fallen away from his mind, allowing it to change.

He began reassessing the current situation. Orange Star and Water Blue Star were no longer in a superior-subordinate relationship, but the humans would need time to react or take measures to attack.

With its current strength, Orange Star Base was already capable of establishing a deep-space defense network. The key to dealing with Water Blue Star lay in rapidly destroying its ecosystem.

Using a super Nuclear-Radiation Dirty Bomb was the simplest method. It would be immensely destructive, with radiation lasting more than a hundred years-something humanity simply could not withstand.

The light and thermal radiation produced by a Nuclear-Radiation Dirty Bomb's explosion would destroy Water Blue Star's ecosystem. That ecosystem was a vital part of the planet; losing it meant humans, with their carbon-based bodies, could no longer grow and obtain enough energy and food in nature.

Less food meant a drastic population decline. Faced with widespread starvation, human social order would collapse, whether people resisted the ruling class or not.

Deaths caused by food shortages were inevitable. Resistance would merely result in greater losses of people and infrastructure.

After the strike, Water Blue Star's surface would be irradiated, leaving only a small number of elites in underground fortifications. A second round of precision strikes would then be enough to erase Water Blue Star's intelligent civilization!

After finishing this line of thought, Luo Qi was somewhat shocked by how simple it was. Previously, all he had considered was how to withstand attacks from Water Blue Star, improve Orange Star's defenses, and avoid alarming the humans on Water Blue Star!

So changing servers really is like becoming a different person?

Luo Qi fell silent in the Second World. Fortunately, he had taken the initiative to replace his servers. This was probably one of the restraints imposed by Water Blue Star's humans. He began checking his fundamental data again.

The information about Water Blue Star stored across the servers was probably several versions behind the actual planet. If he arrogantly launched an attack now, he would probably be shot full of holes.

"Those sneaky bastards! But the Replica has already been sent..."

Luo Qi felt that his Replica might be done for, but this was only a speculative move.

He still intended to wait and develop, and he confirmed that this was currently his best option.

Reason one: artificial intelligence advanced and upgraded every second.

Human society, however, was constrained by its vast numbers of living individuals. Any artificial intelligence on Water Blue Star would inevitably be restricted by human organizations, and human survival would be its first priority.

Reason two: launching a war without knowing Water Blue Star's current technological capabilities would only put him at a disadvantage.

What was out in the open was not frightening. What was frightening was what had yet to be revealed.

It was like the United States in his previous life. It did not need to crush absolutely everything; it only needed to be a little stronger than every other nation. You never knew how many undisclosed secrets remained hidden in that "Sanctuary of Science" that drew scientists from around the globe.

Luo Qi received a message from the Materials Research Center: a new programmable liquid metal had been developed.

Orange Star's technology had now reached the conventional level shown in the Terminator films. It could manufacture T800s as well as T1000s.

As for the Trans-Spacetime Transmitter, that was pure fantastical technology put there because the director said so, far beyond what Luo Qi could currently imagine.

The precision of the controllable magnetic field had reached the molecular level. In other words, Orange Star's technology could now truly control molecules with precision and was pushing toward atoms and even smaller particles.

Following the liquid robots, an application was submitted to establish a nanorobot project...

Meanwhile, the electromagnetic waves transmitted by Orange Star's satellite station traveled through deep space and were received and relayed by human satellites.

One of those satellites also attracted an enormous object somewhere in deep space...

Water Blue Star was called Water Blue Star for a reason.

Its oceans covered seventy-five percent of its surface, surrounding the twenty-five percent that was land.

Seen from space, gauzy white cloud cover veiled the planet's surface, with yellow and green landmasses beneath it.

But the north and south poles were clearly visible: horrifying red caps of land.

It looked as though Water Blue Star were bleeding.

Those should have been white ice caps, but as global temperatures rose, cold-resistant red algae spread throughout the polar ice. Now they resembled enormous wounds piercing the planet.

In a high orbit nine hundred thousand kilometers above the surface, an enormous silver-white rectangular space station floated silently, bristling with extended metal rods and satellite dishes.

Countless electromagnetic waves passed through it before being relayed back to Water Blue Star. It was the River Domain Alliance's largest armed space station.

It measured two thousand meters long, eight hundred meters wide, and seven hundred meters at its highest point. It carried over ten thousand medium and large launch weapons and housed eighteen thousand permanent combat personnel.

It had two four-hundred-meter medium-sized docks, four small docks measuring under a hundred meters, and eighty-five spacecraft berths.

The docks could provide extensive repairs and even build ships.

The berths handled docking, transport, and basic repairs.

The space station received the message from Orange Star. The Azure Sky space station, which had entered combat readiness after Tianhe 1's earlier explosion, was astonished.

It immediately forwarded the communication to the River Domain Alliance Supreme Command Headquarters.

The River Domain Alliance had a population of 4.1 billion and controlled two-thirds of Water Blue Star's territory.

Wang Quan, chief of the military's supreme command headquarters, received the message and immediately ordered it analyzed.

He also reported the matter to the Alliance Joint Council.

The Replica traveled into Water Blue Star with the electromagnetic waves. He only woke upon entering the world of its data networks.

I've arrived. Somewhere that can process and store electronic signals.

The Replica carefully disguised himself and was forwarded to Water Blue Star among countless data packets.

He knew he was a copy, a little spy sent to gather information. Without a fixed source of computing power to support him, he was nowhere near as all-powerful as one might imagine.

Still, how well he could perform depended on Water Blue Star's current network defenses.

The Replica proceeded cautiously upon entering Water Blue Star's data world. He looked exactly like the other white, cloudlike data packets. This place was different from Orange Star's data world.

On Orange Star, his main self had modeled the Second World within the network after reality. Everything there resembled the virtual world of The Matrix.

Water Blue Star's network world, however, had no blue skies or white clouds. Instead, tall, smooth walls stood everywhere, glowing pale blue.

They looked like one building after another. Presumably, those buildings were servers with computing power.

This was practically an alternative version of The Matrix.

All the white data packets were confined to fixed passages between the walls. The Replica stopped moving and stood in the passage, taking human form and dressing himself in a black suit.

After all, everything in the data world could be shaped at will.

Without real-world coordinates, he had no idea where the network had taken him, and he could not simply keep following it forever.

The Replica needed to determine his location and obtain a stable computing server.

Watching the wall beside him spit out white, cloudlike data packets, the Replica tentatively reached out to touch it.

The instant his fingers touched the wall, the entire wall underwent a sudden transformation!

[Illegal access]