Throughout the long history of humanity's struggle against Honkai, mankind had never been able to completely eradicate it, and each Honkai disaster had grown more powerful than the last. As a result, humanity's attitude toward Honkai had become increasingly pessimistic, leading to the creation of several extreme plans. The Ark Project was one of them: a massive Honkai Energy-powered spacecraft that would carry humanity's gene bank away from Earth in search of a second home.
The space center Qin Su occupied had three launch sites along its perimeter, a command center in the middle, and an industrial zone farther out. Spaceflight was an undertaking that placed enormous demands on humanity's technological level, finances, and material resources, let alone a grand plan like finding a habitable planet. Human civilization was not yet an interstellar civilization; humanity was still only taking its first unsteady steps within the Solar System.
A colossal rocket still stood at the launch site. It was the last rocket that had not yet been launched. The Prophet gathered together the finest technology humanity currently possessed. Its cold, black finish and technologically advanced appearance silently spoke of mankind's most glorious achievements over thousands of years, yet its story also vividly embodied humanity's helplessness and sorrow at being forced to let its descendants leave the cradle of their homeland.
According to the reports Mei had reviewed earlier, the Prophet had already "broken apart." The only part of the Ark Project that had truly launched successfully was the reconnaissance rocket that had gone up beforehand. It would transmit information on habitable planets within the target star system, providing reconnaissance data for the spacecraft and the Prophet scheduled to launch fifty thousand years later.
The Central Africa Space Center did not store humanity's gene bank, but it possessed something no less important: foundational scientific knowledge from every discipline. It had originally been intended to help humanity rapidly restore its technology in its new homeland, but now it had gained another use: providing Qin Su with a complete theoretical tree of foundational technology.
According to the information stored by the Central Africa Space Center, the massive spacecraft had been sent into an underground launch site somewhere, where it would be launched by pioneers of later generations.
An unmanned transport aircraft carried the sole T-1000 toward the Ark Project space center in North Africa. As the old saying went, fortune favored the bold. The T-800's success rate in infiltration missions was still too low, so Qin Su had sent out his only T-1000. His only hope now was that the Ninth Law-Ruler had left Fire Moth in utter chaos and that they would not come looking for trouble with him.
The roar of its engines swept across the skies of North Africa as the heavy drone steadily hovered above a spot in the Sahara Desert. This was the Ark Project space center closest to Qin Su's Central Africa Base. Unlike the Central Africa Space Center, the rocket launch program here had already been successfully completed.
The T-1000 set up a simple signal tower in an open area outside the archive, then dragged several destroyed security robots into the wilderness, buried them on the spot, and cleared away the traces. It took the small drone from its briefcase, unfolded its folded wings, and sent it into the sky to provide the T-1000 with visual support.
The remaining archive had originally been scheduled to be buried a few months after the launch was completed. However, just as the burial date approached, the appearance of the Herrscher of Earth interrupted the plan. Earthquakes caused by violent tectonic movements forced the staff to evacuate, leaving only a handful of security robots to guard the space center. The T-1000, originally meant for special operations, suddenly had no opportunity to show its worth.
"Such a prize, delivered without effort. In that case, I'll gladly accept this generous gift."
Everything went smoothly. The data upload was complete, and after inspection, there was nothing wrong with the technology. Nor did the uploaded data contain any strange hidden programs. It was all mid-level technology developed from foundational science, without anything that could be called cutting-edge.
Of the two remaining space centers, one contained the gene bank and the other was an archive. According to the relevant information he had obtained through Fire Moth's internal network, the archive had been buried for several months. In other words, he would have to obtain everything else himself unless he wanted to make contact with humanity.
But he believed the risks of doing so far outweighed the benefits. In the worst-case scenario, there would be no benefit at all, while the risks would certainly remain. The Ninth Law-Ruler had only recently appeared, so a new Herrscher could not emerge within the next six months. If he rashly contacted humanity now, then Fire Moth, already exhausted from dealing with Honkai, would certainly focus on handling an "AI" rebellion if it received news of one. Their nerves were on edge, and they were fragile.
The top Fusion Warriors of this era were immensely powerful. They had been born to fight against the merciless cosmic law known as "Honkai," especially Kevin, who could beat the Herrscher of the End into a shutdown.
"It doesn't matter. I'm still lying low for now. According to the information I intercepted from Fire Moth, they haven't discovered anything abnormal here yet. Besides, the prototype of an advanced small nuclear fission reactor has already been built and will soon be put into practical use," Qin Su silently reassured himself.
He did not know whether the current civilization had achieved controlled nuclear fusion. None of the knowledge he had acquired contained anything related to nuclear fusion. Perhaps because they had cheap and efficient energy like Honkai Energy, they had not paid much attention to nuclear power. As for Honkai Energy, given the incidents where machines had lost control due to it, he had no intention of touching the stuff for the time being.
Back in reality, the T-800s were all being refitted with small Nuclear Fission Batteries seized from the space base. They were old, but highly mature. Qin Su had also improved their designs based on the immense energy provided by the Nuclear Fission Batteries. Now, a T-800 could match a Knight-type in unarmed combat, while large numbers of T-800s could utterly crush an equal number of Knight-types. Under Qin Su's coordinated command, the T-800s' tactical cooperation was seamless.
Not to mention that Qin Su had already begun issuing them first-generation plasma weapons and electromagnetic weapons. Unfortunately, these plasma and electromagnetic weapons still used outdated hydrogen fuel cells. These batteries were inefficient, providing neither impressive endurance nor energy output for the weapons.
More advanced hydrogen fuel cells were currently under development. Before long, plasma weapons and electromagnetic weapons would raise the T-800s' combat power to another level.
In addition, the T-600—a weakened version of the T-800 designed to make up for their numerical disadvantage—had also been developed. It was merely a transitional product intended to deal with insufficient production capacity. Its overall design was not very different from that of the T-800, but the materials required to build it were much cheaper.
Thanks to reverse-engineering the materials that made up the T-1000, the principles behind liquid metal had finally been understood. Although liquid metal was inferior to Soul Steel in every respect, for a mass-produced unit, the T-1000's toughness and strength were exceptionally impressive. More importantly, even if a T-1000 was shattered, it could still reassemble itself.
The T-1000, meanwhile, used a far bolder design. Its energy core was a small nuclear fission reactor, which provided far greater power but was also far more unstable. If a T-1000 was destroyed, there was a high chance it would produce an explosion equivalent to no less than five tons of TNT. Therefore, Qin Su devoted more computing power to the T-1000, strengthening his control over it while improving its combat calculations and corrections.
Qin Su still had many things to do: expand production, apply technology, increase the patrol range of the Terminators to expand the mining area, and research new technology. All of it required time.
In this era fated for destruction, time was the most precious thing of all.
Before you continue