Chapter 220: Construction Of The Ross 154 Planetary System
Galactic Calendar 9390.
Five years passed in the blink of an eye.
On the back side of Jupiter, in a region of space surrounded by several signal shielding satellites.
The Conqueror’s massive hull stood quietly in space like a mountain.
Beside it, densely packed Punisher B-types that blotted out the sky, as well as thousands of various types of spaceships equipped for engineering and construction tasks, were lined up in formation waiting.
Great Xia’s efficiency was still astonishingly high, even without A’dai’s assistance.
In just five years, across all of Great Xia—whether administration, industry, or other related domains—normal production had resumed without A’dai’s assistance.
Although the efficiency was far lower than before, at least it avoided major accidents and crises.
In the Conqueror’s command room.
Liu Jun gazed reluctantly at a tiny starlight in the distant space.
Li Jian patted his shoulder and pushed him into the nano buffer cabin.
“With the Conqueror here, just say the word whenever you want to come back. It’s not like we’re abandoning you there.”
Fan Ren smiled and shook his head, then entered the buffer cabin as well.
“Fifty years! No one uses people like oxen and horses like you do—you’re shearing a sheep you’ve caught!”
“Bro!”
Li Jian listened to Liu Jun’s complaints and, smiling, rarely joked around.
“A’dai, begin.”
“Got it, Boss. All departments please note: the space channel will open in 10 seconds. Proceed in sequence; upon arrival, form up as per the plan and await further instructions.”
After A’dai spoke, at that moment, the countdown rang out across thousands of ships in the entire formation.
3, 2, 1.
As the countdown ended, a dark yellow circular fluctuation zone with a diameter of 100 kilometers suddenly appeared in front of the Conqueror’s massive hull.
In space, due to the vacuum environment, not a single sound emerged from here.
The Azure Phoenix Legion’s Punisher formation at the forefront, upon receiving the order, slowly activated their thrust engines, propelling their massive hulls forward toward that space where even light was distorted.
Soon, the Punisher’s bow reached the distorted space. Its bow touched it like rippling water, sending waves spreading slowly outward from the point of impact.
The hull from bow to stern then fully entered the space channel and vanished in an instant.
Even though Fan Ren had seen this scene many times over the past few years, it still felt miraculous to him now.
“Now you’ve really drained me dry.”
Liu Jun’s dissatisfied mutter came to his ears; Fan Ren smiled and paid it no mind.
Over these years, Liu Jun had, with A’dai’s assistance, been stationed at the Jupiter-Mars Hub for nearly 50 years.
Perhaps due to A’dai’s help, or perhaps his own efforts, the entire Jupiter-Mars Hub had developed in an orderly manner without any chaos.
This time, Fan Ren was also moving with the main force to the Ross 154 star system, one key reason being that only he had full access permissions to the Conqueror.
As the only vehicle in humanity’s hands capable of constructing a space channel, the Conqueror could only shuttle back and forth in this period between the Solar System and the Ross 154 star system to handle ship deliveries on both sides.
This was a massive project.
Time passed slowly. When the last spaceship disappeared into the space gate, A’dai maneuvered the Conqueror slowly forward.
This was a star system permeated throughout with red-orange starlight.
For some reason, though he had come here multiple times, Fan Ren always felt an indescribable sense of desolation upon entering this star system.
In the distance, that star had only 17% of the Sun’s mass and 24% of its radius, appearing somewhat mini.
Due to its small mass and volume, though young, this star emitted red light from its surface.
It was a red dwarf star.
The slow internal nuclear fusion reaction rate also made red dwarf stars not only extremely long-lived but also much cooler on the surface.
Because of this, the planetary systems around red dwarf stars were generally quite small in scope.
It had only six orbiting planets: two gas giant planets and four rocky planets.
However, embarrassingly, during previous exploration visits, Fan Ren had found the mineral resources on the remaining four rocky planets to be pitifully scarce.
As the Fox had said, all kinds of minerals on these planets had long been mined clean during the ancient war between the Fox Civilization and the Sirius Civilization.
The only valuable resource was the liquid metallic hydrogen inside those two gas giant planets.
This was still because the Fox Civilization at the time lacked the conditions to mine this high-value fuel.
Indeed, if they had possessed those conditions, they wouldn’t have been defeated by the Sirius Civilization and ultimately driven to extinction.
Fortunately, all minerals needed for construction here would ultimately be supplied by the Solar System.
The task of this trip was first to build a legion base for the Azure Phoenix Legion.
Afterward, over the next five years, work would proceed on the hibernation pod area and a concealment hub.
In Fan Ren’s arrangement, the hub site was placed near the third gas giant planet.
On several satellites of this gas giant planet existed some fuel required for nuclear fusion.
In the deep space, the red-orange starlight bathed the entire fleet in a bloody hue.
Then, under A’dai’s command, the fleet began accelerating toward the planned construction site in the distance.
Here, A’dai would fully take over, managing the entire hub once built.
At the same time, another reason for selecting this star domain as a secret base was the presence here of a space gate directly connecting to the Alpha Centauri star system.
Here, all arriving human civilization members would exist under the identity of the Fox Pirate Group.
And perhaps later, they would pass through this space gate to the Sirius Civilization to procure supplies.
But all that was still far off for now.
Regrettably, the ‘super-eating ore’ mineral required to construct space gates did not exist in the Solar System.
“Third Brother, leave the construction work here to Liu Jun and A’dai. Boss, Commander Liu and I will handle the Azure Phoenix Legion’s subsequent transfers. You stay here and manage the initial garrison arrangements.”
The nano buffer cabin slowly opened. Fan Ren stepped out and solemnly briefed his two brothers, with whom he had spent decades.
Seeing Fan Ren’s demeanor, Liu Jun sighed and could only nod helplessly.
“Don’t worry, Third Brother may look lazy, but he gets things done properly.”
Fan Ren nodded—otherwise, how could he shear a sheep he’d caught?
He looked at his two brothers’ faces, now clearly middle-aged, while he himself seemed still in his thirties, and couldn’t help feeling a touch of melancholy inside.
No matter how time flew by, he seemed forever frozen at this age.
