73: Chapter 73 The Forge Project – EMP Raid! Factory Paralyzed!

In the laboratory, "Warning, warning, military EMP attack!" Xiao Zhi's alert sounded from the phone.

Chen Fan's hair stood on end; all sleepiness and fatigue were instantly crushed! He sprang from his chair, his voice hoarse: "Xiao Zhi! Locate the source of the attack! Estimate the range of destruction!"

"Bo... ss..." Xiao Zhi's synthesized voice was intermittent, mixed with piercing electromagnetic noise, "Attack type... directional... high-energy electromagnetic pulse... military-grade... power system..."

Before the words could finish—

"Snap!"

The light of the entire world was snuffed out by an invisible giant hand!

It wasn't a slow dimming, but an instantaneous, complete, and absolute darkness!

The incandescent bulbs overhead, the faint glow of computer screens, the flickering indicator lights on instruments... the light sources of all electronic devices vanished completely!

Only Xiao Zhi's core display screen remained stubbornly lit, but its mechanical body emitted abnormal "click-clack" sounds, its joints locked, unable to move—the aftershocks of the EMP were tearing through its internal precision circuits.

Outside the window, the entire Fanxing Technology factory area fell into an abyss-like darkness.

Streetlights, workshop lights, the scattered lights of the office building... all disappeared.

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In the distance, the Magic City downtown area was still brightly lit, but with the factory area as the center, everything within a five-hundred-meter radius seemed to have been forcibly erased from the city's spectrum by a giant black eraser!

No explosions, no flames.

Only an all-consuming silence.

In the darkness, Chen Fan stood frozen in place.

He could hear his own heart beating frantically in his chest, thumping—as if it were about to crash through his ribs and jump out.

EMP—Electromagnetic Pulse.

He had only seen this thing in records: it instantly induces ultra-high voltage and large currents inside electronic equipment, directly burning out chips, circuit boards, power modules... all the precise and fragile core components. The power grid is paralyzed, communications are cut off, and everything built by modern technology is like paper in its presence.

Now, all the machines. All gone.

A surge of murderous intent, mixed with shock, fury, heartache, and icy coldness, rushed to the top of Chen Fan's head! He gritted his teeth hard, using the pain to force himself to calm down.

Don't panic!

If I panic now, I'll truly fall right into Long Zaitian's trap!

He forced himself to take a deep breath to steady himself.

Step one, determine the damage.

Chen Fan rushed to the window in the dark, squinting his eyes, using the faint background light from the distant city to look at the factory area. It was an all-consuming darkness; even the emergency evacuation indicator lights weren't on.

Step two, activate the backup plan.

When building the factory, Chen Fan had left a contingency. Besides the city power, an independent diesel generator set was buried underground in the factory area, with its circuits physically isolated from the main system, specifically for core equipment and emergency lighting.

"Lin Hao!!" Chen Fan roared into the darkness.

No response. The communication system must have been paralyzed as well.

Chen Fan didn't wait any longer. Relying on his memory, he rushed out of the laboratory in the pitch-black darkness, stumbling toward the emergency power control room at the end of the corridor.

The stairwell was equally dark; he could only feel his way down, step by step, holding onto the wall.

His fingers touched the metal casing of the fire hydrant box on the wall. It was bone-chillingly cold, but it helped him steady his mind slightly.

First floor. The control room door was ajar.

Chen Fan rushed in, felt for the bright red manual start lever on the wall, and pulled it down hard with all his strength!

"Vroom——————!!!"

A low, beast-like panting roar suddenly came from deep underground! The diesel generator had started!

A few seconds later, throughout the factory area, scattered incandescent lamps struggled to light up—energy-saving lamps and LED lights had completely failed because their internal drive circuits were burned out. The dim yellow light was weak, but enough to tear through the suffocating darkness.

"Fan Zi!!" Lin Hao's roar came from the end of the corridor, with a trembling voice from the shock, "What's going on?! Everything's black! The workshop machines all stopped suddenly, and sparks were flying everywhere!!"

He rushed into the control room, his face as pale as a ghost under the emergency lights: "Did... did the transformer explode?!"

"It wasn't the transformer." Chen Fan's voice was coldly calm. "It's an EMP attack. Military-grade."

Lin Hao's pupils suddenly constricted.

EMP? Military? Attack?!

These three words were like red-hot branding irons, searing his nerves.

"Long... Long Zaitian?!" Lin Hao's voice shook uncontrollably, but not from fear, but from pure, uncontrollable rage, "Damn it! Is he crazy?! This is a crime! This is a terrorist attack!!!"

"He's not crazy." Chen Fan turned his head, a nearly cruel sharp light flashing in his eyes, "He's very smart. Using this method leaves no physical traces and is hard to trace, yet it can precisely disable our most core asset—technology."

He stared at Lin Hao: "Hao Zi, don't even think about sleeping tonight. Immediately tally the losses, focusing on equipment with precision chips and control systems."

"Understood!" Lin Hao turned and ran, his footsteps creating hurried echoes in the empty corridor.

Chen Fan took a deep breath and turned to rush underground—to the Panshi Factory.

Compared to the Fanxing Technology above ground, the Panshi Foundation buried deep underground was not as heavily affected.

Emergency lights barely illuminated the passage. Chen Fan arrived at the core area of the Panshi Factory and saw Xiao Zhi's mechanical body slumped by the control console.

He walked over and cradled Xiao Zhi's cold metal body in his hands.

Concentrating his mind, he utilized the Amplification system.

Repair. Strengthen. Iterate. Simultaneously making the body resistant to nuclear-explosion-level EMP impacts.

The sensors in Xiao Zhi's eyes suddenly lit up with a ghostly blue light. The mechanical joints made a smooth "humming" sound as it stood up and moved its arms.

"Boss." Xiao Zhi's voice regained its usual steadiness, "Body repaired and upgraded. Anti-electromagnetic pulse capability increased to the highest level."

"Scan all equipment in the Panshi Factory," Chen Fan ordered.

The blue light in Xiao Zhi's eyes swept across the entire underground space. After a moment, a report was generated:

"9% of the equipment's physical structure is intact, but all are shut down due to short circuits in the power supply lines. Three machines near the entrance suffered minor electromagnetic impact, with some capacitors on the motherboards damaged."

Chen Fan's heart tightened, but then he breathed a sigh of relief.

Fortunately. The thick concrete underground had blocked most of the EMP energy.

He immediately began to work, using his Amplification ability along with existing spare parts to quickly repair those three damaged machines.

Meanwhile, the Fanxing Technology workshop above ground was a different scene of hell.

Lin Hao led his people, checking with flashlights in the dim yellow light.

The smell of scorched electronic components mixed with the pungent odor of leaking coolant permeated the air.

Inside the server room, under the pale light of the emergency lamps, the scene was shocking.

Rows of cabinets were lifeless, all operation indicator lights extinguished.

Several cabinets had charred scorch marks on their sides, and the remains of burst capacitors were scattered on the floor.

Opening the cabinet doors, it was even worse inside—the motherboards were extensively carbonized, and the positions of key chips were left with only burnt holes and twisted pins.

The air was filled with a pungent ozone smell, a sign that electronic components had been instantly punctured by ultra-high voltage.

Almost all the equipment was completely destroyed.

After tallying the losses, Lin Hao rushed back to the underground Panshi Factory with a grim face.

"Fan Zi..." his voice was dry, "Above ground... it's basically over. Servers, main control computers, precision instruments... everything that could burn, burned."

Chen Fan was tightening the last screw. Hearing this, his movements paused.

Then, he slowly straightened his back.

A mixture of fury, heartache, and icy murderous intent, like volcanic lava, instantly breached all the dams of reason!

Long Zaitian... you're fucking asking for death!!!

During this time, he had been busy setting up production lines and overcoming technical difficulties for military orders, and hadn't taken the initiative to find trouble with him. This had given the other party an opportunity to provoke and sabotage time and again!

It was because he hadn't fought back that Long Zaitian was so free and so unscrupulous in trying to kill him!

Chen Fan slowly turned around.

The emergency light shone down diagonally from above his head, casting deep shadows on his face. A cold smile slowly curled at the corners of his mouth.

"Long Zaitian..." he softly murmured the name, each word sounding as if it had been fished out of an ice cellar, "I've received your 'gift'."

"I will return this gift twofold."

The dim light of the underground factory reflected his face at this moment.

Calm. Yet more terrifying than any outburst of rage.