Chapter 102 A New Era

"luan bird one, beautiful job!"

"This is Chen Weiguo. On behalf of the Command Center, the highest leadership, and the people of the entire nation, I offer you our highest respects!"

In the encrypted communication channel, Chen Weiguo's voice was slightly distorted, not just because the signal crossed half the globe, but because the mountain-shaking, tsunami-like cheers in the background almost drowned out his roar.

"You are heroes of the country! The pride of the nation!"

These words swept through the bridge like an electric current.

The crew members, who had been slightly losing their composure due to extreme excitement, instantly froze in their actions.

Old Zhang's hands, which had been pounding the table just a moment ago, snapped back to his sides, standing perfectly straight. Li Na hurriedly wiped the tears from her face and threw out her chest.

No rehearsal was needed.

Everyone stood like statues in the exact same second.

Tear tracks still hung on their faces, but in the depths of their eyes burned something hotter than nuclear fusion. It was dignity. A searing dignity of finally standing tall after a whole century of suppression.

"Orders: 'luan bird one', return to base immediately!"

Chen Weiguo's voice came through again, carrying unconcealable joy and urgency.

"The base has prepared the highest-specification welcome ceremony for you! And the best celebratory wine!"

"Heroes, come home!"

Home.

These two words caused the tense air in the bridge to soften instantly.

"Yes! Chief!"

Li Na's voice choked up slightly; she gave a forceful salute and turned to lunge toward the navigation console.

Her fingers hovered above the holographic keyboard. As long as she entered that familiar string of coordinates, this silver-black behemoth would turn its prow and land on the Gobi Desert of the Northwest with glory.

Just a split second before her fingertip could touch the confirmation key...

A hand reached across.

That hand was as steady as a steel clamp, without any trembling, directly blocking the virtual light screen.

"Wait."

Li Na froze.

The cheers throughout the bridge were cut off as if by the throat, vanishing instantly. Dozens of eyes snapped toward the captain's seat.

Lin Yuan didn't look at anyone.

He leaned back in the wide command chair, his gaze passing over the smoking 'tombstone' of the deserted island on the holographic screen, passing through the atmosphere, and staring fixedly at the pitch-black, silent void outside the viewport.

His face did not hold the joy of an impending triumphal return.

The greed and gravity that only appeared when facing extremely dangerous ruins climbed onto his brow once more.

That was the instinct of a top-tier scavenger, etched into his very bones.

"Chief," Lin Yuan grabbed the communicator, his voice low and particularly piercing in the overly quiet bridge, "I'm afraid we can't go back just yet."

The other end of the communicator was silent for two seconds.

"What?!" Chen Weiguo's voice rose sharply, carrying a hint of tension, "Why? Equipment failure? Or were there aftereffects from that clash with the 'Ford'?"

"It's not that something went wrong."

Lin Yuan shook his head, the corner of his mouth twitching ever so slightly for an instant.

"A new 'job' has come up."

Before his voice had even faded...

A piercing screech of microphone feedback suddenly exploded, followed by a voice even more excited and frenzied than Chen Weiguo's, forcibly cutting into the encrypted channel.

"Lin Yuan! Lin Yuan! Did you feel it too, kid?!"

It was Academician Wang.

This old scientist, who usually appeared rigorous down to his very hair, now had a voice so shrill it sounded like he'd just been injected with three pounds of chicken blood; one could even hear the loud sound of him slamming the table on the other side.

"That 'nano-forging matrix'! Just now! At the exact moment 'luan bird' fired the gravitational wave beam and the entire ship's energy output reached its peak!"

Academician Wang panted heavily, his speech as fast as a machine gun.

"The energy source on our end and the 'luan bird's' core had a one-in-a-million quantum resonance! That silver cube... it's alive!"

"That 'Genesis' grade firewall that we chewed on with the 'pangu system' for three months and burned out twelve sets of supercomputers without cracking—it was just opened voluntarily by the cube itself!"

"What?!"

Lin Yuan sat bolt upright, his pupils shrinking suddenly.

He knew all too well what this meant.

That silver cube from the god-level civilization of 'Titan Heavy Industry'. Although they had managed to build the 'luan bird', everyone knew they had only cracked a single leaf on that civilization's technology tree.

And now, the trunk was exposed.

"The star map! We've obtained the complete underlying star map!"

Academician Wang's voice already carried a sob, the trembling of one who could die content after hearing the truth.

"Lin Yuan! Your previous guess was right! All of it! That so-called 'secret Armory'—it's not a dead warehouse buried in the ground at all!"

"It's a living thing!"

"It's a big guy from 'Titan Heavy Industry' that was hit by the 'Mechanical Papacy's' ultimate causal weapon—the 'Logic Virus'—during the final decisive battle, and fell into a logical death loop for self-preservation!"

"It's been trapped in a highly unstable sub-space rift, looping within itself for millions of years..."

"It's a 'titan' class mobile fortress!!!"

Boom!

It was as if a heavy bomb had exploded in Lin Yuan's mind.

Mobile fortress.

The crew members on the bridge looked at each other, the sound of sharp intakes of breath rising and falling. Even if they had no concept of the term, the word 'titan' alone was enough to make one feel a suffocating pressure from ancient technology.

"Yes! A moving super war bastion with its own independent ecology and industrial system!"

Academician Wang's voice was trembling, every word squeezed out from between his teeth.

"Its code name is—'gate of hades'!"

"It's not just a fortress! It's a mobile 'nano-forging factory'! A mobile super arsenal! A Command Center capable of commanding billions of mechanical armies!"

"It is the true backbone of war for 'Titan Heavy Industry'!"

Data streams on the screen refreshed frantically as Academician Wang threw a newly decoded comparison chart onto the 'luan bird one's' main screen.

Silence.

Total silence.

On the screen, the red phantom representing the 'gate of hades' was as massive as a floating continent. And the 'luan bird one' beneath their feet, which had just displayed its divine power before the world and tossed an aircraft carrier like a frisbee, looked like...

...a fly sitting on the deck of an aircraft carrier in front of that red phantom.

Is this the war machine of a god-level civilization?

This massive sense of disparity was like a bucket of ice water, instantly extinguishing the arrogance in everyone's hearts. It turned out the power they were proud of was merely an infant who had just learned to walk upright in the face of a true interstellar war machine.

"And! Most importantly!"

Academician Wang took a deep breath and threw out the final trump card.

"It is calling to us for help!"

"Just now, the 'nano-forging matrix' received an underlying protocol broadcast from the 'gate of hades'! It's very weak and intermittent, like the groans of a dying person!"

"Its core energy is about to run out! The sub-space rift trapping it is rapidly collapsing because it has lost energy support! Spatial turbulence could tear it apart at any moment!"

"Once the rift collapses, it will be exiled forever into the endless spatial currents! We will never find it again! That treasure trove of technology will completely vanish into the void!"

Noisy footsteps and instrument alarms came from the other end of the communicator; clearly, the base was in total chaos.

"Lin Yuan!"

Academician Wang's voice suddenly deepened, becoming incredibly solemn, even carrying a hint of pleading.

"I know this request is too much."

"You've just gone through a major battle; you're at your mental and physical limits. You are heroes, you should go home, receive flowers and applause, drink the best celebratory wine, and see the family you miss."

"But..."

"On behalf of all the research personnel of the 'genesis' project, and on behalf of those old colleagues who have grown white hair for this country, I beg you!"

"Go!"

"While the signal hasn't completely disappeared! While that door hasn't completely closed!"

"Go and bring back the true 'God's Kingdom' of that civilization!"

As Academician Wang's voice fell, only the faint hum of equipment remained in the bridge.

Everyone's eyes converged on Lin Yuan.

Lin Yuan did not answer immediately.

He slowly turned around, his gaze sweeping over the face of every crew member.

Li Na, Old Zhang, and those young faces who had just walked back from the line between life and death. Their eyes were bloodshot, and their faces were written with exhaustion.

However, not a single person avoided Lin Yuan's gaze.

Nor did a single person show any sign of backing down.

On the contrary, that familiar light was reigniting in the depths of their eyes.

It was the scent of prey caught by a hunter.

It was an explorer seeing an unknown map.

It was the innate greed and responsibility of a pioneer of this great civilization when facing the sea of stars.

What was the point of being a tyrant on Earth?

If you're going to throw aircraft carriers like frisbees, you should throw alien aircraft carriers!

Lin Yuan smiled.

The smile was brilliant, revealing a mouthful of white teeth, looking exactly like when he had found a top-grade chip in a scrap yard back in the day.

He sat back in his exclusive captain's chair, his back straight as a combat blade about to be unsheathed.

"Old Wang, save that wine for me."

He spoke softly into the communicator, then suddenly looked up, his gaze like lightning piercing the main screen.

There, a brand new, massive three-dimensional star map was unfolding.

At the end of the star map, in the depths of the endless darkness, a faint but stubborn red light point was flickering.

So distant.

Yet so clear.

"Li Na."

Lin Yuan's voice was calm but filled with a convincing power that echoed in the bridge.

"Set the course."

"Target—'gate of hades'!"

Li Na's fingers became afterimages on the keyboard, the tears in her eyes long since replaced by fanaticism.

"Engine power, one hundred percent!"

"Inject all energy into the 'Kunpeng' warp engine! Forget about cooling times, burn it for me!"

Lin Yuan's palm slammed heavily onto the armrest, his eyes fanatical.

"Our new journey begins now!"

"Yes! Captain!"

Li Na roared with all her might and pressed the red activation button.

At this moment, the eyes of the whole world were still focused ten thousand meters in the sky.

Countless people held their breath, watching that silver-black mythical giant bird, waiting for its next move.

Would it land?

Would it continue to attack?

Under everyone's gaze, the giant ship that had just descended like a god slowly turned its proud head.

It no longer paid heed to the group of trembling steel wreckage on the sea below.

Nor did it heed the clamorous worship and fear on this planet.

It pointed its cold and sharp prow toward that even vaster, darker, and more lethal...

...deep space.

"Buzz—"

No flames, no contrails.

The space around the hull began to show visible distortion; light was folded like a crumpled piece of drawing paper.

The next second.

A blinding blue light flashed.

"luan bird one" turned into a stream of light, silently vanishing beyond Earth's atmosphere.

Leaving behind a world completely changed.

And a newly opened, magnificent...

...Great Interstellar Era.