199: Chapter 199 Farming, Fighting, Car Crash! Shock Absorbers Installed Overnight

10:30 PM.

Cockpit.

Lu Chen sat in the driver's seat, flipping through his notebook.

He reviewed the schedule he had written a few days ago once more.

Days 61 to 63: ZM07 and ZM08 farrowing plus ewes' expected delivery.

Day 64: Harvest of the third wheat crop.

Days 64 to 66: Second batch of strawberries ripens.

Day 67: Sowing of the fourth wheat crop.

Day 71: Harvest of the fourth wheat crop.

Days 71 to 75: The main force of the Iron Hoof Legion arrives at Rustwind Wasteland.

Days 73 to 74: Black Rock City-State's auxiliary engines exhausted.

The two timelines were squeezed together.

Farming and war were colliding in the same week.

The communicator rang.

"City Lord."

It was Lin Wan's voice.

"You're not asleep again," Lu Chen spoke first.

"Neither are you."

"I'm looking at something."

"I am too."

"What are you looking at?"

"The nutrient solution ratio table. The phosphorus concentration needs to be adjusted after the third crop is set to 90% tomorrow; I'm calculating the dosage."

"Have you finished the calculations?"

"Yes."

"Then you're just looking for an excuse not to sleep."

Lin Wan paused for half a second on the other end of the communicator.

"City Lord, I have a question for you."

"Ask."

"If the Iron Hoof Legion arrives on Day 71 and we really have to run, what will happen to the wheat just planted in the Greenhouse?"

"The Greenhouse comes with us; we discussed this yesterday."

"I know the Greenhouse comes with us. I'm not asking about the Greenhouse, I'm asking about the wheat."

"What about the wheat?"

"When we run, Polaris will be at full speed with engines at full power, and the vehicle body will vibrate. This vibration affects the crops on the Hydroponic Racks; at best, yield drops by 10% to 20%, and at worst, the roots are shaken out of the nutrient solution, killing the entire plant."

Lu Chen straightened up in the driver's seat.

"Have you encountered this situation before?"

"Back at The City-State, in the Level 6 Agricultural Zone. Once, The City-State accelerated urgently to avoid an ice storm; the speed only reached fifteen kilometers, but the Hydroponic Racks on the sixth floor shook so violently that 30% of that rice crop died."

"Are the Hydroponic Racks on Polaris the same as The City-State's?"

"No. Polaris's Hydroponic Racks are system-generated; the mounting is much better than The City-State's, and the bases have shock-absorbing structures. But I don't have data on how much vibration the shock absorption can offset, and the system hasn't provided clear parameters."

"Your judgment?"

"My judgment is that at a cruising speed of forty to fifty kilometers, Polaris's Hydroponic Racks can handle it, and the yield reduction can be kept under 5%. But if we hit full speeds of over eighty kilometers, the vibration will multiply, and the yield reduction could potentially rise to 15% or 20%."

"Fifteen to twenty percent."

"For the third wheat crop covering 90% of 12,600 square meters, a 20% reduction means three to four tons less flour."

"Three to four tons."

"Enough to feed thirty thousand people for two days."

The Cockpit fell silent for three seconds.

"Lin Wan, what do you plan to do?"

"I want to do one thing before we run."

"What is it?"

"Install Secondary Shock-Absorbing Layers under the Hydroponic Racks. Using rubber pads and spring shock-absorbing structures, we can reduce the vibration at full speed by 30% to 40%. Materials are scarce, but rubber pads can be cut from the spare pen bedding in the Livestock Farm, and springs can be coiled from scrap steel by Chief Engineer Han's people."

"How long will it take?"

"If Chief Engineer Han assigns three or four people to help, two days."

"Two days."

Lu Chen opened his notebook.

"Day 61 to Day 62: Install shock-absorbing layers."

He added an item to the task list for Day 61.

Item 8: Install Secondary Shock-Absorbing Layers for the Greenhouse Hydroponic Racks; Han Zhengqing to arrange three to four people to assist Lin Wan.

"I'll speak to Han Zhengqing tomorrow."

"Okay."

"Lin Wan."

"Yes?"

"You look further ahead than I do."

"I only look after the Greenhouse; you look after everything. The Greenhouse is my whole world, so I think about it in more detail than you do."

Lu Chen didn't respond.

"City Lord, when are you going to eat the last Strawberry?"

"No rush."

"Even if there's no rush, you should eat it. Once picked, strawberries can only be refrigerated for five days at most; after that, the texture deteriorates."

"I'll eat it within five days."

"Good."

"What about your own two?"

"I said I'd wait until the second batch ripens and eat them together."

"The second batch is still five to six days away."

"I can wait."

"Lin Wan."

"Yes?"

"Thank you for your hard work with the composting today."

"It wasn't hard."

"And for your hard work with the flour too."

"That wasn't hard either."

"Since when did you stop complaining about hard work?"

"Ever since you started giving flour to the pigs."

Lu Chen's finger paused on the notebook.

"What do you mean?"

"If even pigs are eating flour, what right do I have to complain about hard work?"

Lu Chen was silent.

"Are you being sarcastic?"

"I'm being serious. You gave flour to the pigs because the sows are about to farrow, and the piglets will eventually be meat for thirty thousand people. You gave strawberries to the Engineering Team because they welded three thousand beds. You gave flour to the Relocation Team first because they walked a hundred and fifty meters from The City-State without breakfast. There's a reason for everything you do, and everything is to keep the people on this ship alive."

"Are you praising me?"

"I'm stating facts."

"Sometimes facts and praise are the same thing."

Lin Wan was silent for two seconds on the other end.

"City Lord, time for sleep."

"Okay."

"Before eleven."

"Before eleven."

"Don't lie to me."

"When have I ever lied to you?"

The communicator disconnected.

Lu Chen closed the notebook.

The clock showed 10:52 PM.

He reclined his seat and closed his eyes.

The blue light from the control panel reflected on his face.

In the signal log column, four dark red records continued to pulse.

The fifth one had not appeared.

Not today.

11:00 PM sharp.

Cockpit.

Lu Chen lay on the reclined seat, his breathing steady.

The blue light from the panel glowed in the darkness.

The radar scanning line rotated at a constant speed, circle after circle.

Within an eight-kilometer radius, it was clear.

Signal log column.

Four dark red records were lined up in a row.

First: Day 42, 0.3 seconds, 15 degrees West of North.

Second: Day 50, 0.7 seconds, 13 degrees West of North.

Third: Day 57, 1.4 seconds, 11 degrees West of North.

Fourth: Day 59, 2.1 seconds, 9 degrees West of North.

The direction was narrowing.

The duration was increasing.

The intervals were shortening.

Eight days. Seven days. Two days.

Then, after Day 59, silence.

Throughout Day 60, after 108 signal scans, every result was the same word.

None.

There was no fifth record.

Chen Li's last daily report arrived at 9:30.

As of 9:30 PM on Day 60, 114 scans had been performed; all were normal, and the north was quiet.

Lu Chen made his final notes in the notebook.

Day 60.

Total registered residents: 8,466.

First batch of 532 people from the Relocation Team arrived.

First batch of 300 kg of flour distributed, covering 979 people.

The first frame of the Storage Area partition welding completed.

ZM07 has been transferred to the new Farrowing Room.

Daily milk production: 54 liters.

Compost fermentation temperature: 43.5 degrees.

The fifth signal from the Iron Hoof Legion has not appeared.

He closed the notebook.

Day 60 was over.

Farming data was growing.

The population was growing.

Flour was accumulating.

Piglets were suckling.

Strawberries were turning red.

People from The City-State were moving here.

In the corridors, someone was using flour to make batter soup.

Everything was heading in a positive direction.

But the four dark red records in the lower-right corner of the panel reminded him.

The direction was narrowing.

The duration was increasing.

Then, silence.

Silence did not mean safety.

Silence meant the other side was making a decision.

Zhou Yuan's revised judgment was that the fifth signal would appear between tomorrow morning and the morning of Day 63.

But there was a chance the main force had already set out before the fifth signal appeared.

In other words, from this very second, there was a chance the Iron Hoof Legion's main force was already on its way.

And a chance they weren't.

Uncertainty.

Lu Chen closed his eyes.

His mind was still racing.

The wheaty aroma of flour still lingered in his sensory memory.

The sweetness of the strawberries had already faded.

But he remembered it.

It was different from Nutrient Bars.

Different from noodles.

Different from Cabbage and meat stew.

It was the taste of life.

The final minutes of Day 60 flowed by in the darkness.

The clock on the panel jumped to 23:59.

Then it jumped to 00:00.

Day 61.

Signal log column.

Four dark red lines.

No fifth record.

The radar scanning line completed the first sweep of the new day.

Within an eight-kilometer radius, there was nothing.

But beyond the radar, four hundred kilometers away at the Southern Mouth of the Roaring Ice Abyss, at the other end of that icy no-man's-land where the ice rifts averaged twenty meters and reached depths of thirty-two meters...

In some invisible direction.

Something was deciding whether to set out.

Or, it had already begun its journey.