Star Empire

For the Federation, if it wants to be able to develop with carbon-based organisms as its initial base to a level sufficient to control the entire universe, then the peak level of instantaneous communication and deep space navigation capabilities must be the most important - without these, it can be said With the pinnacle of aerospace technology, let alone the country as a whole, I am afraid that if a "state" wants to carry out the most basic reflection activities, it will probably wait until the end of the world.

Now, within a few days at the earliest, deep space starships registered with the Federation, with the help of the resonance hub network, can reach from the end of the world loop to the beginning.

But after the actual distance is no longer an obstacle, people have quietly moved away from each other.

Technology cannot make up for everything.

…

"Thank you for your hard work, General." Looking at Kalost who stepped onto the front-line base deck again, Cavinriel and Zhai Cahir immediately stepped forward to greet him.

"...Do you remember me now? You should do this work yourself next time. After all, I still like it here - I even like the feeling of having my head stretched out. The center of the Federation is obviously the most prosperous place. I don't know why. But so depressing.”

Caloust threw a crystal plate to Cavinriel angrily, and then walked towards his lounge without looking back.

"Tsk, at best it's just a joke in my spare time." Cavinriel shook his head, and then connected the crystal plate with Zhai Cahir.

"Well, it's been confirmed now... Research on new soul control equipment is about to begin... Some new ideas, better models and control interfaces may be used... So it seems that we can temporarily stop consuming experimental subjects. We will wait until new equipment can conduct more direct observations before continuing," said Cavenriel.

"Eisendel's current theoretical advancement has encountered a bottleneck. He doesn't know which model should be used to describe the material form under the unified information... There are two views. I always feel that these views... each have certain differences. A one-sided approach that cuts off the connections between them.”

Zhai Cahill said, "I think... we may be able to temporarily change the direction of execution - we are now conducting research on new existences. Although we already have the ability to think that our starting point is higher than when studying any previous existence, But we... should first continue to try the most basic, macro-level interaction and practical use."

"...If this is the case...then I'm afraid we need to continue to sacrifice the probe - almost all the crystal energy crystals in the emergency experimental cabin have been extracted." Cavernelle suddenly reminded.

"It's okay. I know you still have a lot of probes that haven't been activated here. Just let those probes get close to the crystal energy vortex to be irradiated and then bring them back." Zhai Cahir didn't care.

"...You guys, well, forget it, anyway, what can you do if you don't use the probe to detect..." The two top scholars were actively arguing about their plan with their families behind them, without paying any attention to the people next to them. The lightbulb stuck in the air was the resident general Calost who was feeling distressed about the large number of probes that were about to go offline.

As the research progress gradually slowed down and more and more people participated, everyone's nervousness gradually relaxed, and they realized that having just one front-line base was really not a good idea.

Although at this distance, the shield array and the chromatic core armor can weaken the crystal energy radiation by continuously destroying themselves, the durability of the base is still declining after all. The only known stabilization method other than isolation method is the spiritual method. Intelligent bodies can tolerate the influence of crystal energy to a certain extent - but it is almost impossible to create a set of souls for the entire base - the human soul is too sophisticated and too profound.

Moreover, even with the connection of the star crown, the base built by the goddess bee swarm is really too small. Now that Cavinrel and the others have a general understanding of the nature of crystal energy, and with the help of Eskett and Torres, two survivors with certain crystal energy-related abilities, the crystal energy samples in the emergency experimental cabin are no longer considered Absolutely rare resources, everyone present no longer needs to be as frightened as they were half a year ago.

…

"Establish a new experimental area?"

"Yes, if you want to try to do it without relying on the help of the existing high-level but difficult-to-use equipment... Material science, and I still know nothing about everything as it is now. Now, it turns out that All the test methods and facilities seem to be inapplicable, including all the old description attributes, utilization and matching, processing industry, etc..."

"They are all estimated to have failed - it is very likely that we will have to complete the initial "recipe" of compatible materials with our bare hands." Zhai Cahill pointed to the huge beam-shaped beams across the space displayed in the holographic projection. Main structure, "Think about how many permutations and combinations of substances there are. Now we still have a prediction interval... Once the crystal energy samples are sufficient and the material matching begins... Including the material observation samples, the new The throughput required for the test platform can be imagined, and the environment here is simply not enough.”

"Then... please do it."

…

The next work is relatively simple. The new test site does not require exaggerated materials like color nuclear armor. The remaining work is a familiar scene for those who have experienced the federal war: obtaining a large amount of materials, and the execution method is to explode stars.

This place is close to the boundary of the universe, and star-making activities have become very sparse. The dark light emitted by red dwarfs and brown dwarfs with too low mass creates this dark red color that diffuses in the entire cup of cosmic latte. In addition to darkness, the second main color in the cold space is more recognizable under the instrument, even though the difference in weight between them is huge.

There are still some dead planets orbiting their suns around these old stars. Most of these planets have permanently lost their ability to rotate due to the influence of tidal locking to the stars. On these dead planets, half of them will always have blood-red days, while the other half will have eternal nights.

This group of stars in their twilight, as well as the remnant group left by the primordial stars, happen to cover a considerable range of the material chain. The breadth and abundance can be said to be quite good - they can provide quite abundant experimental raw materials.

In the loose star system, the twilight galaxy, which has been inactive for tens of millions of years, began to receive batches of special visitors - heavy high-dimensional jump missiles loaded with graviton concussion warheads, and a group of strange-looking large ships.

From the Taloga class upwards, larger battleships will generally be equipped with portable mid- to low-level field factories - this is a functional lower-level replacement for the Goddess Bee class. As long as they have materials, these battlefield factories can produce most of the spacecraft that do not require nuclear armor and most of the ammunition except space annihilation bombs - as long as there is quality, a mature fleet system can gradually print and copies itself.

Judging from the actual performance of the current structure, I am afraid that the carrying capacity of a single type of hadronic and leptonic materials for crystal energy is very low, and the resulting crystals have almost no use value except for unstable radiation, Cavinrui Er speculates that it may be that although some of these single-component materials have good properties, they are too simple compared to element atoms, or in other words, as information bodies, their "information content" is too low.

The main goal of exploding stars is to collect elements and matter. Theoretically, the most direct way is to cut out a hole running through the polar axis of the entire planet. However, in order to simplify the process, the most effective and simple way to dig out deep minerals...is to destroy and crack it.

The materials needed to create space architecture are thin-walled neutron stacks. This material can be processed from all matter, so this part only requires a few old stars. For element extraction, it takes a little more work.

Currently, in this universe, 114 elements have been discovered that can exist stably in the universe for a minimum available time. Each element also contains several isotopes. Trying to find a combination that can accommodate crystal energy, Zhai Cahill Not only must these more than a thousand nuclides be combined, but their proportions must also be taken into consideration. Due to the influence of crystal energy, such a workload cannot be done directly with the help of any computer, and can only be recorded manually. You can imagine how much work this requires.

Light gas elements, such as hydrogen, helium, nitrogen, etc., can be collected directly from the deep gas layers of gas giant planets; most medium-mass elements and general heavy elements can be obtained from planets.

However, this process is relatively violent: the large iron-nickel core can be dug out directly for large-scale atomic screening, while some planets do not have a central metallic core. The entire planet is almost made of complex rocks, and there are even some The entire planet is a huge and "smooth" piece of obsidian glass. It is unknown whether it was burned by the Empire or the Zerg before.

Most non-metallic elements are more convenient to collect from this type of planet, so in order to increase the speed of atomic screening, these planets will be spread evenly to expand the surface area; while heavier elements with natural radioactivity are mainly Taken from the nebula dust belt left after the supernova explosion. Supernova explosions can also be called violent natural phenomena in the universe. Heavy elements are born in the large fireworks naturally released by the universe. These elements also exist in planets. , but they are all in a combined state, and atomic screening still accounts for the process. It happens that there are still some new generation stars within these billions of light years. In order to speed up the collection, only one type of heavy element is collected in a cloud belt, and dozens of them have already been Red supergiants with manganese cores were collectively detonated.

In a new location far away from the crystal energy vortex, the powerful material guidance capabilities of the star corona level are assembling a new space station. From the appearance, the corona stage is like a projector, outlining a holographic image, but the difference is that the "laser" emitted by the corona stage is extremely pure mass - the decay flow of matter, accompanied by light With repeated sweeps, this huge new entity is rapidly taking shape.

In space not far from here, there are still a bunch of silver-white circles floating quietly, which look like jewelry bracelets. However, these circles are obviously not suitable for bracelets. Their diameters reach dozens or even more. Hundreds of kilometers, these are a very primitive but still useful tool - accelerator, or neutron gun, used to produce isotopes of various types of atoms in large quantities. Because the half-lives of many isotopes in nature are too short and their abundance is too high Low, so it is inevitable to use more technological means to transform the world.

This place is already quite far away from the crystal energy vortex, and the impact caused by crystal energy radiation is no longer absolutely considerable. In addition, the ability of crystal energy to affect souls and consciousness has been basically presumed to exist. Most people in this area have already After being exposed to the hidden irradiation of crystal energy radiation for a long time, they have already developed a certain resistance to the mental pressure brought by the crystal energy structure. Therefore, after such a short buffer period, the activities can be carried out much more conveniently. The construction time of space buildings is quite fast.

"...Looking for a suitable match in the material ocean..." Cavinrel shook his head, "There is too little quantifiable standard."

"Aren't we just looking for quantifiable standards now? Otherwise, how do you explain and model gold and silicon using information theory? What's more, what we are looking for now is not their universal properties, but their relationship with crystals. The relationship between energy!"

"Don't think too highly of yourself... These are existences beyond our cognition in an absolute sense. Even if they are compatible with the world, their properties must be very different - don't think of yourself as too clever. I haven’t seen through this world yet. In this case, how do you know what can be burned if you don’t take a look?”

"But this... efficiency is still too low..."

"Then think of a better way!"

…

In the new site, the work of Cavinrel and Zhai Cahill is repetitive and boring: continuously exposing a considerable number of samples to the collected crystal energy samples - the initial exposure target, It is a disposable probe and a mutated substance produced after being infected by the crystal energy vortex along with the probe. It is precisely because of these semi-infectious substances that can be obtained in large quantities anytime and anywhere that the observation activities can be quickly spread to such a large scale without having to trouble the two of them all the time. After multiple screenings, the material structures that are considered more valuable will be more intuitively affected by the direct materials extracted by Eskett and others.

By observing and comparing the mutation speeds of these material blocks, we can determine whether the element and its isotopes have the theoretical best properties for crystal energy, that is, the affinity for crystal energy - in other words, based on this, it is possible Experimental activities such as storage can be carried out.

Here, Cavenriel repeatedly confirmed a previous possible guess: crystal energy radiation is indeed slowly affecting the souls of these people, but the weakening of the abnormal fatigue response to the crystal energy phenomenon is indeed the result of two aspects. The first aspect is that a small amount of crystal energy that exists alone will slowly decay spontaneously. This can be seen from the work of Eskett and the two returned crystal energy and the contamination of the probe by the returned crystal energy.

Soul and consciousness are the foundation of life, the basis for the existence of federal civilization. Whether it is subtle or direct modification, Cavernrel dare not relax his vigilance about this - even if it is unknown, he will always keep an eye on it. It is much better than studying too selflessly and losing everything in the end...

Even if this will slow down the progress of the main goal to a considerable extent...

The two people who had almost no external influence now can no longer wear regular clothes, and they are almost a piece of crystal with one footprint. Therefore, they can only constantly replace the disposable large test robes - the accuracy is difficult to estimate. But in terms of the source-derivative relationship, the direct derived radiation from the main body of the crystal energy maelstrom is much stronger than the secondary bodies brought by those yellow fragments.

Whether from the outside or from the inside, this space station is almost a large rectangular parallelepiped garnarium, where thousands of samples can be tested simultaneously every day.

As time goes by, the work of Cavinrel and Zhai Cahill is constantly progressing. Although current computers cannot directly assist in analyzing the variation of samples, they have enough power to integrate with the help of high performance and high bandwidth. Analyzing the similarities and differences of these samples, the first stage of sample screening was completed soon, but only part of the results were what Zhai Cahill and the two expected.

…

"The results of the first step have been screened out. Relatively speaking, hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, titanium, iron, nickel, copper and cobalt performed relatively well, and somewhat surprisingly, the performance of isotopes was not good. . And among those elements, the most prominent ones are actually hydrogen and oxygen... related to our lives." Looking at the statistical results in his hand, Zhai Cahill couldn't help but be a little surprised.

"Don't be too surprised. When I was doing experiments here before, the first substance produced by the decay of chaotic existence in the transition from crystal energy to matter was a kind of tetranuclear heavy hydrogen that does not exist in our world."

As Cavinriel spoke, he looked at Zhai Cahir. Apparently there were other situations: "From the perspective of unified information, the information composition of each element is different. Protons and neutrons The increase in quantity is linear, but the information structure they change is obviously not a linear change. Also... Zhai Cahill, don't you feel any difference in yourself?"

"It's different? What's the difference? I feel very good." Seeing that his research had made a breakthrough, the excited Zhai Cahill rarely lost his lazy temperament and didn't care about Cavinri at all. What you want to say.

"Have you forgotten your reaction to crystal energy when you first came here? I remember clearly that you almost fainted after just one glance, but now you are almost immune to the crystal energy carrier. Fatigue takes its toll, and it’s more noticeable than the change in a lot of people who have been here longer than you.”

"This...hey, it's true." Zhai Cahir finally discovered that something was wrong with him. Now his condition is quite perfect, and before, just one look at the crystal energy was like forcing all the planets in the universe to run a simulation for a hundred years. After the parameters, the state of exhaustion that almost exploded my head was completely reversed.

"With such a big change in the situation, don't you know how to check more?"

"It's too far away from the main event range. How can I check it? What if I find out? Do I need to remind you that I have been affected by something no less than crystal energy?"

"...You worry too much." After a short pause, Zhai Cahir patted Cavinriel on the shoulder:

"It is probably due to the influence of information computers. Information computers contain another first stable state that is different from crystal energy. During my long-term work, I have been receiving disturbances from the host. In the process, my soul may It has been changed subtly, at least the carrying capacity and adaptability have been improved. As a person closest to information computers, I have been affected the most, so my adaptability should be relatively the highest."

"...Insufficient information, this should be the case." Currently, the new soul equipment applied for by Cavinrel is still being approved outside the bubble. There is no quantifiable method, and he cannot be sure. However, at present, Zhai Kaxi Your guess is quite reasonable.

…

The clock is ticking.

After having a general direction, the hot metallurgical work continued, and the Gnaku became a large melting pot. The high-temperature metal "soup" in large pots was mixed with scattered carbon and hydrogen, and was processed under the precise control of the atomic sieve. Mixed, solidified, and then sent to be irradiated.

"Well... the attempt to evenly distribute all atoms seems to have never worked." Looking at the failed sample No. 1, Zhai Cahill was a little annoyed, "Hydrogen has the best endurance, and we have been improving hydrogen atoms. However, the finished product will still suffer from severe crystallization.”

"What if you try to enrich hydrogen?" asked Cavenriel.

"It's not very useful. The most I tried was to arrange the hydrogen atoms with the sum of the atoms of other elements at one to one hundred, but the effect was still not good."

"No, I'm not talking about this level, I'm talking about the macro level." Cavernrel interrupted the chief control technician, "Make the alloy into a regular internal porous structure, and then directly inject liquid hydrogen into these pores Inside!"

"What operation is this?"

"Maybe we can try the principle of hydrogen storage alloys in ancient times."

"I said, why are you accumulating so much ancient knowledge?" Zhai Cahir felt very strange. He even thought that Cavinriel was planning to find a planet to survive in the wilderness tomorrow.

"...You reminded me that in front of the field of crystal energy, we are primitive people, and our knowledge has long been in no particular order - what we call advanced may not even be enough to step into the new field. On the contrary, although some old methods are backward, they are The idea and purpose are still applicable, so why talk so much nonsense? Anyway, even if it fails, it will just be another piece of scrap metal."

…

Under the command of the computer, the boiling molten alloy was quickly shaped into the required shape. Inside it, a series of cavities were neatly arranged. Each of these cavities was located on its own non-diagonal line. Other cavities in the position are connected by thin tubes. From a structural point of view, this is similar to the working sub-machine storage nest of the Goddess Bee-class industrial combination ship. However, the cross-section of the storage nest is hexagonal, but these cavities are spherical.

After pouring ultra-low temperature liquid hydrogen into the internal cavity of the alloy, Zhai Cahill directed the atomic infiltrator to cover an outer plate that had been cut out, and then the alloy was placed on the test bench.

In a sample laboratory that was still empty, a group of crystal energy samples were released from the safe under the control of AI. These pale golden clouds moved slowly under deliberate guidance, moving towards it. The alloy block in the distance emits a soft yellow light.

Outside the isolation wall, Cavinriel and Zhai Cahill, who were tracking changes in samples through closed-circuit surveillance, suddenly felt uneasy.

"Cavenriel, I don't know why. I didn't feel it before, but now I have a hunch that what you said may be correct."

"I'm not bragging." Cavernrel looked a little serious, "In fact, I feel the same way."

"But... this is very strange..."

In the laboratory, facing the irradiation of crystal energy light, just like what the two had seen countless times before on biological and inanimate experimental materials, as time went by, the outer layer of this experimental sample began to appear. Added some fine reflections.

"Or...failed?"

"Hmm... It seems like this. We need to think of new ideas... No, wait!" Cavernriel suddenly screamed, and Zhai Cahir's eyes were also attracted by this scream. On the monitoring screen, the crystal energy sample completely disappeared for the first time, but the experimental material did not mutate.

The signals returned by all sensors pointing at the test material become noisy.