Chapter 98, Fourth Update
Receiving the communication from Caoyuan, Lu Yuan, seeing that no one was around, vigorously swung his fist.
Yes!
The Apollo space fighter is mainly advanced in terms of interstellar cruising; its weapons are of the same generation as Cang Yuan's, clearly lagging behind the weapon blueprints in the industrial ship.
At the maximum speed of this kind of fighter, it would take 10 days to rush here from the wormhole space station for support, plus the delay in communication signals,
and the time to react, it would probably be 11 to 13 days.
With Cang Yuan's current growth rate, 13 days is enough for many unspeakable things to happen.
This battle can definitely be fought.
Moreover, the excellent cruising capability of the Apollo fighter should only benefit the zero element.
Scans inside the fighter revealed a structure similar to the Zero Element Furnace on the industrial ship, the difference being its much smaller size.
But unexpectedly, the fuel in the Zero Element Furnace was just ordinary liquid hydrogen.
'This makes no sense. Whether through combustion or nuclear reaction, hydrogen can only produce ordinary energy and matter, yet the effect of the Zero Element Furnace now seems almost magical. The scanning depth of the handheld scanner can only reach the proton-neutron level. Could the zero element's uniqueness lie in the quarks that make up protons and neutrons?'
Lu Yuan knew that unless the system store got new stock, with the current equipment on hand, there was no way to thoroughly investigate the physical principles of the zero element.
Perhaps the Apollo technical personnel know something.
Alright, for the next battle, we should capture some prisoners.
Over the next day, the Engineer players trained the interns, Ye Xing and Caoyuan explored the streets and alleys of Oasis City, and the others intensified their efforts to clear the Mechanical Hive dungeon under the Red Iron Town mine, accumulating resources at full speed.
A day later, at ten o'clock Earth time, Ding Zai, like the other 59 new players, logged online as soon as his clone was ready.
'Oh! This ray tracing! These subdivided surfaces! It completely simulates reality, the art design is truly ambitious!'
His game character was named 'Burning Up'. Because he didn't want his boss and colleagues to recognize him, he used the system's automatic face generation, resulting in a standard appearance with a scholarly air, in the Investigator profession sequence.
Most of this batch of players were selected by Lu Yuan from people who work in manufacturing in reality, while also enjoying science fiction and industrial construction games.
Males constituted the absolute majority, totaling 56 people.
Many of them had played 'Factorio' and 'Dyson Sphere Program'. Players of these two games often have a deep understanding of automated production lines, and coupled with real-world operational experience, they can seamlessly integrate into Cang Yuan's military industrial production.
Under the temptation of accelerated Engineer leveling in the new version, they mostly chose the Engineer profession sequence, just as Lu Yuan had anticipated.
Characters naturally have to level up slowly starting from level 1, but in a few days, when they start doing Engineer profession quests, this group of veterans will likely skip the novice stage entirely.
Lu Yuan was very much looking forward to what kind of tricks they could come up with then.
After all 60 Guangdian players had put on their combat suits and introduced themselves to each other, the Butler gathered them in the open square in front of the staff canteen, read out the fixed opening speech for the game's start, and informed them of the game's era background and ultimate goal.
'Compared to before, our new employee tasks have been greatly optimized. Completing the full set of novice tasks now not only grants 4 basic weapons and military exoskeletons, but also a 1800 credit interest-free loan for newcomers, helping everyone purchase equipment and vehicles in advance, skip the low-level power vacuum period, and join the old players in running dungeons and being heroes.'
'Um, excuse me, where is the shop?' Burning Up raised his hand and asked.
'Over there.'
The Butler pointed to the small storefront that had just been built not far away.
'However, the shop currently only serves as a display area for goods. We don't have extra staff to watch the shop for long periods. Everyone can use their operation bracelets to read the specific parameters on the mask's projection screen, complete orders, and the goods will be transported to you by small Mechanical Spiders.'
How convenient!
A Ran opened the shop page and saw power armor prominently for sale, priced at 4500 cangyuan coin.
The daily task wage for level 1 employees is 15 cangyuan coin, and the long-online subsidy is 10, totaling 25 per day, or 750 per month. Without taking on extra bounty tasks, power armor would be a very distant dream.
'The bounty tasks for the Investigator profession are to locate and scout Raiders camps! Small ones are 200, medium 300, large 400; locating underground dungeons, 500 each; and contacting civilian settlements, persuading them to cooperate with Cang Yuan, at least 300 each...'
Calculating it this way, as long as you're willing to grind, getting power armor within a month isn't a dream!
Yeah! Burning Up!
Other eye-catching items are mostly high-power weapons, such as rocket launchers using ONC explosives, 220 cangyuan coin;
Plasma hand axe, 400 cangyuan coin;
Plasma sword, base price 850 cangyuan coin, blade length 80 cm, the longer the more expensive;
Plasma armor-piercing crossbow 280 cangyuan coin, crossbow bolt 120 each;
17.8mm individual anti-tank rifle, 900 cangyuan coin, 0NC tungsten steel ammunition 250/8 rounds:
10mm individual Gatling gun 1000 cangyuan coin, steel core ammunition 270/500 rounds, tungsten steel 900/500 rounds.
Producing these weapons either consumes a lot of electricity or requires precious rare metals and gases, so it's normal for them to be a bit expensive.
If switched to ordinary propellant and ordinary warheads, the price immediately drops to a quarter, but the output also drops by that much, and they might not even break through BOSS defenses.
The electric all-terrain vehicle is also very cheap; a base model without weapons and configurations is only 300 cangyuan coin. It's actually being sold at a loss, so each person is only allowed to own one at a time.
Lu Yuan wouldn't set a high price for something used to help players run dungeons and farm Raiders; that would be working against himself.
'The last step of the novice task is to run a dungeon, fighting 5 Mechanical Desert Spiders, and capturing at least 1. Only after completing this do you get the exoskeleton and interest-free loan. Should we form a team?'
'Of course we should team up, how can you solo a dungeon.'
'Team up, team up, team up!'
They had already envied the battles in 'star sea' countless times in livestreams and videos, clearly understood where the difficulties lay, and immediately began thinking of strategies based on the task list.
'Why don't we team up now! Let's go to the shooting range to practice. By the way, have any brothers played with guns in real life? Share some experience.'
'I want to go eat that Desert Spider roasted rib first.'
'Not sisters—ah, alright then, the stomach is empty right after being cloned, let's fill our bellies first!'
To the side, Lu Yuan quietly watched the new players brimming with energy, running towards the various facilities within the camp.
Very good, very good.
He sent a message to Black Smoke.
'Help me gather the interns.'
'You're going to tell them 'that thing'?'
'Yes.'
A few minutes later, after the new players had dispersed, 120 interns stood on the square again.
'Over the past two days, everyone has integrated well with the Cang Yuan Engineers.' Lu Yuan stood on a raised platform, his gaze sweeping over the crowd. 'I am very happy to see that the labor skills you have accumulated in the past have been put to good use.'
'According to the original plan, you would spend a six-week internship here, but now, there is a better opportunity available to everyone!'
The interns listened attentively.
What opportunity?
'Everyone, do you want to go to space?'