Chapter Ninety-Five: To the Basin Base

At that moment, Zhang Desen, who had returned early to Western Capital, together with Li Longfang and Zhao Chengming, whom he had brought back, also began training the selected special forces soldiers.

As Zhang Desen resumed the old trade of training special operations troops, he was surprised to discover that these chosen recruits grasped combat skills with astonishing speed, including crossing mountains and ridges, climbing trees, hiding, and slipping in silently. This left him somewhat astonished.

Only after Li Longfang told him about their backgrounds did Zhang Desen understand.

It turned out that this batch, whether household retainers from the Chancellor's residence or retainers from the Liu household, had all been born in the mountains. Some had even lived by hunting in childhood. Crossing rugged terrain, surviving in the wild, and the like were as natural to them as breathing, and the use of modern weapons was for them merely a matter of changing tools.

As long as someone taught them, they could master them quickly. This greatly satisfied Zhang Desen, because these people were simply born material for special forces, and it seemed they could be sent into actual combat very soon.

While training the special forces, Zhang Desen also made time to pilot the spaceship to the lunar base in Tycho Crater and bring down some essential supplies.

Of course, Zhang Desen also knew that some things could not be rushed.

Just as the message left by the super-ancient people had said, besides certain necessities such as spacecraft pilot training simulators, essential power-generation equipment, zero-gravity training devices, spacewalk training systems, and other items meant to facilitate the transport of cargo, it was also necessary to train a group of pilots to take the larger cargo ships left behind by the super-ancient people to the moon so they could haul down the larger machines stored in Tycho Crater.

In the end, however, Zhang Desen used the lifeboat he had piloted before to bring a group of porters to the Tycho Crater base. He had those laborers move urgently needed machines and equipment onto one of the giant transport vessels left behind by the super-ancient people.

After that, Zhang Desen piloted that enormous ship left by the super-ancient civilization, transporting his lifeboat and the urgently needed machinery back to the newly purchased land of the Liu family on the south bank of the Qiantang River, where they prepared to produce new things.

It should be mentioned that during the period when Zhang Desen had gone to the Southern Dian Kingdom and destroyed the mountain base of the beast-men, Master Liu had not been idle either. In fact, after hearing Zhang Desen's account of his original universe, including its technologies, Master Liu very much hoped to duplicate everything there.

In addition, to deal with technologically advanced powers such as the beast-men's Orm Empire, development of science and technology was necessary. Thus, while Zhang Desen was away in the Southern Dian Kingdom, Master Liu bought a very large tract of land on the south bank of the Qiantang River, planning to begin work as soon as Zhang Desen returned with some captured production equipment from the beast-men's Orm Empire.

Later, although they did not seize enough equipment from the Orm Empire's mountain base, they more than made up for it at the lunar base left by the super-ancient people, so this tract of land immediately became useful.

Moreover, Master Liu had already arranged for people to build some modern workshops in advance, using as references the various photographs of modern factories that Zhang Desen had brought from his original universe. By the time Zhang Desen returned, the buildings were already in place; only the machinery was missing. Thus Zhang Desen's plan could proceed smoothly.

At the same time, Master Liu purchased an oil-bearing region in the southern part of this universe's Isle of Yi, and he also bought a large tract of land in the northern region of the Isle of Yi. This was intended as the future site where Zhang Desen would establish, on his behalf, a city of spaceflight and industry similar to the one in Zhang Desen's original universe. This made Zhang Desen unable to help admiring how thoughtful his father-in-law was.

Naturally, Zhang Desen did not bring down all the advanced instruments and equipment at once, because even replacing old weapons with new ones required an adjustment period. So he brought down some earlier technologies, such as flying shuttles and spinning jennies, in order to help Master Liu's commercial power grow even stronger and to ensure further improvement of the economic foundation, after which newer equipment could be adopted.

Before long, Master Liu and the others discovered that after using the things Zhang Desen brought back from the super-ancient people's base, production and profits kept multiplying. And as the market expanded more rapidly, profits would only grow higher still.

That was only natural, after all; technology had the advantage. So Master Liu did not hesitate to give forty percent of the business profits to Zhang Desen, equivalent to taking him in as a partner. Zhang Desen could not refuse, and in the end had no choice but to accept.

Zhang Desen, too, was filled with vigor and threw himself into the work with even greater enthusiasm.

…

Meanwhile, the battle at the Gekur base was finally showing signs of coming to an end.

Dadu Kur at last led his assault team through the ventilation shaft once designed by him and successfully infiltrated the Gekur base. This instantly plunged the forces on Goba Shyov's side into chaos.

As Dadu Kur led his assault team in a relentless push through one sector after another within the Gekur base, Yuri Gotnev and the others also discovered that confusion had begun to spread among the base's defenders. He immediately ordered all reserves into battle.

Under the combined pressure of Yuri Gotnev's personally commanded assault and Dadu Kur's sneak attack, the defensive lines of the Gekur base collapsed swiftly. The outer defenses were breached in short order, and Yuri Gotnev rapidly dispatched troops to attack the interior from the front, beginning to take one sector after another.

Inside the Gekur base command room, Morel Ross was reporting the latest situation to Goba Shyov. After hearing it, Goba Shyov roared:

"How is this possible? How could they know there was a place to sneak in? Who leaked it?"

Morel Ross said, "Commander, let's withdraw. There is still one air-launch port we can use. We can go seek refuge with our primitive kin."

Goba Shyov said, "I am unwilling to accept this. Can the doomsday weapon be activated yet?"

Morel Ross replied, "Reporting to you, Commander, not yet."

Goba Shyov said, "Then can the nuclear bombs detonate?"

Morel Ross said, "Yes, but because they are not in the proper positions, at most they will only cause a tremor. After that, there will be nothing much. The radiation won't spread either."

Goba Shyov said, "Why? Why is this happening?"

"Commander, we should leave quickly, or it will be too late."

"Will they accept us? Don't forget, in the past they considered us monsters precisely because of our scientific technology. Otherwise, Yuri Gotnev and the others would not have regarded us as a threat even more terrifying than humanity itself, and become hostile toward us."

Morel Ross said, "Commander, didn't you say before that it was because they had not looked at the problem from their own angle? If we had not approached them with such arrogance simply because our technology was superior, perhaps communication would have been possible. The method can be changed in many ways. For example, we could first secretly use our scientific knowledge to help them, making them believe we are gods, and then desperately deny it. Gradually, communication could be established. Besides, I think if we do this now, we could ultimately become their leaders, and using our high-tech achievements, slowly arm them again. Then, with their population, we could build a new high-tech empire, and we would be invincible."

"Yes, then..."

Goba Shyov had not finished when Morel Ross went on:

"Rest assured, my Fuehrer. Except for what remains trapped inside the Gekur base, I have already transferred all our remaining high technology to the basin base in the Dzungarian Basin. Those technologies and machines are enough for us to restore our high-tech civilization."

Hearing Morel Ross address him as Fuehrer, and hearing what he said, Goba Shyov could not help but reply:

"Good, my friend. As long as you stay with me, your Fuehrer, I will never treat you poorly. Do not worry."

Morel Ross said again, "It is not only me..."

As he spoke, he clapped his hands. The command-room door opened, and outside stood nearly three hundred beast-men, who said together with Morel Ross:

"We swear to follow our Fuehrer to the death! Long live the Fuehrer!"

Goba Shyov said emotionally, "Good. You are all my brothers. I will never treat you poorly. Let us set out!"

Morel Ross and the other beast-men said together, "Thank you, Fuehrer! Long live the Fuehrer!"

Then Goba Shyov left through the final air harbor with Morel Ross and everyone else who remained.

Of course, the reason Goba Shyov's nuclear weapons failed to function was that the Gekur base had not been completed in time, so the weapons had not been installed in the proper locations. They were all still locked inside several sturdy nuclear arsenals, causing the doomsday weapon, which would have been terrifying once completed, to die unborn and fail to display its power.

The reason they had been divided among several nuclear arsenals was that if one arsenal were destroyed, the others would still be safe. Those arsenals were extremely sturdy and designed to withstand nuclear blasts; even if nuclear weapons exploded, they could not be broken open. Combined with the surrounding concrete isolation layers and other features, they ensured that if an explosion occurred inside, its effects would not spread beyond the arsenals, and the long passage of time could be used to wait for the radiation to decay slowly, so the surrounding environment would remain unaffected.

In fact, Goba Shyov had never intended to destroy the surrounding environment in the first place. He merely wanted a doomsday weapon as a bargaining chip in case of necessity.

But now it seemed that those nuclear weapons and the Gekur base would go to Yuri Gotnev and the others for nothing. So when the ship took off, Goba Shyov remotely detonated all the nuclear weapons. Although, as mentioned earlier, the shockwaves and radiation would not leak out, the violent tremors would cause everything inside the Gekur base except the nuclear arsenals to collapse.

Precisely because of this, the apocalypse did not come, but the Gekur base was destroyed, and all the soldiers from both sides who had not managed to escape in time were ruined along with it.

Yuri Gotnev, who had been preparing to enter and inspect the Gekur base, suddenly saw it destroyed by a massive explosion. Enraged, he cursed furiously:

"You bastard, you damned Goba Shyov! Don't you know that the Orm Empire has a very small population now? And yet you killed so many of your own people for the sake of your selfish interests. Your crimes are beyond counting. If you are not already dead, I will make you pay!"