From Titan Corporation to the Empire of Man

Chapter 107 Money and Consumption, “Real Fear”

After listening to the replies from his comrades, Payne pondered for a few seconds and said: "This place is not crazy like Minova. There must be abandoned sites, but they are difficult to find. We can first check the conditions of the residential areas in the sewers before making plans.

And you? Magnus, do you have any better advice. ” Pain brought the topic to Magnus.

"I agree to go to the residential area to check first." Magnus made no objection.

"Okay! Let's go then."

With the convenience of stealth equipment, everyone began to quickly travel between factories.

In fact, Magnus can also use psychic perception to accurately locate the location of Lieutenant Payne and the hunters without the outline of friendly forces provided by the screen.

He can also sense the mood swings of others, and then determine whether others are lying or hiding something. Of course, this does not work for his father.

However, Magnus prefers the assistance of technology, which is convenient and worry-free.

Various data were now presented to him on the screen. For example, the oxygen content nearby increased by 3%, carbon dioxide and ammonia decreased by 1% and 2% respectively, and the temperature remained at minus 36 degrees.

It seems to be a little stronger than the area where the space door is located, but ordinary people still need breathing masks and cold-proof clothing if they are exposed to work or walk in this environment.

So while walking through the factory, Magnus saw that the workers were wrapping themselves up tightly.

He also discovered that there were also assistance from engineering mechas here, but the opponent's engineering mechas were all about ten meters away, and the roaring noise of the engine and the black exhaust gas emitted showed that the opponent's mecha was powered by diesel.

Not long ago, the hunters of Group A collected and shared a large amount of intelligence, revealing that the technological development of alien races is completely different from that of humans.

After going deep into the Iron City, Magnus believed that the Zero-Six Humans in the early stages of the war were capable of confronting the alien race. After all, heavy industry was very developed. However, the unfavorable war and retreat to Antarctica in the later period may be due to poor decision-making and lack of resources. Got some luck.

And luck is also part of strength.

after that.

It took them more than two hours to gradually pass through the extensive industrial area and reach the buffer zone connecting with the main city.

From here on, there is finally a sense of life.

There are buildings over 40 stories high on both sides of the main road. There are also a large number of signboards with the words "Classic Cangzhou Noodles" and "Old Soldiers BBQ never uses synthetic meat, it is rat meat!" outside the door and windows. In some trails, It's even filled with pink lights.

Based on the analysis of clothing, more than half of the people walking along the main road are workers, and the rest should be local residents and outsiders from other areas.

It seems that this buffer zone is not only a place for workers to relax and have fun, but also the main source of "currency" for local residents.

Even in the doomsday, if you want to maintain the normal operation of such a super-megacity and the stability of social order, you must establish a unique economic system to encourage people to work and create value, as well as promote transactions and economic activities.

Faced with the uncertainty of being attacked by giant beasts at any time, people need to spend the "currency" they have accumulated to relieve stress.

When there is demand, supply will be driven. Over time, the area where workers pass when changing shifts has developed into today's buffer zone.

The flow of people and gray industries have also led to the poor security and mixed situation in such a buffer zone, which is conducive to the hiding and infiltration of Payne and Magnus.

In the extreme daylight of Antarctica, it is difficult to distinguish between day and night, and the helmet screen shows that the local time is "23:12", which is considered a late night time period. Correspondingly, the number of pedestrians on both sides of the main road has also decreased.

Immediately afterwards, Magnus and his party chose to leave the main road and came to the path between high-rise buildings.

This place is even more prosperous and lively, with criss-crossing overpasses and platforms all over the sky, and stairs outside the building leading directly to different consumption places. But they have no time to hang around, they only focus on collecting useful information and looking for places that can serve as their temporary base. place.

Everyone dispersed.

Magnus, who was at the entrance of the alley, let go of his psychic perception and looked for a suitable observation target.

"Are you hungry or full?"

"I shouldn't regret it."

In an instant, countless emotions and shallow thoughts poured into his mind, which gave Magnus a slight headache.

"I really want to smoke."

However, not long after, he noticed a middle-aged woman passing by and hugging him tightly with her arms, as if she was suppressing some kind of addiction.

So he followed the woman through the stairs to the overpass, which was at least sixty meters above the ground. He then passed through an automatic sensor pressure-maintaining door and entered the middle-floor lobby of an old-fashioned giant building;
  "Hand-knit sweater! Scarf!"

"Authentic Pan Mee! Little girl, you just got off work. Do you want to drink hot soup and eat some noodles?"

Magnus heard the shopkeeper's shouting voice, trying to attract people to come and patronize him. He saw that the hall with a "back" structure was filled with stalls selling various products and restaurants with different tastes.

The data displayed on his helmet screen showed that the temperature and air quality in the hall had reached a pleasant level.

So when the woman came inside, she opened her hood, took off her breathing mask, ignored the stall owners and shopkeepers soliciting customers, and walked straight to the stairwell at the end, heading to the "market" on the next floor.

Passing through the open door, Magnus, who came here with him, felt a brief shock.

The booth on the right hand side alone has weapons and ammunition blatantly displayed, indicating that the nature of this level is not much different from the black market in the main universe, and it is also very likely to be controlled by gang organizations.

Keep following.

The woman finally stopped, then walked into a shop selling old world tobacco and alcohol, and went straight to the point: "Give me five camels."

"Okay, five hundred in total."

The clerk took out a sealed box with a camel logo from under the counter, opened it, took out five cigarettes, and put them in a small plastic sealed bag.

Seeing this scene, the woman quickly took out a stack of plastic cash from her pocket and handed it to the clerk. She took the cash of different colors, carefully verified and counted them, and then smiled again after confirming that everything was correct, "Thank you for your purchase. Walk slowly and don’t see me off.”

"Uh-huh."

The woman nodded repeatedly, picked up the cigarette and rushed out of the store without a trace, as if she was going to find a deserted corner to enjoy it.

On the other hand, Magnus, who had seen the whole process, did not continue to follow the woman, but chose to wander in this black market, and by the way, he also thought of a general plan to integrate here.

The Iron City is quite large. Even before the reconnaissance mission was launched, the company predicted that the total population should be between 006 million and 1.6 million based on the heat source reaction captured by Ernie 1.9 at high altitude. This shows that there are complex and diverse conditions inside the city. Power structure.

There are conflicts of interest between different forces, and the black market in front of us and the gang members who maintain law and order in the black market are the epitome of this phenomenon.

Conflicts of interest can cause disputes, affect human unity, and lead to the breakdown of trust.

Magnus already knew that cash transactions still existed in the Steel City, and also discovered that tobacco and alcohol were hard currency, so this gave the company an excellent opportunity to intervene.

Think about this.

Magnus immediately opened the communication and said: "Ensign Payne, I think I have obtained enough information here, it is time to discuss it."

"So are we, let's meet here first."

Hearing this, Magnus saw the location just marked by Payne through the thumbnail map on the helmet screen, and then responded: "Okay, see you later."

The command center of the forward base.

Sui Yang summarized the information as usual and marked it on the three-dimensional map displayed on the center console. The left and right maps looked a bit empty. After all, he had also sent his son who was following him out.

Magnus is good at psychic powers and has a similar "mind-reading ability" to him, which helps to insert the company's power into the steel city of Human Zero Six.

Sui Yang, who had sorted out the coordinates and all the information, was still thinking about whether to invest a large amount of R&D funds and resources into the artificial intelligence and bionic human projects he launched a year ago.

"Terminator" and "I, Robot" are just movies, but the debate about "whether artificial intelligence will betray the Lord Eater" has never stopped, because once artificial intelligence becomes self-aware, its evolution speed will exponentially exceed that of humans. .

However, the development of human beings has always been inseparable from "computing". Although Sui Yang had already ordered the scientific research department to carry out research on quantum computers when he obtained the means of mass production of Bose-Einstein condensates, he still could not ignore the importance of artificial intelligence. importance.

Bionic humans are closely related to artificial intelligence, but they are related to different concepts. Betrayal and aggression also exist in film and television works, such as Ash in "Alien 1" and "Alien: Prometheus". David.

However, there are also characters who insist on siding with humans, such as the Bishop and Annalie Call in "Alien 2" and "4", and Annalie Call still thinks about it even after gaining self-awareness. It is necessary to eliminate the threat of aliens for mankind and prevent mankind from being implicated and harmed.

As for the impact of subspace
  Sui Yang had heard of "Electronic Daemon" before traveling through time. It was actually the "code" used by the Chaos forces to dismantle human facilities and ships after humans entered the Empire era in "Warhammer 40k". Virus".

I also learned about some artificial intelligences in the dark technological age, which also have the ability to purify subspace corrosion, such as the "Tabula Myriad" stored on Mars.

Therefore, while conducting research on artificial intelligence and bionic humans, it is important to improve and establish a sound "law" framework and limit it based on their basic operations and logic.

Secondly, the information returned by Hunter Group A showed that the Pioneers were using human genes to conduct experiments and even mass-produced some small-sized biological weapons.

Combined with this, Sui Yang has more reason to believe that the Pioneers have already penetrated into the Iron City. There may be many traitors or human spies among the top leaders of Humanity Zero-6.

Sui Yang knew some of the Pioneer's weaknesses in advance through the movie "Pacific Rim". In addition, Atlas also possesses "green and non-polluting" tactical weapons such as metallic hydrogen bombs, so the threat from the Pioneer is not very serious. .

In contrast, Sui Yang was more wary of the pioneering forces hidden in the steel city.

In order to prevent his compatriots from being implicated and to accurately find the "parasite", Atlas must infiltrate into the steel city without exposing himself, become a "dark side" force, and look for opportunities to perform "elimination surgery."

Beep-beep-.

At this time, two reminders caught Sui Yang's attention.

It turned out that the hunters of Group A were about to complete the disinfection measures. At the same time, the latest news came from Group B where Magnus was located, and they also made a request to arrange for a batch of bulk tobacco and alcohol produced by the company and to dispatch personnel to transport it to the Steel City. , to help them better integrate into local society

"approve".

After reviewing the application, Sui Yang responded.

Immediately afterwards, he sent an invitation for video communication to the Department of Biology. Soon, Alexia with long hair appeared on the holographic screen and proactively asked:

"What's wrong? Is there something urgent?"

"It doesn't matter. It's just a thought."

Sui Yang sent the graphic and text information he had compiled to Alexia, but before he could continue speaking, he heard a burst of hurried and angry words from the other party:
  "Is this...wait? Shet! If I read correctly, those creatures bred by aliens definitely mixed our human genes!"

"It's most likely so." Sui Yang nodded lightly, seemingly without any emotion, and didn't comment too much.

In fact, Atlas is also using alien creatures to conduct experiments and weaponize them. However, as a human being, from a human standpoint, he deeply understands Alexia's anger because he also has the same emotions. .

"And I speculate that they even combined their own genes to cultivate humanoid biological weapons, so after listening to my idea, you may turn your anger into motivation." Sui Yang did not have any intention of showing off, and sent Zero The zombie virus files of Universe Five were displayed and said:

"The biological samples brought back by the hunters will be sent to you soon. At that time, you can conduct analysis and research, and try to restore the genetic information of the alien creatures. If that doesn't work, I will send a hunter to secretly capture a living sample.

No matter what, you can use this virus to try to develop a variant that only targets alien creatures, so that they can experience real fear. How about it? "

"Since we can use the genes of different organisms and races, and then combine them with our own genes to conduct experiments, it shows that they can also be infected by viruses. Of course, we are extremely happy!"

Alexia had no objection at all, and even wanted to say that her boss was indeed better and more "creative" in the field of destroying enemies.

(End of this chapter)