I live in the Martian wilderness!

[Mars Day 11, 08:00 AM]

Gu Yu stood in front of the circular airlock leading to the backyard, his black armor combat suit making him look like a warrior about to go into battle.

Yesterday, he completed the grand blueprint for the "Shennong Project" and the "Rose Garden Project".

But blueprints are just blueprints.

Before sowing the first seed, we must first cultivate a warm soil for these fragile life forms on Earth.

"Xuan, the first phase of the ecological zone renovation plan has officially started."

"Understood, Lieutenant Colonel. Best of luck."

"laugh--"

As the airlock depressurized, he stepped into the huge, dark vacuum lava pipe.

Gu Yu, like a geological surveyor, conducted a detailed survey of this "new continent" that belonged to him.

"Xuan, switch to exploration mode and activate the helmet laser scanning array."

As the command was given, several miniature laser emitters on the edge of Gu Yu's fishbowl-like helmet instantly lit up, emitting fan-shaped laser beams.

These are Xuanjian's eyes.

It no longer observes the world through the sensors on the Sky Shuttle, but walks and measures this land through Gu Yu's helmet.

Gu Yu walked slowly inside the dark lava pipe. With each step he took, the scanning array on his helmet performed a high-precision three-dimensional mapping of the surrounding terrain.

On his HUD interface, a real-time 3D terrain map, composed of countless green data points and constantly expanding, is rapidly taking shape.

"Xuan, based on the survey map and the data we deployed earlier, mark the best entry point for Tian Shuai to enter this area."

"Marked, Lieutenant Colonel," Xuanjian's voice came through the earpiece.

On the 3D map, a ground breach located 1.5 kilometers to the northeast is highlighted.

"The entrance was partially collapsed due to early geological activity and is currently the most likely weak point to be widened."

"However, preliminary models show that the narrowest part of the entrance is only 2.8 meters wide, which is too narrow for the Tissot engineering vehicle to pass through."

"That's enough." Gu Yu stopped the exploration and turned back to the shelter.

Gu Yu already knew his territory inside and out; now it was time to let that steel behemoth enter the fray.

He walked directly to the Tissot parked at the entrance. After docking with the external airlock, he sat back in the familiar cockpit.

"Xuan, navigate to the designated entrance."

The Tissot engineering vehicle let out a deep roar, tracing an arc around the shelter as it drove toward the marked location.

It was like a gap cleaved open by an axe; though enormous, the entrance was piled high with massive, collapsed boulders.

"Switch to the mountain-moving excavator arm and replace it with a G-4 high-frequency breaker."

The next half day was dedicated to demolition work.

Gu Yu was completely focused, controlling the hydraulic breaker from a first-person perspective through the camera at the front of the robotic arm.

"Boom boom boom boom—!"

In the thin Martian atmosphere, the deafening roar of the hydraulic breaker was greatly weakened and distorted. Only a series of "popping" sounds reached the cockpit.

But Gu Yu could clearly feel that the high-frequency impact of two thousand times per minute was transmitted to the driver's seat through the vehicle's frame as a series of violent vibrations.

He didn't just smash things randomly; instead, he used the Xuanjian to calculate the rock's "stress weak points" in real time and then struck them with acupuncture-like precision.

Under his manipulation, massive boulders weighing several tons were dismantled and shattered along their most vulnerable textures, much like a skilled butcher dissecting an ox.

Then switch to the land reclamation bulldozer blade to clear away the annoying gravel.

Then, by utilizing the weight of the Tissot itself, the slope of the entrance was made gentle and firm.

At 14:00 PM, a five-meter-wide ramp, wide enough for the Tissot engineering vehicle to pass freely, was forcibly carved out.

Gu Yu drove the Sky Shuttle slowly into the entrance that he had opened himself.

In the dark, vacuum-like underground cave, the giant searchlight of the Sky Shuttle, like the midday sun, illuminated the scene within a hundred meters ahead as if it were daytime.

It resembled a giant beast surveying its territory, the sound of its tracks rubbing against the ground particularly clear.

Finally, it stopped in the open space near the back door of the shelter, a spot that Gu Yu had already scouted out.

This will be the starting point for his future farm.

He planned to first use the excavator arm to carve out two rectangular shallow pits in the hard basalt ground.

One is about 15 square meters, and the other is about 5 square meters, both only 30 centimeters deep.

"Xuan, what do you think? This way we won't have to use up our precious polymer adhesive."

"No, Lieutenant Colonel. This plan is extremely energy-intensive; I do not recommend it."

An energy consumption simulation was immediately projected onto the screen.

"To perform in-situ vitrification treatment with a thickness of 10 centimeters on a 15-square-meter main water tank, it is necessary to operate continuously for 25 hours at a peak power of 100 kilowatts."

"The total energy consumption will reach 2500 kilowatt-hours, which will instantly deplete all the reserves of the Tianchi capacitor bank and overdraw the energy output for the next few days."

"We have a better option." Xuanjian brought up another solution, a pool model made of black modules.

"Lieutenant Colonel, you seem to have overlooked your greatest strength—your superpower."

"We can adopt a modular carbon board solution. You provide carbon elements as raw materials, and Shenggong Module will print out porous carbon foam composite boards with mortise and tenon structures for assembly."

Xuanjian immediately provided a detailed data comparison:

"To print a 15-square-meter, 5-centimeter-thick carbon plate pool, we estimate that you will need to provide 200 kilograms of carbon."

"The printing and assembly process will last for about 5 hours at a power of 50 kilowatts, with a total energy consumption of only 250 kilowatt-hours."

Gu Yu stared at the astonishing contrast between the two sets of data and fell silent.

Its energy consumption is only one-tenth.

Time is only one-fifth of the way through.

The only cost was the consumption of some carbon elements that he could conjure from thin air, and some physical strength.

"Moreover," Xuanjian added the most crucial point, "the thermal insulation performance of the carbon plate pool is more than ten times that of the in-situ sintered glass pool."

"In the long run, it can save you more energy on insulation."

Gu Yu looked at the perfect solution on the screen and finally smiled helplessly.

He was almost blinded by the genes of an "infrastructure maniac" and forgot that his greatest weapon was actually himself.

"Alright, Xuan, we'll go with your plan."

Gu Yu looked at the perfect carbon fiber plate design and nodded in agreement, but his brows remained furrowed.

"However, there is still one problem." He pointed to the list of materials on the screen, "This plan still requires us to use up our stock of polymer adhesives."

"The total amount is only a few dozen kilograms, and every little bit used is a little less. Is there... a way that doesn't consume any of Earth's resources at all? I need a solution that can refill indefinitely."

Xuanjian was operating at high speed, frantically searching across the Martian periodic table and geological database.

A few seconds later, an element symbol was highlighted—(sulfur).

"Yes, Lieutenant Colonel." Xuanjian's voice carried a hint of excitement. "We can use local Martian sulfur to replace polymer materials as the binder for carbon foam."