Age of Cosmic Exploration

"Humanity’s scientific development is extremely irregular, or rather, humanity’s experience caused this irregularity. From a god-tier space civilization’s space warp, to a high tier space civilization’s anti-gravitational system, to a middle-tier space civilization’s psychological control system... humanity has too many technologies that are beyond its current civilization level, and this may cause difficulties in scientific development of human technology in the future!"

This prediction was given about one year ago at human society’s first scientific symposium. It was given by an up and rising scientist within the Academy. The sentiment was approved by many of the scientists, including two great scientists. In actually, this was not something new. This belief was something that existed back on Old Earth; it was akin to something called "degree of civilization maturity."

To use an example, the Mayan civilization was technologically advanced, especially in terms of astrology and history. Even their agricultural technology was almost at the level of a middle-age civilization, and their math and construction were almost the level of modern civilizations. However, such a civilization was still limited within the medieval ages and didn’t have any breakthroughs in science until its extinction.

Such examples were observable all over the world, like ancient China, ancient India, Babylon...

Of course, while these words might have academic and realistic implications for the Academy, for the normal citizens, it was exciting news. Public-use technology would continue to improve. Military technology represented humanity’s safety in space, so the greater it was, the better it was...

Currently, within humanity’s military technology, there were at least five that were personally designed by Bo Li. Of course, she couldn’t have done that alone. She had the best research laboratory where all the latest technological devices could be found. Similarly, she had the best military weapons research team and the team’s number was as high as 400 people. This combined with Bo Li’s power as a Whisperer meant that the team could showcase extreme potential. Initial assessment put humanity’s most advanced weapon at least several hundred years ahead of humanity’s current technological level!

Energy Storm was the core of this technological advancement. It was humanity’s most powerful long-distance weapon. In fact, other than the surprise shot at the first defense line, at other instances, humanity’s normal cannons, including the Genesis and Requiem, were unable to harm the enemy fleet. The most they could take down was either the small battleships or guardian spaceships; they could do no damage to the bigger ships. According to human analysis, there were still at least more than several hundred large spaceships among the enemy fleet. They were like motherships, each of them were more than 200,000 meters long. They were evenly spread among the enemy fleet, and human weapons were helpless against them; even Energy Storm wouldn’t be able to cause any damage to them...

In fact, this was the initial design scheme behind the large Energy Storm main cannon. When humanity started building Kun Lun, there was an awareness within the higher ups. If humanity could create such a large mothership and exist as an invincible entity among similar-level space civilizations, then didn’t it mean that other civilizations could do the same? After all, humanity had just entered space many years ago? Humanity was still a baby compared to many other space civilizations. Since humanity could create Kun Lun, it was ludicrous to imagine that other space civilizations wouldn’t come up with similar ideas.

Therefore, the human government came up with a new order for Bo Li’s team. It was to design a cannon that could take down super-large motherships. The normal Energy Storm was merely a side product of this project, and this sole large Energy Storm main cannon was humanity’s actual trump card!

When this ball of energy as bright as the sun shot out from the human base, every individual at second defense line followed its trajectory. It carried with it everyone’s hopes until it exploded among the enemy fleet. A giant energy wave overwhelmed the fleet, and it reached even the second defense line...

Yes, the size of the explosion was bigger than expected. Its damage was at least 10 times greater than predicted. After all, this was the first time the cannon had been fired after it was designed and built. Its damage was calculated using normal Energy Storm as the basis, but in reality... the larger the energy, the greater the compression rate, and the higher the damage. The ratio wasn’t 1 to 10 as they expected...

Just like that, the large energy was compressed into a small sun and idled in the middle of the enemy fleet. At the same time, energy waves spread out at all directions. They tore through the ranks of the enemy fleet and even caused endless tremors at the second defense line. It felt like the meteorite was being affected by a giant earthquake. There were cracks in the ground and many buildings collapsed. The whole city area was submerged into chaos. There were sounds of crying and screaming, and certain places had caught fire due to the leaking of energy lines. At the same time... the second defense line’s energy circulatory system was heavily damaged, causing the life support system to move towards the emergency energy storage. If this war wasn’t ended before the emergency energy storage depleted... the entire second defense line would end up a city of death!

Even though Jacko was in central command, he still suffered a nasty fall. However, he quickly jumped from the floor and yelled, "Start the system self-prognosis immediately! What about the military observation team? Analyze the damage situation of the enemy fleet! How are things at the civilian sectors? The various weapon systems? Also... is the large Energy Storm main cannon still usable? Quick! I need the answer within five minutes!"

Central command was chaotic, but they were, after all, soldiers. The prolonged training still made them return to their discipline and senses quickly. In less than five minutes, all the reports had been prepared.

"Second defense line’s internal life support system is losing energy. Damage rate 26.3 percent, expected repair time is 17 hours... the emergency energy can last for 72 hours. There is ample time..."

"Most of second defense line’s external structure have been destroyed. Less than 30 percent of siege buildings survived..."

"Energy Storm main cannon’s parts have been completely ruined. In a short amount of time... no, more accurately, building another one will take less time? What kind of sh*tty data is this? Have them recheck this!"

Jacko looked through all the reports with a drawn face. He cursed and yelled within central command. His usual cool had been lost. With the blood trailing down his face, instead of a military soldier, he looked more like a gangster.

However, when the more detailed report came, he became silent instantly before the whole central command erupted in cheer!

With just that one cannon shot, in visible range, the unknown fleet had lost at least 500,000 spaceships, and this included at least 30 motherships. And that was not counting the ones that had been vaporized. In other words, that one shot had taken out at least one-third of the enemy numbers!

Of course, this was a result that couldn’t be repeated. One was because the enemy fleet had stopped moving around the second defense line and their arrangement was tactical. Two was due to the energy requirements of the main cannon; to fire another shot was impossible. That one shot was practically a miracle!

The good cheer lasted for only a moment before Jacko roared, "Assign the Defense Unit with AI robots to go rescue and help the citizens. At the same time, start repairing all the cannons and salvage those that cannot be repaired. Those that can still be used, continue firing. Make use of this opportunity when the enemy is confused..."

However, before he finished, the small dots of light that represented the enemy fleet on the large 3D image in the room started to move. There was no chaos or retaliation... They moved with startling uniformity. Yes, this was a fleet without any lifeforms. They were merely machines. For this fleet, there was only data. Be it destruction of 100,000 ships, 200,000 ships, or 500,000 ships, they were all only data...

Therefore, the expected chaos didn’t happen. Instead, the fleet started moving towards the second defense line. They didn’t fire any cannons. Just like what happened at first defense line... they were going to land and overwhelm the second defense line.

Instantly, everyone’s brains stopped moving and their eyes reddened with bloodlines. Everyone could see the end before them. The innumerable robots landing on second defense line, taking advantage of the fact that the defense mechanism was down. Then the citizens would be...

The thing that increased the sense of fear most was that the large fleet started to separate. With the people at the second defense line watching, a large section of the fleet departed to head... towards the City of Light Moon.

This represented... extinction? Human extinction?

"No, there’s still hope!" Jacko suddenly roared as he slammed his bloodied military cap down. Like a gambler, he yelled, "Continue my orders from before. Use all the available weapons to stop the fleet from getting close to second defense line... and wait for me to return!

"We still have hope! We have three Homo Evolutis in the second defense line, but we only need one. We have equipment within our hangar that is powerful enough to stop the fleet from coming close to second defense line and to buy enough time for the New Solar System’s first fleet to arrive...

"Rei and a Steel Ball!"