Scholar’s Advanced Technological System

by Stayrr

After suffering from a heat stroke while working under the scorching heat of summer, Lu Zhou, a hardworking but poor university student, somehow becomes the owner of an advanced technological system. With the cheat given by the system, his university life changes overnight. A Master’s degree? Easy. PhD? Not a problem. From a nobody, he quickly becomes a huge celebrity in the wor

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Read Scholar's Advanced Technological System - Chapter 783 - A Little Trouble online free - Novelfull

Chapter 783: A Little Trouble

The video was a shot of the spacecraft in orbit, only a minute and fifty seconds long.

The video portrayed a semi-circular landing capsule separating from the Heart of Gold spacecraft, falling toward the thin Mars atmosphere, and eventually disappearing…

Just like Lu Zhou had predicted, the second the landing was successful, NASA announced the news on their official website and posted the Heart of Gold video on the Internet.

What happened next was nothing out of the ordinary.

In just ten minutes, this less than two minutes long video went viral, reaching number three on the YouTube trending page.

After watching the video, everyone in the conference room had gone silent.

After a while, Chen Yunhai broke the silence.

"We should discuss our countermeasures…"

"Nothing to discuss, I've said from that beginning that we should focus on doing our own project well."

Lu Zhou closed his laptop and looked at Academician Yuan Huanmin. He then asked, "How long until the Moon Palace life capsule is ready?"

Academician Yuan paused for a second before replying, "It is already ready. The tests will take another week."

"Then we'll launch in two weeks' time!" Lu Zhou shoved his laptop into his bag and stood up. He then said, "Let's all get to work, meeting over!"

…

The success of the Heart of Gold spacecraft earned the United States a huge amount of respect from the international community. The entire country was celebrating.

The video posted by NASA on YouTube was being bombarded with comments from all over the world.

It was almost like The New York Times was taking revenge on the Moon Palace's cooling system debacle. They deliberately posted a boxing glove with a star and stripes pattern in their news report, as if they were mocking China.

Even the Washington Post said that this was "a great step for mankind".

Other than the American media outlets, other media outlets also reported this hot topic.

The BBC stood from a neutral standpoint, and it pointed out that there was no doubt that NASA had the upper hand in this space competition.

So far, it seemed like the Moon Palace program was no match for the Ares program.

Compared to the helium-3 resources on the Moon, the rich methane resources on Mars could be used as an energy source for liquid oxygen methane rockets.

It turned out that chemical propulsion technology was far from being bottlenecked. This could be seen from the BFS rocket. The colony on Mars would become a starting point for NASA to send other spacecraft to other planets.

The future of ion thruster propulsion systems was bright, but it seemed like chemical propulsion rockets were still putting up a fight.

Space-X announced a contract with YouTube to regularly post Mars colonists videos for the public to watch for free.

Elon Musk promised in an interview that all advertising revenue generated would be invested in space projects.

On the other hand, the White House and NASA released a message, asking the public to vote for the name of the Mars colony.

The public was quite enthusiastic at voting; even those who were uninterested in aerospace decided to put in their votes.

Within a day, more than 30 million people had voted online.

Finally, the White House announced that the first Martian colony would be called "New Virginia".

This was where the British settlers first settled in America.

Naming the Martian colony after this was quite a meaningful choice.

NASA also announced the next step of the Ares program.

Before sending more migrants to Mars, the current colonists stationed on Mars would survey resources such as methane gas reserves and metal deposits and expand the scope of geological exploration activities to areas that were previously unreachable by remote-controlled Mars rovers. They would explore the Mars polar carbon dioxide reserves, assess the feasibility of repairing the Mars atmosphere, and most importantly, exploration of underground water.

So far, it seemed like the Americans had the victory secured.

Across the Pacific Ocean, the Lunar Orbit Committee was under a lot of pressure.

At the beginning of the space station program, there was a lot of controversy on whether to place the space station in lunar orbit or in Earth orbit. Now that the Ares program proved to be successful, the debates were getting louder.

However, Lu Zhou, the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee, didn't seem to care.

The launch for the Moon Palace life module was going to happen, regardless of the American's success.

After the life module had been completely assembled, the Moon Palace, which contained the function module, node module, and experimental module, would be used as a complete lunar space station, floating in the "NRHO" orbit.

This was the final stage of the Moon Palace first phase…

…

White House.

President's office.

The president had just returned from the congress. He sat in his office chair while reading through the meeting notes enthusiastically.

The expressions of the opposition MPs brought a smile to his face.

A week ago, the opposition MPs were attacking him for the excessive funding for the aerospace program, and very few people believed that he was right.

But the Ares program was proven to be successful!

They were winning the space race!

He was leading the Americans to a better future!

He signed his name on the document and remembered the congress member who told him to reduce funding. He couldn't help but grin.

"What don't these idiots understand? Sure, NASA is spending a lot of money, but they're creating jobs and helping the economy, what are they complaining about…"

Roosevelt's dam boosted American's economy, aerospace was no different.

He shook his head and left the budget document aside. He then picked up a document regarding the California nuclear power plant project.

He was just about to read it when he heard a knock at the door.

He put down the document and said, "Come in."

When he saw Director Carson appear at the door, the president's face was full of smiles.

"Director Carson! It's nice to see you, take a seat!"

Carson looked at the cheerful president and felt a little weird.

"Mr. President, it's nice to see you too…"

The president leaned in his office chair and asked, "Do you have good news for me?"

"No… Not quite." Director Carson gulped and said, "Our colonists are in a bit of trouble…"

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Chapter 784: Mars Diaries

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

It had been almost two weeks since they landed on Mars, three days since the life support system was named "New Virginia".

During this time, the New Virginia survey plans went quite smoothly. Even though they encountered a 17-hour sandstorm, it passed away without doing any harm.

In fact, Mars' atmosphere was a hundred times thinner than Earth, so a sandstorm itself was not particularly dangerous. What was dangerous was the electrostatic lightning that came with the sandstorms and the decline of sunlight. This prevented the solar-powered devices from getting enough energy.

However, this kind of event had already been taken into consideration by Space-X's Mars colonization project team. The life support system was equipped with a methane generator, which could replace the solar-powered devices to supply energy.

The first thing these colonists did after landing was to install lightning rods for their home, to prevent any possible accidents…

Although they encountered many difficulties adapting to life on Mars, they were able to overcome them. They cooperated with the NASA ground command center to complete the scheduled scientific research missions. Johnson usually took half an hour every day to film his "Mars Diaries".

He was the "Columbus" of this new "continent", so he obviously hoped that more people would be interested in "New Virginia". Therefore, when he was shooting videos, he usually chose to show the more glamorous parts of his Martian life. He never filmed the dangerous and bad sides of his life.

Actually, his "vlogging advertisement" was quite successful. People took the bait and began to discuss living on Mars. Each episode of the Mars Diaries caused enthusiastic discussions on Facebook and Twitter.

So far, five episodes of "Mars Diaries" had been released. It had become one of the most popular Internet shows in North America. Many TV stations even purchased broadcasting rights from Space-X.

Today was the filming of episode 6.

Johnson placed the camera on the table and took two steps back. He then smiled brightly, exposing his white teeth, as he greeted the camera.

"Hello, guys! It's Johnson here, the captain of the Heart of Gold! It's been a while since we last talked!

"Unfortunately, we encountered a sandstorm! We can't explore outside today… But don't worry about us, we're not worried about being blown away by the wind, and the tornado barely tickles us.

"I want to use this opportunity to show you guys what we do on Mars when we can't explore outside…"

Johnson picked up the camera equipment from the table and walked to the common area. He explained to the audience what they did to kill time, such as playing VR games or running on the treadmill.

"This is our entertainment lounge… It is a bit small, but this is still in the early stages… Hey, Travis, say hi to everyone."

Travis was playing video games. He gave a fake smile at first, but when he noticed Johnson's scary eyes, he changed it to a real smile.

Johnson gave him a thumbs up.

"I'll cut that out, you're welcome."

"Thanks, Johnson."

Travis rolled his eyes and put on his VR goggles. He then went back to playing his video game.

Actually, life up here was rather boring. It was far less utopian than Johnson had portrayed.

However, the downsides were obviously not shown in the vlogs. Even if he accidentally filmed it, the team at Space-X would cut the "bad" parts of the video out.

However, that was often not necessary.

Because he rarely filmed the negative side of things.

By speaking into the camera, he was communicating with people from tens of millions of kilometers away. It became a daily routine for him. If there were more things to film and editing didn't take as long, he would gladly film one vlog per day.

After showing the viewers Travis playing video games and Julia reading a book next to the coffee machine, Johnson walked into the garage and stood next to his "car".

"All good things come to an end. It is time to say goodbye. I look forward to talking to you guys again. I hope you look forward to the next episode, bye…"

Johnson put on a cool pose in front of the camera and ended today's shoot.

He heard footsteps coming toward the garage. Travis, who had finished playing his video game, walked over.

He looked at Johnson standing next to the rover and folded his arms. He complained to Johnson.

"This damn vlog doesn't make me feel good at all."

Johnson smiled and tucked the camera into his pocket. He walked up to Travis and patted him on the shoulder.

"Take it easy, buddy. After the sandstorm passes, I'll take you out for a drive."

Travis said, "I don't want to drive, go yourself. There's nothing but sand here! God damn it, why did I come here?"

There obviously were no roads on Mars, so driving over sand was fine, but last time, they had to drive around the more rocky areas to collect samples. The drive was extremely bumpy and uncomfortable.

After living on Mars for a while, Travis was quite resistant toward outdoor missions. He demanded his work be moved indoors.

Johnson decided to approve his demands.

Instead, Julia was transferred to outdoor missions.

Fortunately, these missions didn't require many people. Most of the pieces of equipment were highly automated, so most of the time they didn't even need to get off their rover.

Before sending the life support system to Mars, NASA considered the case where none of the colonists would want to leave the cabin.

To put it bluntly, their main mission was to test the life support system, and most of the other scientific activities were just supplementary.

"Okay, bud, everything will be okay. We flew for two months just to get here, the fun is just starting to begin."

Johnson didn't know how to respond to his teammate's complaints, so he could only try to comfort him.

Regardless of whether Travis was comforted or not, this was the only thing Johnson could do.

However, what Johnson didn't know was that tens of millions of kilometers away, the NASA ground command center was in chaos.

That's right.

There was nothing scary about a Mars sandstorm.

However, a Mars sandstorm could last more than six months. Even if they used the methane generator as a backup power source, they might not last six months…

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Chapter 785: Global Sandstorm

NASA ground command center.

The president's roar echoed through the building.

"F*ck!

"A bunch of idiots!

"If you knew there were going to be sandstorms, why did you choose this time to send our colonists there?"

The people in the conference room looked at the angry president, and they stayed dead silent. None of them wanted to be called out.

Especially Director Carson.

He looked down awkwardly.

He didn't expect something like this to happen.

After all, he wasn't God, how could he have expected this to happen.

"Mr. President… We don't have a weather observatory on Mars. I understand what you're feeling right now, but there was no way for us to know what the climate on Mars would be like…"

Director Carson paused for a second and spoke.

"Generally speaking, most sandstorms occur during summer, and global sandstorms rarely occur outside of summer… What is happening now is completely out of our expectations. Although we do have countermeasures…"

The president stared at him and asked aggressively, "What are the countermeasures?"

"But a small accident occurred," Director Carson said with an awkward expression. "Originally, our plan was to set up methane and groundwater resource collection points so that we could use the resources on Mars to survive. As long as we had these resources, the sandstorms blocking the sunlight wouldn't be a problem, but…"

"But?"

Director Carson gulped and said, "But our colonists had just landed on Mars and hadn't set up the methane and water collection points. The methane reserves on board… won't last very long."

Simply put, they did not take into account that the weather would be so horrible two weeks after landing.

Even though the global Mars sandstorms were difficult to predict through astronomical observations, one could make rough estimations. According to historical data, it occurred on average every 3 Mars years, which was 5.5 Earth years.

The last global sandstorm was in 2018, only 3 Earth years had passed since then. Not to mention there was also another Hohmann transfer orbit happening soon, which they could use to send resources to the colonists.

However…

No one expected Mars to have such harsh climates. This sandstorm swept the entire planet. Looking at Mars from a ground astronomical observatory, Mars looked like a dusty ball, blocking all sunlight…

Not having solar power wasn't the worst part.

The worst part was that they had just planted their crops, and the plants needed sunlight to grow.

There were only two options left for the colonists, either to dispose of all the crops that had just been planted or waste electricity and use artificial sunlight.

Neither option was optimal.

"Why didn't you think about this before?" The president said to Director Carson angrily, "I spoke clearly in the White House! If we can't guarantee that our colonists will be 100% safe, I'd rather not send any colonists at all!"

Carson: "Sir…"

The president said, "What? Do you have a question, Mr. Carson?"

"Yes, you did say that." Director Carson gulped and said, "But you also said during a closed-door meeting… To win the space race at any costs, as quickly as possible."

The president's face stiffened, and he awkwardly rubbed his nose and spoke.

"Did I say that?"

The vice president standing beside him nodded silently.

"I remember you saying it… We can find it in the meeting notes."

The vice president was just a puppet, and he didn't have any reason to suck up to the president. Furthermore, he was the head of the reorganized National Space Committee, and he didn't want the blame to be on him.

The president replied, "That's not the main point! Regardless of what I said, I want you to immediately take countermeasures! Director Carson!"

Carson suddenly stood up straight.

"Yes, sir!"

The president gave him orders.

"I need you to come up with a plan in 24 hours, then implement it over the next 72 hours. I don't care what method you use! We must ensure the safety of our astronauts and keep them alive!

"If this fails, you know what will happen."

Carson broke out in cold sweat as he replied nervously, "Yes, sir…"

…

[New Virginia!]

"These people are so optimistic."

Lu Zhou looked at the popup window on his computer screen and shook his head with a smile.

Lu Zhou was spending his lunchtime at his Jinling Institute for Advanced Study office. He drank coffee while reading some theses.

Coincidentally, he noticed this popup.

"It seems like Space-X is really spending a lot on advertising. They're even advertising on academic forums."

The public opinion regarding New Virginia was one-sided.

Ever since the BFS spacecraft successfully dropped the capsule, New Virginia seemed to be the place of dreams. Because of the "Mars Diaries" program, everyone wanted to live on Mars…

North American media outlets gradually stopped talking about the space race. Instead, they focused on interviewing friends and families of the colonists.

Lu Zhou was also a "fan" of the "Mars Diaries". He didn't miss a single episode.

After all, if he wanted to defeat his opponents, he had to understand them first.

Even though he felt like Musk seemed too cocky at times, there was no doubt Musk was an accomplished person.

The BFR rocket was the leading chemical propulsion rocket in the world, yet there was still room for improvement.

And he also had his life support system…

In addition to watching the "Mars Diaries" through the Lunar Orbit Committee, Lu Zhou requested electromagnetic wave signals data from the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope. He then sent the data to Xiao Ai for analysis and cracking.

Not all of the transmission data could be cracked, but this was another way to obtain more information on "New Virginia".

If everything went well, he might even obtain crucial information.

For example, the Mars resource survey data…

Lu Zhou closed the webpage and was about to get back to work. However a pop-up window appeared on the lower right corner of his screen.

[Master, file number 0001 has been decrypted! Do you want to look at it now? ψ ( ́) ψ]

Lu Zhou looked at Xiao Ai's devil emoticon and smiled.

"Okay, send it to my desktop… Oh yeah, how are the other files going?"

[Not done yet. They used different encryption methods for each communication, so it is going to take a long time to decrypt… (; ́д)ゞ]

"No worries, take your time, I'm not in a hurry."

[Okay! Xiao Ai will try its best!()ゞ]

Even though Xiao Ai was smart, it still had its limitations.

Even supercomputers couldn't immediately crack encryption.

File No. 0001 was the first communication signal between the Heart of Gold and the NASA ground command center. The data was collected by the FAST project team two weeks ago.

Lu Zhou opened the cracked file and skimmed through it. Just like he expected, it was all messages such as "everything is fine" and "mission approved". He didn't find any juicy content.

Lu Zhou was about to copy the file onto a USB drive when he suddenly heard knocking sounds on his door.

Lu Zhou closed the file and cleared his throat.

"Come in."

The door opened, and Hou Guang came in.

Hou Guang had a serious look on his face. He skipped the small talk and went straight to the point.

"There is news from the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope. They found something unusual."

Lu Zhou leaned in his chair and said, "What?"

"There's a global sandstorm on Mars!"

…

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Chapter 786: Era Of Space 4.0

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

Global sandstorm?

After hearing Hou Guang's words, Lu Zhou subconsciously looked at the calendar at the corner of the table. He saw that the year was indeed 2021.

Hou Guang guessed what Lu Zhou was thinking, so he spoke.

"I know you are surprised… In fact, the observers at the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope are also surprised. On average, a global sandstorm occurs on Mars every five to six years."

Hou Guang sighed.

Even though it was a good thing for their opponents to be in trouble, they didn't want NASA to be completely obliterated. It wasn't in their interest for the Ares program to go sideways.

After hearing Hou Guang, Lu Zhou contemplated for a bit.

"Is there a reason?"

Hou Guang smiled and replied, "What reason could there be…"

The climate on Mars was a complex system. Because of the thin atmosphere and extreme terrains, there were no reliable methods that could accurately predict climate change.

The only inference people could make was that global sandstorms occurred every five to six years. Each sandstorm lasted for months or even an entire year. This was often accompanied by lightning and tornadoes.

If someone wanted to make accurate Mars climate predictions, they would have to send at least a few weather satellites into Mars' low-Earth orbit.

Lu Zhou: "If a global sandstorm happens, what does that mean for the colonists on Mars?"

Hou Guang: "Generally speaking, the sandstorm will affect the solar power generators, but they should have a backup power supply. It shouldn't be a big problem… Of course, only NASA knows how bad the situation is."

The life support system embodied the most advanced technology of many space companies such as Space-X and Blue Origin. Even though the Ares program was executed hastily, Elon Musk had been making preparation to colonize Mars for decades. There was no way he didn't take sandstorms into account.

Musk might have even practiced sandstorm drills on Earth.

Of course, these were just Lu Zhou's speculations.

Like Hou Guang said, only the Mars colonists and NASA knew what the true situation was like.

Lu Zhou nodded and went silent for a while.

"Ask those at the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope to continue observing Mars… I guess we'll wait for NASA's announcement."

Lu Zhou's focus was still on the Moon. He only paid a little attention to what was happening on Mars. It would be a good thing if this sandstorm revealed to Lu Zhou how advanced NASA's Mars technology was.

Hou Guang left the office and closed the door on his way out.

Lu Zhou looked at the door and remembered he had a meeting with the director of the European Space Agency. He stood up and was about to prepare for the meeting.

However, he suddenly stopped and spoke to his computer.

"Xiao Ai, change the file decryption order. Crack the most recent files first!"

The computer signal light flashed, indicating that Xiao Ai had heard him.

Lu Zhou nodded and left the office.

…

The controllable fusion negotiations had come to an end. China and the rest of the world were at the honeymoon stage, and they had started to work closely in both academic and industry fields.

China's entry into the International Space Station program and the European Union and China cooperation on the moon space station were the best examples of this.

Inside the command center at the Jinling launch site, Lu Zhou met Mr. Owens, the director of the European Space Agency.

Owens just came from a meeting in Beijing. He flew to Jinling mainly to see Lu Zhou. He wanted to meet the leader of China's aerospace industry, the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee, a legendary scientist…

"Hello, Professor Lu, it's a pleasure to meet you!"

Owens was tall and lanky. He enthusiastically shook Lu Zhou's hand. Lu Zhou smiled politely toward Owens.

"It's nice to meet you too, Mr. Owens! Take a seat."

Officials from the European Space Agency and journalists from European and Chinese media outlets followed Owens' footsteps.

This meeting was open to the public. Both sides were going to talk about cooperation plans and portray an image to the international community regarding their cooperation.

Which was, that the negotiations between China and the European Union had been going smoothly.

Owens, while sitting on the sofa, explained his viewpoint in an interesting manner.

"If we look at the history of human space exploration, I think it can be divided into three stages."

Lu Zhou smiled and asked, "Which three?"

Owens smiled and said, "In the first stage, space 1.0, humans studied astronomy and astrology and cultural and religious factors played a big role. In the space 2.0 stage, we went into space and set foot on the Moon. This is the 'Apollo' era. In the space 3.0 stage, space became another area for human development. Commercial space launch missions were becoming more frequent. This is the 'International Space Station' stage."

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Interesting, so when do you think we'll enter space 4.0?"

Owens thought for a bit and smiled.

"I think space 4.0 is the era of the Moon Palace."

"Oh, really?" Lu Zhou smiled and asked, "Why isn't it the era of Ares?"

Owens smiled and shook his head.

"Mars is too far away, and it takes months for a round trip. Europe doesn't have the capability to participate yet. Maybe Ares will be the next space era, but so far, we are more optimistic about the Moon."

Lu Zhou couldn't help but think.

He's really thinking about this from all angles.

It's not that they don't want to join the Ares program, it's that they don't have the capabilities to join.

Is this guy really from Germany?

Lu Zhou felt like Owens was different from his other German friends…

Owens smiled toward a reporter's camera.

"We're in a new era where civilization will become more and more integrated with aerospace. In the future, more and more countries will participate in aerospace projects, and people of different skin colors will all fly on spacecraft.

"I would like us to develop lunar resources together, to build a 'lunar village' together."

Lu Zhou smiled and reached out his right hand.

"We are happy to cooperate. I'm glad to reach a consensus with you."

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Chapter 787: SOS?

Building a community with the same goal for the future was one of the fundamental philosophies of the Chinese. It was also the main principles proposed by the Chinese representatives at the 15th United Nations General Assembly.

China didn't want to achieve world domination. Rather, they wanted the world's future interests to align with China's interests.

Of course, this wasn't something Lu Zhou had to worry about.

As a scholar, he only had to focus on his own research.

However, as a scholar, he was still glad to see his motherland being integrated into the international community, which meant he could use his voice to influence this community…

The meeting lasted for an hour, and the two talked about a lot of things.

Owens was surprised at Lu Zhou's vision for the lunar village. Lu Zhou was interested in some of Owens' ideas on the development of space resources and business operation models.

Technology provided humans with tools to transform and manipulate natural resources. However, the way at which people should use these tools was a discipline in and of itself.

"The Living Planet seminar is going to be held in Prague, Czech Republic. If you have time, we'd sincerely like you to visit."

"If I have time, I'll think about attending."

Lu Zhou smiled and nodded. He obviously didn't give a clear answer.

Owens didn't push any further. He shook hands with Lu Zhou and said goodbye.

…

The day after Lu Zhou and Owens finished their meeting, the news that China and the European Union reached a lunar resources development consensus swept across the Internet.

Everyone Daily posted a concept map of the lunar village.

On the other hand, Xinhua Daily announced in its latest newspaper issue the specific content that was discussed by the Chinese and the European Union on the development and exploration of lunar resources.

Surprisingly, the European Union recognized the bill signed by China at the beginning of last year, which was to control the profits of companies in the lunar resource mining field.

This bill caused a lot of controversies back then. It was even criticized by the Western media as a modern East India Company Act.

If it weren't for the western countries' desire to obtain China's nuclear fusion technologies, they would have kept silent…

But now, the European Union recognized this bill and stated that countries should compete fairly and cooperate on the development of lunar resources. This was able to shut a lot of people up.

The Americans were especially shocked. They couldn't believe this "betrayal" by Europe. The line that said "space 4.0 is the era of Ares" attracted a lot of discussions.

Even though Director Owens spoke euphemistically, some people were still offended.

The Ares program was heading toward the victory line, yet Owens still had doubts regarding the Ares program?

The Americans thought the Europeans were blind.

However, even though the Europeans seemed to be leaning toward the Chinese side, the United States had no time to take care of this matter.

While the China National Space Administration and European Space Agency were having their own discussions, New Virginia was stuck in a global Mars sandstorm.

Even Lu Zhou's favorite "Mars Diaries" program was suspended.

However, Space-X didn't state the true reason for the suspension of the Mars Diaries program. They said that the information transmission costs were too expensive and that they needed the bandwidth for scientific research.

After Space-X announced this on their website, a lot of people were disappointed.

The program was at its climax, and many fans were let down.

However, most people were understanding.

After all, scientific research was more important than creating an entertainment show.

Elon Musk stood in front of a camera and apologized to the "Mars Diaries" fans.

"It's a shame that this sandstorm might last for a long time. I assure you that everything is going fine. The atmosphere density of Mars is only 1% that of Earth's. Even though this sandstorm is tough, it won't do any damage.

"Also, I'd like to use this opportunity to talk about something exciting.

"The new BFR rocket is about to depart. This time, we are sending a 16-ton experiment module to Mars!

"If you have something to say to our colonists, please send us a written letter! We will choose 100 letters and send them to Mars along with our experimental module. Our New Virginia residents will read these letters out loud on Columbia TV!"

The reporters burst into excitement as they all rushed forward and reached out with their microphones.

Letter to Mars!

That is so exciting!

Musk is a genius!

However, Johnson, who was tens of millions of kilometers away, had no idea that this disastrous sandstorm was being downplayed on Earth…

The oxygen and methane resources continued to decline, and the situation was becoming increasingly dangerous.

Of course, the US authorities had been trying their best. NASA even held several meetings regarding New Virginia's rescue operation.

So far, Director Carson was presented with two solutions. One was to launch a new BFR rocket to Mars and send over resources that could help the colonists. The other was to find a way to get the colonists back on the BFS spacecraft, where they could continue living for a long time.

However, so far, it seemed like neither solution was realistic.

The distance between Mars and Earth was getting wider and wider. The best launch window to Mars was over. Even though they had BFR rockets available, it would take the rockets more than six months to reach Mars.

And it seemed like New Virginia could only survive for two more months.

Praying that the sandstorm would stop seemed to be the most realistic solution…

Inside the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study, a text bubble popped up on Lu Zhou's computer.

Xiao Ai: [Master, file 0021 is successfully decrypted!]

Lu Zhou, who was reading theses, looked at the text bubble and replied, "Send it to my computer."

Xiao Ai: [Yes, Master ~ (๑•̀ᄇ•́) و]

In less than half a second, a folder appeared on his desktop.

Lu Zhou opened the folder and saw the file. Instantly, three letters caught his attention.

Lu Zhou raised his eyebrows and muttered to himself.

"SOS…?"

They sent out an international distress signal?

Things are becoming more and more interesting…

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Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

Chen Yunhai stood in front of the dean's office and took a deep breath. He straightened his collar and gently knocked on the door.

After hearing "come in", he pushed open the door and walked in.

"Sir, did you ask for me?"

"Yeah, I did." Lu Zhou smiled at Chen Yunhai and stood up. He gestured toward the sofa and said, "Don't be so polite, come, sit down."

Chen Yunhai sat on the sofa and thanked the assistant who just poured him a cup of tea. He began to look at the stack of draft papers sitting on the coffee table.

He saw some complex calculations and symbols drawn on the draft papers, and beside the draft papers were proof processes.

Chen Yunhai had no idea what he was looking at. Lu Zhou walked over with a cup of coffee and sat down across from him.

"Just some personal hobbies." Lu Zhou placed the stack of draft papers aside and took out a freshly printed document. He placed it on the coffee table and said, "Two hours ago, we decrypted the signal sent from Mars to Earth. I'm sure you'll be interested."

Chen Yunhai suddenly became serious, and he quickly picked up the document.

The moment he saw the three letters, he was stunned.

"SOS…?"

Lu Zhou nodded.

"Yes, with what is happening on Mars right now, I think there's nothing wrong with our decryption. I think New Virginia is in a bit of trouble."

Lu Zhou paused for a second. He then continued, "But this could turn into an opportunity for us."

Ideas flashed through Chen Yunhai's mind, but he still shook his head.

"I know what you mean, but this might be difficult to execute… The White House would rather let the colonists die than to cooperate with us."

If America decided to let China take over the rescue mission, not only would it damage America's prestige and pride, but it would also bring risks such as technology thievery.

Even though this wasn't politically correct, aerospace itself was a risky industry. The death of a few astronauts wasn't significant enough for the White House to put down their ego.

Looking at the big picture, if the Americans couldn't begin a rescue mission, it would be better for the three astronauts to die than for China to intervene on this matter.

At most, the Americans would prepare a special funeral for the colonists.

Perhaps Space-X's stock price would take a hard hit after this. But this wouldn't be the end of the Ares program. The Ares program researchers would learn from their mistakes and try again…

"I know." Lu Zhou put down his coffee mug and nodded. He said, "Theoretically, that is true. NASA wouldn't spend billions just to save three astronauts… Not to mention the rescue mission might go wrong. It might be in the interest of the United States to announce the 'accidental' death of the three astronauts."

"That's right." Chen Yunhai nodded and said, "Therefore, it might be hard for us to capitalize on this opportunity."

"Not necessarily." Lu Zhou shook his head and said, "What if we told the Americans that we can save the astronauts?"

Chen Yunhai looked interested, and he said, "So what you're saying is…"

"That's right, leak the news from our side." Lu Zhou nodded and said, "Then they will have to conduct a rescue mission. If they don't…

"Then it's no longer an accident, it's murder!"

United States.

NASA headquarters.

At the Ares program ground command center, staff members were working hard at their respective jobs.

Director Carson stood inside the command center as he reported to the president on the current situation.

"We are now certain that the sandstorm on Mars is a global event, and our estimation is that the sandstorm will last for at least five months. Our colonists are facing—"

The president interrupted Director Carson and said angrily, "I don't care what type of sandstorm it is. I just want to know one thing, what is your plan?"

Director Carson went silent for a while. He then said, "Sir… I don't want to say this, but the chances are slim. Even if we launch the BFR rocket now and go to Mars using an unconventional orbit, it would take at least three months to reach Mars."

President: "Can our colonists survive for three months?"

Director Carson paused for a second and spoke.

"It's fifty-fifty… It depends on their survival skills."

"We can't let them know what the situation is like yet," the president said. "Tell them that we are trying our best to rescue them and that they don't have to worry!"

"But our rocket…"

Director Carson looked at the president's gloomy face, and he suddenly knew what the President was implying.

"… I understand."

Compared to bringing the astronauts back alive, asking them to keep this a secret was more important. They had to make the astronauts believe that NASA was doing their best to rescue them.

If the astronauts knew that they had no chance of survival, they could use the telecommunication equipment on Mars to spread the news across Earth…

That would be a disaster for NASA.

Suddenly, footsteps were heard from the corridor of the command center.

The White House secretary appeared behind them.

"Sir?"

The president turned over and looked at the tall man. He frowned and asked, "What now?"

The secretary gulped and replied, "The news was leaked."

The president replied, "What news?"

"News regarding the New Virginia colonists…" The secretary took out a newspaper from his bag and carefully said to the president, "Look at it yourself."

The newspaper was from the Everyone Daily Foreign Edition.

The president took the newspaper and squinted his eyes as he read.

The moment he laid his eyes on the newspaper, his heart sank.

A giant headline was right at the top of the newspaper.

[Mars encounters a rare global sandstorm, "New Virginia" colonists are in danger!]

WTF?

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Chapter 789: Ion Thruster Propulsion System?

Normally, the United States was the one that criticized other countries.

The president didn't expect to be attacked by Chinese media like this.

[Mars encounters rare global sandstorm, "New Virginia" colonists are in danger!]

In this report, Everyone Daily quoted researchers from the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope, who said the sandstorm could last for months.

The most significant impact was that the sunlight reaching Mars would be decreased by 70 or even 80 percent. This caused power generation problems.

The Mars colonists wouldn't have enough energy to sustain their daily activities.

This meant that the life support system wouldn't have any solar power!

If this problem remained, they would only be able to survive for another two months before the oxygen and methane tanks were depleted…

As soon as the news broke out, there was an uproar in North America.

New Virginia is being buried in a sandstorm?

WTF?

What angered Americans wasn't the sandstorm itself; instead, it was because this was the first time they heard about this!

Just a week ago, they were still sitting in front of their TVs, drinking beer and eating chips, watching the Mars Diaries program on Columbia TV. They envied the lives of the Mars colonists.

But now…

They weren't envious at all!

Many people who signed up for the Ares program were glad they were not chosen.

Not only did they regret signing up for the program, but they were also furious!

The day after Everyone Daily Foreign Edition released the news, intense discussions happened on major social media platforms such as Facebook.

People began posting screenshots of their withdrawal from the Ares program registration, stating that they were deceived by NASA and the US government. They said that NASA was conducting inhumane experiments!

The people that said things like "the Americans are already landing on Mars, yet China is still stuck on the moon?" quietly disappeared.

Of course, there were people who had a different opinion.

For example, those patriotic Americans who thought that "the BFR rocket will bring our heroes home!"…

Regardless, it was obvious that NASA tried to cover up this story.

On the other hand, the public interest for Space-X started to deplete. According to the statistics, the number of registered volunteers for the Ares program, which was originally announced on the official website, was close to the 20 million mark. However, in just one day, the number fell to 5 million, and it was still dropping.

Space-X and NASA had shut down the registration channels on their websites, and their websites no longer displayed how many people were registered…

Outside the NASA building.

Major media trucks filled the entire building parking lot.

Reporters with their cameras and microphones surrounded the building.

"Mr. Carson! What's the current situation in New Virginia?"

"Why is this happening just two weeks after our colonists landed on Mars? Didn't NASA inspect the climate before approving the launch program?"

"Is NASA even planning on saving our colonists? Why are there no rescue launch missions arranged? Are you really going to abandon our heroes?"

"We have the right to know the truth!"

As Director Carson looked at the microphones surrounding him, he began to sweat from his forehead, and he even began to feel a little nauseous.

He took a deep breath and tried to appease the reporters.

"We will release a statement shortly! But now is not the time! I can say that our colonists are safe right now! We have the world's most advanced artificial biosphere technology. Even if this sandstorm lasts for a year, our colonists will be safe!"

However, most people didn't buy what Director Carson was saying.

They thought about the suspended "Mars Diaries" program and had a rough idea of the real situation.

The situation in New Virginia wasn't looking good.

Moreover, the colonists might not be able to survive for much longer…

…

It was difficult to keep a global sandstorm on Mars a secret. After all, any powerful astronomical observatory centers could point their telescopes at Mars and observe what was happening.

However, most space observatories didn't think of the serious impacts this would have on the New Virginia colonists.

That was until the Everyone Daily Foreign Edition report, which revealed the truth…

Director Carson finally got rid of the annoying reporters. He walked toward the NASA building and went directly into the command center room. The secretary-general of NASA quickly spoke to him.

"The situation is not looking good. Julia is Dutch. The Dutch government has expressed its concerns regarding the latest developments of the Ares program. Last night, the French also publicly stated that if we can't give them an explanation of the New Virginia situation, they might consider closing their Ares program registration… The French president said that the citizens want nothing to do with New Virginia."

"Sh*t, who cares if the French is involved or not!"

Even though Director Carson seemed like he didn't care, his face said otherwise.

This was a diplomatic level problem.

Europe was an important ally of the United States, so they couldn't just ignore their feelings.

Not to mention the real issue wasn't the diplomatic relations, it was the overwhelming public opinion.

If they couldn't save the colonists, the president wouldn't be able to win the next election, which meant he would be fired as the NASA director.

Even though they wanted to save the colonists…

They were not able to.

Director Carson walked into the command room and took a deep breath. He thought about what to say to the staff members working here.

However, his assistant rushed over to him while carrying a laptop.

"Director, you have a video call."

Director Carson asked, "Who is calling?"

"The IP address is from the other side of the Pacific Ocean…" The assistant gulped and said, "I think it's from Jinling, China."

Carson's pupils narrowed. He had a rough idea of what was happening.

He opened the laptop and hit the enter button.

The video call was connected.

A familiar face appeared in the center of the video.

"Hello, Mr. Carson, it's nice to see you. It looks like you're in a bit of trouble."

Director Carson stared at Professor Lu through the screen. He didn't even bother asking how Professor Lu got his Facebook account. He said, "Yeah, but you don't have to worry about it, we can solve it ourselves."

"Oh, really?" Lu Zhou smiled and said, "By the way, 72 hours ago, you missed your orbit transfer window. If you wanted to send a BFR rocket now, the situation might not be optimal. I did some calculations on the flight process and uploaded it to arXiv. You can look at it if you want."

Director Carson nearly spat out blood.

Doing some calculations for fun was fine.

But he couldn't believe Lu Zhou posted it on arXiv.

Because of Lu Zhou's influence on arXiv, by tomorrow, reporters would be swarming to his front doors with this new juicy piece of information…

Director Carson stared at Lu Zhou's annoying face and asked, "Are you making fun of us?"

"Of course not, we are deeply saddened by your circumstances." Lu Zhou shook his head and said, "By the way, do you want to learn about our ion thruster propulsion system?"

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Chapter 790: You Need It

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

Ion thruster propulsion system?

Want me to learn about it?

Director Carson paused for two seconds after hearing Lu Zhou.

Then he spoke without hesitation.

"No, thanks!

"Everything at New Virginia is normal. Our life support system can guarantee that the colonists will survive the crisis."

There's no way I'm letting the Chinese save us!

Imagine how embarrassing it would be if they rescued our colonists?

Also, the BFS spacecraft had all of the most advanced technologies from various aerospace companies. The research and development expenses were in the tens of billions of USD, not to mention the expensive life support system on Mars…

He couldn't trust the Chinese with his technology!

Looking at how resistant Director Carson was, Lu Zhou couldn't help but chuckle.

He spoke.

"Oh, really? The three astronauts in New Virginia don't think so."

Director Carson frowned and said, "What do you mean?"

Lu Zhou cleared his throat and said, "We're very concerned about the colonists in New Virginia, so we looked at the electromagnetic signals from Mars."

Suddenly, Director Carson broke out in cold sweat. He wasn't happy.

"You listened to our communications?"

"Don't get so riled up, you guys do that all the time, right?" Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Also, we happened to detect the signals during our normal astronomical observation activities."

"But our communications are encrypted—"

Before Director Carson could finish speaking, Lu Zhou interrupted him, "SOS."

"!"

Director Carson was dumbfounded.

In the beginning, he thought Lu Zhou was bluffing, but that was clearly not the case anymore.

Director Carson stubbornly replied, "We don't need your help…"

"No, you do," Lu Zhou said to Director Carson seriously. "This is three lives we are talking about. Think about it carefully before you answer my question."

Lu Zhou reached out and tapped on the keyboard, thus ending the call.

Director Carson went silent for a while. He pinched his eyebrows and felt a terrible headache.

Three f*cking lives…

Who cares about three lives?

However, he couldn't refute Lu Zhou's words.

If China decided to publish those communication messages…

It would be a disastrous blow to the credibility of the authorities.

Maybe the American public could ignore the death of the astronauts, but the White House couldn't ignore it, nor could he. Anyone who was personally involved in the Ares program would be impacted by the deaths of the astronauts.

Ten minutes ago, he was thinking about covering up the deaths with an accident or natural disaster, but he didn't have that option anymore…

If he didn't try his best to save the astronauts, he could be painted as a murderer!

The secretary looked at Director Carson and gulped.

"Sir? Are you… okay?"

"I'm doing great." Director Carson looked at the command center and paused for a second. He then looked at the secretary and spoke.

"Get the car ready… I'm going to the White House."

This was a decision that had to be made by the president.

The secretary paused for a second.

"Now?"

"Right now!"

…

Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

After the video call, Lu Zhou sighed in relief and leaned back on his office chair.

He wasn't particularly good at negotiating, but he knew that he accurately conveyed his intentions to Director Carson. If there was no official response from the United States, he would disclose the communication messages.

If the United States still didn't give an official response, the Lunar Orbit Committee would announce a humanitarian relief to save the New Virginia colonists.

After all, it wasn't like the United States could prevent other people from saving the colonists.

As for why China wanted to bring the colonists back alive?

Saving lives wasn't the main reason. Participating in the rescue mission would be a huge boost to the international prestige and reputation of China, even if the rescue mission were to fail.

Lu Zhou was also curious about the technology used in the life support system and the BFR spacecraft floating in Mars orbit. Sending a researcher there would be very helpful.

His computer signal light flickered, and a string of bubbles popped up on his computer screen.

Xiao Ai: [Sir, someone tried to send a Trojan to your computer.]

Trojan?

Is it from an intelligence agency, maybe the CIA?

Lu Zhou wasn't surprised. After all, Carson was a high-level official. Not to mention Lu Zhou used his personal computer to video call Carson.

Lu Zhou: "Is it a problem?"

[Not a big problem! ()]

Lu Zhou nodded and said, "Help me get rid of it then, and if you can, maybe teach them a lesson. This is a bit ridiculous."

Xiao Ai: [Okay, Xiao Ai will take care of it!]

The text bubbles disappeared.

The fans on the laptop spun for a while and gradually stopped.

Lu Zhou thought that the Trojan was probably removed. He took out his phone and called Hou Guang.

The phone quickly connected.

Lu Zhou began to send out orders.

"Tell the ground command center to calculate the launch trajectory. Within 12 hours, I need the fastest trajectory to Mars for an ion thruster propulsion system!"

"In addition, assign the rescue mission to Starlight. Tell them to prepare for the rescue mission. And tell them to refuel their resources on the Moon Palace space station, then stand by in lunar orbit."

Moon Palace had a special cargo bay that stored spare fusion batteries and the propulsion working medium. This space station was originally intended to be a "lunar docking port", therefore it had plenty of working medium supplies.

After hearing Lu Zhou's orders, Hou Guang immediately asked, "The United States replied to us?"

"I'm not waiting for their reply." Lu Zhou shook his head and said, "By the time they reply, it will be too late."

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Chapter 791: The World Will Witness Again

If someone wanted to understand the advantages and disadvantages of ion thruster and chemical propulsion, they would have to have a fundamental understanding of a high school physics concept—acceleration.

On a short distance scale, because of the huge thrust produced by chemical propulsion, spacecraft could reach a very high speed in a short period of time, thus reducing the overall flight time.

However, if the distance scale was expanded to millions of kilometers or even tens of millions of kilometers, the situation would become drastically different.

Unlike ion thruster propulsion, chemical propulsion could produce a huge thrust in exchange for working medium consumption. However, ion thruster propulsion could reach speeds much higher than chemical rockets due to its continuous acceleration and large specific impulse.

It took the BFR rockets three months to travel to Mars.

However, for Starlight, which was orbiting in lunar orbit, it would only take one month.

Not to mention this was without using the Hohmann transfer orbit. If Mars and Earth were at exactly the optimal position, it would take less than a month for the Earth to Mars journey.

In the empty and dark space, the astronauts stationed on Moon Palace had just finished supplying Starlight with the working medium.

Sitting in the cockpit, Xu Zhenghong reached out and pressed his helmet, and he reported to the ground command center.

"This is Starlight, we have completed refueling. Requesting further instructions."

"This is the ground command center. Congratulations on completing the mission. Please switch to cruise mode and await further instructions."

"Roger that, switching to cruise mode."

Sitting in the co-pilot seat, Liu Biao watched Xu Zhenghong switch to cruise mode.

"Are we not returning to Earth?"

"The ground command center is telling us to stand by."

"Is it because of the Americans?"

"Yeah."

Liu Biao couldn't help but feel emotional.

A couple of months ago, he saw the American spacecraft flying across space.

Before they could say hello, the spacecraft was already gone.

He didn't expect to meet the BFS spacecraft so soon.

The cockpit went silent for a while.

Xu Zhenghong closed his eyes and was about to take a nap when the cockpit signal light flickered.

Liu Biao said, "Signal from the ground command center."

"I see it." Xu Zhenghong opened his eyes and stood up. He then pressed his helmet button and said, "This is Starlight, heading to scheduled airspace, preparing to switch routes…

"5,4,3,2,1… Fire!"

Starlight's five ion thruster propulsion engines burst into a faint blue arc as it slowly pushed the silver spacecraft…

…

15 minutes ago.

Facing this dilemma, the White House finally made a decision. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs received a phone call from the president of the United States. During this phone call, the POTUS formally requested help.

10 minutes ago, the news reached the Jinling launch site. The command center staff immediately started to get to work.

Starlight was performing a mission in lunar orbit. When they received the news, they immediately began to prepare for it. After they refueled their living and fuel supplies from the Moon Palace space station, they began their journey toward Mars.

It took less than 15 minutes between the president formally requesting help and Starlight heading toward Mars.

The world once again witnessed the efficiency of China.

On the other hand, the Lunar Orbit Committee held a press conference at Jinling Hotel. They publicly reported the progress on the latest rescue mission to various media journalists.

This made the Americans furious.

The Americans wanted to keep this low-key.

Yet the Chinese even invited reporters to the press conference!

The White House wanted to keep this whole thing quiet. They didn't expect China to make such a huge debacle over this.

The press conference made the NASA staff members' faces turn red.

They spent three days analyzing all of their options and solutions. However, they weren't able to make a final decision and missed the optimal launch window.

China, on the other hand, was able to send out a rescue team within 15 minutes of the president asking for help. China's efficiency was on another level.

However, NASA knew the rescue plan obviously wasn't made in 15 minutes. China was probably planning for this rescue mission long before the video call.

Even then, this type of efficiency was never seen before.

Not only that, but China's open, transparent, serious, and responsible attitude with regard to the rescue mission formed a sharp contrast with NASA's image. The public opinion of the Ares program changed overnight.

[I am ashamed of NASA.]

[This is unbelievable. If it weren't for the Chinese, we wouldn't have even known what our Mars colonists are going through right now? Does the White House plan on burying their bodies?]

[They dispatched a rescue team within 15 minutes… Jesus, how is that possible?]

[I seriously doubt NASA had any intention to save those colonists at all!]

[Now I know why the Mars Diaries was suspended. It's not because of communication costs, but purely because of the sandstorm. The White House wants to hide the truth from us…]

In order to save some face and demonstrate their determination in bringing the colonists home, the White House announced that they would bear the entire cost of the rescue mission.

In less than 15 minutes after the announcement, NASA received a bill from China.

US$1.7 billion.

China was asking for a wire transfer.

After seeing the bill, Director Carson nearly spat out blood.

US$1.7 billion!

They can build another damn Starlight with this money!

Do they think we're the ATM?

His assistant came over.

"Sir?"

"What now?"

The assistant looked at Director Carson and hesitated for a bit.

"I have some bad news…"

Carson said impatiently, "Hurry up, tell me."

Seeing how his boss was irritated, the assistant said, "Okay! Half an hour ago, we found a documentary on the official Chinese website."

Director Carson's heart sank, he could feel something was wrong.

However, he couldn't describe this feeling.

He opened his mouth and asked reluctantly, "What kind of documentary?"

The assistant replied, "I think it's called… Mars Rescue."

Carson: "…"

F*ck!

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Chapter 792: Worst Case Scenario

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

In the end, the Americans didn't make the transfer.

After all, such a large amount of money couldn't be transferred at a moment's notice. This had to go through a bank's special transfer route.

Lu Zhou didn't expect the Americans to actually pay…

"The Americans are actually paying?" Lu Zhou said to Director Li.

He thought about it carefully and realized that it made sense. This wasn't about money anymore.

Not to mention the White House's promise to pay the expenses, even if they didn't make their promise, the White House wouldn't have let China pay the money.

It would be embarrassing for America if they let China spend money to save their own people.

Director Li nodded and said, "The US treasury secretary summoned our embassy members in Washington this morning. They said the US$1.7 billion figure was too high, and they are only willing to pay US$1 billion."

US$1 billion!

Lu Zhou felt his hands shaking.

He coughed and replied, "1 billion is enough."

However, Director Li looked a little unhappy.

"We'll try to get more for you, but the White House is only willing to pay 1 billion… Is that enough for you? If not, we can give you more."

This rescue operation greatly improved China's international image and national prestige. This was worth the money.

Even though Lu Zhou was the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee, Star Sky Technology was his private company. If Star Sky Technology really had to spend that much money on the rescue operation, it was reasonable for the central government to subsidize his costs.

After all, high tech companies were the future of the country. China wanted these companies to thrive.

However, after hearing Director Li's words, Lu Zhou shook his head.

"There's no way it would cost that much. Including all of the expenses, it is at most two to three hundred million USD."

Director Li was shocked.

"Only two to three hundred million? Then the US$1.7 billion bill was…"

Lu Zhou laughed.

"Exactly, it was a bargaining technique."

Director Li: "…"

Asking for US$1.7 billion was indeed a bit too much, not to mention this was supposed to be a humanitarian relief mission.

Actually, Lu Zhou didn't plan on making money. He knew the Americans would give him a lower counteroffer, in which he would "reluctantly" accept the counteroffer.

He had no idea the White House would be so generous. Lu Zhou was almost embarrassed.

Lu Zhou thought for a while and didn't feel good about what he was doing.

"Should I change the price?"

"There's no need… You really are ruthless." Director Li thought for a while and said, "How about this… Just tell them we'll cover the remaining US$700 million."

Remaining US$700 million?

One billion is more than enough, what do you mean cover?

Lu Zhou suddenly realized what Director Li meant.

He sighed and replied, "I thought I was being ruthless… I didn't expect you to be even more ruthless."

Director Li said, "What do you mean… What if we have other hidden expenses? Like the 'Mars Rescue' documentary costs? Of course, when the media asks us, tell them that we spent US$1.713 billion. The Americans covered 1 billion, and we covered the 0.713 billion…"

Lu Zhou couldn't help but ask, "Where did the 130 million come from?"

Director Li sipped some tea and replied, "It looks more legit that way."

Lu Zhou: "…"

…

On the other hand.

NASA headquarters.

Ares program ground command center.

The president stood next to the console with his hands behind his back. He stared at the flashing green dot on the big screen, as well as a green trajectory line.

That green dot was Starlight, flying toward Mars for the rescue mission. The president wasn't in a good mood.

It had been twenty years since the Columbia incident, in which all seven astronauts were killed.

Honestly speaking, the president would rather let another seven astronauts die than for the Soviets to obtain the wreckage of Columbia… He was sure that George W. Bush would have thought the same.

However, that was just a hypothetical situation; there was no way for the Soviets to obtain the wreckage.

However now…

It seemed like China was going to obtain the wreckage.

The president tilted his head and looked at Director Carson.

"What's the situation in New Virginia like?"

Carson said, "The colonists are in a stable mood. We already told them that there is a rescue spacecraft heading toward Mars and that they would have more than enough fuel for the return flight…"

The president nodded and signaled for Carson to stop speaking.

After a while, the president spoke.

"The second phase of the Ares program has completely failed. We need to start doing damage control.

"The BFS spacecraft is equipped with our most advanced space communications equipment. Boeing said that it would be better to crash the BFS spacecraft than to let the Chinese get their hands on the spacecraft."

It wasn't just communication equipment, but the spacecraft also contained environmental-control bio-security systems and cosmic ray shielding materials. These were all state-of-the-art technologies from America aerospace companies.

Although China might be ahead in the world in terms of the ion thruster propulsion system, the Americans dominated other aerospace technology fields.

The BFS spacecraft was the embodiment of the technology accumulated from hundreds of launch missions. If they allowed the Chinese to take that technology, it would be a huge loss to the American aerospace industry.

When Director Carson heard about the president's crazy plan, he began to sweat from his forehead.

He's talking about destroying a billion-dollar spacecraft!

Not to mention…

"But the high-power signal transmission equipment on the BFS is the only way we can get in touch with New Virginia. If we crash the BFS spacecraft…"

"The crash will happen after China's Starlight has reached Mars' orbit… We can make up an excuse and say the spacecraft has failed." The president continued, "No one will be on the spacecraft anyway. It'll just be a piece of metal falling out of the sky."

Director Carson said, "But… if the BFS spacecraft is destroyed, New Virginia will be completely isolated from our communication channel. This might make rescue efforts even more difficult."

"God will protect our heroes," said the president. He looked at the large console screen and muttered to himself, "If something goes wrong, we will give them our thoughts and prayers."

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Chapter 793: Falling!

In fact, Starlight arrived 79 hours earlier than Lu Zhou had expected.

After 41 days and 2 hours of flying, the fiery red planet gradually appeared in the view of the Starlight porthole.

Liu Biao squinted and looked outside the porthole. He watched as the bright sun slowly rose from the edge of the fiery red silhouette. He watched the billowing sand waves tumble like a sea of fire.

"This is a mess… But the scenery is quite pretty."

"Yeah." Xu Zhenghong nodded and pressed his helmet. He said, "This is Starlight, we have entered Mars' gravitational system. Successfully entered orbit a-1."

They waited quietly for about five minutes.

A noisy unstable sound came from Earth, which was tens of millions of kilometers away.

"This is the ground command center, congratulations on completing your mission… Please begin active braking procedures and prepare to approach Mars. Orbital navigation will be handled by the onboard computer. Good luck."

"Roger that."

Since they were tens of millions of kilometers away from Earth, the ground command center obviously couldn't control the spacecraft in real time.

The orbit change plan had already been coded in the spacecraft computer in advance. The pilot would complete the orbit change plan with the help of the onboard computer.

Of course, even though this sounded complicated, it was much easier in practice.

Starlight had a high degree of automation control. Unless an edge case happened, generally the pilot only needed to keep his eyes on the speed dial and make sure the spacecraft didn't deviate from orbit.

Liu Biao: "Are we landing? Or are we waiting for them to come to us?"

Xu Zhenghong: "The New Virginia life support system has a return capsule. They will return to the BFS spacecraft using their return capsule. Then we will return to orbit."

They would also drop their "spying space probe".

Of course, this was a top-secret mission. This was personally arranged by Chief Designer Lu Zhou. Even Liu Biao wasn't told about this mission.

Liu Biao: "Ok… What if they don't come back?"

Xu Zhenghong said, "Then we'll give them our thoughts and prayers… Remember to take photo evidence, make sure the Americans don't blame us."

"No problems, I'll start taking photos now!"

Liu Biao smiled and reached out to press a button on the console.

"Not yet."

Xu Zhenghong smiled.

However, his face suddenly froze.

He looked at the silver-colored spacecraft outside the window. His pupils contracted. He placed his hand on his helmet.

"This is Starlight… The American spacecraft seems to be in a little bit of trouble."

Five minutes went by.

The command center voice came through the communication channel.

"What's happening?"

Xu Zhenghong squinted and stared at the silver spacecraft in the distance.

He didn't know why, but he felt like something was wrong.

Liu Biao looked in the same direction and turned on the ranging lidar, and he aimed the lidar at the target spacecraft.

Even though this device was used to measure the distance of meteorites, it could also be used to target spacecraft.

Xu Zhenghong looked at the velocity meter on the lidar and took a deep breath.

"BFS spacecraft is falling… I repeat, BFS spacecraft is falling!"

…

It had been more than a month since the distress signal was issued from Mars.

Accurately speaking, it had been 41 days and 2 hours.

Due to the lack of light and electricity, the crops in the planting area had withered.

In order to save energy, two weeks ago, they restricted their range of activities to the experiment room and cut off power to all other areas. The reason for this was because the experiment room contained the only control terminal that could receive and send data to the BFS spacecraft.

Even then, they were running low on resources.

They would die from hypoxia in the next 42 hours…

A trembling female voice broke the silence in the experiment room.

"Are they going to save us?" Julia helplessly glanced outside the window with a look of despair.

There was no chance of hoping the sandstorm would stop.

It seemed like the sandstorm would last for at least six months.

Johnson leaned on the window while holding a picture in his hand. He answered with a weak voice, "Definitely."

Even though he answered enthusiastically, there wasn't an ounce of optimism on his face.

"Maybe not," Travis said. "Maybe they'd rather us die."

Julia's eyes widened, and she asked, "Why?"

Travis: "Think about it. If we die, we will die as heroes. If we live, they'll have to give supplies and bring us home… It's a negative play for them."

"Enough!"

Johnson suddenly growled.

The cabin went silent for a second.

Travis frowned and spoke with an unhappy tone.

"Hey, is there something wrong with what I said?"

Johnson stood up and looked at Travis.

"I just want you to shut your f*cking mouth, stop wasting oxygen."

"What does that supposed to mean? We're going to die anyway. Oh, you want some of this? Come on, I've had enough of you." Travis rubbed his hands and clenched his fists.

Julia saw that the two men were about to fight, so she used all of her energy to stand up and tried to stop them.

"Enough, calm down you two!"

Suddenly, they heard a muffled noise outside the life support system.

The two men stopped and looked outside the porthole.

Despite the heavy sandstorm, they could clearly see a ball of fire burning on the ground. At the same time, they saw a green dot flashing on the control terminal. Finally, the dot turned red.

A line of words flashed on the upper right corner of the control terminal.

[Connection lost.]

Johnson gulped. He looked horrified.

"Sh*t, our spacecraft!"

Travis quietly muttered, "Jesus Christ…"

The silence went on for a long time.

The fire exhausted all of the remaining oxygen and was eventually swallowed by the sandstorm…

Julia looked outside the porthole and asked with a quivering voice, "Are we going to die?"

No one answered her.

The BFR spacecraft had enough fuel to float in orbit for twenty years, but somehow a "failure" occurred…

Johnson used his index finger to draw a cross on his chest.

God, please protect me.

However, deep down, he knew that there was nothing God could do; this was the land of Ares…

Suddenly, the control terminal started to ring.

At first, he thought it was static noise, so he ignored it.

That was until the ringing became clearer and clearer…

Johnson saw [Connection Request] on the terminal, so he quickly rushed over and pressed the button.

Could this be aliens?

He hoped he wasn't imagining things.

It turned out it wasn't his imagination.

The moment the communication channel was connected, a voice traveled through his ears…

"This is Chinese astronaut Xu Zhenghong, how are you doing, my Martian friends?"

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BFR spacecraft is crashing towards Mars!

When Earth heard the news, they were already five minutes too late.

Lu Zhou was shocked; he didn't think NASA would be this cunning!

There was no way it was just a coincidence that the BFS spacecraft happened to crash right now.

Especially since it wouldn't be difficult to make a spacecraft self-destruct. They just had to drop the orbital height and let the gravity of Mars slowly pull the spacecraft to the surface.

Generally, after a satellite reached the end of its useful life, it would be manually guided to fall into the sea.

Lu Zhou didn't expect that the Americans would rather destroy the spacecraft than to let the Chinese astronauts have a look around the spacecraft.

Why are the Americans overreacting so badly?

Inside the ground command center, Hou Guang was standing next to Lu Zhou. Hou Guang opened his mouth and asked, "What do we do now?"

Lu Zhou thought for a second and replied, "Do we know where the BFS spacecraft crashed?"

Hou Guang shook his head and said, "We don't know the specific coordinates. And we can't observe the Mars surface due to the global sandstorm. However, we can roughly estimate the impact area."

Lu Zhou immediately replied, "Mark the estimated impact area. I need to know its relative position to the New Virginia village."

"Okay."

Lu Zhou stood beside the console and waited quietly for ten minutes. Soon a three-dimensional composition grid image was displayed on the screen. The New Virginia village was marked with a blue point, using coordinates provided by the United States. The estimated BFS impact area was painted with a red circle, with an area of around 40 square kilometers. The distance between New Virginia and the center point of the red circle was around 30 kilometers.

It would take the Mars rover an hour to drive from New Virginia to the BFS impact site.

Lu Zhou stared at the image for a while and suddenly had an idea. He looked at Hou Guang and said, "Ask Starlight to contact the New Virginia colonists."

Hou Guang: "Then what?"

"Then take them home." Lu Zhou smiled and said, "But we're going to charge them for the return ticket fee."

…

"I repeat, this is Chinese astronaut Xu Zhenghong. How are you doing, my Martian friends?"

The voice echoed in Johnson's head. He grabbed the headset and put it on his head.

He quickly replied, "We are good! No, we're not doing good… Did NASA send you guys? No, I meant—"

The other end of the communication channel interrupted Johnson, "Not quite. We are helping you out based on humanitarian principles, and we are not employed by anyone. If you want to go home safely, please follow our instructions."

Johnson could tell something smelled fishy, so he frowned and asked, "What do you want us to do?"

Xu Zhenghong: "Please open the data transmission system."

Johnson hesitated for a bit before agreeing to Xu Zhenghong's request. He opened the data transmission system.

This was quite risky. If the other party were to implant a virus in the life support system, the other party could shut off their oxygen supply and kill them.

However, he was out of options.

If he wanted to go home, he had to follow the orders.

When the data transmission system was turned on, a progress bar popped up on the screen.

Johnson frowned and asked, "What is this?"

"We need to collect data to investigate the accident."

Why do you Chinese people have to investigate the accident?

However, now was not the time to complain.

Johnson looked at the progress bar and took a deep breath. He couldn't help but ask, "We just wait here until it is complete?"

"No, we need one more thing from you."

Johnson gulped and replied, "Yes?"

"The approximate location of the BFS spacecraft crash has been sent to your mission log. It is about thirty kilometers from New Virginia. Of course, I believe you have a more accurate way of determining the location of the BFS spacecraft. I don't care how you find the spacecraft, but I need you to recover the black box and sample the materials in the crash area…"

Xu Zhenghong paused for a second and spoke in a serious tone, "This is NASA's request."

Johnson gulped.

He didn't have time to think.

"But there is a sandstorm outside, we can't…"

"The atmosphere on Mars is only one percent as dense. There is nothing scary about a sandstorm. If you bring us what we want, we'll take care of you.

"That's it.

"I look forward to your good news."

The communication channel was closed.

Johnson looked at the screen and punched the wall.

"Goddamn it!"

Julia whispered, "Do you think NASA made the requests?"

Travis nervously said, "Hey man, who cares what they want, just give it to them. NASA abandoned us. Why else would they crash the BFS? Don't tell me it's an accident!"

Johnson went silent.

After a long time, he seemed to have made a decision. He slowly said, "Prepare the rover."

"Okay."

Travis obeyed Johnson's order.

After all, this was his chance to go home.

Johnson looked out the porthole and suddenly sighed. He muttered to himself, "Whether or not this is NASA's request, BFS is gone. We can only contact Starlight… We have to believe them."

He still had a wife waiting for him.

And two beautiful children.

No matter what, he had to go home!

If NASA wanted to abandon them, then there was nothing wrong with working with the Chinese…

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Chapter 795: Successful Rescue!

Mars' orbit.

The cockpit was silent.

Liu Biao quietly waited for the other side of the communication channel to reply. He took a deep breath and suddenly spoke.

"Captain."

Xu Zhenghong: "What?"

Liu Biao: "Are we doing the right thing?"

"What's wrong with nations exchanging favors? They would do the same to us." Xu Zhenghong looked at the red planet and said, "Not to mention we can't just do favors for free."

Liu Biao asked, "What if they don't find what we want?"

Xu Zhenghong went silent for a second and replied, "Then it would be a loss for us."

But they would still continue the rescue.

This was what Professor Lu told them to do…

…

On the surface of Mars.

The metal alloy doors of the life support system slowly opened. A red Mars rover drove out of the door and onto the billowing sand.

Johnson looked at the green dot on the radar. He was filled with a range of emotions.

Obviously, NASA wouldn't issue them such a ridiculous task. The Chinese astronaut was obviously lying.

But if he wanted to go home, he had no other choice…

With the radar helping with navigation, Johnson quickly arrived at the destination.

The rover was parked near the impact zone. Johnson, who was already in his spacesuit, got out of the rover and walked toward the BFS with a toolbox in his hand.

"Sh*t… It's completely destroyed."

Johnson sampled the BFS spacecraft materials and stored them in a special sample box.

The closer he was to the impact center, the more debris there was.

He carefully stepped over the metal fragments. He took out a cutting gun from his toolbox and turned on the cutting gun. He soon cut a circular opening onto the spacecraft cabin.

Johnson sighed and put the cutting gun again.

"Sigh… Time to get to work."

He grabbed the metal bars on the outside of the BFS spacecraft and slid into the cabin.

"Black box… Let me think… I think it's under the pilot's seat…"

Johnson turned on his spacesuit flashlight and wiped the sand and dust off his spacesuit helmet. He started walking toward the cockpit.

In fact, just like Lu Zhou had guessed, there was indeed a black box on the BFS spacecraft. The black box recorded a series of data such as the BFS spacecraft launch calculations, as well as communication records.

If the BFS spacecraft happened to crash on Mars, it was the colonists' job to recover the black box.

However, it wasn't the colonists' job to hand over the black box to the Chinese…

Johnson found a green suitcase with a reflective strip under the pilot's seat. He paused for a second, shook his head, and began to walk out of the cabin…

Thirty kilometers away, inside the life support system.

Julia and Travis were left behind in the experiment cabin. They anxiously waited for the news from their Captain Johnson.

Travis looked outside the porthole and didn't see anything except yellow sand.

Suddenly, the experiment cabin door opened. Johnson, wearing a spacesuit, walked in. He was covered in sand.

He was holding a green box and a small suitcase.

Travis smiled and walked up to him, but Johnson ignored him. Johnson walked straight to the console and connected the data cable to the suitcase. He then pressed the communication button.

"We have what you want."

Static noises were heard.

A clear voice came from the communication channel.

"Congratulations, you have earned your return ticket. Please enter the return capsule and begin ignition. We will be in New Virginia air space in five minutes."

"Roger that."

Johnson unplugged the cable and looked at his two teammates. He sighed in relief.

"We're going home."

…

The New Virginia escape capsule was located at the center of the life support system, directly above the methane generator.

During an emergency, the colonists would have to enter the escape capsule and begin the escape procedure. The oxygen and methane reserves in the life support system would be injected into the engine of the escape capsule. The escape capsule would then fly to the BFS spacecraft.

Of course, the BFS spacecraft was destroyed by NASA.

Even though Johnson had no evidence that NASA purposely destroyed the BFS spacecraft, Johnson knew NASA was behind all this.

He knew NASA purposely gave up on them.

This made him feel slightly better about helping China…

The silver-white escape capsule separated from the life support system, leaving dust and smoke behind.

This was the end of their failed colonization mission.

Of course, even though they failed, they gained experience and knowledge. This would pave the way for their successors…

The escape capsule headed toward the starry sky, gradually merging into orbit. After half an hour of floating, it was finally captured by the arms of Starlight.

The large and small spacecrafts slowly approached one another.

"New Virginia capsule is in orbit… Our oxygen levels are running low, we need help."

"This is Starlight, we have received your request. Please wait patiently for rescue."

The hatch slowly opened, and a thick and long mechanical arm extended out of the cabin and grabbed the escape capsule. The capsule was then slowly dragged into Starlight's cargo area.

This system was originally intended to be used for recovering space trash and dead satellites, but it was also technically feasible for fetching escape capsules.

On the other hand, in Jin Ling City, the lunar orbit project committee held a press conference with regard to the rescue operation.

When the reporters at the conference heard that the BFS spacecraft had crashed onto Mars, the conference room went into chaos. Johnson's wife, who came all the way to China, was in tears.

However, just a few hours later, everything changed.

News of the escape capsule entering orbit, Starlight arriving in their target airspace, and other news of the recovery operation slowly started to flow. Reporters, as well as members of the US embassy, at the scene held their breaths as they waited nervously for the result.

At last, when the news of the successful rescue reached Jinling's ground command center, it was instantly spread to the press conference. The big screen at the conference read "all three astronauts were rescued".

Everyone saw the words on the screen…

The press conference was filled with thunderous applause.

"Jesus Christ… Thank you! Thank you! I'm sorry, I don't know what to say…"

A crying woman held Lu Zhou's hand. Her legs felt weak. A staff member quickly supported her, and it almost seemed like she was going to faint.

Lu Zhou gave her a comforting look and told the staff member to take care of her.

Her husband was finally safe.

For the past month, her life had been nothing but torture.

Now that the knot in her heart was finally untied, she could finally get a good night's rest.

Chen Yunhai, director of the Lunar Orbit Committee organization department, stood in front of the camera and solemnly announced the victory of the rescue operation. He also announced the return timeline of Starlight.

The US embassy members were standing at one side, and they wiped the tears off their faces and began applauding.

The Americans had lost the space race; there was no doubt about it.

But…

They couldn't help but applaud…

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Chapter 796: Finesse

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

After Starlight recovered the escape capsule, Starlight continued to orbit around Mars for a couple of days. It then began the return flight procedure and started to switch orbit.

Xu Zhenghong took out a key, inserted it into the console, then twisted it. A black item was released from Starlight's cargo storage and began to fall toward the fiery red planet.

Liu Biao caught a glimpse of the black object. He looked out the porthole, but he couldn't see anything.

"Did you see something outside the window just now?" he asked.

Xu Zhenghong stared at the speed diameter on the console. He reached out and pressed the main engine button.

"I didn't see anything, you must be imagining stuff."

Liu Biao was sure he saw something.

He was an ex-fighter jet pilot. He had the eyes of an eagle.

"Did they drop something?"

"No." Xu Zhenghong casually changed the topic, "Once we finish accelerating, go say hi to them. Give them a quick rundown of Starlight's components and place them in the guest cabin. Oh yeah, make sure to turn on your recorder and keep the black box safe."

Liu Biao smiled and gave a thumbs-up gesture.

"Roger that."

…

It took less than ten minutes between the escape capsule breaking through Mars' atmosphere and it being recovered by Starlight. The camera installed on the outside of the Starlight cabin captured this beautiful moment.

This twenty-minute long video was transmitted back to Jinling ground command center. It was then sent to the CTV "Mars Rescue" editing room, marking the end of the documentary.

The documentary was finally complete.

The day after the Lunar Orbit Committee announced the successful rescue mission, CTV released the full version of the "Mars Rescue" documentary.

The total length of the documentary was 120 minutes. After some digital processing, the distress signal from Mars detected by the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope was restored. Everything from the White House's call for help, to the Communist Party of China giving instructions, to Starlight beginning its rescue mission within 15 minutes of receiving the distress signal… They were all captured in the documentary.

A digital version of the documentary was released on major video and social media sites in China.

The comment section of the documentary exploded.

[Starlight is nutty! Professor Lu is nutty! (national flag)]

[Fifteen minutes response time!]

[I want the Moon Palace to be open to the public! I want a chance to go to the Moon!!]

[The Americans sent someone to Mars, but we had to rescue them, hmm… Does this count as a victory for us?]

[I think it does…]

[I noticed that the rescue mission costs were US$1.714 billion. The Americans only paid US$1 billion. Why did we have to spend US$714 million to save their people? Aren't we competing in a space race right now? If I were the chief designer, I would definitely force the Americans to pay the full amount!]

[Well then, thank goodness you're not the chief designer.]

[…]

The wave of comments flooded the website. The "Mars Rescue" was soon uploaded to YouTube.

Even though NASA's inefficiency throughout the entire debacle angered many netizens, the White House calling for help at the right time still earned them a lot of brownie points.

The generous and responsible attitude shown by China during the rescue mission also added a touch of respect and prestige to the country's image.

Even though there were competitions between the different nations on Earth, in space, everyone was from the same planet.

Regardless of the unknown motives behind this mission, being able to rescue someone from tens of millions of kilometers away was something worth remembering in history.

Of course, the Lunar Orbit Committee was the one that deserved the most praise.

With a fifteen-minute response time, the efficiency and speed of execution shocked everyone around the world…

Three days after the press conference.

Lu Zhou was drinking tea with Director Li inside his Jinling Institute for Advanced Study office.

They happened to talk about the comments on the Internet when Lu Zhou spoke emotionally.

"Sometimes I think that if you don't influence public opinion, someone else will. We have been too passive in this regard."

The space race had been going on for more than 1 year and a half.

The Lunar Orbit Committee had been established for quite some time. They even sent a space station into lunar orbit. However, this was their first time receiving global praise.

Director Li nodded and spoke emotionally as well.

"Yeah, but that isn't something we can change overnight."

Lu Zhou nodded and didn't say anything else.

Just like Director Li had said, some things couldn't be changed overnight.

Whether it was constructing a tower or building up one's public reputation, it all required time.

Director Li paused for a second. He then suddenly asked, "Oh yeah, speaking of which, did you get the BFS spacecraft black box?"

Lu Zhou nodded and said, "We did."

Director Li went silent for a while and said, "I'm afraid this isn't easy to deal with."

They couldn't conceal the truth.

There was no reason for the three Martian colonists to keep this a secret.

Even though they knew that this wouldn't be a huge deal, it would still damage their reputation.

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "There's nothing difficult. Just copy the data and give them the box back."

Director Li suddenly replied, "Do an accident appraisal. Then send the accident appraisal report together with the black box."

Lu Zhou didn't know what Director Li meant at first, but he quickly caught on.

"You're quite good at finessing."

Director Li frowned and replied, "What is finessing?"

Lu Zhou coughed and said, "Nothing… It's kind of like street smart."

"Damn you millennial, speak normally." Director Li smiled and stood up from the sofa. He said, "Okay, I won't bother you anymore, I still have to go to a meeting at the launch site. Do you want to come as well?"

Lu Zhou finished his tea and stood up as well.

"I'll send you out."

"I knew you didn't want to go." Director Li smiled and said, "I'll go by myself then."

"Take it easy."

After Director Li left the office, Lu Zhou took out his phone and looked at the time.

The black object he dropped on Mars should have landed by now…

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Chapter 797: Crawling All Terrain Survey Vehicle

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

After Director Li left, Lu Zhou took the elevator straight to the second basement floor of the main building at the Institute for Advanced Study. He walked through the hidden sample room and entered the secret third level basement.

This was his underground laboratory.

All of the system debris rewards were stored here, which was managed by Xiao Ai.

The moment he entered the laboratory, a quad-rotor drone with a display flew over.

Lu Zhou looked at Xiao Ai and asked, "How's the crawler going?"

The so-called "crawler" obviously referred to the all-terrain remote-control exploration vehicle on Mars. This was one of his past system mission rewards.

Unlike the carbon nanofiber clothes, this gadget obviously contained much more sophisticated technology.

According to the manual, its communication radius was 3 astronomical units. Even if Mars and Earth were at their farthest relative position, the all-terrain crawler could still be controlled.

Lu Zhou was very interested in the communication technology contained in this gadget. He tried to disassemble this thing, but he couldn't find a non-destructive disassembly method. The manual also clearly said it had a built-in self-destruction program, which could lead to unpredictable consequences.

This gadget was obviously similar to the nitrogen shield.

He could either shoot at it with the scanner gun, or just use it as it was.

Fortunately, unlike the nitrogen shield, this wasn't a one-time-use device. According to the manual, this gadget could be charged with solar and geothermal energy. When its energy level was low, it would automatically enter its low-energy standby mode and wait for its battery to recharge.

Considering the fact that Lu Zhou already had a space station on the moon, his only choice was to put this crawler on Mars.

That way, not only could he survey resources for future colonists, but he could also explore the New Virginia site and see what happened there.

Xiao Ai: [It has successfully landed on Mars! We can begin at any time!]

Lu Zhou nodded and said, "Let's begin now."

Xiao Ai: [Yes, sir! (๑•̀ᄇ•́) و]

The control terminal of the "Crawler" all-terrain survey vehicle was a heavy notebook computer, which was also equipped with a signal transmitting and receiving device the size of a fridge. The signal transmitting and receiving device was installed by Lu Zhou beside the rooftop water tank. It was quite discreet.

However, even if someone felt like it was suspicious, they had no right to investigate.

This was because the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study played a crucial role in controllable fusion and aerospace research. Even the military research departments would have a hard time obtaining access to these buildings.

So far, the terminal of the crawler was connected and controlled by Xiao Ai.

Five minutes after Lu Zhou's order, a black prism-shaped box on Mars made a gas-leak sound.

The shell of the box slowly opened. A remote-controlled vehicle that was less than a meter tall with angular edges appeared. It followed its preset instructions and began heading toward the New Virginia site.

On the other hand, Lu Zhou, who was in his underground laboratory, made a cup of coffee for himself. He then sat down at the experimental table and opened the survey vehicle control terminal.

He quietly waited for the communication delay. Finally, the signal traveled tens of millions of kilometers and a dialog box popped up on his screen.

["Lightning" escape capsule activated!]

["Crawler" activated!]

[Terminal successfully connected!]

A crystal clear video feed was shown on the screen. Lu Zhou drank his coffee as he watched the crawler drive through the harsh climate.

Due to the five minute long delay, it was obviously impossible for him to control this vehicle. However, this vehicle had some built-in intelligence, and using its preset instructions, it could complete its tasks without any human intervention.

The person sitting in front of the control terminal only had to look at the signals sent every minute or even ten minutes, and to look out for edge cases.

Actually, Xiao Ai could do this job for him. But Lu Zhou was curious. That life support system was the embodiment of North America's state of the art biosphere technology. He wanted to see what it was like.

After a while, the outline of the life support system could be seen through the crawler camera feed.

Lu Zhou looked at the tragic "remains" of the biosphere. He thought back to the concept map published by Space-X and couldn't help but feel bad for the Ares program.

After the escape capsule was launched, the entire life support system was abandoned. The remaining power was enough to sustain the life support system for a period of time, but it wouldn't last long.

The escape capsule took away almost all of the remaining oxygen and methane. Not to mention the tail flame of the capsule damaged the shell of the life support system.

When the crawler drove through the gardening area, Lu Zhou could clearly observe through the camera that the vegetables had been destroyed by the escape capsule flames.

However, these were all just minor problems. After all, ever since the global sandstorm, the colonists had abandoned all of the crops.

The crawler drove up to the garage door, and it extended its arm and unlocked the garage door.

The crawler turned on its lights and went into the garage.

Lu Zhou looked at the life support system through the screen and couldn't help but think.

His "Garden" research project was attacked by unknown forces. He had doubts it was the CIA, but there was no evidence. He never would have imagined that he would obtain new artificial biosphere technology this way.

Maybe this was the so-called karma.

Even though he didn't believe in karma.

The crawler passed through the garage and went into the experimental area. Lu Zhou looked at the plastic bags and imagined what the last couple of weeks were like living here.

In order to conserve living resources and energy, the colonists moved into the same room. They stayed in the only room that had the communication terminal.

Lu Zhou couldn't help but feel sympathetic.

He imagined the poor colonists arriving on Starlight and finding out that they could finally take a shower in Starlight's guest cabin.

The crawler drove to the laboratory console. It extended its arm and inserted the arm into the console.

Soon, the screen lit up, showing a progress bar.

The progress bar was completed. The data was being transmitted to Lu Zhou, who was tens of millions of kilometers away.

Lu Zhou quickly looked through the files and had a serious look on his face.

He was even a little shocked.

"Interesting…"

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Chapter 798: Traces of Underground Ice?

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

America's artificial biosphere technology was state of the art.

There were no problems with the design of the entire life support system unit. In fact, one could even make the argument that the design was perfect.

From the air circulation system to the water filtration system and automatic planting irrigation device, each resource was utilized to its maximum efficiency. The biosphere was on the boundary of science fiction.

There was even a three-diameter circular interface door on the side of the life support system, presumably for future colony expansion uses.

Space-X and NASA wanted to expand New Virginia into a hundred-person colony. They wanted to create an ecosystem cycle using the rich methane and carbon dioxide resources.

The only problem, or the only problem Lu Zhou could find, was that the Ares program was executed too hastily. They just happened to encounter a global sandstorm…

This was 70% nature's fault, and 30% human's fault.

If this sandstorm didn't come so suddenly, maybe the New Virginia colonists would have had more success on Mars. Once the geothermal wells and methane collection points were deployed, even during a sandstorm, these collection points could supply energy to the electric generator.

Of course, this was all in hindsight.

After Lu Zhou downloaded the data of the life support system, the crawler opened the sample library door.

The alloy door slowly opened, and highly concentrated carbon dioxide air immediately flowed into the experimental area. If there were a living person there, it would be difficult for them to breathe.

However, this wasn't a problem for the crawler.

The little guy drove through the dusty corridor and quickly arrived at the sample library. Rows of neatly arranged sample racks could be seen through the camera lens.

According to the labels attached to the sample rack, the rock samples of areas around New Virginia were stored. The numbers and letters represented the coordinates of the samples.

Even though these astronauts on Mars were called "colonists", they were more focused on scientific investigations.

These precious samples were part of their research tasks.

"It seems like the experimental area doesn't have a direct channel to the sample library… It's a pity we can't take these things away," Lu Zhou said as he looked at the samples.

If he could bring these samples back to Earth, it would greatly benefit humans' understanding of Mars.

Unfortunately, the colonists weren't able to take these samples into their escape capsule.

Xiao Ai: [Master, do you want to begin the scan?]

Lu Zhou nodded and said, "Yeah, begin."

After quietly waiting for five or six minutes, the Mars crawler drove to the first row of the sample racks. A searchlight-looking component slowly came out from the top of the crawler.

A clear blue light emerged from the searchlight, shining on the shelf samples.

The reflected light was received by the crawler and fed into a special processing algorithm. A series of physical features such as the size of the rock, weight, and element composition was sent to Lu Zhou.

Location and retrieval depth data of the samples were also sent to Lu Zhou.

Within 10 minutes, Lu Zhou saw a circular sample distribution map in front of him. The map was around 10-20 kilometers in diameter.

Lu Zhou looked at the map and suddenly seemed curious.

He was already satisfied with collecting the life support system data; he didn't expect to retrieve even more useful information!

According to the map, there were at least two methane gas emitting craters near New Virginia, as well as a possible underground ice layer!

In March 2019, the European Space Agency's Mars space probe found traces of liquid water under the Martian Antarctic ice sheet. NASA also previously published the discovery of perchlorate in craters. However, these resources were located in extreme conditions and difficult to retrieve.

If they could find a shallow underground ice layer, it would benefit the future Mars colonists!

"It seems like NASA has more information about Mars…"

Lu Zhou stared at the area marked with the suspected underground ice layer. He pondered for a moment before tapping the keyboard.

Xiao Ai immediately knew what he meant.

Xiao Ai: [Master, do you want to explore this area?]

Lu Zhou nodded and said, "Yeah, after the crawler finishes investigating the New Virginia village, tell it to explore that area. If it finds the underground ice layer, tell me immediately."

Xiao Ai: [Yes, sir! (๑•̀ᄇ•́) و]

Lu Zhou finally saw what kind of high-tech life support system NASA had, and his curiosity was satisfied.

He left the crawler alone because Xiao Ai could execute the orders for him.

After telling Xiao Ai to keep the life support system in its original appearance, Lu Zhou copied the life support system data onto a mobile hard drive. He then took the hard drive and returned to the first floor of the Institute for Advanced Study building.

He took out his phone, opened his address book, and called a number.

The phone immediately connected.

A husky voice was heard.

"Hello?"

Lu Zhou: "Is this Professor Hu?"

Hu Yang paused for a second and replied, "You are Professor Lu?"

"Yes, it's Lu Zhou." Lu Zhou paused for a second before asking, "Where are you right now?"

"I'm in the aerospace institute at the Chinese Academy of Sciences… Why?"

"Ok." Lu Zhou skipped the small talk and said, "If you are free, please come to the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study. I can't tell you why over the phone. We have to meet in person."

Professor Hu held his breath.

He asked with excitement, "Is this related to the Garden project?"

Lu Zhou's reply was exactly what Professor Hu wanted.

"Correct, it's related to the Garden project!"

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Chapter 799: "Bridge" to the Moon

Ever since the armed attack on Biosphere A, part of the experimental data was destroyed and the Garden project was stalled.

Even though none of the research institutes had terminated their cooperation with the Garden program, many foreign research institutes were considering whether to withdraw due to security reasons.

The project researchers had been reallocated to the Institute of Aerospace Technology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Biosphere A had already begun reconstruction. Local military forces had increased their presence. However, some of the losses were irreparable.

Nearly half a year of the Garden project's results were destroyed. Professor Hu, as the project leader, suffered the most and lost a ton of weight.

Even though no one was blaming him, he was blaming himself.

Therefore, after he received the phone call from Professor Lu and heard that Professor Lu had something important to tell him about the Garden project, he immediately left Beijing and rushed off to Jinling.

After a long journey, he finally arrived at the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study dean's office.

"This is what I wanted to give you." Lu Zhou took out a hard drive from his drawer and sat down on the sofa. He handed it to Professor Hu and said solemnly, "I hope you can make good use of the data."

Hu Yang looked at the hard drive and hesitated for a bit before asking, "What is this?"

"Data from Mars."

The office went quiet for three seconds.

Professor Hu gulped and asked, "Is this… legal?"

Lu Zhou smiled and replied, "Depends on how you use it. It's definitely not legal to publish in a journal. You also can't discuss it with any foreign expert. But anything else should be legal."

Hu Yang reached out and tried to grab the hard drive, but Lu Zhou didn't let go.

Professor Hu looked up at Lu Zhou with a confused expression.

Lu Zhou looked at Professor Hu and said, "Remember, once you have this, you could be on a CIA list."

Hu Yang smiled and said, "Whatever, I'm probably already on a list."

The moment China displayed their interest in colonizing space, the Garden project was bound to be targeted. He, as the leader of the Garden project, was doomed from the beginning.

He tried to grab the hard drive again.

This time, Lu Zhou let go.

Professor Hu looked at the hard drive and suddenly said, "Once the Garden plan is completed, we will be able to colonize the solar system."

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Forget about the solar system, we'll be able to conquer much more than that."

It was just a matter of time.

…

After Hu Yang returned to Beijing with Lu Zhou's data, he immediately contacted several key researchers who worked on the Garden project and set up an independent research group. This research group was specifically dedicated to researching valuable experimental data.

On the other hand, Starlight, which was thousands of kilometers away, successfully entered the Mars-Earth return orbit. There was no doubt that Starlight would return to Earth safely, so the Internet discussion gradually cooled down.

After the astronauts returned to Earth, CTV would conduct an interview…

A lot of things happened on Earth during Starlight's month and a half long journey back to Earth.

NASA was going full force ahead with its Ares program and Lunar Gateway project. China, on the other hand, was focusing on Star Sky Technology and developing lunar resources.

The first phase of the Moon Palace project was complete. Once the six astronauts entered the lunar space station, human civilization would be on their way to colonizing the Moon.

The space station suspended in lunar orbit was like a global "spaceport". Maybe in a decade or two, people would look at the starry skies and see a populated Moon…

Of course, this was just the beginning.

After countless days of design and planning, Chief Designer Lu's "Earth-Moon orbital transport system" finally went from a blueprint to reality.

After soliciting opinions from the Internet, the first "Earth-Moon orbital transport system" spacecraft was named "Magpie Bridge".

The Magpie Bridge design was similar to that of Skyglow; they both had a single propulsion engine at the rear of the spacecraft. They controlled the propulsion direction by changing the speeds of various engines. However, instead of the five engines in Skyglow, the Magpie Bridge had four engines. The Magpie Bridge also went from a shuttle-shaped design to a rectangular parallelepiped, and the wings were removed.

It looked more like a bulky ship that was going to go back and forth between the Earth and the Moon.

The Magpie Bridge was deployed and sent into low-Earth orbit by the Long March 9 rocket. The Lunar Orbit Committee's Earth-Moon transfer capacity rose to a new level.

The transportation of materials from low-Earth orbit to lunar orbit would be completed by this ion thruster propulsion spacecraft, which was specifically designed for outer space navigation. The Magpie Bridge reached a carrying capacity of 500-750 tons!

So far, the Lunar Orbit Committee was considering whether to rent a unity module from the International Space Station to hold their "transit supplies".

If this cooperation were to go through, the International Space Station would become a supply transfer station between lunar orbit and low-Earth orbit.

From now on, if someone wanted to send something to the Moon, they only had to send it to the ISS, which would then send it to the Moon by using the Magpie Bridge.

This way, smaller aerospace companies could participate in the lunar orbit project!

A high-thrust propulsion system would no longer be a requirement for the Earth-Moon transfer. The most difficult voyage would be done by Star Sky Technology's giant "ship".

Lu Zhou didn't even realize that he was building an interplanetary transport company.

Most people would have never imagined that Space-X's vision was being executed by a Chinese company…

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Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

Aerospace Science and Technology Institute director's office.

After Hou Guang saw Lu Zhou's proposal, he hesitated for a second before asking, "Mining on the Moon?"

Lu Zhou nodded and replied, "Yeah."

Lu Zhou didn't seem like he was joking. Hou Guang put on his glasses and began reading through the proposal abstract.

After a couple of minutes, he placed the proposal on the table and looked at Lu Zhou.

"I've finished reading the proposal… So… You want to design a device that can automatically mine shallow ore deposits on the Moon?"

Lu Zhou: "Correct."

Correct…

Lu Zhou is treating this so casually.

Hou Guang couldn't help but smile.

"We have only just completed the first phase of the Moon Palace project, now we're moving on the lunar mining… Are we moving too fast?"

Lu Zhou shook his head and said, "Not fast at all. The Moon Palace project itself is a project aiming toward the development of lunar resources. Now that the Magpie Bridge is in service, I think it is about time we move from lunar orbit to lunar surface."

The 2020s was the beginning of the "Moon Age".

If someone wanted to mine resources on the Moon a couple of years ago, it would be impossible to achieve. But in 2021, lunar mining was feasible.

NASA's Lunar Gateway program, the Moon Express company receiving funding, the European Space Agency signing a contract with rocket manufacturer Ariane Group… These were all events that pointed toward lunar resource mining.

Take the MX series of detectors made by the Moon Express as an example. It was able to collect and retrieve 20kg of Moon rock samples. According to their research and development plan, they were focusing on mining shallow deposits in low gravity environments.

Of course, Lu Zhou didn't care about his competitor's actions; he just didn't want to wait any longer.

The key to completing the second phase of the special "Control of Earth and Moon" mission chain was to build a semi-permanent scientific research station on the Moon.

If he only wanted to complete the main system mission, he could do it right now with Star Sky Technology's current available technology.

However, he would be missing out on other rewards.

Some of the branch missions were impossible, but some might be achievable. Lu Zhou didn't want to give up those mission rewards too easily.

One of the branch missions was to mine and smelt 100 tons of titanium alloy on the surface of the Moon, as well as collecting 50 tons of lunar soil.

Now that the first phase of the Moon Palace project was complete, the second phase was about to begin. They would require a lot of construction materials. Fortunately, the Moon happened to have an abundance of titanium ore reserves.

If they could use the Moon's resources as construction materials and create a "self-sustaining" lunar construction system, they could greatly cut down the project costs.

Also, in Lu Zhou's opinion, this was his only chance at expanding the Moon production scale.

Once the second phase of the Moon Palace project was complete, the remaining phase would be to modify the lunar space station.

By that time, he would no longer need an abundance of titanium alloy materials…

Of course, even though lunar mining was theoretically possible, there were many hurdles.

The low-temperature and low-gravity working environment of the Moon, the high staffing costs, and the automation technology requirements… These were all barriers that they had to overcome.

Hou Guang scratched his head and contemplated it for a second.

Lu Zhou suddenly threw this idea in his face, so he didn't have any time to form an opinion. He said, "How about you leave the plan here with me? I'll do some research on my own… However, industrial production is not my expertise, so I'll have to consult experts."

Lu Zhou nodded and said, "I've already done my research. This was discussed at the weekly Lunar Orbit Committee meeting. The theoretical research has already been done."

He paused for a second before adding, "I'll contact Shenyang Machine Tool as well as the two state aerospace companies. We won't be alone in this project. The top industrial automation and aerospace equipment companies will help us. There will be at least three academicians involved, and I will be the project leader. You'll have to handle some of the more troublesome parts. If you need more people, feel free to tell me."

Hou Guang quickly said, "It's fine, there are enough people!"

One academician would have a group of noob researchers working for them, not to mention scholars from the Changjiang Scholars Program, associate professors, post-doc fellows, and PhD students. One academician had an entire research army behind them.

And they had three academicians…

Coordinating the project teams would be a difficult task in and of itself.

Hou Guang couldn't help but think.

Professor Lu is the only person in the world that can recruit three academicians so easily…

…

The same proposal plan appeared on the Chinese president's desk.

After the president read the proposal, he took off his glasses and looked at Director Li of the State Administration for National Defense.

"Did Professor Lu write this?"

Director Li nodded and replied, "Yeah."

"Has there been a meeting about this?"

"There has."

"What do other experts think?"

"Academician Yuan from the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation thinks this is worth a try. Chief Engineer Yang Zhongquan of Shenyang Machine Tool agrees. Even though it will be difficult, it is not impossible. It will greatly help our country's automation industry," Director Li said.

After hearing Director Li, the president nodded.

"Our country is honored to have a scholar like Professor Lu."

He picked up the pen from his table and signed the document. He then stamped it with a bright red stamp.

"Approved!"

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Chapter 801: Welcome Home!

The Lunar Orbit Committee was preparing to begin construction on the Moon's surface. It had been a month since Starlight left Mars.

The last orbital change was complete, and Starlight had consumed most of its working medium. It had already turned off its ion thruster systems and was now relying on its inertia for the rest of the journey.

Travis had already gotten used to living on Starlight.

They had clean bedding, plenty of oxygen, and delicious food.

He spent more than a month in a small experimental room in New Virginia. Compared to that, life on Starlight was heaven.

The Chinese had a much better bathing system than NASA. Starlight had a one-person bathroom that simulated a gravitational environment by using centrifugal acceleration.

Simply speaking, after the device began to rotate, taking a bath on Starlight would feel exactly the same as taking a bath on Earth. Gone were the floating water drops.

After the person finished bathing, an air intake outlet would suck every drop of water out of the bathroom, and only then, would the cylinder stop rotating.

The bathroom was almost like a giant centrifuge.

The BFS spacecraft would never have such an extravagant way of bathing.

Of course, the moment they stepped onto Starlight, they had to carefully calculate every drop of their resources. However, Starlight had plenty of electricity…

The only thing that Travis was unhappy with was the lack of freedom.

He only had a single bed in a small room, with no furniture except a foldable table under his bed. He couldn't even leave his room outside of eating and bathing. He killed time by sleeping.

The depressing atmosphere made it impossible for Travis to feel comfortable. The round portholes showed nothing but the empty dark space. It gave off a deep-sea submarine vibe.

The Heart of Gold had luxurious furniture and an entertainment system. Starlight, on the other hand, was like a garbage truck.

It was almost like Travis was in jail.

Travis looked at Johnson, who was in his own room, and asked, "How long until we arrive on Earth?"

Johnson was sitting on his bed, reading through a book. He replied casually, "Maybe a month… maybe two months… Maybe longer."

The captain didn't seem to be interested in talking. Travis shrugged and couldn't help but say, "Why don't the Chinese allow us to walk around? Are they really afraid of us…"

"It's because we're not sure if you contracted any bacteria or viruses from living on Mars. We can't give you a full-body examination either," Liu Biao said as he floated over with a lunch box.

He placed the lunch box on the table outside their bedrooms and said, "I know the living conditions are harsh, but I hope you guys can power through. After all, this cabin was originally a cargo compartment. We never thought we would have to fly to Mars."

Travis looked at the Chinese astronaut and said, "Hey, buddy, can you give us a game console or something? Not everyone wants to read a damn book!"

Liu Biao smiled and said, "I'll relay your request to the ground command center. Maybe they'll give you a game console next time."

"Next time? I don't want to be here again!"

Liu Biao didn't reply. He turned around and left the guest cabin module.

After the cabin module door was locked, the bedroom doors unlocked. Travis muttered, "It feels like I'm in prison."

Johnson said, "We are asking them for a favor… At least they're bringing us back to Earth."

Travis thought about it and realized that Johnson was right.

He suddenly remembered something the Chinese astronaut said.

He gulped and spoke in a nervous tone.

"Captain…"

Johnson: "What…"

Travis: "If there are microorganisms and bacteria on Mars, does this mean we are…"

"Don't think too much." Johnson flipped through his book and casually said, "It is possible, but it's very unlikely."

Travis angrily slammed his fists on the heavy door.

"Sh*t, is that what the White House thinks of us? As laboratory mice?"

Julia was in her room, and she sat on her bed with her arms wrapped around her knees. She listened to the two guys as she quietly stared outside the porthole.

She had been using this time to reflect on her life, on her decisions, and her plans for the Ares program.

In the beginning, she didn't understand why her mission failed even though everyone tried their best.

But now, she finally realized that the outcome of the Ares program might not be an accident.

This hasty trip to Mars was an unwise decision from the beginning…

…

Starlight's journey back to Earth was faster than expected.

On the 50th day of Starlight's journey, a blue planet appeared outside the porthole.

"This is Starlight, currently entering the space station orbit, requesting navigation support."

"This is Moon Palace, providing navigation."

"Received, thanks."

After the communication, Starlight slowly merged into the Moon Palace orbit.

A silver-white structure slowly appeared in the porthole, with the sun shining behind.

Johnson was lying on his bed. He looked at the Moon Palace and put down his book. His blue pupils enlarged.

"Jesus… Is this the Chinese space station?"

He couldn't believe what he was seeing.

The image in front of him was much more shocking than the concept image.

The spacecraft slowly inched forward.

They were getting closer and closer to the space station.

The rice-sized space station eventually turned into a dragon.

The thousands of solar panels were like the dragon's wings. The heat sinks were like its scales. The cylindrical space modules were its limbs.

It was like a fortress.

Or a piece of art…

Xu Zhenghong, who was sitting in the Starlight cockpit, smiled with a tired look on his face. He reached out his fist and made a fist bump with Liu Bio. He then pressed the button on his helmet and spoke in a clear voice.

"This is Starlight, we have successfully entered orbit, requesting docking!"

Two seconds went by.

The other side replied, "This is Moon Palace.

"Welcome back, our heroes!"

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Chapter 802: A Little Trouble

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

Starlight was sailing in the deep dark space, and it slowly approached the silver "docking port".

A pair of long "landing gears" slowly extended out of Starlight. With the landing gears pointed toward the space station docking port, Starlight slowly approached the space station.

Johnson was sitting inside the cabin, and he watched the space station through his porthole. His heart was beating a million miles a minute, and his palms began to sweat.

Spacecraft docking was one of the most difficult areas of aerospace technology.

It required accurate industrial cameras, strong spacecraft materials, and sophisticated engine control technology. It also required a series of software requirements such as computer imaging and vision measurement.

It had especially tough requirements for the orbital altitude and the speed of the spacecraft. The engine control had to be accurate to within a second, a one-second mistake could result in a docking failure.

When the United States Project Gemini first came out, they had the goal of docking Gemini 6 with Gemini 7. The two spacecrafts were able to maintain a distance of 30 centimeters for 20 minutes, but they failed to eventually dock. It wasn't until the following year when the United States finally conquered the technology by docking Gemini 8 with an unmanned spacecraft.

The docking of manned spacecraft didn't happen until the seventies. This was when the United States and the Soviet Union finally shook hands and made peace, putting their efforts into aerospace together.

One of the main reasons why the Apollo program didn't launch their components in stages and docked in space was because of the technical difficulties. It was much easier to use a high-thrust rocket and launch all of the components together.

Compared to Travis and Julia, Johnson had been in NASA for much longer, so he knew how difficult docking was.

However, in the blink of an eye, the Starlight landing gears were inserted into the Moon Palace docking bay.

Starlight successfully connected its landing with the space station. The landing gear contracted into Starlight, which pulled Starlight toward the space station.

Finally, the two aerospace spacecrafts were connected.

Then…

It was over.

The docking process wasn't intense at all. It was surprisingly smooth.

"WTF?"

When Johnson looked out the porthole, it was almost like he just saw a ghost.

As a NASA trained astronaut, he knew that spacecraft docking was supposed to be much more difficult!

The correct way of docking spacecraft was to fly the spacecraft in front of the space station, then decelerate the spacecraft, thus allowing the space station to catch up.

He had never seen a spacecraft using landing gears to "pull" itself into a space station!

The cabin signal light turned on.

All of their cabin doors were unlocked. Travis floated out of his room and stretched his limbs. He saw Johnson, who seemed a little fazed.

"Hey man, what's wrong?"

Johnson looked at him.

"Did you see what happened? Did you see how the Chinese docked their spacecraft?"

Travis looked at his captain and scratched his head. He frowned and replied, "I have no idea what you are talking about."

Johnson sighed.

"Never mind then…"

Johnson knew he shouldn't have asked Travis this complex question.

The three Mars colonists floated around the cabin common area. The cabin main door slowly opened, and Liu Biao appeared in a spacesuit.

"Starlight has successfully docked with Moon Palace space station. We will examine your physical condition in half an hour and disinfect the entire spacecraft."

When Liu Biao suddenly noticed that Johnson looked like he just saw a ghost, he asked, "Are you good?"

"I'm… great." Johnson couldn't help but ask, "How did you guys do it?"

Liu Biao was at a loss. "Do what?"

Johnson opened his mouth and didn't know what to say.

Should I ask him how they were able to dock the spacecraft that way?

Maybe for them, spacecraft docking is a piece of cake.

However, Johnson didn't want to believe how advanced China's aerospace technology was.

Johnson smiled at the Chinese astronaut and replied, "Nothing… Pretend I didn't say anything."

However, deep down in his heart, he still wanted to find out…

After Starlight and Moon Palace successfully docked, Liu Biao led the three colonists to the airlock chamber.

When the spacecraft was undocked, this was a buffer zone for astronauts to enter in and out of the space station. This was where astronauts put on their spacesuits, checked their equipment, and adjusted to the air pressure…

However, now that the spacecraft was docked, the airlock chamber turned into a checkpoint.

"Wait here, a professional doctor will examine your body. After your examination, we might give you a tour of the Moon Palace."

Johnson looked at Liu Biao and asked, "What do we do now?"

Liu Biao smiled and said, "Eat something, drink something, then… The medical team from the United Nations might need you to provide feces and urine samples."

Julia turned red and asked, "Right here?"

"Not here." Liu Biao pointed toward the metal alloy door and said, "There's a toilet over there."

The colonists didn't have to wait for long.

With the help of two Moon Palace staff members, Johnson and the other two colonists quickly finished their physical examinations. Metabolite samples were also collected from the three people, which were then sent to a special experiment cabin.

Professor Leslie from the Institute of Microbiology at Health Center Clinique Lémana in Switzerland was responsible for the analysis of these samples. Researcher Zhao Shuxuan from the Institute of Biomedicine of the Chinese Academy of Sciences was also involved in the sample analysis.

Both of these scholars were big names in the field of biology, and they had published many theses. Even though they weren't the best scholars, they were still top-tier.

Most importantly, both of them were under 45 years old, which meant they were relatively young and in good health conditions. A lot of big names wanted the opportunity to work on the Moon Palace, but the weightlessness environment was too much for their old bodies.

Time quickly passed by.

Everyone inside and outside of the experiment cabin was waiting nervously for the test results.

Professor Leslie, who was sitting in front of an electron microscope, suddenly whispered to herself. Her eyes were filled with surprise.

"Jesus, f*ck…"

"What happened?" Zhao Shuxuan walked to the microscope and looked at the computer screen. He said, "What is this?"

"A strange anaerobic bacterium with thick cell walls and cell membranes… Wait, no, it's a spore! No wonder it was able to survive on Mars." Professor Leslie adjusted the microscope magnification and said excitedly, "Jesus… This is incredible."

As Zhao Shuxuan stared at the image on the screen, his eyes flashed with excitement as well, but he quickly became serious.

"We might be in trouble."

Leslie looked at Zhao Shuxuan and adjusted her glasses.

"True, but this is still exciting, right?"

The colonists waited quietly in the airlock chamber.

Johnson and the others started to get a little impatient, but fortunately, the hatch opened shortly after. A man who they had never met before appeared at the door.

Johnson remembered that he saw this man before on Starlight. If he recalled correctly, this man was the captain of Starlight.

Before he could ask what happened, Travis spoke.

"What happened? Why is it taking so long? When can we go home?"

"Sorry, my friends."

Xu Zhenghong had a dignified look on his face as he spoke with a heavy voice.

"Our trip back home is going to be delayed."

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Chapter 803: "Life" From Mars

Earth, North America.

NASA headquarters.

Director Carson sat in front of his desk, flipping through documents.

Suddenly, his office door opened. A man in a suit quickly walked in.

Director Carson looked at his assistant and took off his glasses. He then asked in a tired voice, "What is the situation like? How are the three astronauts doing?"

The assistant replied, "They're on the Moon Palace space station."

Carson twisted the pen in his hand and gently tapped the pen against his desk.

"What's their timetable like? When do the Chinese plan on giving us our people back?"

They spent at least US$1 billion for this Mars Rescue mission.

Even though China publicly said they had to fork up US$713 million themselves, who knew how much of that was true.

After all, Star Sky Technology was the only company that could travel to Mars in this time period. They could manipulate the numbers however they liked.

China estimated that at most China spent three to four hundred million dollars on this mission, which was way less than the claimed 1.7 billion.

The assistant looked at Director Carson and paused for a second. He then replied with an awkward expression, "Not sure…"

"Not sure?" Director Carson paused for a second and frowned. "What do you mean… Are they planning on holding them hostage?"

"Not quite, it's just that… There seems to be a problem with our astronauts."

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"What problem?"

Director Carson looked at his assistant with a bitter face.

"They found Martian bacteria in the metabolites of the three colonists…"

…

After Moon Palace and Starlight successfully docked, the news that the three New Virginia colonists returned to the Earth-Moon orbit spread across the world.

However, before people could celebrate their return, the news that they found Martian bacteria on the three colonists spread like wildfire.

The international community was in an uproar.

Some people were curious about the tiny living beings on Mars, while the others said that they didn't care what the astronauts brought back from Mars.

However, the other people, the majority of people, were panicking…

Columbia TV.

A while back, when the Ares program was still trending, talk show host Jimmy enthusiastically invited the three colonists to his show. However, his stance had completely changed. Not only did he become a firm disbeliever of the Ares program, but he also invited an ecologist to criticize NASA on his show.

The old professor stared into the camera lens and spoke with an angry voice.

"I told you all, the Ares program is an inhumane and stupid experiment! NASA knew that not only is the Martian climate dangerous, but it could also contain dangerous microbes and viruses! Even then, they still decided to send these poor colonists to Mars, making them think they were safe…

"But great, now they're coming back to Earth, thanks to the Chinese. What are we going to do with the Martian bacteria? What if the bacteria is harmful to our fragile ecosystem?

"NASA must be held accountable for this!"

Columbia TV wasn't the only one that changed its stance.

Almost all of the politically correct media outlets expressed their disagreement with the Ares program and NASA.

Just like Carson had expected, NASA and the Ares program were criticized due to the news regarding the colonists carrying Martian bacteria.

He felt like he was mistreated.

After all, there was no plan to bring these colonists back to Earth. If it weren't for the global sandstorm, they wouldn't be receiving all this hatred.

But it was too late for that now.

The moment the Martian bacteria were detected in the three colonists was the moment his political career ended…

Director Carson wasn't the only person who was affected.

All those on Wall Street, New York as well as the aerospace companies listed on the stock exchanges were having a bad day.

Even Space-X and Blue Origin, which were at the top of the aerospace industry, were taking hits.

However, the academic community had a different reaction.

A thesis published by Leslie and Dr. Zhao Shuxuan caused a huge worldwide sensation.

The existence of life on Mars had always been a controversial topic.

Even though humans had sent countless space probes to Mars, as well as a life support system, so far no one had brought back a single gram of Martian soil.

The only sample that was available to astrobiologists were three Martian meteorites that hit Earth. They were numbered ALH840001, Yamato593, and Nakhla.

Even though there were signs of microorganisms on these meteorites, there was no direct evidence of these microorganisms.

Even though the bacteria on Starlight contained a huge amount of risk, it had immense research value.

The biology community believed that this was a gigantic discovery. Hopefully, by researching these bacteria, it would reveal more secrets of the Martian ecosystem.

The astronomy community said that the bacteria brought back from Mars by the three colonists could provide important research data for the study of Mars' historical and geomorphological changes, as well as the evolution of the Martian atmospheric environment.

Of course, scholars also expressed some concerns.

Martian bacteria that could survive in the harsh Mars climate meant that they were likely to survive on Earth, which could cause unpredictable effects on Earth's ecosystem.

European colonists once brought a series of infectious diseases to North America. This almost exterminated the American indigenous people. The number of Native Americans who were killed by those infectious diseases was far larger than those who died from guns.

These three colonists went to Mars and came back with Martian bacteria. Even though they seemed to be in good physical health, no one knew what could happen in the future.

In the midst of the world panic, the Chinese Lunar Orbit Committee issued a public statement.

"For the benefit of human civilization as a whole, we will not bring back the three colonists until we have either determined the possible effects of the bacteria on the Earth's ecosystem or made sure that the bacteria are completely removed from the bodies of the three colonists."

The Chinese Lunar Orbit Committee also announced that a lunar research facility would be built on the surface of the Moon to temporarily house the three colonists and to study their health conditions.

The research facility would be opened to the international community. China welcomed other countries to participate in the research.

However, due to various factors such as cost and limited space, other countries would have to pay to participate in the research…

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Chapter 804: Urgent Mission

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

Martian bacteria were discovered in the bodies of the three Ares program. The fate of the entire Earth's ecosystem seemed to be in the hands of the Chinese Lunar Orbit Committee.

Fortunately, China had a serious and responsible attitude toward this issue. Almost immediately, the Lunar Orbit Committee announced their response plan.

Honestly speaking, Lu Zhou didn't think this was a big deal at all. After all, he had many other things to worry about.

That was until two days after the bacteria was discovered, a blue pop-up window suddenly appeared in front of his eyes.

[Urgent Mission: Biological Invasion (90 days limit)]

Lu Zhou thought he was still dreaming.

That was until he got out of his bed and stared at the blue window for a long time.

Lu Zhou closed the blue window and immediately lay back on his bed.

"System!"

That familiar feeling hit his cerebral cortex. He opened his eyes and saw nothing but pure white.

Without any hesitation, Lu Zhou walked to the center of the system space and placed his hands on the mission panel.

As expected, that urgent mission was in his mission panel.

The mission chain icon below it turned gray, and it also had a lock icon.

"It seems like if I don't solve this urgent task, I can't continue my other mission…"

R

This was his first time seeing an urgent mission.

It seemed like as his influence increased, his research gradually started to affect the entire civilization.

Lu Zhou stared at the lock icon for a while and clicked the [Urgent Mission] icon.

Soon after, the mission details were displayed in front of him.

[Urgent Mission: Biological Invasion (Danger Level: 3)

[Description: As a civilization's technology advances, they are often faced with dangerous situations. Statistics show that more than 90% of civilization's destruction originates from their own arrogance and not from the attacks of outsiders.

[Requirements: Remove the alien species invasion. Countermeasures can include but are not limited to:

1. Dispose of infection source: Whoever brings trouble should go to hell.

2. Natural selection: Survival of the fittest. The Earth's ecosystem is bound to be invaded. Those that cannot adapt are eliminated. It is only a matter of time. (materialism 3, Darwinism 5, risk: 70%)

3. Gift of the universe: Objectively speaking, this is both a threat and an opportunity. Find a way to coexist with the new species. (materialism 10, risk: 39%)

4. Pray: It might be a good idea to let God decide the fate. Put them in an isolated place for a while, maybe they will recover? (idealism 10, risk: 15%)

…

]

[Rewards: Unknown.]

Lu Zhou: "…"

After Lu Zhou read the mission description, he didn't know what to think. He had no idea where to even begin complaining.

He had no idea what the hell idealism and materialism meant, nor did he know what the risk percentage represented. What made him speechless was that he wasn't even informed of the mission rewards.

Is the mission rewards related to which countermeasure I take? In other words, the rewards might reveal which countermeasure I should take?

The system should at least give me some hints!

Lu Zhou stared at the mission panel for a while and finally made the decision.

First of all, he couldn't just get rid of the colonists; that option was ruled out. Not only would it damage China's international image, but it would also bring serious international diplomatic issues.

The only one who would be happy was NASA.

If that were to happen, they wouldn't have to pay China the remaining balance. They could also put all of the blame on the Lunar Orbit Committee. No one else would remember the failures of the Ares program. They would only think about the three colonists who died and how NASA tried their best to save them…

"I only have 90 days to complete the mission, but there are no criteria for completing the mission. Maybe the criteria depend on the choice I make?

"The risk for option 2 is the greatest, I should remove it as well."

"So…" Lu Zhou stared at option three and said, "This is the most suitable one then."

Whether he wanted to completely remove the parasitic bacteria from the three colonists or to prove that it was harmless, he first had to research the bacteria and find out exactly what it was.

Without hesitating, Lu Zhou left the system space.

He only had ninety days to act. For a biological research task, this was quite a short time frame. Unfortunately, he couldn't do much to help. He could only support other scholars to do the research for him. This undoubtedly made this mission a lot more difficult.

Lu Zhou opened his eyes and sat up from his bed. Without hesitating, he called Beijing and reported to the chairman of the Lunar Orbit Committee.

After hearing Lu Zhou's report, the president replied in a stern manner, "How serious is the problem?"

"Pretty serious," Lu Zhou said in a serious tone. "So far we know very little about the bacterium, there is not enough clinical evidence to prove it is harmless. We know it can survive in harsh environments, and it is difficult to kill. Even if it is harmless to the human body, it might damage our Earth's ecosystem in other ways."

Even though Lu Zhou didn't know what level 3 danger meant, considering the fact that the system issued an urgent mission, the problem must be pretty serious.

The president immediately asked, "I understand, what do you need?"

Lu Zhou: "The return of the three Ares program colonists has to be delayed. We cannot trust the White House and NASA to handle this situation. Especially since they are under the public's pressure.

"In order to solve this, we will need help from international experts.

"I propose to cooperate with other countries on this issue. We should establish a special scientific research organization. This is a global crisis, but if we handle it correctly, this crisis can be avoided."

After hearing Lu Zhou's requests, the President nodded and spoke in a serious voice.

"Okay, I will try to meet your requirements as soon as possible. Also, before the Communist Party of China makes a decision, you have total decision-making power. I believe in you."

Lu Zhou nodded.

"Okay, I'll try my best."

Lu Zhou hung up the phone and called the State Administration for National Defense. He explained the situation to Director Li and then put on a change of clothes. He then called Wang Peng.

"Come pick me up at Zhongshan International.

"Take me to the Jinling aerospace launch site.

"Hurry!"

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Chapter 805: Unfavorable First Contact

It had been 24 hours since the Lunar Orbit Committee announced their response plan.

Once the plan was published on the Lunar Orbit Committee website, the world held the plan in high regard.

A United Nations emergency meeting was held in New York. Representatives, senior political figures, and big-name experts from various countries attended the conference.

Before the conference began, Deputy Secretary-General Eliasson stood up. He began reading his speech in a solemn voice. This marked the beginning of the conference.

"For a long time, we knew very little about life outside of Earth. We believe that we are not the only lucky planet in the galaxy. However, we have yet to receive any evidence that there is life outside of Earth.

"Clearly, that has changed. From what happened to the Ares program colonists, we know that we are not alone in the solar system.

"However, the first contact is not always optimal. I believe everyone sitting here has discussed this issue with relevant experts. The bacterium from Mars is tough. It can survive through hundreds of degrees of temperature change and is resistant to background radiation.

"It is foreseeable that their arrival will have an unpredictable impact on our ecosystem.

"Once again, I'd like to emphasize that this is a global crisis! Solving this problem should not be the responsibility of just one country, it should be the responsibility of humanity!

"Thank you."

The crowd erupted in applause.

Deputy Secretary-General Eliasson nodded and slowly sat back down.

After the opening remarks, the emergency United Nations meeting officially kicked off.

Various representatives put forward their own opinions on how to deal with the crisis.

For example, the United States' proposal was to establish a completely enclosed area in the Sonoran Desert. The astronauts would be placed there, and their physical conditions would be observed.

Others suggested asking the colonists for their own opinions on whether or not they would be willing to sacrifice themselves for the sake of humanity. Even though two of the astronauts were Americans, it would be a time-saving and cost-saving method.

After all, if the colonists were to die, all of the problems would be solved. They could slowly research the remaining bacteria samples.

However, everyone knew that this was not a realistic plan.

Other than the US, the one that received the most attention during the conference was China.

After all, the colonists were on the Moon Palace. Regardless of what the UN's decision was, it would still depend on China to execute it.

The Chinese representative stood up and spoke slowly and calmly.

"Our position is clear.

"Before confirming the bacteria is not a risk to the Earth's ecosystem, we will not allow the astronauts to return to Earth.

"Our proposal was announced by the Lunar Orbital Committee. We will build a research facility on the surface of the moon. The astronauts will be safe there."

"How do you plan on ensuring the safety of the three colonists?" the US representative said. The US representative stood up and said aggressively, "Long-term exposure to low gravity will cause unpredictable effects on the human body! Don't you think this is a violation of human rights?"

Without missing a beat, the Chinese representative replied, "Did you think about their human rights before sending them to Mars?"

Whispers were heard in the venue.

The American representatives opened his mouth, but he couldn't say anything.

The Chinese were right.

The Americans had no right to take the moral high ground.

If they considered these factors in advance before hastily launching the BFS spacecraft to Mars, they wouldn't be in so much trouble.

The Chinese representative looked at the American representative and said, "Not to mention, we have solutions to your problems.

"In order to ensure that the lunar facility can operate with sufficient funds, we welcome all countries to contribute to the common interests of humanity. At the same time, we also welcome scholars from all countries to participate in the study of life on Mars!"

After some heated debates, the United Nations eventually decided to adopt the Chinese solution.

After all, the Chinese had the final say in the matter.

Even if the United Nations chose another solution, the Chinese could refuse to implement the solution "for the sake of the overall interests of the international community".

Moreover, looking at the votes, most of the countries agreed with China's solution.

This was mainly because of China's reputation in aerospace technology…

The second half of the conference was mainly focused on research funding, participating researchers, as well as participating research institutes.

The conference went from 10 am to 3 pm.

The emergency conference finally ended.

After Director Owens of the European Space Agency had a quick chat with NASA Director Carson, he left the UN building and walked toward the parking lot.

Deputy Director Ferrian of the European Space Agency was walking behind him. Ferrian suddenly said, "Sir."

Owens didn't stop talking. He asked casually, "What?"

Ferrian paused for a second and said, "1.2 billion euros… Do you think this is worth it?"

"It doesn't matter if it is worth it. This crisis has to be addressed by the international community." Owens paused for a moment before adding, "From a practical point of view, to be able to join in on China's lunar development and participate in the life of Mars research is extremely meaningful.

"1.2 billion euros is definitely worth it."

…

Hundreds of kilometers away, inside the Moon Palace.

The three colonists were inside their living capsules. Zhao Shuxuan gave them their routine physical examination.

Travis finished his blood test and sat down on his bed. His wrists felt sore from the gravity-free blood collection device. He began talking to the Chinese researcher…

"Hey, what's our situation like? Can you at least tell us… What did you find on our bodies? We have the right to know."

Zhao Shuxuan filled in a form and said with a blank expression, "You are in good physical shape. Don't overthink this. Because there are many uncertain factors, we need some time to double-check everything. I promise that when everything is over, you can go home."

Travis made a helpless expression and said, "Okay then… Can you let me access the Internet then? Surely I'm allowed to go on a computer, right?"

"The bandwidth fee here is very expensive. I'm afraid I can't allow you to do that. However, your game console will arrive soon." Zhao Shuxuan flipped over the form and asked, "How are you feeling?"

Travis: "Everything is great, amazing. However, being in a weightless environment for a long time isn't comfortable. I feel like my muscles are shrinking."

Zhao Shuxuan: "That's just an illusion. Your bones and muscles are in perfect condition. Also, there is a special cabin on the Moon Palace that can simulate the Earth's gravitational environment. If you feel unwell, you can go take a bath or something."

He paused for a second and continued, "By the way, how long did you sleep last night?"

Travis thought for a while and answered, "Eight hours. There isn't much else to do other than sleep."

"Eight hours, right?" Zhao Shuxuan said as he recorded the data. He frowned and asked, "Do you feel discomfort anywhere?"

"I told you, I'm feeling fine. It's just weightlessness." Travis stood up from his bed and said, "The inspection is over, right? Stop bothering me, I'm going to drink some coffee. Life here is so boring."

Zhao Shuxuan: "We have unlimited coffee here, but it's all the same kind… By the way, are you feeling sleepy?"

"I'm always a little sleepy," Travis said. "Flying in space is so boring, there isn't even a bar here. It feels like a jail here."

He floated past the Chinese researcher and floated toward the hatch.

As Zhao Shuxuan watched Travis float away, he frowned.

His guesses were correct.

The little bacterium from Mars was more complex than he had imagined…

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Chapter 806: Parasitic? Symbiosis?

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

"Yesterday, the United Nations held an emergency meeting in New York to determine the world's response to this crisis. A research team composed of experts from multiple countries would be stationed on the Moon Palace within a week.

"On the other hand, the World Health Organization officially named the bacterium 'X-0172'.

"Brought to you, by China Southern News."

The Mars bacterium news segment was over.

Lu Zhou sat at his table, enjoying his breakfast. He looked at the calendar on his phone and muttered to himself, "87 days left."

Time is running out…

Lu Zhou picked up the remote control and turned off the TV. He wiped his face with a paper towel and then stood up.

"Xiao Ai, straighten up the kitchen for me please."

The quad-rotor drone flew into the kitchen.

[Okay Master, leave it to me! ٩ (•̤̀ᴗ•̤́๑) o]

Lu Zhou put on a coat and called Wang Peng.

Soon after, a black sedan parked outside his mansion. The black sedan took him to the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

Strictly speaking, biological research wasn't a strong suit for the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

Especially when it came to the area of astrobiology. Not only were there few astrobiology experts at the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study, but there were also few astrobiology experts in the country.

However, sometimes research didn't have to be done by an expert. After all, when it came to cutting-edge newly-born research fields, the difference between professionals and normal researchers was small.

So far, the expert in microbiology was Professor Liu Zuobing, who was in charge of the frozen dormancy project.

Although his main research direction was cryobiology, he often studied cell samples collected in extreme environments.

After all, the X-0172 bacteria were also collected in extreme environments…

After Lu Zhou got off the car, he went straight to the Institute of Biology building.

When he arrived at the laboratory, Professor Liu Zuobing and several of his students were looking at something in front of an electron microscope.

Lu Zhou didn't want to interrupt their research. He quietly waited for them to finish, then decided to speak to Professor Liu.

"Has the sample arrived?"

"It has." Professor Liu Zuobing looked at the slide under the microscope and said, "I bet this is the world's most expensive feces."

Lu Zhou joked, "Also the world's most dangerous feces."

Professor Liu Zuobing waved his hands and said, "Don't worry, the samples that arrived on Earth have been carefully disinfected. If we follow safety procedures, there shouldn't be a problem."

Even though Professor Liu didn't sound convincing, Lu Zhou knew that Professor Liu wouldn't make any silly mistakes.

Lu Zhou paused for a second before asking an important question, "Is there any progress in the research?"

"There is a little progress." Professor Liu Zuobing took off his glasses and said, "According to the latest research published by Leslie and Professor Zhao Shuxuan, we can confirm that the Ares program colonists have sleepiness symptoms. This is likely caused by the amino acid-like derivatives secreted by the X-0172 bacteria."

"Amino acid-like derivatives?" Lu Zhou frowned and continued to ask, "Is the problem serious?"

"The problem is not serious, but this kind of amino acid derivative is very interesting… It might even benefit the host."

Lu Zhou: "Benefit? Can you elaborate?"

"Active dormancy," Professor Liu suddenly said. He explained, "Let's assume that Mars once had a rich atmosphere, a protective magnetic field, and a variety of ecosystems. When severe geological changes occur, the pheromones released by this bacteria when producing spores will most likely help the host. Similar to hibernation."

Helping the host survive through harsh weather conditions was a survival tactic for the bacteria. Therefore, the parasite formed a mutually beneficial symbiotic relationship with its host.

Professor Liu Zuobing paused for a second and looked at Lu Zhou.

"So far, other than the drowsiness symptoms, we have not found any other health effects. We have reasons to believe that the secretion of the pheromones belongs to an active defense mechanism of the bacteria. In this state of bacterium-induced dormancy, the host's tolerance to extreme environments might be greatly improved. The host could also require very little energy for basic survival functions."

Lu Zhou said, "What is the pheromone-releasing mechanism?"

"That's the problem, we haven't fully figured out its mechanism yet." Professor Liu Zuobing sighed and said, "There are currently two speculations. One is that when the host creates an immune response to foreign bacteria, the bacteria are forced to produce spores for their own protection, thus forcing the release of the active dormancy pheromone.

"The other possibility is that, under certain external physical conditions, the bacteria could determine that the host is in an extremely harsh environment, and they would then actively release dormancy pheromone spores to protect the host."

Even though drowsiness wasn't fatal, no one wanted to be chronically fatigued.

So far, one of the three colonists had experienced drowsiness.

If a third of the human population had chronic fatigue, the impact on society would be unimaginable.

Lu Zhou asked, "Which one are you more inclined to believe?"

Professor Liu Zuobing: "I'm leaning toward the first possibility."

Lu Zhou said, "Which means there might be X-0172 antibodies inside the drowsy patient?"

Professor Liu Zuobing nodded cautiously.

"I don't know, but I think so!"

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Chapter 807: Lunar Project

Hundreds of thousands of kilometers, in lunar orbit.

Not far from the Moon Palace Space Station, a hexagonal silver-plated device was dropped from the Magpie Bridge, which landed on the surface of the Moon.

A few months ago, the Jinling Institute for Advanced Research collaborated with a number of research institutes within the United Nations to carry out research and development in regards to automatic lunar mining equipment.

The project had already made some progress. This 300 million yuan device called "Pioneer" was one of the research results of this project. It was mainly responsible for the preliminary mining of rich titanium ores.

If the device was successfully deployed and worked normally, the Lunar Orbit Committee would consider deploying an automated ore melting device on the moon surface, and this would be used to process the titanium ore into titanium ingots or even titanium alloys. The titanium would then be used for the second phase of the Moon Palace project, which was to establish a research facility on the Moon.

The silver hexagonal device slowly dropped toward the Moon.

The closer it got toward the Moon, the more nervous the Moon Palace and Magpie Bridge staff members were.

"Countdown to impact… 5,4,3,2,1… Landing is successful!

"Opening mounting bracket!"

The moment the silver-white prism made contact with the lunar surface, a circle of gray moon dust swelled from underneath the equipment.

The device anchoring feet nailed into the moon rocks.

The two Moon Palace staff who were staring at their screens were relieved. They high-fived each other and celebrated for a second, before immediately returning to their mission.

"This is Moon Palace, the automatic mining equipment prototype has successfully landed on the Moon. Requesting further instructions."

"This is the ground command center, congratulations on completing your mission. Please confirm the status of the automatic mining equipment. If everything is normal, begin the test in ten minutes."

"Roger that."

The Moon Palace staff member skillfully confirmed the status of the equipment. They then immediately turned on the device.

A signal light on the automatic mining device flickered. It was almost like a giant monster was awakened.

The bottom alloy plate slowly opened, and a huge drill was nailed into the lunar soil.

The drill began to spin, and the titanium-containing moonstone was quickly broken into numerous fragments. The moonstone was sucked in by an ore-processing pipe and ejected from the side of the device.

Once the smelting device was deployed, the material discharge port on the side of the automated mining device would be connected to the smelting device through special pipelines. The materials would then be transported into the smelting furnace. This was a fully automated mining production process.

But for now, the titanium-containing moonstone just sat there in a pile. Since the device was operating normally, there was no reason to keep it on.

"The machine is working normally."

"Turn it off then."

"Roger that."

The drill bit slowly came to a pause and retracted itself into the mining machine. The discharge port no longer ejected any moonstone.

Due to the Moon's low gravitational environment, there was still flying moon dust everywhere.

Johnson was watching this through a porthole on the Moon Palace. He looked at the dusty Moon surface and opened his mouth.

"Jesus… What are the Chinese people doing to the Moon?"

No one answered him.

Julia was just as confused as him.

She only saw the Chinese throw something from the spacecraft, and the impact almost looked like a missile hitting the Moon.

"Are they… testing weapons on the Moon?"

Johnson went silent for a while. When the dust finally settled, he had a clear view of what was going on.

"Hopefully not…"

In theory, the United Nations signed a treaty for the peaceful development of outer space resources. Experts from all over the world were on this space station. Not to mention that there were countless astronomical observatories pointed toward the Moon.

The Chinese must be going crazy if they were actually testing weapons on the Moon.

Johnson believed that the Chinese were merely building something on the Moon, similar to the plant growth unit they deployed some time ago.

Julia looked at her captain and asked, "Speaking of which… When can we go home?"

Johnson shook his head and said, "I don't know."

"Where is Travis? How come I haven't seen him lately?"

Johnson went silent for a while. He then said, "He might be in some trouble."

"I heard that… He seemed to be infected with a Mars virus. Maybe we are…" Julia said as her face turned white.

Even though Johnson was worried himself, he tried to comfort his teammate.

"Don't worry, all of the world's top biological experts are here. Travis, you, and I are all going to be safe."

Johnson didn't believe what he was saying at all.

When he first arrived at the Moon Palace, he was allowed a brief communication with NASA.

Fortunately, the Chinese didn't prevent him from knowing the truth. The NASA director told him the whole story.

Simply put, they were the hosts for a type of extremely resistant Mars bacteria. This bacteria could impact Earth's ecosystem. Therefore, they were temporarily isolated in the space station. After a while, they would be transferred to a lunar research facility.

Would they survive? What if the bacteria were invincible? These were questions Johnson didn't want to think about.

Perhaps the best solution was for them to sacrifice themselves. Johnson even sensed that Director Carson was hinting at a sacrifice during their conversation.

However, one person was only given one life. No matter how heroic the sacrifice was, Johnson couldn't just give up his life that easily.

Suddenly, the living module hatch opened.

The Chinese researcher who had previously examined them was accompanied by two astronauts. They floated into the living module and stood in front of them.

Johnson was nervous, and he tried to calm himself down.

"What happened? Is there any research progress?"

Johnson didn't have any hope. After all, the international experts had only arrived at the Moon Palace for a couple of days. It was impossible for them to find a solution in such a short time frame.

However, Zhao Shuxuan's words surprised him.

"A little bit."

Zhao Shuxuan looked at Johnson's surprised face and said in a serious manner, "In order to verify our hypothesis, we need you to cooperate with us for some experiments."

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Chapter 808: Medicine With a "Taste"

Without hesitating, Johnson agreed to cooperate with the experiment.

The Chinese researcher named Zhao Shuxuan told him that the relevant clinical experiments had only been performed on mice twice, thus there was a huge amount of risk. However, for Johnson, this was the only way he could return to Earth.

If he couldn't get rid of the Martian bacteria on his body, he might have to stay at the Moon Palace for the rest of his life. He would be isolated or even abandoned from the Earth's ecosystem.

He still had a family on Earth, waiting for him to go home.

He sat on the medical bed and quietly waited for the two researchers to prepare his medicine. After a while, a Chinese researcher came over with three capsules and some water.

"Eat it."

Johnson took the three capsules from Zhao Shuxuan and didn't hesitate. He threw them in his mouth and downed it with the water.

Johnson quietly waited on the medical bed for five minutes. He looked around restlessly and saw that everyone in the laboratory was looking at him. He asked awkwardly, "So, that's it?"

"Not sure." Zhao Shuxuan shook his head and said, "We'll find out in an hour or two. I suggest you lie down and sleep for a while."

Johnson: "Can I ask where the capsules came from? I'm just curious…"

Professor Leslie and Professor Zhao Shuxuan looked at each other. Zhao Shuxuan replied, "You don't have to know too much."

Johnson said, "Is it a secret?"

"Not quite." Leslie shrugged and said, "It's just that… Only one person has an immune response to the bacteria."

Johnson frowned and said, "So what?"

Professor Leslie coughed and said, "The bacteria are mainly lodged in the large intestine…"

Johnson's face went white.

"Sh*t… Is it…"

"That's right, it's sh*t… Or rather, sh*t extract, so not quite sh*t."

Johnson could feel his stomach turn. He resisted the urge to vomit and asked, "You think this thing… will work?"

"I'm… not sure." Professor Leslie smiled awkwardly and said, "Sometimes you have to try before you know, right?"

Johnson wanted to say something when suddenly, an intense feeling of drowsiness hit his brain. He began squeezing his forehead.

Professor Leslie noticed his reaction, and she suddenly looked ecstatic.

Johnson was on the verge of passing out, and he could faintly hear the conversation between the two.

"Jesus… Our hypothesis was correct!"

"Antibodies that can kill X-0172 can be extracted from the metabolites of colonizer 3!"

"Let's report our research to the world."

"…"

…

While the Moon Palace researchers were completing their experiment…

All the way on Earth, at the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

Lu Zhou had been monitoring the experiment closely. After he heard that the experiment was a success, he quickly went to the newly established X-0172 laboratory. He asked Professor Liu Zuobing, the person in charge, about the research on the Moon Palace.

"How are the other two colonists doing?"

"Their sleep is stable, and we tried various methods to wake them up; cold temperatures, hot temperatures, electric shock, etc. They wouldn't wake up no matter what," Professor Liu said. "Overall, the experiment was quite successful. At the very least, it confirmed our hypothesis. From the metabolite samples, traces of spores were seen in both colonists."

Lu Zhou immediately said, "Which meant that Travis' body did indeed produce X-0172 antibodies."

"Theoretically, that is true." Professor Liu nodded and sighed. He then said, "However, the cumbersome thing is that even if we have the antibodies, we can only remove some of the X-0172 in the colonizers. It is difficult to kill the rest of the bacterial spores."

Spores, also known as endospores, were a kind of dormant, non-reproductive structure produced by some bacteria. They were also known as the most resistant living organisms in the world. They had outstanding heat resistance, chemical resistance, and radiation resistance properties.

Take the Clostridium Botulinum as an example. It would take 5 to 9.5 hours for its spores to be killed in boiling water. On the other hand, the anti-radiation ability of Bacillus Megaterium was 36 times stronger than that of E. coli cells. Even under direct radiation of ultraviolet rays and high-energy rays, the Bacillus Megaterium could still survive for a long time.

Spores had no significant metabolic effects. They contained the threat of potential germination. They were called a type of hidden life form because once the environmental conditions were optimal, the spores could germinate into vegetative cells at any time.

It was almost like the dried vegetable packets that came with instant noodles. The dried vegetables would be rejuvenated when it came into contact with water.

Therefore, if they couldn't kill the spores, something bad could happen sooner or later.

The laboratory went quiet.

Professor Liu Zuobing stared at the thesis that came from the Moon Palace. He began to contemplate.

Lu Zhou could sense from the dignified look of the old professor that this problem wasn't going to be easy to solve. Even if they combined the world's top biomedical research and development forces, it would still be difficult to find a solution.

Lu Zhou: "Is there anything we can do about the spores?"

"If there is, we have already tried it." Professor Liu shook his head and said, "International experts have held several meetings. The most reliable method is probably intermittent sterilization, by constantly activating the spores before killing them. However, there's one problem. We might be able to reduce the number of X-0172 bacteria in these colonists, but it is very difficult to remove all of them."

Lu Zhou: "Is it kind of like cancer cells that have spread across the body?"

Professor Liu: "Not quite, but kind of."

Lu Zhou thought for a second and suddenly asked, "What about the antibody extracts? Do we have them in our laboratory?"

Professor Liu pointed at a sealed glass bottle on the table.

"It's right here… Why?"

Lu Zhou: "Can I take a copy to do some research on my own?"

Professor Liu looked at Lu Zhou weirdly and said, "You can… But I don't think there is a point."

He believed in Lu Zhou's research abilities, but this just didn't make sense.

This was only a metabolite extract; it didn't contain any X-0172.

Why does he want to research the metabolite extract?

Lu Zhou casually smiled and replied, "I guess we'll find out. You never know."

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Chapter 809: Professor Z?

The ability to eliminate spores had always been the most important indicator for measuring various disinfection and sterilization methods.

The world leader in this area was probably the German company Oxytech. Their vaccine bactericidal disinfectant used in vaccine production was the world's most powerful spores disinfectant. Its main component was hydrogen peroxide.

After the X-0172 bacterial invasion was discovered, a batch of a customized version of this type of antiseptic was imported to the Moon Palace. However, this antiseptic was only for sterilizing surfaces; it couldn't be used on human beings.

The Moon Palace didn't know what to do with the parasitic spores.

So far, it seemed like the research was in a hiatus.

Lu Zhou felt like if he didn't do something now, nothing would get done.

With the metabolite extract from Professor Liu, Lu Zhou went to the third level underground laboratory at the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

Lu Zhou sat at his desk and placed the glass test tube containing the metabolite extract on the corner of his desk. He found the research paper published by the Moon Palace research team and read it for a while. He finally sighed.

"Unfortunately, biology is not my area of expertise. I can't help even if I want to.

"Does that mean I have to ask the system for help?"

Lu Zhou looked at the reagent on the table and pondered for a moment. He then closed his eyes.

"System, is there any way to kill the X-0172 spores."

He opened his eyes and saw a shining blue dialog box in front of his eyes.

[Solution for removing X-0172 parasitic bacteria from the human body.

[Required general points: 10,000 points]

"Ten thousand points?"

Lu Zhou nearly fell off his chair.

If he recalled correctly, he only had 4,835 general points.

He started to have doubts about his life.

Is this bacterium that hard to deal with?

I've saved up so many general points over the years, but it's still not enough…

Wait a minute…

Lu Zhou suddenly remembered something, and he patted his head.

"Jesus Christ, how did I forget?"

The system's pricing of "questions" were based on the content of questions. If he asked for the solution to the entire problem, the system would obviously require a lot of general points. However, if he divided the problem into many parts and only asked for the solution to one of the parts, the required general points would be much lesser.

So far, the international research team was bottlenecked on how to kill X-0172 spores.

Therefore, he had to modify his question…

"System, is there a way to prevent X-0172 bacteria from producing spores?"

The reason why the X-0172 bacteria were difficult to kill was that when they were attacked, they would actively produce spores to protect themselves. Even physical countermeasures such as high temperature, high pressure, ultraviolet light, and even radiation couldn't kill the spores, let alone the antibodies produced by the host itself.

Therefore, the key to removing the X-0172 bacteria was to prevent them from producing spores!

As long as the bacterium's active defense mechanism was removed, it would only be a matter of time before the research team found the appropriate antibodies.

After a while, another blue dialog box appeared in Lu Zhou's sight.

This time, the price was much more reasonable.

[Prevent X-0172 bacteria from producing spores.

[Required general points: 2,500]

2,500.

It was roughly equivalent to half of his general points.

Even though he didn't want to, he had to save the future of humanity and complete his urgent mission. Lu Zhou clenched his teeth and pressed the redeem button on the dialog box.

"Redeem!"

The moment his index finger touched the button, a huge stream of information hit his brain like a tidal wave.

Lu Zhou hadn't experienced this sensation in a long time.

It was almost like his brain was being written with memories that did not belong to him.

After half a minute, that strange sensation disappeared.

Lu Zhou sat in his chair for half an hour and finally finished digesting the information in his brain. He opened his eyes and felt enlightened.

"I see…"

Although it might not be possible for him to design the solution, with his level 6 biochemical and Nobel Prize-level chemistry abilities, he could easily understand the solution provided by the system.

Simply put, in order to prevent the X-0172 bacteria from producing actively dormant spores, the system proposed a special pheromone.

This pheromone could deceive the X-0172 bacteria, and it would make them think that they were in a comfortable environment. Thus, the bacteria would no longer produce spores when they were attacked by antibodies.

"We just have to inject the infected person with the special pheromone before taking the antibody. This will make the X-0172 bacteria give up."

Without hesitating, Lu Zhou immediately opened his laptop and began writing a thesis.

The preparation method for the pheromone that blocked the spores was already provided to him by the system, so there was no need for him to modify anything.

As for the clinical effects of the X-0172 antibodies and metabolite extracts… Lu Zhou cited several papers published by Professor Leslie and Professor Zhao Shuxuan.

Time slowly passed by…

The time on the clock went from morning to afternoon.

Lu Zhou looked at the completed thesis and couldn't help but smile with satisfaction.

He hadn't written a thesis for a long time.

The more influence he obtained, the less he had to personally complete scientific research tasks. Most of the time, his work was focused on high-level planning rather than participating in specific research tasks.

"When this space race is over, I'm going to take a long-deserved break."

Lu Zhou converted his thesis into PDF format. He was about to submit the thesis when he suddenly remembered something.

Do you think it is suspicious that a mathematician produced such an advanced biology thesis?

Even though this research came from his own brain, he wasn't the one that came up with the solution. He bought the solution from the system using general points.

If he won a Nobel Prize for this thesis, he would feel a little embarrassed.

Lu Zhou contemplated for a second and had an idea. He removed the author's name and replaced it with a "Z".

"Perfect."

Lu Zhou smiled at the thesis and opened arXiv. He created a new account and uploaded the thesis.

Explaining this would be too cumbersome.

I'll just post it anonymously.

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Chapter 810: Useless International Experts

Moon Palace.

Inside the experiment cabin.

Ian Crawford, a British professor of planetary science and astrobiology at Birkbeck, University of London, sat in a chair and looked outside the porthole. He suddenly smiled and spoke.

"About six years ago, I wrote an evaluation report regarding the economic viability of lunar mining."

Stephen Parubi sat across from him. Stephen snorted and replied, "Then?"

"Then I published that paper in Natural Geography and sent a copy to UKSA." Ian Crawford shrugged and continued, "But the UKSA people thought it was a waste."

Professor Stephen: "Is that not true?"

"Of course not." Professor Ian looked down the porthole and smiled as he said, "The Chinese are making my thesis a reality."

"One day, sooner or later, they will find that instead of creating a production line on the Moon, it is cheaper to produce it on Earth, then send it to space," Professor Stephen muttered. He then said, "I mean, the Chinese aren't doing anything special, we have similar plans ourselves."

Professor Stephen was from Stanford University, and as an American, he didn't like to hear news about China winning the space race. Especially since the Ares program had now become a mess.

Stephen didn't feel so good. He reached into his pocket and subconsciously tried to grab a cigarette. However, he realized his spacesuit didn't have cigarettes in his pocket.

"Damn it, can't a man just smoke a cigarette out here?"

Professor Stephen was about to get up from his chair when he heard someone speak.

"Smoking on the space station will insert at least two million smoke particles into the ventilation system. Smoke when you get back to Earth."

Professor Zhao Shuxuan said as he floated into the cabin. He grabbed the handrails on the wall while holding the latest experimental report. He said, "Okay, everyone, the break is over. Time is running out, and there are three poor colonists waiting for us to rescue them."

Professor Stephen didn't like to hear the Chinese talk about the Ares program's misfortune, but he didn't say anything.

The Ares program was indeed a mistake. Ever since the beginning of the sandstorm, the Ares program had brought nothing but trouble. Top astrobiology, microbiology, and clinical biology experts were now in the Moon Palace. They were here to do one thing—clean up the mess from the Ares program.

Zhao Shuxuan distributed the copies of the test results and gave a brief explanation of the situation to other researchers.

"The latest test results have come out. The level of antibodies and hypnotic pheromones in colonists No. 1 and No. 2 have decreased. Looking at their heart rates, we can see that their metabolism is gradually returning to normal levels, and they should soon wake up… Do you need some time to look over the test results?"

"No need, I've finished reading them." Professor Stephen put down the test results and adjusted his glasses. He said, "Right now, the problem is not the antibodies or the X-0172 bacteria."

Professor Ian: "Spores."

"That's right, spores." Professor Stephen nodded and looked around at the other scholars. He said, "We have to get rid of the spores first."

Professor Leslie asked, "Do you have a good idea then?"

"We have two options.

"First is to find a way to prevent the X-0172 bacteria from forming spores. The second is to find a way to kill all of the spores directly."

Professor Leslie thought for a second and said, "The second method will be difficult."

"That's right. So, for the time being, the most realistic solution is option 1." Professor Stephen looked around the experiment cabin and said, "In my opinion, the research facility here is simply too poor. I don't know if our experiments will work in a gravity-free environment. If we want to prevent the X-0172 bacteria from forming spores as soon as possible, we should send the samples to Earth."

Professor Stephen looked at Professor Zhao Shuxuan when he spoke.

Zhao Shuxuan was the leader of the Chinese researchers. He was also the person in charge of the entire X-0172 bacteria project, and he was the only one who had the right to send the inactivated bacterial samples to Earth.

Of course, Stephen wanted to send more than just inactivated samples. He wanted to find a way to convince the Lunar Orbit Committee to send live X-0172 bacterial spores to his laboratory at Stanford University.

He was certain that this would increase their chances of eliminating the bacteria once and for all.

However, the Chinese researcher didn't grant him his wish.

Zhao Shuxuan shook his head and rejected his proposal.

"That is too risky, we shouldn't even send inactivated samples."

"Nothing is perfectly safe, but we can try our best," Professor Stephen said. "We have live smallpox samples as well, how is this different?"

Zhao Shuxuan paused for a second. He then shook his head.

"I have to think about this."

Professor Stephen sighed.

"We've already thought about this."

…

The research team meeting was over, and they didn't arrive at any constructive conclusions.

It was starting to get late. The experts from various countries finished their dinner and went into their cabin rooms.

Professor Stephen lay in his bed and connected his laptop to the Moon Palace data interface. This way, he could communicate with Earth.

Even though the speed was slow and the delay was high, the bandwidth was enough for him to exchange opinions with expert researchers on Earth.

Professor Stephen logged into the instant messaging software. He was about to contact his assistant, but his assistant happened to call him.

"I'm sorry to disturb you, Professor Stephen, but I have to report something to you."

Stephen frowned and asked, "Yeah what?"

"Per your request, we searched the database for research on parasitic bacteria spores. We found a paper on arXiv."

The assistant paused for a second before continuing, "The author claims that… he found a way to inhibit X-0172 bacteria from producing spores."

"That's impossible, there are only seven people in the world that can write a thesis like that, and I'm one of them." Professor Stephen smiled and shook his head. "Send it to my email."

His assistant nodded.

"Okay, Professor."

Stephen had no hope for the thesis on arXiv at all.

The only X-0172 samples were on the Moon Palace. If other scholars wanted to do research on the bacteria, they would first have to get their hands on the bacterial sample.

Even though there were twelve inactivated X-0172 samples that were sent to Earth, these were all in the hands of large research institutes. There was no way a large research institute would anonymously publish a paper on arXiv.

Of course, even though he knew the value of the arXiv thesis was zero, he still wanted to see what the author wrote.

After all, it might give him inspiration.

Professor Stephen opened the thesis and began reading it. After a couple of pages, he gasped.

His expression became more and more serious, and he went back to the front page of the thesis and began reading it more carefully.

"What is this… Who wrote this?"

The more he read, the more astonished he was.

His eyes were filled with suspicion, surprise, and disbelief.

Professor Stephen only wanted to know one thing; who wrote this thesis?!

However, when he saw the author's name, he was stunned.

"Z…?"

Who the hell is Z?

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Chapter 811: Amino Acid Derivatives

The next day.

Inside the Moon Palace experiment cabin.

Professor Stephen stood in front of a group of researchers. He had dark circles around his eyes. He raised the thesis in his hand and spoke without energy.

"I'm sure you have read this thesis… I will not repeat what was written in the thesis. Just out of curiosity, I want to know who is Dr. Z?"

The six people in front of him were muddled. Professor Stephen spoke again.

"I'm sorry, but Dr. Z has to be among the seven of us… No, six, because I know I didn't write it. Ian, was it you?"

Ian looked at the thesis and shook his head. He said, "No, it's not me, why would I publish an anonymous thesis? This might be a Nobel Prize-level discovery, who wouldn't want their name attached to this?"

The X-0172 bacterial invasion was considered a global ecosystem crisis. Anyone that solved this problem would undoubtedly be regarded as a hero to all of humankind. They might not win a Nobel Prize, but they would definitely be nominated.

Professor Leslie glanced at Professor Zhao Shuxuan and made eye contact.

"Z… Isn't that the first letter of your name?"

"Forget about it." Professor Zhao shook his head and said, "It's not me… Why would I stay anonymous?"

Most people would gladly put their name on this thesis. The seven researchers had no idea why this person decided to stay anonymous.

All of the seven researchers in the experiment cabin looked at each other.

Finally, Professor Ian shrugged and looked impatient.

"Okay… It looks like Dr. Z is not with us. Anyone with a sane mind would want their name attached to this thesis."

"This is ridiculous," Professor Leslie said in disbelief. "Without having access to the X-0172 bacteria, how the hell did they find out the bacterial spores mechanism?"

The experiment cabin went quiet.

Obviously, Professor Leslie wasn't the only one perplexed by the problem.

"This sounds ridiculous, but I think we can try Dr. Z's method… Our research idea is to find a way to prevent X-0172 bacteria from producing spores, right?" Professor Ian looked at the thesis and shrugged. He then looked at the other researchers in the cabin and said, "It seems like Dr. Z has the same idea as us."

Zhao Shuxuan nodded and said, "I think it's worth a shot."

Professor Leslie nodded. "I'm fine with it."

Professor Stephen leaned against the porthole and said, "I was planning on doing that anyway."

Professor Ian snapped his fingers.

"Four people agree, more than half the votes… Okay, it's settled."

…

Normally speaking, repeating an experiment was more difficult than doing the experiment the first time.

A lot of important research results in the field of modern biology came from coincidences. Even if someone ordered the same set of reagents, the same equipment from the same manufacturer, the experiment could still yield different results.

Not to mention that photoshop technology had become more and more powerful. If an undergraduate student couldn't repeat an experiment, they would often just photoshop the experiment images.

Therefore, repeatable experiments had become one of the most important indicators of a valuable experiment.

Professor Stephen believed that Dr. Z's proposal was going to work.

Because the words in this arXiv thesis resonated with his academic mind.

"The X-0172 bacteria can survive in the harsh environment of Mars. It is difficult to kill it using ordinary methods. We have to find its weakness."

"What is its weakness?"

"Being able to survive on Mars gives it an advantage for facing extreme environments, but at the same time, it is also a disadvantage.

"It hasn't fought with other microorganisms for survival, so it must be weak against other microorganisms.

"So the key to solving the problem is to find a bio-pheromone that can deceive the X-0172 bacteria… Jesus, why didn't I think of that?"

Professor Stephen muttered to himself. He stared at the ceiling, lost in his own thoughts.

Actually, this was only a research idea.

If Stephen had more time, he might have come up with the research idea.

But that wasn't the main point.

What was puzzling was that even though Dr. Z thought of this research idea, how did Dr. Z calculate the molecular formula of the amino acid derivative that blocked the formation of the X-0172 spores?

Can this stuff even be calculated?

I thought this had to be deduced from thousands of trial and error experiments?

This was something beyond his understanding of biochemistry.

Professor Stephen looked at the amino acid derivative molecules on the computer screen as he scratched his beard. He had no idea how Dr. Z did it.

Suddenly, the experiment cabin door opened. Zhao Shuxuan floated in.

Professor Stephen looked at Professor Zhao and asked, "What's the result like?"

Zhao Shuxuan: "The three patients have been injected with the synthetic amino acid-like derivatives. We are still observing the effects."

Professor Stephen sighed.

"Looks like we just have to wait now."

Time quickly passed by.

There was no sunrise or sunset in the space station, and time passed by quickly.

Professor Stephen kept yawning. He was starting to get a bit bored when the experimental cabin door suddenly opened.

Before he could say anything, Professor Leslie floated in with an excited look on her face. Leslie spoke.

"We observed an increase in metabolic levels in colonists 1 and 2! The spore content in the metabolites was significantly reduced! No allergic reactions occurred either!"

She took a deep breath, and her voice trembled as she spoke with excitement.

"The amino-acid derivatives work!

"We did it!"

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Chapter 812: 27-Day Coma

"Ah…"

His first reaction was pain.

Johnson then felt a cold sensation going from his feet to his spine. He opened his eyes and woke up.

"Sh*t, I'm so cold…"

Johnson felt like his entire body was freezing. He tried to curl into a ball, but he found out that he was tied to the bed.

He used his finger to unlock the nylon straps. He then slowly floated up and sat on his bed.

He noticed the Chinese researcher who injected him with the antibodies was sitting on a bench while watching him.

"Your metabolic level is still at a very low level. It's normal to feel cold."

"How long… did I sleep for?"

Zhao Shuxuan looked at the watch on his wrist.

"Around 27 days."

"27 days?!" Johnson was astonished, and he muttered, "That's unbelievable."

Zhao Shuxuan: "Why?"

"When I was in the Marine Corps, I went unconscious for a week due to injuries. I had to lay on my bed for a whole month. I remember when I was finally allowed to get out of bed, all of my muscles felt weak. It took the medical team half a month to help me walk normally."

Johnson raised his arm and looked at his hands in disbelief as he said, "But right now, I feel like I just had a… nap?"

"It is really weird. Prolonged inactivity should lead to muscle atrophy, but the pheromone secreted by X-0172 bacteria prevents that. The pheromones protect the dormant cells." Professor Zhao Shuxuan looked at Johnson sitting on the bed and said, "We are still researching the specific physiochemical process. If you are interested, you can pay attention to the follow-up research progress."

When Johnson heard about the X-0172 bacteria, he suddenly became tense. He nervously asked Zhao Shuxuan.

"How're the Martian bacteria in my body doing?"

Zhao Shuxuan: "It's been removed."

Johnson sighed in relief.

That knot in his heart was finally untied.

He no longer had Martian bacteria in his body.

He could finally go home.

He realized that his two teammates were still at risk.

After a while, he casually asked.

"What about Julia and Travis? How are my two teammates doing?"

Zhao Shuxuan looked at the watch on his wrist again and said, "Julia woke up 15 minutes ago. She's probably doing personal business in the bathroom right now. As for Travis, his situation is more complex."

Johnson asked, "What's wrong with Travis?"

Zhao Shuxuan had a serious look on his face. After a moment of silence, he spoke.

"The way we remove the X-0172 bacteria is to prevent it from forming spores and then kill the bacteria with antibodies. However, his situation is a bit special because he has a built-in immune response to the X-0172 bacteria. This means that the spores in his body are always under attack. Even if we injected him with the blocking pheromone, the spores in his body wouldn't become vegetative cells."

Johnson gulped and said, "Which means…"

"He is still in a coma, staying dormant." Zhao Shuxuan patted him on the shoulder and stood up. He said, "Don't worry too much, we will take care of him."

"Thanks."

Johnson smiled weakly.

He wasn't actually worried.

He never liked how rebellious Travis was. He only pretended to care about him because he was the captain. To be honest, he didn't give a rat's a*s on whether or not Travis would wake up.

The Ares program had completely failed anyway.

The medicinal cabin door opened, and a researcher with a beard floated in.

After Professor Stephen saw Johnson on his bed, he immediately floated next to Johnson.

"Oh, I'm so sorry! How are you feeling right now? Is there any discomfort?"

Johnson was bewildered at how enthusiastic Professor Stephen was. He looked at Zhao Shuxuan.

Zhao Shuxuan coughed and said, "This is Professor Stephen from Stanford University, a microbiologist appointed by the US government."

He looked at his watch for the third time.

"I'll leave the room to you guys."

Zhao Shuxuan floated toward the door and left the two people alone.

Johnson watched the cabin door close. He hesitated for a bit before saying, "I'm doing fine… When can we go home?"

Professor Stephen patted him on the shoulder and said, "Soon. The Magpie Bridge is transporting supplies to the Moon Palace. The Chinese promised us that we can use the Magpie Bridge to return to the ISS. Then our own spacecraft will pick us up from the ISS."

I can finally go home.

This was music to Johnson's ears.

Professor Stephen looked at how happy Johnson was, and he said, "Speaking of which, what do you think about Mars? Do you want to talk about it?"

Johnson: "Is this part of the medical examination?"

"No, I'm just curious." Professor Stephen shook his head and asked with a smile, "You are a hero. No one has ever stepped foot on that red desert planet, but you did! I'm curious, how was life on Mars? I heard that you planted potatoes there? Did you use Martian soil? How does it taste, is it delicious?"

Am I a… hero?

Faced with Professor Stephen's questions, Johnson smiled bitterly.

Correct, they were the first to step foot on Mars, but the Chinese were the ones who brought them back.

This didn't count as a successful trip.

The New Virginia life support system was being destroyed by the sandstorm. After surviving for a month, they were finally rescued by the Chinese.

Johnson looked outside the window, at the silver-white Moon. He took a deep breath and spoke.

"I wouldn't want to go there again.

"It was horrible."

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Chapter 813: Dr. Z Saved the World?

[After 27 days in a coma, the two Ares program colonists have recovered!]

[Breaking news! Martian bacteria was defeated by the Moon Palace expert team! Dr. Z provided important clues!]

[…]

The day after Johnson woke up, the Lunar Orbit Committee announced the latest progress on the X-0172 bacterial research to the world.

The world heard that out of the three colonists who fell into a comatose state, two of them had successfully woken up with the infected bacteria removed from their bodies. This caused a huge sensation in the international community.

After Everyone Daily reported the news, the Washington Post immediately covered the news and interviewed the Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Eliasson.

A month ago, at the UN emergency meeting, Eliasson read out an initiative calling all countries in the world to deal with this global crisis.

Even though his speech wasn't the main reason why various nations cooperated in this crisis, his speech was still undeniably iconic.

When someone asked him to evaluate the crisis response performance of various countries, Eliasson responded without hesitation.

"This was one of the greatest threats to humanity. We stayed together as a team and didn't give up!"

Reporter: "What do you think about the unsuccessful rescue of the African American colonist Travis?"

Eliasson: "I think there is still hope. I trust our international expert team. They just need a little more time!"

Out of the three patients infected with the X-0172 bacteria, two of them were successfully cured. This was a considerable breakthrough.

According to the Chinese announcement, in a week's time, Johnson and Julia would be transferred from the Moon Palace to the ISS by the Magpie Bridge spacecraft. The experts from the United Nations would give them a final examination on the ISS before sending them back to Earth.

The Earth's ecological crisis caused by the Mars bacteria had finally come to an end.

During the 27 days, countless people had expressed concerns about the future of the Earth's ecosystem. Finally, all those concerns were gone.

Humans were no longer defenseless against the spores of X-0172 bacteria. Everyone was confident that it wouldn't take long for the last colonist to recover.

All they needed was a bit of time.

In addition to the two colonists who were about to return to Earth, the media also paid attention to "Dr. Z", who played an important role in the entire crisis.

According to Professor Stephen from Stanford University, if it weren't for the pheromone molecular formula and synthesis method provided by this person, they would still be stuck on the X-0172 spore formation bottleneck.

"The results of his research made a huge contribution to the elimination of the Martian bacteria!

"Although I don't know why he chose to remain anonymous, I hope he can stand up and accept his honor!"

Speculations about the identity of Dr. Z were formed.

The media outlets weren't the only ones curious about the identity of this scholar. The general public had also developed a considerable amount of interest in this anonymous scholar.

Interesting enough, if his name were written in the thesis, the general public wouldn't be interested in the thesis author at all. Everyone would forget his name after the media reports.

It was like how everyone knew that a Nobel Prize winner was nutty, but no one would remember every Nobel Prize winner.

But now, even people who weren't in the field of biology were curious about the identity of this author. They wanted to know which country this scholar came from, and why they chose to be anonymous…

Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

Institute of Biology.

Professor Liu Zuobing handed a report to Lu Zhou and spoke emotionally.

"I can't believe the slow release agent with no side effects is on Mars."

He was referring to the discovery that the pheromone secreted by the X-0172 bacteria when forming spores promoted active dormancy of the host.

Lu Zhou began reading through the report.

According to the experiment data, mice implanted with the X-0172 bacteria would begin to form spores when exposed to a temperature of minus 12-15 degrees. This released dormant pheromones, which placed the host into a dormant state.

When the host had slept for 24 hours, the host would enter a full sleep state. During this state, the host's metabolic levels would drop to extremely low levels. This ensured that the host would retain normal cell structure. The host's vegetative cells could then be rejuvenated at a later date.

Lu Zhou raised his eyebrows. He was intrigued.

Professor Liu noticed Lu Zhou's expression. He smiled and spoke.

"Remember the nematode cell we got a while ago? We plan on inserting the 18S-rDNA gene fragment into the X-0172 bacteria. The X-0172 bacteria will synthesize special proteins that might maintain the morphology of dormant biological cells."

Lu Zhou flipped through the page and casually asked, "Is it fine to add the DNA to the X-0172 bacteria?"

Professor Liu Zuobing: "It is within our risk tolerance range."

"Then we'll go with your plan." Lu Zhou gave the report back to Professor Liu and nodded. He said, "Remember, safety is always the highest priority."

Professor Liu Zuobing solemnly said, "Don't worry, I'll be extra careful."

So far the only place with activated X-0172 bacteria was the Moon Palace. The bacterial samples sent to Earth were inactivated. However, despite this, as the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee, Lu Zhou had some research privileges.

The moment the crisis happened, a live sample of the X-0172 bacteria was sent to the Institute for Advanced Research. The highest level of security was assigned to this sample.

However, they obviously didn't disclose this to the public.

Professor Liu was about to leave when he suddenly remembered something.

"Oh yeah, that metabolite extract… Did you run out of it yet?"

"I have a little bit left. I put it in my office. If you need it, I can get someone to fetch it for you…" Lu Zhou looked at Professor Liu and asked casually, "What?"

Professor Liu shook his head and spoke.

"There's a question I don't know if I should ask."

Lu Zhou said, "What question?"

Professor Liu Zuobing said, "Do you know who Dr. Z is?"

Lu Zhou: "No, why?"

"I'm just asking." Professor Liu smiled awkwardly and said, "That Dr. Z who posted the thesis on arXiv, is it you…"

Lu Zhou asked, "Do you really think it's me?"

Professor Liu nodded honestly.

"Generally speaking, very few biology theses are posted to BioRxiv. I rarely hear my colleagues uploading their theses to arXiv… If I recall correctly, arXiv is mainly for physics, mathematics, and computer science theses."

Not to mention there were only a few people who had contact with the X-0172 bacterial sample. The experts on the Moon Palace said that they did not write the thesis themselves. The Jinling Institute for Advanced Study was the only place on Earth that had access to the samples.

If Dr. Z weren't Lu Zhou, then it would have to be people in Professor Liu's research team…

Obviously, his research team wasn't that nutty. He knew there was no way anyone in his team could write a thesis of this level.

However, he wasn't totally confident in his assumption. After all, Lu Zhou had never published a biology thesis before, and he had never heard of Professor Lu doing any kind of biology research…

Liu Zuobing was a little confused.

Professor Lu stayed awkwardly silent.

Biologists have their own preprint upload site?

They don't post it on arXiv?

Sh*t, this is my first time hearing about this.

I should have done more research, this is quite embarrassing.

"Whatever, stop talking about this useless stuff."

Lu Zhou changed the conversation topic and said, "Regardless of who Dr. Z is, we will remember his contribution. If he wants to stay anonymous, we should respect his decision… Also, the X-0172 research team can be disbanded. Merge the research data with the dormancy project team."

Professor Liu immediately said, "There's still one colonizer who hasn't woken up yet."

Lu Zhou: "We've already solved the difficult part. The rest will be handled by the international experts. As for you, you should continue research on human cryonics dormancy."

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Chapter 814: Reward for the Urgent Mission?

Even though there was still a colonizer in a coma, the crisis of the X-0172 bacteria was undoubtedly over.

Because they had the pheromone that could remove the bacteria's defense system, the tough spores were no longer an issue.

Two days after the good news traveled from the Moon Palace to Earth, which was the 33rd day of Lu Zhou's mission, Lu Zhou received a pop-up window while he was working at the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study.

[Congratulations, user, urgent mission completed!

[Mission completion details: Recently, humanity has faced its greatest threat. Fortunately, the crisis was avoided. Congratulations on finding a way to eliminate the bacteria. The decisions you make will change civilization…

[Mission evaluation: A

[Rewards: Experience pack (1-??? experience points), civilization rescuer medal (materialism 10)]

Lu Zhou: "…?"

Maybe because he asked the system for help, or because there was one more infected person, his evaluation was only an A.

But that wasn't the main part, he didn't care about the S evaluation rewards anyway.

What he didn't understand was what the hell was the "civilization rescuer medal"?

He had won many awards over the years, but this was his first time winning an award from the system.

What does this thing do? Can I exchange it for general points or experience points?

Lu Zhou was muddled. He opened his inventory and saw the medal quietly lying there.

A circle of golden stars wrapped around the medal. It floated above an inverted triangle metal base, as if there was some kind of magnetic force.

The medal also had a red and blue ribbon attached to it. Even though Lu Zhou didn't know what material the ribbon was made of, it looked extravagant.

"Magnetic levitation? Or some other kind of force?"

Lu Zhou was curious. He took out the medal from his inventory and played around with it. He then opened the medal instructions.

[The medal is issued by (REDACTED), according to the (REDACTED) convention signed in (REDACTED), this medal is among the highest honors for individuals from low-level civilizations. If immigration channels are open, individuals from low-level civilizations can use this medal to obtain full citizenship from higher-level civilizations…

[Note; This medal has a built-in anti-counterfeit detector. Do not disassemble. Do not scan.]

"I feel like this medal just revealed an extraordinary secret."

Lu Zhou looked at the medal instructions on his inventory, and he began to contemplate it.

By looking at the sentence, the (REDACTED) words were a subject, an adverbial, and an attributive. He originally thought that this system was probably created by a high-level civilization or institution called "Future". But now, it seemed like things were more complicated than he had thought.

After pondering for a while, Lu Zhou gave up and shook his head.

Even though he wanted to know what was redacted, the system clearly had a reason for keeping this a secret from him.

So far, it seemed like the system didn't have malicious intentions. The system even wanted to protect him and benefit Earth's civilization.

Maybe the system is waiting for an opportunity?

Lu Zhou believed that once he upgraded all of his subjects to level 10 and unlocked the [Future Era] and [Giant Engineering Structure] missions, more secrets of the system would be revealed to him…

After placing the medal back into his inventory, Lu Zhou reached out and selected another object in his inventory.

After he pressed the "activate button", a bunch of mysterious stars popped out of the gift bag. Some tiny stars landed on his face, so he took a step back.

However, Lu Zhou soon found out that the stars weren't made out of anything; it was similar to a holographic projection.

Then, a light blue dialog box appeared on the screen.

[Congratulations, user, 300,000 physics experience points awarded!]

"I completed a biological mission, but I received physics experience points? Is the system hinting at me to study physics?"

Lu Zhou smiled and shook his head. He reached out and tapped the screen.

His new characteristic panel was displayed in front of him.

[

A. Mathematics: Level 8 (774,000/3 million)

B. Physics: Level 7 (313,215/1.2 million)

C. Biochemistry: Level 6 (10,000/600,000)

D. Engineering: Level 5 (10/300,000)

E. Materials science: Level 6 (63,000/600,000)

F. Energy science: Level 3 (50,000/100,000)

G. Information science: Level 3 (3,000/100,000)

General points: 2,335

]

"Mathematics level 8, physics level 7… The next level up requires millions of experience points. It will be a while before I level up again."

Lu Zhou closed his characteristic panel and looked at his mission panel.

His mission chain was lit up again. He closed his eyes and exited the system.

When he opened his eyes again, he was back in the dean's office.

Lu Zhou leaned back in his chair and rested for a while. He was about to continue working when he suddenly heard a knock at his door.

"Come in."

Professor Liu Zuobing opened the door.

He cheerfully walked into the office while holding an experimental report. He walked toward Lu Zhou's desk and spoke.

"The experiment was successful!

"The 18S-rDNA gene fragment is compatible with the X-0172 bacteria. So far, we have successfully transcribed the special proteins and amino acid derivatives that we need!

"If everything goes well, we should finish this research project in one month!"

Lu Zhou took the experimental report and briefly glanced at it. He nodded with satisfaction.

"Nicely done… You must have worked very hard."

"Not hard at all. This is my research direction anyway. I have to thank you for providing me the opportunity." Professor Liu Zuobing smiled and suddenly remembered something. He said, "Oh yeah, when I analyzed the X-0172 genome, I found something interesting."

Lu Zhou said, "What?"

"How do I put it? Maybe I'm wrong…" Professor Liu said, "This genome gives me a feeling that it didn't come from natural evolution. I'm not sure if it's a coincidence or what."

Not from natural evolution?

Lu Zhou paused for a second. He began to frown.

"Not from evolution? Could it be…"

He suddenly stopped talking.

He instantly realized what could be happening.

Liu Zuobing looked at Lu Zhou and nodded.

"Yeah, it's almost like it was created manually."

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