The North Pole is within the fief!
All white ice plains, this place won't do!
Jiang Ye's face turned green.
He immediately switched out and asked Li Nannan, "Can we change the fief location?"
Li Nannan replied with a photo, a selfie of her rolling her eyes.
Jiang Ye was desperate.
He had originally obtained one-third of the area of Birong Star and felt he had a sure win, but now he found it was all a barren, cold land...
This wave of difficulty was immense!
Jiang Ye returned to the app and rotated the planet, bringing the entire fief into view.
A small red dot was flashing, located on land one hundred kilometers from the North Pole.
Jiang Ye reached out and tapped it:
[Initial Star Station: A sturdy star station built by the military, used for landing and taking off spacecraft]
[Please top up 100 billion to unlock]
It seemed this was the starting point. One hundred billion wasn't a huge sum, and Jiang Ye decisively topped up.
After the purchase was successful, the various data of the initial star station appeared.
It could only dock two star-class spacecraft?
Jiang Ye was dumbfounded.
Wasn't this a scam?
The star station he built on Jiang Ye Star cost over a hundred billion and could dock more than ten star-class spacecraft simultaneously!
The military are such dogs!
...
Three days later, at eleven o'clock at night.
In the spacious star station, two massive star-class warp spacecraft had just landed steadily, lights flashing, hot air whistling.
Each spacecraft was as large as a small castle, entirely black.
Ground crews drove small vehicles, rushing to inspect them.
These were two new semi-military spacecraft Jiang Ye had purchased, specially customized with reinforced and cold-resistant modules, costing a total of 26 billion.
They were named Birong One and Birong Two respectively, and would be used to travel to Birong Star at the start.
Soon, the spacecraft inspection was completed. The new spacecraft had no problems, and the ground crews lowered the boarding ramps.
On the open ground at the edge of the star station, large numbers of soldiers had assembled.
Che Zhen personally led the team: 100 living soldiers and 400 mechanical soldiers, all fully armed, with large marching packs on their backs and metal cases in their hands.
"Report! Birong Star First Unit assembled! Expected five hundred, present five hundred!" Che Zhen saluted.
Jiang Ye stood in front of the troops and returned the salute.
"Be extremely careful when you get there. The situation on Birong Star is complex. I don't expect you to accomplish much; prioritize your safety and establish a foothold first," Jiang Ye said with a serious expression. "I will join you soon! I will hold a review then, and not a single one of you will be missing!"
"Yes!" the soldiers shouted in unison.
Jiang Ye surveyed all the soldiers and finally waved, "Board!"
Che Zhen immediately shouted commands, and the soldiers entered the spacecraft in an orderly fashion.
In the distant dark factory buildings, lights flickered on, and large star station cargo vehicles silently drove out, lining up and sliding towards the spacecraft. The cargo vehicles were loaded with large and small bright red cargo boxes, containing various tools and materials needed to build the camp.
Loading took over half an hour, and the cargo holds of the two spacecraft were finally filled.
The spacecraft doors slowly closed.
The immense roar of the engines, like dragons taking to the sky, sent the two spacecraft rapidly ascending into the night sky, trailing meteor-like flashes.
Jiang Ye calmly put on noise-canceling headphones and watched the two spacecraft take off.
With the clatter of high heels, Cen Yemeng, dressed in fur, ran over and draped a fur-lined long robe over her husband's shoulders.
"It's cold, let's go back. They've set sail smoothly," Cen Yemeng said, then tucked a hot water bottle into her husband's embrace.
"I can't use the remote control cabin signal this time; I can only send living people. I'm very uneasy," Jiang Ye sighed, turning to embrace his wife and walk back. "Nuclear radiation, mutated creatures, unknown terrain, and extreme cold can all be fatal. We know nothing about the situation near the star station, and the military won't provide data. It's a headache."
Cen Yemeng comforted him, "It'll be fine. With the spacecraft and the star station, the soldiers' lives will definitely be okay."
"I hope so," Jiang Ye frowned.
The couple got into their car. Instead of going home, they headed to the nearest military base.
The spacecraft were warp-capable and would reach Birong Star in a few hours. The signal station would likely be set up by dawn, and Jiang Ye needed to see the firsthand information.
They arrived at the office at exactly one in the morning.
Cen Yemeng took off her clothes, decisively got into bed, and snuggled under the covers.
"Let's sleep for a bit. Won't we get news earliest at five?" Cen Yemeng patted the pillow and looked at her husband.
"I'm not sleepy. I need to handle some trivial matters. If anything happens, I need to be on standby," Jiang Ye sat down behind his desk.
He was extremely nervous.
Sending five hundred people to an unknown area without any communication.
It felt like dropping troops into wild mountains in the middle of the night, with no idea what they would encounter upon landing.
The screen only showed the spacecraft's status from ten minutes ago; everything was normal. After that, the signal disappeared as the spacecraft entered warp, during which no messages could be relayed.
Signals near Birong Star were being jammed by the military. Even after the spacecraft arrived, they couldn't relay any messages.
The military did this to simulate wartime conditions, assuming Birong Star was surrounded by alien forces and its signals were cut off.
Not only Jiang Ye's troops but also troops sent by other planetary powers were in the same situation: entering the black zone, to survive or perish on their own.
According to the plan, at four in the morning, Che Zhen would lead the troops to land safely and begin setting up the signal station.
The signal station equipment weighed a substantial 310 tons, accounting for a significant portion of the cargo.
However, this signal station was extremely impractical; sending even a single character back to Jiang Ye Star required tens of thousands of yuan in time-sensitive components.
Furthermore, it couldn't transmit audio, images, or video signals, only the most basic text messages.
This was also contingent on the military's signal jamming field not being at full power when messages were sent. If it was at full power, no message could get through.
Jiang Ye processed the backlog of miscellaneous tasks while anxiously waiting.
Two o'clock.
Three o'clock.
Four o'clock!
Jiang Ye had his secretary, Su Yueming, bring him breakfast. He stared at the screen without a word.
If everything went smoothly, by this time, Che Zhen would have led the troops off the spacecraft and moved the cargo into the star station.
Four-thirty, five o'clock!
Jiang Ye stared intently, waiting.
If all went well, he would receive news any moment!
Cen Yemeng slept soundly. The office was so quiet you could hear the air conditioner.
Time passed extremely slowly, and Jiang Ye felt an intense urgency.
Five-thirty.
Six o'clock.
Six-thirty!
Still no news.
Jiang Ye couldn't sit still. He paced back and forth behind his desk, his eyes fixed on the screen.
Why was there still no news?
Had something happened?
Bah, bah, bah! He couldn't have such unlucky thoughts!
Perhaps they had just caught the military's signal jamming period, and the messages couldn't get through temporarily.
Seven o'clock.
Cen Yemeng woke up. She stirred in the covers and sat up with a yawn.
She saw her husband's anxious expression, suddenly remembered something, and looked at the clock on the wall.
"Still no news?" Cen Yemeng's face was filled with dread.
"No," Jiang Ye's mood was extremely bad.
Seven-thirty.
The couple stood before the screen, both sweating profusely.
Finally, the screen flickered!
Birong Star: [Safe, received?]
Jiang Ye was overjoyed!
Cen Yemeng also breathed a sigh of relief, patting her chest.
The signal station on Che Zhen's end found it difficult to send even a single character, so they kept the message as brief as possible. This message meant "My unit has landed safely, can you receive messages?"
Jiang Ye immediately sent the pre-edited message, [Received, need?]
This was also a pre-arranged reply, meaning "Received your message, what do you need transported?"
No pleasantries, only questions about requirements. Every word was incredibly precious.
However, a prompt popped up on the screen:
[Message failed to send, resend?]
Jiang Ye immediately clicked on the prepared software.
The software began sending messages automatically, ten per second. The screen scrolled rapidly.
[Received, need?]
[Received, need?]
[Received, need?]
...
After waiting for half an hour.
Finally, the frenzied scrolling and sending of messages stopped.
[Sent successfully!]
It was incredibly difficult!
Across many light-years, with the military's intermittent jamming fields and complex environmental interference, sending a signal to Birong Star's rudimentary small signal station was a monumental challenge!
Jiang Ye let out a long sigh of relief. Being able to communicate with each other, even with just a few sparse words, was already the first step towards success!