Chapter 107 Unmanned Operation and Golden Disk

The scene of the drone swarm working in space was magnificent. Hundreds upon thousands of silvery-white dismantlers were tearing and cutting at the surfaces of those Ark-class behemoths, like termites gnawing at a giant beast. The dazzling cutting beams lit up the hull of each giant ship, peeling off the heavy armor that had been in place for ten thousand years, layer by layer. But this dismantling was not for destruction, but for research and taking over the systems of these giant spaceships.

While Hao Ren went to repair those giant generators and search for the artifact deep within the Ark, he also gave Nolan a series of orders: he wanted Nolan to figure out the navigation systems of these Arks as soon as possible and take over the control of each Ark, at least to be able to control these ships to fly to where he wanted them to go. To this end, Nolan first dismantled the armor plates near each group of engines and power furnaces (engine power furnaces, not shelter power furnaces) of the *Cliffs*. After ascertaining how these old devices worked, she believed that instead of tampering with the Ark's old-fashioned navigation host, it would be better to directly cut off the ships' "nerve lines" and instead have the drones install a new set of controllers on the engines and power furnaces. Her idea was supported by the *Giant Tortoise Rock Terrace's* logical mainframe, so she was now putting it into practice.

The engineering drones used their nimble mechanical arms to clamp a device called a "penetration core" and flew towards the Ark behemoths, attaching these penetration cores to the latter's engines and other key locations. The penetration core was a silvery-white sphere, like a drop of mercury, with a soft surface and beautiful shape, containing hundreds of millions of tiny units inside. Once these small "mercury droplets" were placed on a circuit board or switch group, it would immediately dissolve, then penetrate into the mechanical device, corroding and replacing the original circuit. In this way, the drones could easily control alien civilization equipment with technology levels far below their own—of course, this control method had great limitations, and it was useless when dealing with high-tech equipment that did not use physical lines or physical switches.

This little thing didn't come in handy when capturing the *Patian's* golden warship back then.

Hundreds of small holographic images were simultaneously displayed on the *Giant Tortoise Rock Terrace's* bridge, showing the information sent back by each drone team, and the progress bar of the penetration core taking over the Ark behemoth's control system was also displayed on it. Currently, the *Cliffs* was almost completely under control. Nolan directed the Ark to turn on the lights, turn off the engines, and turn left and right, while testing the sensitivity of the newly installed control system and muttering, "This process is like controlling a zombie spaceship, corroding all its original nerve lines and replacing them with my circuits... Weird."

Everyone on the bridge expressed that it was difficult to have a common language with a ship—Nolan's metaphor was too bizarre.

While the drone swarm was carrying out a vast and magnificent engineering project in space, the shelter of the *Throne* Ark was still immersed in a calm atmosphere.

People did not know what incredible things were happening on the opposite side of the several-kilometer-thick earth beneath their feet. They were just trembling as they prayed, facing the still-silent Ancestral Forge, repeatedly chanting the names of their ancestors and gods, and spreading superstitious sayings about the "Frostfire Judge" in whispers. The uninvited guests had entered the Ancestral Forge for an hour, and there was still no movement coming out. Neither doomsday frost fell from the sky, nor did warm currents dispel the cold of this world. People only saw some faint flashes of light coming from the horrifying crack on the surface of the Ancestral Forge—those flashes had appeared not long ago, and had been flashing incessantly ever since. Occasionally, some low rumbling sounds came from the crack. People did not know what these flashes and sounds meant.

In fact, the autonomous machines were happily repairing the giant generators behind the crack, and the flashes from the welding torches at the ends of their arms leaked out. The low rumbling came from deeper within the Ancestral Forge, where Hao Ren and his party were located.

There were countless solid doors between these ancient generators and reactors, as well as various safety shields and concrete shells. Most of these things were to protect the fusion reactors deep in the facility, but due to disrepair, these doors could no longer be opened by conventional means. Hao Ren had to use some technical means to open a path—his technical means included, but were not limited to, 5-kilogram equivalents, 10-kilogram equivalents, 35-kilogram equivalents, and Lily's headbutts. To be honest, these technical means were already quite gentle compared to the firepower he used to use when opening roads in the past.

Another series of rumbling sounds. A completely jammed metal door was destroyed by a series of precise small-scale explosions and fell down. Vivian used a gust of wind to disperse the dust in the air and walked forward with Hao Ren. Nangong Sanba followed behind, muttering, "Seriously, I don't think it's very safe to use explosives to open roads in a fusion reactor that's been running for ten thousand years... And it lacks aesthetic appeal."

"Anyway, the Data Terminal is watching over us, and we've safely avoided all the danger points along the way," Hao Ren said indifferently, looking up at the road ahead. This was already inside the energy hub of the shelter, and it could be said that they had stepped half a foot into the fusion reactor. Probably not many people would walk around this place in the years when the Ark was operating normally. All he could see were various severely aged pipes and mottled walls. The narrow and cramped maintenance passages were full of dust, and every once in a while on the ceiling above, he could see a wide skylight. Through the transparent skylight, he could see the spectacular scenery outside: all kinds of huge mechanical structures and thick cables with ten thousand years of history occupied the entire view. These things were like the internal organs and blood vessels of a steel behemoth, filling Hao Ren's surroundings, constantly reminding everyone that this place was close to the heart of the Ark.

Although everything here was crude and simple in the eyes of the Data Terminal, the Ark was still a miracle. The thing built by the designers had a kind of rough and primitive beauty, and no matter what—it sheltered hundreds of thousands of people through such a long period of time. Those cables flowed with the blood plasma of this ship, and the people of the Ark relied on these things to survive to this day.

But what exactly went wrong to cause the people of the Ark to suddenly regress from the space age to the medieval dynasty?

The deeper Hao Ren went into the reactor, the more serious his questions became. Until now, he had not found any clues to answer this question. The skeleton he found in the control room before was the only "prehistoric" remains he had discovered, but that skeleton did not explain anything at all.

At this time, the Data Terminal came out to interrupt his thoughts: "Wait a minute, there was just a sudden abnormal energy reading ahead."

Hao Ren subconsciously replied, "Energy? There's energy everywhere in this place."

"It's 'abnormal energy'," the Data Terminal bumped Hao Ren on the forehead, "It's the artifact!"

Hao Ren immediately looked at Vivian, who also looked over at the same time and nodded slightly.

The group immediately cheered up and jogged through the narrow maintenance passage. Finally, they arrived at a very open place. This was a cylindrical hall, and the hall was surrounded by a circular wall inlaid with huge tempered glass windows. Through those glass windows, you could see that the outside was the ring-shaped coil of the fusion furnace, and in the center of the hall was an alloy circular platform that was slightly inclined to the ground, with a radius of more than ten meters.

A golden thing was embedded in the center of the alloy circular platform, emitting a faint light.

Golden disk.

At the moment he saw the golden disk, Hao Ren was momentarily lost in thought. He had once imagined that the artifact in the local legends that protected the world might be this kind of disk—after all, this was the only kind of artifact he knew of that came directly from the Goddess of Creation—but when he really saw that it was just such a thing, he felt that everything was too logical, so logical that it was a little unbelievable.

This fleet successfully escaped the eldest son's world-destroying disaster, and escaped the brain monster's cosmic pursuit. What they relied on was the golden disk?

Vivian was a little dazed when she saw the disk. She subconsciously walked forward, and Hao Ren immediately noticed this and grabbed her: "Vivian!"

"Ah?" Vivian woke up suddenly, "What's wrong?"

"You seemed to be in a daze just now," Hao Ren looked at Vivian's eyes nervously, and was relieved to confirm that she had returned to normal at this time, "Stay away from me, I'll check the situation of that disk. Lily, you watch Vivian."

Lily immediately squatted down next to Vivian: "Go ahead, go ahead—I'm best at watching things!"

Hao Ren nodded and walked towards the golden disk.