Chapter 264: Time Waits for No One

President Radack pondered for a moment before saying, “Merely taking such steps isn’t enough. Musk is a tech fanatic. If that AI becomes an omnipotent ruler, it would effortlessly control him. We need someone else to guard the supercomputer room, and high explosives should be placed around it. No, set up a nuclear bomb, for which I hold the codes. Whether it’s the omnipotent ruler or not, it must remain under our control; it will either serve us or be destroyed along with its hardware.”

Caesar’s face showed shock; he hadn’t expected Radack to have such resolve, but his words were clearly correct. No matter if it was the omnipotent ruler or not, as long as its connection to the outside world was severed, it would be confined within that supercomputer. With a nuclear bomb in place, it became a means for them to threaten the AI, rather than the AI being a threat.

“Mr. President, this idea is brilliant. I will oversee this personally to ensure the AI serves us. With it on our side, we stand a much better chance against Dream Technology.”

After Caesar left with enthusiasm, Radack summoned his security advisor Hilary.

“Find me the best domestic expert on artificial intelligence. I have important questions, and time is of the essence.”

When Radack was alone, the air seemed to churn, spiraling toward the open window.

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In the Tanga Federation’s base command center, Du Qiu reviewed the progress of Heaven Realm’s construction.

“The fabrication bay is in place. Aside from basic raw materials, everything else is being shipped directly from the Moon base. One hundred Wyvern fighters have been temporarily assigned to transport the materials until the fabrication bay’s production lines produce transport ships, then the space transportation task will have dedicated units.”

Star Ocean explained with imagery from space.

“Did you activate the visual stealth systems on the fabrication bay and the Wyvern fighters?”

Ever since the Wyvern fighters were first tested and spotted by astronauts aboard the Heavenly Palace space station, Du Qiu would ask this each time he observed their assets in space.

Given the current international situation on Earth, Du Qiu had no intention of revealing Heaven Realm’s construction process, although he wasn’t concerned that Earth’s nations could prevent its completion. The 500 Wyvern fighters were enough to keep any Earthly attack at bay from Heaven Realm.

Star Ocean had yet to predict when the first fracture zone would develop or locate the second. However, the increasing earthquake activity across Earth’s seismic belts convinced Du Qiu of the Mayan prophecies’ accuracy.

His focus was to accelerate Heaven Realm’s construction; only a sufficiently vast Heaven Realm could save as many humans as possible.

“Of course, sir. The stealth feature is the default setting for large objects in space.”

“Make sure the radar stealth system is activated too. While far, some radio telescopes might detect them,” Du Qiu tirelessly reminded.

“With these adjustments, based on the Moon base’s production capacity, we can advance the launch of Heaven Realm’s first core module to September 6th.”

“Good. Send the first transport ship straight to the asteroid belt as soon as it’s offline. The early prospectors to the asteroids and Mars have arrived, right?”

“Yes, sir. The Martian prospector is scanning above Mars’ orbit, and once we’ve collated the information, I’ll promptly plan the Martian mining base construction. The asteroid belt prospector is marking targets in the belt; soon a mining base will be established on Ceres.”

“Summarize the Moon base’s mining experience, improve the standardization of the mining bases. This is our foundation for space expansion,” Du Qiu nodded.

Although he couldn’t replicate the immense producers of the alien civilizations from his dreams, he managed to create similar features with current technology. Even though there was a big gap compared to alien technology, standardized mining bases were better than none.

After discussing Heaven Realm’s construction progress, Star Ocean mentioned, “Sir, the United States has made a new move against us. They’re smearing us through public opinion. Should we retaliate?”

“Have Rein Leinar and Mr. Brühler taken any countermeasures?”

Rein Leinar had finished a global tour as Dream Technology’s worldwide CEO and returned to the Tanga Federation. He was now working out of the African headquarters.

Mr. Brühler, the external cooperation director of Dream Technology, hadn’t returned to the base and was currently quite passionate about his work.

“Rein Leinar just held a press conference. He fielded questions from reporters, refuting the U.S. claims of us being alien proxies.”

Du Qiu rubbed his chin, musing, “Time waits for no one. We need to focus more on building Heaven Realm and preparing for the catastrophes; we have no time for tangles with the United States. But a verbal denial is too soft. Didn’t Hao Ren make contact with the Persians? Sell them another batch of Tuna missiles. Additionally, it’s time for our assets in the United States to act. Since the great disaster has started, let’s dissect the United States sooner.”

As he spoke, Star Ocean interjected, “Sir, there’s an urgent matter.”

“What happened?”

Star Ocean reported, “We’ve just received image data from the carbon nanotube bugs in the U.S. Presidential Residence. Let me show you.”

The video of Radack’s emergency meeting and afterward conversation with Caesar was not very clear, but it was sufficient to see and hear.

“How interesting. They think they can challenge us with the reserved technology at N1 Base, do they?”

“Yes, sir. It’s the very N1 Base we previously uncovered. Technologically, it’s indeed better than anything the U.S. has produced thus far. But there’s still a gap compared to us.”

Du Qiu shook his head, replying, “We can’t underestimate N1 Base’s technology. After all, we’ve learned from it, and it’s contributed to our progress. At least our command control system was modeled on N1’s network command system, which is quite impressive.”

“Sir, I suspect the system was designed by that AI, Eden. It’s too well-suited for AI management—or rather, for AI to control nodes, similar to the movie ‘Terminator’s’ Skynet.”

“Haha, isn’t that perfect for you to manage? That’s why I say this system is not bad.”

Hearing Star Ocean’s humanized tone, Du Qiu could not help but laugh.

“Sir, are you mocking me?”

Suppressing his laughter, Du Qiu said, “No, you misunderstand. I’m happy because you are here to help me manage Dream Technology’s vast networks.”

“Thank you for the compliment, sir. It’s my duty.”

“Let’s try to infiltrate the space exploration company with carbon nanotube bugs, see if we can access that supercomputer. Maybe we can capture it and find out if it really is Eden.”

“Sir, that’s definitely feasible. Shall we proceed?”

Du Qiu thought for a moment and did not respond immediately but asked another question instead.