The tires ran over the gravel and made a squeaking sound.
In the endless desert, a Mars rover faced the wind and sand flying in the sky, slowly moving forward.
In this life forbidden zone that had been undisturbed for a long time, apart from this AI-controlled all-terrain reconnaissance vehicle, there were only a few microorganisms still lingering on.
Time seemed to have taken away everything it could.
In this dead world, every grain of sand was engraved with desolation.
However, for this dead planet, today was definitely an extraordinary day.
The roar of the engine came along the thin atmosphere, and a silver-white ring slowly descended from the sky. Four thick flames and airflows pushed open an arc-shaped umbrella in front of it. The red sand on the ground was blown away from a distance, and it even set off a sizable sandstorm.
The all-terrain survey vehicle seemed to have heard the movement from the sky. It turned its head and turned the all-angle camera on the top, casting a "confused" gaze into the sky.
It was also this glance that recorded that soul-stirring scene.
Like a comet crashing into the ground, the umbrella-shaped flame was instantly extinguished the moment the ring hit the ground. Instead, rolling sand and dust rushed into the sky like a reverse waterfall, like a turbid cloud pulling open the dusky sky.
[Information has been recorded … Setting the label.]
[Setting complete.]
The emotionless words flashed on the display. The "reptile", which had lost interest in the silver-white ring, continued to move forward along the original route. The task set by its owner was to explore the terrain and natural resources on the surface of Mars.
It had been doing this for years, and it would continue to do this until the machinery was damaged or the power was exhausted. Unlike the artificial intelligence that communicated with it, it did not have any extra curiosity for other insignificant things other than recording.
It did not meet this "colleague" who came to Mars earlier. After landing, the colonial capsule did not even take a break. It immediately began to deploy.
About four or five meters long alloy rods were inserted straight into the ground, firmly fixing the colonial capsule on the ground.
Then the silver-white metal shell expanded outward in four directions, like an inflated doughnut. It unfolded a planting area that looked similar to an airbag.
The deployment went smoothly.
Just like they had practiced countless times in the desert of the Great Northwest.
Standing in the communication room of the colony cabin, Liang Youcheng connected to the Xu Fu hovering in orbit through the console and briefly reported the current situation.
"This is the outpost of the Mars colony. We have successfully landed."
"The climate and environment here are worse than we thought, but fortunately, everything is going well … The colony chamber has been deployed. So far, the device has been stable, and there have been no troublesome failures."
"After a short rest, we will immediately begin today's work."
Liang Youcheng tried to make the report as concise and comprehensive as possible. He then sent this message to the Jinling launch site and updated it to the Xu Fu mission log.
After that, it was a series of routine rituals such as walking out of the cabin, planting flags, and taking pictures.
While these routine ceremonies were in progress, a four-wheeled rover that looked like an off-road vehicle slowly drove out of the garage outside the buffer room. It was driven by Dr. Fan, a planetary geologist, and it followed a straight trajectory into a sea of sand.
His destination was a "water source" 7.2 kilometers away from the colony cabin.
It was an underground ice layer 20 meters below the surface, located in the middle of a small basin. According to the estimated data provided by the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study, its reserves were about 150 to 400 million cubic meters.
Although many reservoirs on Earth could easily exceed this reserve size, compared to the water resources on the Moon, this reserve was enough to highlight the "vast land and abundant resources" of Mars.
For this colonial outpost, water resources were the first thing that must be ensured. It meant freshwater resources and oxygen, which were the most fundamental material basis for the operation of the entire artificial ecosystem.
Next were renewable resources such as solar energy and wind energy.
Although the thin and turbid atmosphere on Mars made solar energy and wind energy not so easy to use, it was better to collect energy on the spot than to use expensive nuclear energy.
After all, the nuclear fusion technology used on space stations and spacecraft was still a bit different from the Pangu reactor.
The latter was a serious magnetic confinement ignition device that released stellar-level energy. Every link from ignition to heat emission was designed according to local conditions. It required hundreds of engineers to maintain the stable operation of the device.
The former was just a pulsed fusion device based on the sonoluminescence phenomenon in liquid metal.
Although this device was countless times smaller than a series of giants such as the Pangu reactor and the Xihe reactor, it was far inferior in terms of energy utilization efficiency, total power, and cost per unit of electricity.
This was one of the reasons why even though the Moon Palace was equipped with this kind of fusion battery, it still had solar panels that were several times larger than the main body.
At present, the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study was researching how to build a simplified version of the first-generation magnetic confinement ignition device on the Moon, which would be used to power the ILHCRC collider and other "high-power experimental equipment" in the lunar scientific research station. It would also inspire the second-generation helium-triple-fusion technology and liberate the productivity of the Guanghan Special Economic Zone.
After all, after years of development, the energy gap on the Moon was still not small. It was still a bit difficult to rely entirely on solar panels and storage stations.
As for the "Mars Scientific Research Station" that didn't even have a name …
There was no need to even think about this kind of energy supply facility.
The rover stopped in the middle of the basin. Fan Tong, who got off the rover, put down the mobile drilling device behind the rover, and skillfully operated the tablet in his hand. First, he used seismic waves to measure the stratigraphic data, then he carried out multiple core samples of rock formations at a depth of 10 and 20 meters in three areas.
"Core sampling completed."
After a series of static noises, Captain Liang's voice quickly came from the communication channel.
"How's the situation?"
"It's unbelievable … I mean unbelievable." Fan Tong leaned against the mobile drilling device that had been put away behind the rover. He looked at the tablet in his hand with a strange expression on his face. "The data provided by the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study is unimaginably accurate. I can't help but wonder if they secretly went to Mars … How did they collect such accurate data?"
Liang Youcheng wasn't very clear about the inside story, but he wasn't particularly interested in these details. As the world's top research institution, the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study naturally had their own way of doing things.
Not to mention, they had Academician Lu.
Any unimaginable thing would seem reasonable when it came to that man.
"Maybe they collected information from the wreckage of the New Virginia. It seems to be a long time ago … Who cares, since the information is accurate, we don't have to worry about freshwater resources for the next three years."
More than 100 million cubic meters of freshwater reserves.
Forget about three years, even if their population multiplied by ten times, they still wouldn't be able to use it up in three hundred years.
The colony capsule was originally an eco-friendly type, and the need for external resource input was very small. If the situation was optimistic, they could even achieve complete internal circulation of water resources, but the energy consumption would be relatively higher.
"Is there anything else?"
"Um … There is one more thing I have to report to you."
With a hint of excitement in his tone, Fan Tong continued.
"When I was doing seismic wave detection earlier, I found a … slightly exaggerated earthquake crack nearby."
"Earthquake crack?" Liang Youcheng frowned. "Are you sure … it's an earthquake crack?"
"I'm sure! There's absolutely no mistake, that kind of fracture structure can only be produced by natural seismic activity. Because of the relatively low terrain, it was lucky not to be buried by the wind and sand! However, surprisingly, according to the information I learned in the literature, the geological activity of Mars should have stopped billions of years ago. This kind of geological structure, which is common in active plate movement areas … is very unusual. Can I go down and take a look? "
Planetary geology was his major.
The excitement in his heart at this moment could no longer be described in words.
Although it was only a small fracture, its discovery may rewrite human civilization's understanding of Mars! As a scholar, was there anything more exciting than this?
Compared to Dr. Fan's excitement, Liang Youcheng was relatively calm.
Out of caution, after thinking about it for a moment, he finally rejected this proposal that was full of risks.
"Come back first, your mission today is over. It's better not to cause trouble."
Fan Tong: "I promise you, there will be absolutely no danger! Its depth is only about ten meters. Even without a safety rope, I can climb up … Of course, I will tie it to my waist. "
"Come back now, this is an order." Liang Youcheng said in a tone that could not be refused, "Take a picture of your discovery and record it in today's work log. I will let Ming Wenzhe follow you tomorrow."
After a long silence, a sigh came from the communication channel.
"Okay … You're right."
Fan Tong reluctantly looked at the crack behind him. He shook his head with some regret, threw the tools back on the rover, and got back into the cockpit.
Liang Youcheng, who was standing in the communication room, finally breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the positioning signal returning on the screen.
Confirming the freshwater resources was the last task of the day.
Everything had been going smoothly since the landing. He didn't want to cause any more trouble.
But having said that, his heart was also full of curiosity about the "earthquake crack" that shouldn't have appeared.
He had made up his mind. When Dr. Fan came back, he would report the situation to the ground command center and let the researchers on Earth decide whether to conduct further investigation …
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