The fleet stayed on Planet Lighthouse for two days and received all kinds of exploration equipment from Tarrokov. Large alloy containers were transported to the Black Star Corps' transport ships and placed neatly.
These were all exploration supplies provided by the dynasty, such as the stargate equipment, the foolproof planetary fortress expansion pack, the universe monitoring buoys used to perfect the star map and provide dynamic environment monitoring functions, and so on. They were all military equipment and would not be circulated in the regular interstellar market. At most, they would occasionally appear in the black market.
Han Xiao got Philip to count them. He received about five hundred sets of stargate equipment, six thousand Foolproof Planetary Fortress Expansion Packs, and fifteen billion Universe Monitoring Buoys. They were not given to him but borrowed mission items. They would last for some time.
Furthermore, Tarrokov had sent a dynasty fleet to temporarily join the Black Star Army to assist him in exploring the Garu Star Cluster. The commander of this fleet was a major general under Tarrokov called Senico.
Tarrokov was stationed on Planet Lighthouse as the commander, and the few dynasty fleets he sent out all had their own commanders. Senico was Tarrokov's direct subordinate and one of the dynasty officers stationed in the Flickering World in Han Xiao's memories.
Because they would be partners in the future exploration period, Han Xiao met with Senico and reached a simple agreement. Senico expressed that he would not interfere with the exploration plan of the Black Star Corps and would only provide assistance.
After two days of preparation, the chief commander finally announced the start of the operation. The various fleets on Planet Lighthouse went their separate ways and headed to the Star Cluster of their choice.
The Renault Star Cluster was explored by the Bloodshed Land and Klent, the Garu Star Cluster by the Black Star Corps, and the Crown Star Cluster by the remaining dynasty fleets. In comparison, the Crown Star Cluster had the most people exploring it, while the Garu Star Cluster had the least.
The Black Star Corps fleet and Senico's fleet headed toward the border Star System at the southernmost tip of the Garu Star Cluster.
Before they set off, Han Xiao had already informed all the members of the army about the exploration plan, including the millions of players.
He placed all kinds of jobs on the faction mission list, such as exploring planets, setting up buoys, and so on. They were also divided into different areas. There were many missions, but each had a limit on the number of people who could participate in them, allowing the millions of army players to choose from.
The various exploration missions caused discussions on the forums. This was because the mechanism of the Flickering World Main Storyline Missions was a point system, which was divided into individual points and group points. Different exploration missions would give different amounts of points, which would depend on the actual harvest. Only when the mission was completed would they know how many points they would be awarded. At this time, the players could only guess and analyze, but they still enjoyed it.
On the forum, players generally agreed that exploring planets was theoretically the most profitable. Discovering resources, discovering life, researching the history of the planet, mining resources, and so on would all be rewarded with points. The process was full of unknown interest.
In the eyes of the players, the other missions such as setting up the monitoring buoys, setting up the stargates, and building the stronghold transit station were all laborious tasks. Currently, the number of people choosing them was the least.
Han Xiao knew that once the players figured out the exploration process, the guilds would begin to compete openly and covertly. The large guilds hoped to use the resource-rich planets as their resource points. Although they could only obtain a small portion of the total amount of resources mined, it was already extremely generous for the average player.
In his previous life, there were two important reasons why the players of the various countries in the Flickering World fought each other. One was faction fighting and the other was fighting for resource points. Now, however, the millions of players belonged to his own faction, so faction fighting would not occur. Thus, fighting for resource points was the only reason.
Han Xiao was clear that in order to fight for the various planets with rare resources, the guilds would compete fiercely, and guild wars would frequently break out. Although it had not reached that stage yet, he knew in his heart that competition would definitely occur, especially now that there were club guilds from different countries in the army.
Another reason he wanted to encourage the new and old players to socialize was to plan ahead and minimize the impact of the guild competition on the ordinary players. It was inevitable that ordinary players would fight each other for fun. What he wanted to prevent was an obvious hostility between the ordinary players. Thus, he used the two faction contribution points missions to encourage the players of the various countries to actively make friends.
As long as there were no obvious cracks in the internal players, the guild competition would not be a loss for him. After all, the players' equipment would have to be repaired if it was damaged.
…
The various fleets sailed for a few days before entering their designated positions and officially starting their exploration work.
The Black Star Corps exploration team arrived at the southernmost Star System of the Garu Star Cluster. According to the plan, they built the first transit station to connect to the Dawn Star Cluster.
The engineering team used a foolproof Planetary Fortress Expansion Package on a desolate planet at the edge of the Star System. A transport ship opened the launch bay, and hundreds of thousands of giant mechanical bases with space thrusters flew out. They looked like steel nails. These were the Fortress Nodes.
The Fortress Nodes arranged themselves in the outer space of the planet. The distance between the nodes was the same, forming a huge net that covered the entire planet.
Then, the thrusters of the nodes of the fortresses spurted out surging orange exhaust flames and broke through the outer space. Like hundreds of thousands of space-based gravity weapons, they landed on the surface of the planet and stabbed deep into the crust, raising boundless dust.
The next step was that all the Fortress Nodes were activated. A crimson light shone from the top, and they started to modify the planet's atmosphere and terrain. Every node was vibrating, and shockwaves burst out, causing rumbling earthquakes. The underground rock layers were torn apart, and large amounts of metal structures were poured in.
Silver and gray metal extended out from the Fortress Nodes and covered the ground, turning the planet's surface into metal. According to the preset program, these engineering alloys with nano-modification ability automatically transformed and assembled. Bases, fortresses, and warehouses were built one after another.
Dozens of hours later, the initial modification was completed. This desolate planet had a brand new look, turning into a silver and gray Planetary Fortress, becoming the first stronghold of the Garu Star Cluster.
The dynasty's engineering spaceships were not idle either. They used tractor beams to drag huge pieces of stargate components and assembled the stargate next to this stronghold.
The stargate that was not activated looked like a huge hollow mechanical ring. After it was activated, the inner ring of the mechanical ring lit up with a blue light like an indicator light, releasing space energy. According to the preset coordinates, it connected to one of the stargates near Planet Lighthouse.
After the activation process was completed, the hollow part of the mechanical ring turned into a wormhole-like blue vortex, turning into a complete stargate.
Other than the team that stayed behind to build the stronghold, the rest spread out. Some went to the surrounding areas to set up space monitoring buoys, while others went to explore the unknown planets.
This Star System was divided into about ten Star Zones. At this time, the Black Star Corps started to explore the first Star Zone.
According to the plan, Han Xiao sent out a special task force led by Hardaway with 150 sets of stargate equipment. Their goal was to cross more than ten Star Systems to head to the east of the Garu Star Cluster and build a long-distance stargate passage.
The spaceships of the special task force were all high-grade warp speed transport ships, with a limit of 14.1 warp speed. They would need about four months to cross such a long distance to reach their destination.
When the special task force built a long-distance stargate passage, the four-month journey would be shortened to a few hours. Because it was not a direct stargate, they would need to transit through more than ten Star Systems, so they would need some extra time to travel.
Countless army members worked together, and Han Xiao himself was not idle. He took the main ship and led a group of normal army warriors and players to explore a planet at the center of this Star Zone.
In his memory, this planet was a trade transit station in his previous life. It was one of the gateways into the Garu Star Cluster. It was quite valuable, and it did not have a harsh environment. It was a habitable planet with indigenous civilizations.
Now, this planet did not have a name, only a serial number. It was a good opportunity to occupy it and develop it.
…
At the outer border of the Shattered Star Ring.
This was the edge of the explored universe, separated from the Flickering World by a long desolate universe belt.
Fleets left the border from different directions, turning into hyperdrive streams of light and entering the desolate universe belt, heading straight for the Flickering World.
The news of the Red Empire developing the Flickering World had spread throughout the galaxy. Although the dynasty had banned other civilizations from entering, an agreement was not enough to scare off the advanced organizations. They all wanted to bypass the dynasty's monopoly and enter the Flickering World in advance.
These fleets were not the first batch. They came from different civilizations and organizations and did not want to be discovered by the dynasty, so they hid their identities.
Because they could not use the dynasty's stargates, they could only sneak into the Flickering World with the stargate equipment, planning to secretly build a secret stargate passage to avoid the dynasty's surveillance.
Even if these fleets had very high warp speed, it would take them a very long time to cross the desolate universe belt and reach the Flickering World.
Among these stowaways, most of them were doing it for benefits, while a small group had ulterior motives.
One of them was the direct subordinates that the Arcane Church had secretly sent.
—
(I've caught a cold and slept for eleven hours. My mind is not very clear. I have to pack my things tonight and catch a flight tomorrow morning, so I'll be writing less in the next two to three days. I'll try not to take leave (; ̄ д ̄))
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