Chapter 1084: Chapter 93: Today in the Hero-Controlled Zone

This time, Jeanne and the others are heading to a mining base located somewhere 0.8 light seconds away. Workers usually work there to the limit, receive their pay, and then fly back to rest.

This way, they can save commuting time.

And on that planet, there is also a Hero’s outpost.

“Why go to that place?” Jeanne was puzzled, “Can’t you come into the city? It’s not like the city excludes Heroes.”

Li Liang shrugged: “Of course we have a base in the city. But within the Asteroid Belt, Heroes spend less time in the city.”

“Why?”

“We’re here to fight. And for Heroes, Neutral Cities are a pretty good place to rest. Given the current situation, we have to fight. There’s not much room for rest.”

“Fight? With those workers?”

“Don’t underestimate the workers of the Neutral City-States.” Li Liang chuckled, “These workers are mostly elite soldiers from the old times, undergoing long professional military training. They might be a bit out of touch with the times, but their military skills are high. It’s just that they have become disillusioned with the world. Besides, Heroes should stand with the workers.”

According to Li Liang, similar bases often have Heroes stationed there. While people from Neutral City-States mine on the planet, Heroes also find ways to turn it into a hidden base, placing supplies needed for starships or setting hidden landmines and forts.

The fleet of the Chivalrous Power can gain a greater advantage here.

And some technologies developed by the Chivalrous areas beyond the Solar System, especially those for construction, can also be put into practice here and collect usage data.

For Heroes and the Neutral City-States, it’s a win-win strategy.

Jeanne suddenly became curious. Beyond Saturn and its orbit, the Far Sun Planets were long occupied by Heroes. They are the true bitter cold lands, where the sun’s light and heat become weak, and there is a lack of easily mined metal veins. In the Protector’s propaganda, they are the real harsh frontiers.

“It’s mostly true.” Li Liang felt it was natural when faced with Jeanne’s curiosity, “They’re indeed lacking a lot of things… Anything not lacking here is lacking there. Due to the lack of solar energy, everyone relies heavily on public infrastructure and the power grid. Population growth is also severely limited. The environment there is too harsh. Large-scale expansion is difficult with so few minable resources… Transporting from here is too far and requires guarding against the Protector Fleet in the Jupiter Domain.”

“In the beginning, all our resources and infrastructure were taken from the ruins in the hands of the Protectors. It’s been the people from over there who slowly transformed it into their new home.”

“During the era of the Sixth Martial God, the Heroes who raised the banner over there began to call for the rebuilding of the industrial system. During the Seventh Martial God, things became even more remarkable, and we even rebuilt a normal research system—not the kind of deformed thing like the Scientific Knight Order but something more… more normal.”

Jeanne asked, “What do you mean by ‘more normal’?”

“At the end of the old era, Martial Ancestor tried to promote academic reforms to eliminate the medieval mentor-apprentice system, erasing teacher-student relationships with personal attachment.” Li Liang said, “It had some effect but was left unfinished due to the outbreak of a secret war. The Sixth Martial God left plans, and the Seventh Martial God provided some assistance when fighting within the Asteroid Belt.”

“In the past 40 or 50 years, the Heroes have been continuously experimenting with new research systems. They’ve tightly linked ‘engineering education’ with ‘industrial production’ and ‘engineering research,’ and deeply integrated ‘theoretical research’ and ‘science education’ with ‘engineering research,’ forming a stable, large structure… It’s quite complicated to explain. But, thanks to the existence of the Scientific Knight Order, we at least know what an ‘academic community shouldn’t become’ and ‘what scholars should avoid becoming.'” Li Liang said.

Jeanne nodded understandingly. Tumor Xiang Shan scratched his head, sighed, and said, “Oh my, this is what a normal scientist should be. Scholars should be like this. There are still normal people in this crazy era.”

Li Liang pointed the spaceship’s camera toward the outer regions of the Solar System, roughly in the direction of Saturn, and said, “You can take a look… The optical equipment on the spaceship is limited, and you can only see faint lights near the Saturn Ring. But I can tell you, that’s our pride.”

Jeanne connected her vision to the camera. Following Li Liang’s gesture, she indeed saw underneath the dark and beautiful universe, those faint, dreamlike distant artificial lights.

Tumor Xiang Shan seemed a bit dazed.

Tumor Xiang Shan suddenly sighed, “Old Seven probably never saw this even until his death.”

The Seventh Martial God was born from a starship, went through countless battles, and finally died on a starship.

While he was alive, the Chivalrous rear and the Neutral City-States had yet to appear.

From birth to death, he was always fighting.

Li Liang didn’t notice the subtle change in Tumor’s emotions and continued proudly explaining the information from there. The most valued technology by the Hero team is superconductor technology. Far Sun Planets have naturally ultra-low temperatures, and some materials, which don’t require very high standards, become “room temperature superconductors” there. Superconductor technology is the pillar of quantum computers.

The superconductor power supply network and quantum computers are the most core infrastructure for the Heroes. Their computing resources are not inferior to the Protectors. Over there has a well-developed network, and old-era literature and art materials are fully open, with active creation.

For Li Liang, the above are all achievements of “us,” the most pride-worthy matters. If asked by someone from the inside of the Solar System, she would proudly speak endlessly about them.

Unfortunately, there are very few connection points between the inner and outer networks, and the rate of information exchange is very low.

It’s not that either side intentionally isolates. Father of Machines doesn’t prohibit anyone from connecting to his network. And the Heroes can’t wait to send their information to the Protector-controlled areas inside the Asteroid Belt. But the Solar System is too vast. Establishing a signal transmission chain across Jupiter’s orbit, Saturn’s orbit, and Uranus’s orbit is hugely costly. The Protectors have no such intention, the Heroes lack the resources, and there’s also the need to guard against King Aqini sneaking in for sabotage.

Now, exchanging information relies mainly on people carrying hard drives.