Chapter 517 - The Interstellar Defense System
Of course, Luo Yuan felt that the most important thing was that the new warship could fit more people. The number of inhabitants could the new warship could hold was beyond one's expectation.
Even with the current population of five million people, using the current mothership as the standard, the megastructures they had would definitely be able to accommodate the people as it could fit a billion people. Even a town-sized area in the ship could accommodate the population in China prior to the apocalypse.
However, based on the growth rate of humans, they would still need a few hundred years to fully occupy the spaceship.
In recent years, in the secret laboratory of the Glassian mothership, they had never stopped cloning human beings. They only slightly reduced the rate at which they cloned humans. The human population had increased by two million in 10 years, reaching a total population of eight million people.
The reason for this was not because they were incapable of cloning more humans or to prevent exposure but instead, it was because they lacked babysitters and teachers to tend to the clones.
There were only a small number of people that did not go into hypersleep, there were less than 500,000 of them. Most of them were researchers and only about 30,000 of them were professional babysitters. The clones were not products and yet, they were not as strong as Luo Yuan's clones that could survive on their own after they stopped taking in external sources of nutrients.
The newborn clones were relatively weaker. However, there was not much difference between the clones and an ordinary human. The only difference was that the clones were slightly stronger. A professional babysitter was necessary to feed the clones and start potty training.
After half a year, they would then begin showing abnormal signs of development, being able to walk and talk. By this period of time, the clones would no longer need to be taken care of.
The clones were not allowed into the virtual reality world, having to live and study at the welfare home. The reason they were unable to live in virtual reality was because their cognitive ability - the ability to distinguish between virtual reality and actual reality was not developed yet. If they were exposed for prolonged periods of time by living in a virtual reality environment, they would get easily confused between the actual world and virtual reality.
Many of the adults experience this as well, let alone children. Every time they left virtual reality, they would feel like they were in another world. Reality was merely a place for them to meet their physical needs. Most of their time was spent in virtual reality where they would work, live and play.
As a matter of fact, people living in virtual reality were getting confused. What was the real world? What was virtual reality? The boundaries became a blur.
This was the natural progress of things after people stayed in virtual reality for prolonged periods of time. It was an unavoidable side effect. However, Luo Yuan had no means of rectifying it at all. The greatest contribution of the researchers was their intelligence. As long as their work was not affected, they could work anywhere.
Regardless of how strong or advanced the new warship was, it would be rendered useless as the human could only stay in the old Glassian mothership to carry out technical verification in the virtual reality.
The dark region was a desolate area. It had no resources at all. Even if lady luck was on their side, and they managed to find an asteroid, it was still impossible for them to build a big spaceship that weighed at least hundred tons in weight.
They could only continue work on the spaceship when there was an asteroid to mine nearby. One or two asteroids could never meet the resource requirements for something that large so the project to build the new warship could only commence when they reached Barnard's Star.
They would have to fly for more than 10 years
However, due to human technological advancements, the technology in the spaceship would probably be an outdated one after 10 years. It was fated that the spaceship could only be seen on its blueprint, only being able to admire it in the virtual reality.
After visiting the spaceship, they then headed to the next destination by aircraft. The space outside had become the proving ground for the human armed forces. Aside from the spaceship and factories, there were still many weirdly shaped defense systems floating in space.
"It's one of the components of the Armed Satellite Global Defense System designed by the Tiandun Weapons Research Centre. It weighs about 300 million tons in weight. Its defense system consists of 10 clusters of huge fusion furnaces, one gamma-ray cannon, and 12 quick-firing electromagnetic cannons. For a complete set, there would be 18,000 of those components, covering the whole planet."
The Tiandun Weapons Research Centre was one of the largest research centers that specialized in designing interstellar weapons. About two-thirds of the interstellar weapons here were designed by them. The dean of the research center explained in details as Luo Yuan and the top management came for a tour to inspect the space defense.
Luo Yuan frowned as he heard the number, "300 million tons, and there are more than 10 thousand of them. Are there sufficient resources to meet the demand?"
"This…" The dean of the design institute felt awkward and replied, "It is designed by a young man. We'll modify it shortly."
"You can be creative but you've to be realistic at the same time. The real world is different from virtual reality. Resources are limited." Luo Yuan said seriously.
"Mayor, you're right. I've been thinking about it too. The weapons designed by the machinery and military design centers have been too daring over the years. They are most particular about appearance and quantity. The suit with a height of 300 meters did really terrify me. What's the point? Its effect was not comparable to the spacecraft if war were to happen. We must put a stop to these unhealthy practices." Bi Jianping agreed.
The manager of the research center was scared and was drenched with sweat as he was criticized by two bosses. He dared not even speak up to explain himself.
"That's still fine. You could never imagine how heavy is the first warship that they are going to build. The first edition of the design is 300 billion tons. How could this make sense to them?" Tian Jinping laughed as if he was a nice person. In fact, he was a serious person. As the supervisor of the industry department, he was very strict. His subordinates did not even dare to breathe in front of him.
Luo Yuan laughed and said, "It seems like they are granted too much authority in virtual reality. It has to be adjusted. Although an unlimited supply of resources could increase research efficiency, there are limited resources in Barnard's Star. If this continues, our development in future will be severely restricted."
It was not a guess but a fact instead. Based on the data obtained from the investigation, there were only two rocky planets in the galaxy while the rest of them were gaseous planets.
Moreover, it was a red dwarf star that emitted an extremely dim and weak light, causing the surface of the planet to be covered by thick layers of ice. These layers of ice were different from the one on Earth. It could reach a thickness of thousands of meters or even hundreds of thousands of meters. Aside from the water being easily accessible, all the other resources were quite difficult to extract and it consumed a lot of time and energy.
The most important thing was that humans had to consider the possibility that the rocky planet might be a gaseous planet or even a water-based planet. If that was true, it was indeed grievous news to the humans.
In fact, the chances of this happening were quite high. Since the temperature in its star system was quite low, if the planet did not have a sufficient amount of mass to generate enough heat, it would be frozen. Regardless if it was methane or hydrogen, it would be impossible for them to withstand an extremely low temperature of around zero degrees Celcius.