After three days of waiting, it was finally the day of the experiment. Li Gaoliang was lying on the virtual reality chair along with his soldiers. He finally understood what Lu Zhou meant by the planet “Reach”.
The boundless space, the cerulean planet, a giant starship…
“F*ck me! Is this… the Magpie Bridge?”
“Doesn’t look like it… Seems like something fictional.”
The people were standing in a room inside the virtual reality world. They all looked surprised.
This was different from their previous experiences of fragmented worlds; everything here looked so real. The textures of the materials, the sounds of footsteps, this felt like a dream.
It was almost like the laboratory in the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study had teleported onto a starship.
The sounds and the feel of touch weren’t done by external equipment.
Just like the images they were seeing with their own eyes, everything was projected directly into their brains…
Of course, in addition to the view outside the starship window, what surprised them the most was the armor on their bodies and the guns hanging around their shoulders.
The sci-fi armor felt so realistic. Even though they were lying inside a small laboratory room, they couldn’t help but feel like they were in a real war.
“Why is the armor so heavy…” a well-built man said. He frowned and continued, “It must be at least 50 kilograms.”
Even though they were in a low-gravity environment, they could still feel the heaviness of the armor.
The weight of the armor gave them a sense of security, but they didn’t look relaxed at all.
Using unfamiliar equipment was a dangerous thing, especially since the armor was so heavy, one could become an easy target on the battlefield.
The shorter man standing next to him spoke.
“Is this bulletproof?”
“No…” a man said. He had a long-range rifle across his shoulder. He spoke in a calm manner, “It looks like an exoskeleton… The tactical eyepiece is equipped with a holographic display, and it tells you how to use the weapons in your hand.”
Suddenly, the cabin door opened.
When Li Gaoliang and Professor Lu walked in, the soldiers stopped talking and gave a military salute.
Lu Zhou nodded awkwardly as he looked at Li Gaoliang.
Li Gaoliang took a deep breath and walked forward. He looked at all of them and spoke.
“I know you are all surprised… In fact, I was more surprised than you when I saw this.
“This is just an exercise, but I hope you can treat it as a real battle!”
Li Gaoliang looked back at Lu Zhou and wondered if he could skip the military nonsense and begin the exercise.
However, he saw Academician Lu look interested and intrigued, as if Academician Lu wanted him to continue the glorious speech.
Li Gaoliang paused for a second and finally turned around. He spoke in a stiff tone.
“… Our allies on planet Reach are being attacked by hostile forces. Our mission is to reach the communication tower at the colonial outpost. This is to ensure the normal operation of the communication facilities. We also have to set coordinates for the airstrikes of orbital weapons.
“The manual for using the equipment is built into the exoskeleton. Press the button on the right side of the tactical eyepiece to begin the holographic control interface.
“Our spacecraft will arrive in the airdrop area in 20 minutes. You guys have ten minutes to familiarize yourself with the equipment.”
Li Gaoliang set a ten-minute timer on his watch.
Li Gaoliang stood still and looked at the people in the cabin. He then shouted, “Are you ready?!”
The soldiers stood up straight.
“Yes, sir!”
Li Gaoliang turned around.
“Let’s go!”
After the group of the people left the cabin, Lu Zhou went to the command center.
The workers here were all NPC with simple encoded behavior logic. When Lu Zhou walked into the command center, they did not even look at him. Instead, they continued to “work”.
It was like Lu Zhou was watching a movie.
And he was sitting in a front-row seat.
“… Watching movies with virtual reality is a pretty good idea. The audience can participate in the plot without interfering with the plot,” Lu Zhou said as he looked at the screen, which was showing the soldiers stepping into the airborne capsule. He said to himself, “Not bad, I should write down this idea.”
The group of soldiers stepped into the airborne cabin buffer room.
Under the instructions of the staff member… the NPC, Li Gaoliang quickly connected the life support system to his exoskeleton.
Honestly speaking, he felt a little bad.
He was an experienced soldier, but at this moment, he felt like he was a new recruit.
He heard a voice in his ear.
“Approaching the airdrop area in 30 seconds.”
“Five.”
“Four.”
“Three.”
“Two.”
“One.”
The countdown ended.
They heard a muffled click and began feeling a huge thrust.
“Successfully in orbit, airborne procedure beginning.”
“Good luck, soldiers!”
“Cabin is separated!”
The cabin began to heat up.
When they made contact with the atmosphere, there was a huge force pushing them into their seats.
Li Gaoliang clenched his jaw.
This feels way too real.
The feeling of descending from space feels exactly like real life…
They had already traveled hundreds of kilometers. Flames came out of the deceleration engine.
When they were 100 meters from the surface, the airborne capsule ejected a smoke bomb, exploding on the ground, covering the battlefield.
The airborne capsule crashed on the ground as the group of well-trained soldiers stepped out of the cabin door, set up their weapons, and opened the infrared imager on their tactical eyepiece.
However, everything was dead silent. There was no sign of life here at all.
One of the soldiers had their rifle pointed at a shadow nearby. He took a deep breath and asked in the communication channel.
“Sir, who is our enemy? F*ck… What are these plants, how come I’ve never seen them before?”
Li Gaoliang looked at the shadow nearby and checked his map as he said, “Apparently, they’re aliens.”
“Aliens? The f*ck?!”
There was no time for these people to stay surprised.
There was a sound of howls in the distance.
The high-pitched howl pierced their eardrums, sending chills down their backs.
They could hear sounds of footsteps in the distance, like animals running through a forest.
Suddenly, they could see red dots on their tactical eyepiece maps.
They could see sharp claws appearing from the smoke.
The soldiers had their guns ready to fire, their pupils shrank.
The enemies are…
Swarm Hosts![1]
[1] TN: species from Starcraft