Warhammer: Striving to Be a Grinding Man

Chapter 66 Return Flight

The airlock closed behind them. The dark purple subspace sediment of the wrecked ship was kept out of the armored hull, and the hangar dome was lit with cold white lights, the beams of spotlights sweeping across each newly entered servant and each weary veteran.

Kara stood inside the airlock, holding a scanner in her hand, scanning each person entering from top to bottom. The scanner's beeping echoed in the empty hangar, and each green confirmation tone meant the inspection was successful.

Liu En stood silently to the side. He had already silently decomposed the green spores—those invisible threats that had clung to the gaps in the power armor and weapon grips for months—within the wreckage using his field technique. But the procedures had to be followed. The decontamination process lasted over two hours. Everyone, all the servitors, and all the supplies brought from the wreckage had to be tested before entering the Black Pearl's core compartments. No one dared to gamble on even a single spore slipping through—if it took root inside the ship, the entire vessel would capsize.

Liu En watched as the last veteran passed the inspection, then turned and walked toward the bridge.

Phyllis's logistics team set up a makeshift worktable next to the hangar exit. She held a data board in her hand, her long, dark brown hair tied in a neat ponytail, her gaze sweeping over the first batch of sample boxes brought back from the wrecked ship.

"Solar Void Armor." She flipped open the sealed inventory list, her fingers flying across the data panel. "Calibraf Laser Rifle... Multi-barrel Laser Cannon... Thermometallurg... This is only a small portion." She paused, then dragged over a half-open sealed crate containing gray-black magazines and several sturdy Hellfire Guns. "There are also Astragalus-issue Hellfire Guns and Thermometallurgical Bombs, salvaged from another armory deep within the wreckage—M35-era stockpiled goods, in better condition than expected." She looked up at Liu En. "Captain, how many of these are there?"

"If we bring them all back, it will be enough to equip tens of thousands of people," Liu En said.

Phyllis paused for a moment. She lowered her head and continued recording on the data tablet, her fingers tapping the screen noticeably faster.

The initial inventory of supplies continued late into the night. Phyllis wrote down preliminary statistics on the whiteboard, then erased and rewrote them—because the numbers were indeed substantial. The quantity of the Sun-type Void Armor was considerable. Cases of the Calibraf rifles were stacked several layers high in the cargo hold. Helmets were neatly arranged on shelves, their bronze coating reflecting a dim light under the lamplight. Next to them were several stacks of ammunition boxes and spare parts salvaged from various parts of the wrecked ship—standard Astragalus ammunition, spare parts for Casterland mechs, and even a few thermobaric bombs dug from collapsed compartments, their red prohibition markings faded but still intact.

The next morning, Liu En summoned the core personnel to the bridge: Marcus, Kara, Phyllis, and several senior non-commissioned officers from the garrison regiment.

"The passageways deep inside the wrecked ship have been cleared. All the warehouses along the way are marked with coordinates, material type, and storage status." Liu En pulled up a route map of the wrecked ship's interior on the holographic projection table, with orange markers lighting up along the passageways. "The first batch brought back only included a portion. Most of it is still piled up in the warehouses inside. You'll lead a few more teams back to bring the rest back."

Kara looked at the markings on the projection screen. "Captain, you're not going?"

"We're not going," Liu En said. "The route back and forth is safe now. The markers and records are all there; you can just follow the map."

The relocation plan was finalized over several days. Kara selected the most experienced veterans from the garrison to form the escort team, while Phyllis mobilized almost all available service servitude from the Black Pearl—cargo, transport, and support types—and incorporated them all into the transport team. Marcus was responsible for scouting the area around the wrecked ship and being ready to handle any emergencies.

The Central Armory of the Solar Auxiliary Army was the largest warehouse discovered this time. Viper-type reconnaissance tanks were parked in rows at the deepest part of the warehouse, their six-wheel-drive chassis covered with dust covers, and their gun barrels sealed with plugs. The tracks of Chimera armored personnel carriers were rolled up and stacked in the corner. The Lemanrus battle tanks were so large that they could not pass through the narrow passageway as a whole.

"Disassemble," Kara said. "Remove the turret, assemble the chassis separately, and disassemble and pack the tracks."

The blue arc of plasma cutting flashed deep within the warehouse. Service-type servitors, carrying cutting tools, removed the tank turrets from their bases. Transport-type servitors stacked the dismantled parts on backpack racks and secured them with straps. Tracks were disassembled into individual sections, stuffed into mesh bags, and piled on top of the racks.

The cargo carriers, laden with fully loaded cargo holds, moved steadily along the passageway on their six legs. Service carriers followed behind, carrying large pieces of cargo cut off. Veterans from the garrison regiment stood sentry duty at intersections and corners, their explosive rifles pointed deep into the wrecked ship. Since Liu En had traversed that path, the Greenskins and the cunning Scoundrels had rarely appeared in this area, but vigilance had never been relaxed.

Trip after trip. The convoy of transport aircraft shuttled back and forth between the wrecked ship and the Black Pearl, the cargo holds crammed full of sealed crates. The Black Pearl's warehouse area was gradually filling up, with supplies extending from the hangar to the cargo holds, and from the cargo holds to the temporary storage area. But there was still room to spare; all the crates were neatly stacked, and the passageways remained clear.

This back-and-forth trip lasted quite a while, involving two trips. On her final return trip, Kara reported to Liu En, "The warehouse is empty."

Liu En responded.

During this time, he would focus his consciousness on Enpu every day—not for the whole day, but for nearly ten hours each day. Garros needed him to handle affairs at any time. The dome there was basically completed, the servant production line had expanded to more than fifty lines, and tens of thousands of servants of various types were being produced every day. The new second phase of the plan had already begun.

All eleven original Starfortress-type intelligent mechs have been transported back to the Black Pearl and are temporarily stored in the temporary storage area next to the hangar. The Starfortress mech that Liu En personally rebuilt stands silently at the corner of the corridor outside the private workshop, awaiting instructions.

Liu En told Marcus via internal communication: "Have some technicians carefully inspect those eleven Starfortress mechs, reassemble the disassembled weapon platforms and accessories, and then seal them all in the weapons bay. Do not activate them without my order." Marcus responded without asking any further questions.

He stayed in his private workshop, studying and summarizing the blueprints in the space. Complete blueprints for the Solar Auxiliary Army's equipment, the Knight Mechs, the Cyclone Torpedoes, the Star Fortress-type Intelligent Controlled Mechs… countless blueprints. There were also the complete manufacturing blueprints for the Static Field Generator—he had disassembled it in that adamantite cabin and possessed the atomic-level material composition information of the entire generator.

Static field generator. How much is this thing worth in the Empire? The answer can't be measured in money. By the 41st millennium, most Forgeworlds had lost the ability to independently manufacture stasis field generators. This technology originated in the Dark Ages, and that knowledge was long lost in the Horus Rebellion and the subsequent millennia of war. The Forgeworld of Bellacin, once renowned for producing stasis field equipment, has completely ceased supplying related products in the past five hundred years. The few Forgeworlds that can still produce them are marked as "extremely rare," each unit requiring years of time and the full commitment of several high-ranking technical priests, with a scrap rate exceeding 90%.

A Stasis Field Generator can provide the Sage of Domination with absolute defense on the battlefield—intercepting all incoming firepower, from bomb guns to Titan-class volcanic cannons, which lose momentum within the force field and land harmlessly. A single activation can decide the outcome of a battle. And the only items preserved by the Stasis Field—ancient remains from the Horus Rebellion, mutated alien specimens, dangerous artifacts—are essentially nonexistent without it. The Inquisition and the Ronin Merchants are willing to trade a fleet for ownership of just a few Stasis Fields.

Liu En disassembled the prototype from the ruins of the wrecked ship and, using his universal atoms, could create countless fist-sized devices with adamantine shells within an hour. What would take the Empire's forging world ten years to complete was, for him, merely a matter of field expansion and consciousness touch.

It can be molded when the time is right. And if one day he needs to impress a sage who has forged a world, or silence a special envoy of the Inquisition at a crucial moment, a stasis field generator is more effective than any rhetoric.

After the inventory of all supplies was completed, Phyllis wrote the final statistical figure on the whiteboard and placed it back on the table. Her fingers were trembling slightly—not from fatigue, but because the number was indeed substantial. She took a deep breath and suppressed the tremor.

Marcus reported to Liu En on the bridge, "Captain, the material handling operation is complete. The inventory of the Solar Auxiliary Force's equipment is also finished."

"That's enough," Liu En said. "Let's get down to business."

He pressed the communication button, and the entire ship broadcast: "Black Pearl, all departments, take note. Prepare to return to port. During the voyage, Phyllis, arrange for the logistics team to conduct inventory and registration; Kara, arrange for the garrison to rotate and rest; Marcus, route set, prepare to return to Lucis."

Marcus replied "Received" without asking any further questions.

Liu En leaned back in his commander's seat for a while. The next target was Istvan III. Many things needed to be arranged beforehand.

Back to Lucis. He'll rest and recuperate in Lucis for a while. There are still five years left in Amegiddon—the orc warlord WAAAGH of the Bonecrusher! will shatter that world in 941.M41. Five years is enough for him to set up the framework for Garros.

Liu En stood up, walked past the neatly stacked supplies area, and entered the private workshop. The hatch closed behind him.

He sat down and closed his eyes.

Consciousness detached from this body, receding like a tide, and instantly surged into the body lying in the life support pod on the top floor of the Garros Governor's Mansion through a high-dimensional anchor point.

Enpu opened his eyes. A thin layer of mist condensed on the inside of the glass canopy of the life support pod. He raised his hand, his palm touching the inside of the canopy; it was warm. The canopy slid open automatically, the nutrient solution receded, and dry air rushed in.

He sat up, pulled on a dark gray robe, and lowered the hood. Barefoot, he walked across the corridor on the terrazzo floor, the lighting automatically switching to daytime mode.

Enpu went into the study, sat down at the worktable, and picked up the data board to look through it.

The dome is complete. A transparent, armored dome, two hundred kilometers in diameter, with no central support, envelops the entire city. Huge airtight doors line the dome's edges, allowing shuttles and transport ships to enter and exit. Aerial platforms, suspended inside the dome and welded to the adamantite framework, can accommodate medium-sized transport ships. Such engineering would have been unthinkable in my previous life—interstellar technology has made the impossible possible. Sunlight streams through the transparent armor plates, casting a cool, white halo on the dome's interior. The city grows beneath the dome, its street grid extending outwards from the central plaza. Residential modules, agricultural areas, food factories, and storage centers are all constructed according to Imperial standard blueprints.

The dome is not the end of the construction.

The machine servant production line has now expanded to fifty lines, with tens of thousands of machine servants of various types coming off the line every day—engineering type, transportation type, combat patrol type, precision assembly type—continuously emerging from the underground factory and being distributed to various construction sites by the computing power hub.

A massive furnace is under construction in Garros.

A cylindrical cavity, ten kilometers in diameter and ten kilometers in height, was carved deep into the crust of the planet Garros. An adamantite framework grew from within the rock layers, firmly securing the dome and sidewalls. Layers of terracotta steel lining were poured, with cooling pipes and energy cables laid within the lining's layers. The core of the furnace—the plasma confinement chamber—was still in the blueprint stage, but the construction of the cavity itself was already largely complete. Once this furnace is ignited, Garros will no longer be just a colony with assembly lines. It will possess a complete industrial chain, from ore to refined ingots, from refined ingots to components, and from components to finished products.

The second dome is already in the planning stage. Its coordinates are located southeast of the plain, hundreds of kilometers from the first dome. Once the underground furnace is completed and operational, engineering machinery will travel there to lay the foundation for the second dome.

The core technology for wet components has matured significantly.

The brains in the incubation tanks—wet components grown from the data infusion protocol of the Andros Project—were continuously retrieved from the underground incubation center, placed into temperature-controlled transport cases, and transported to the computing hub. Transport servitors, carrying sealed cases, lined up in a long queue in the corridor, the light from their optical lenses forming a thin, dark red line in the darkness. At the installation stations, precision servitors, with their multi-fingered claws, carefully inserted the wet component cores into the slots of the Thinker array. One after another, row after row. Under the dome of the computing hub, the lights changed from cool white to dark blue—a sign of full-load operation.

The next focus is on reforming and improving it.

He couldn't mold a thinking wet component. Those things—self-awareness, memory, personality, combat instinct—were the limits of his abilities. But the wet component core didn't entirely need those. It only needed thought, not ego. It could process data, execute instructions, autonomously allocate computing power in a distributed network, and handle problems tactfully without rigidity. The decision-making architecture of the Dead Core, the data injection protocol of the Andros Project, and the underlying logic of the Imperial Thinker Array—the grafting and combination of these three things were gradually unfolding layer by layer in the deep architecture of the computing power hub.

This will be the heart of Garros—or rather, the Garros galaxy—in the future.

Enp placed the data panel back on the table and leaned back in his chair. The dome outside the window reflected the dim starlight in the twilight. The Perseverance would arrive soon; judging by the time, it should be at Garros in no time.

Consciousness detached from this body, receding like a tide, instantly surging into the body within the Black Pearl's private workshop via a higher-dimensional anchor point. Liu En opened his eyes. Outside the porthole was the same starry sky, but from a different angle. The Black Pearl had already departed the coordinates of the wrecked ship, the thrusters' exhaust flames burning steadily in the darkness, heading towards the Mandeville point.