bioinnovel Chapter 411 7 Years!
Chapter 411 7 Years!
We got back to the villa at nine o'clock in the evening.
Nie Qingcheng was waiting for him in the living room.
The coffee table was covered with a large pile of things—a laptop, the old notebook from 1943, her own handwritten notebook, and printed data.
She spent the whole afternoon investigating. Zhang Yan knew it the moment he saw her from the doorway.
He sat down next to her.
"What did you find?"
"Current human launch technology." Nie Qingcheng turned to a page of her notebook. "The Parker Space Probe's peak speed is 192 kilometers per second. It would take 6,500 years to reach Proxima Centauri. Voyager 1 is 17 kilometers per second, 70,000 years. Chemical propulsion, ion propulsion, nuclear pulse propulsion—all ruled out."
She closed her notebook.
"Conventional methods are not feasible."
Zhang Yan already knew. But he waited for her to finish speaking.
"So," Nie Qingcheng looked at him, "the Heart of Heavenly Craftsmanship is technology from 30,000 years ago. How did people from 30,000 years ago get there?"
Zhang Yan brought up the list of functions in the upper-level protocol of the Heavenly Craftsmanship Heart.
This is the complete list unlocked during the first deep access to Shennongjia. He had previously focused on fixing modules and hadn't looked at each item in detail.
The "Door Maintenance Agreement" contains more than a dozen sub-modules. Most of them are already activated.
The very bottom.
A grayed-out, inactive module.
"Gateway Jump Protocol".
Zhang Yan clicked on it.
The description is only one line long.
"Physical-level spatial jumps are performed through transmission channels between gate network nodes. Activation condition: Seven-gate network integrity ≥ 60%"
Nie Qingcheng leaned closer to take a look.
"Leap," she repeated. "The gate network itself is the transmission channel. That thing can move between gates because it utilizes the channel. The Heart of the Craftsman acts as the key—"
"We can use the same passage. With people with us."
Nie Qingcheng tapped her finger twice on the table.
"Activation requirements: Seven-gate network integrity ≥ 60%." She repeated. "What is the current integrity level?"
Zhang Yan investigated.
System message: Data for the seventh gate is missing, network integrity cannot be calculated.
He stared at the line of text for three seconds.
A dead knot.
To reach the seventh gate, a jump is needed. To jump, network integrity needs to be 60%. To calculate integrity, data from the seventh gate is needed. To obtain data from the seventh gate—you need to go there.
"A vicious cycle," Nie Qingcheng said, revealing his thoughts.
Zhang Yan didn't rush to deny it. He was thinking.
A notebook from 1943. He took it out of his inner pocket. He turned to the second page.
A hand-drawn topology diagram.
Six points lie on a plane, forming an irregular hexagon. The seventh point is above the plane.
Connect all six points with a dashed line.
dotted line.
It is not a solid line.
Zhang Yan had noticed this detail before but hadn't thought about it deeply. The lines connecting the six points were solid, but the lines between the seventh point and the other six were all dashed.
What do dashed lines mean?
He retrieved the underlying code structure of the gate network in the system.
All nodes of the six gates are labeled as "Shielding Nodes". Function: Generates a spatial shielding field.
The node type of the seventh door is different.
"Anchor point".
Zhang Yan read it aloud.
Nie Qingcheng looked at him.
"The seventh gate isn't a shielding node. It's an anchor point," he said, pointing to the topology diagram. "The dotted line means—it connects differently from the other six gates. The six gates are responsible for generating the shield, while the seventh gate provides the spatial positioning reference for the entire network."
"Like the origin of a coordinate system."
"Yes. It doesn't participate in the direct calculation of shielding efficiency. Its function is to let the Six Gates know their position in the universe, thereby accurately forming a spherical shield."
Nie Qingcheng reacted quickly. "If it's not involved in the shielding efficiency calculation—"
"Then the method for calculating network integrity is different."
Zhang Yan re-examined the activation conditions of the jump protocol.
The integrity of the seven-channel network is ≥60%.
He broke down the condition.
"Completeness" is not a simple average of the efficiency of the seven gates. It is a weighted value. The efficiency of the six shielding nodes has the primary weight, while the state of the anchor points has the secondary weight.
The purpose of an anchor point is spatial positioning. It doesn't need "efficiency." It only needs to "exist."
In other words, even if the seventh door itself is inefficient, as long as its coordinates are known and can be connected, the anchor point is considered "online".
Zhang Yan had already obtained the coordinates.
The system has coordinate data. Anchor points "exist" conceptually.
He had the system recalculate the network integrity.
This time, the system did not report any errors.
Input: Current efficiency of the six gates + known coordinates of the seventh gate (anchor point is online, efficiency is unknown, take the lowest value of 0%).
Result: Network integrity – 52.3%.
52.3%.
There's a 60% difference, which is 7.7 percentage points.
Zhang Yan stared at the number.
7.7%. Not an astronomical figure. Not an insurmountable gap.
"The average efficiency of the Six Paths Gate needs to be increased from the current 52.3% to 60%," he said.
Nie Qingcheng was already calculating. She opened her notebook and her pen flew across the page.
「当前六门效率。65.3、62.1、50.4、48.7、45.2、43.1。平均52.5。差7.5。」她抬头。「如果把其中两道门从当前水平提升到65%以上，平均值就能过60%。」
Zhang Yan nodded.
Which two routes are the fastest?
The answer requires no thought. The two problems with the greatest potential for improvement are—currently the two least efficient.
The third hurdle: 43.1%. Needs to be increased to over 65%. The increase is 22%.
Fifth threshold: 45.2%. Needs to be increased to over 65%. Increase by 20%.
Nie Qingcheng's pen stopped on the paper.
She didn't look up, but Zhang Yan saw her fingers tighten.
"The third gate," she said flatly. "The Sahara. Helios's territory."
"right."
"The fifth gate. The Antarctic ice sheet. Depth unknown."
"right."
Nie Qingcheng put down her pen.
The Sahara. Last time, Zhang Yan infiltrated the fifth underground level there to collect stardust samples, and almost got exposed. Helios is already wary of him.
Antarctica. One of the most inaccessible and extreme places on Earth. There are no known access routes, no gatekeepers to conduct prior reconnaissance, and not even the precise depth of the gate has been confirmed.
Two of the most difficult places on Earth to reach.
Nie Qingcheng raised her head and looked at him.
"What about time?"
Zhang Yan brought up the countdown on the system panel. After balancing, the weakest gate was at 43.1%. Based on the rate of erosion outside the gate, it would fall below the danger line in a little over thirty days.
"We'll build two gates. Each will take four days to prepare and execute. We'll leave a three-day buffer period in between," he said. "A total of eleven days."
Nie Qingcheng wrote the countdown and eleven days side by side on the paper.
Thirty days minus eleven days, leaving nineteen days.
Nineteen days of tolerance.
She closed her notebook and leaned back on the sofa.
"Which one should we go to first?"
Zhang Yan thought for a moment. "The fifth gate. Antarctica."
"Why not go to the third gate first? Helios at least has existing facilities and passageways."
"Because there's no information about the fifth gate. Before going to the Sahara, at least I knew what the five underground levels looked like. Antarctica is a completely unknown environment. Let's tackle the toughest challenge first."
Nie Qingcheng didn't refute. She stood up and walked to the window.
She stood with her back to him for a few seconds.
Can mechs operate under the Antarctic ice sheet?
"White Tiger and Black Scorpion are fine. Vermilion Bird's power furnace will be less efficient in extremely cold environments, but it won't affect its core functions."
What do you need?
"Detailed geological data of the target area on the Antarctic ice sheet. Military polar station support. And—" Zhang Yan paused. "The locksmith's cooperation. Collaborative repair mode."
Nie Qingcheng turned around.
The evening light shone on her face from the side, and the beauty mark under her eye was faintly visible in the shadows.
"I'll start making arrangements tomorrow. I'll get the geological data from Qin Xiao, who will be in charge of procuring it from the military. I'll coordinate the polar station. You'll be responsible for confirming the timing with the locksmith."
She walked back to the coffee table and bent down to neatly fold the scattered documents one by one.
"Zhang Yan".
"Um."
"After all this is over." She didn't look at him, her hands continuing their work. "Hokkaido. You owe me."
Zhang Yan watched her retreating figure.
"I won't forget."
Nie Qingcheng put the documents into a bag, picked it up, and walked upstairs. She glanced at him as she passed by.
"There's porridge in the kitchen. Come up when you're done eating."
Zhang Yan went to the kitchen to get some porridge. As he sat down at the table, his phone vibrated.
Qin Xiao.
"Brother Yan, I've done a preliminary check on the location of the fifth gate. It's in the eastern part of the Antarctic ice sheet, where the ice thickness is estimated to be over 2400 meters. There are no research stations from any country in that area, and the nearest supply point is 1,200 kilometers away."
Zhang Yan held the spoon without moving.
A 2400-meter-thick ice layer. Twice as thick as the rock strata of Shennongjia.
Qin Xiao sent another message: "I asked the military's polar station, and the fastest logistical support they can provide will take five days to arrive."
Five days of preparation, four days of repair.
Nine days.
Zhang Yan put down the spoon and opened the system.
Real-time data for the fifth gate: 45.2%. Stable. There is currently no concentrated attack on it from outside the gate.
But no one knows how long this "temporary" period will last.
The phone lit up again. It was Qin Xiao again.
"Also, Brother Yan—there was a thermal anomaly lasting 0.3 seconds that occurred three days ago beneath that ice sheet in Antarctica."