Chapter 124: The Signal Amplifier

Chapter 124: The Signal Amplifier

“To make a long story short. This is the architectural design blueprint of the Capital headquarters. Currently, an action team of one thousand people is heading our way.”

Ou Qinglan spoke at a very fast speed, pointing at the image projected by the portable Personal Smart Terminal in front of her.

Chen Feng nodded to show he understood. “So, do we have to break through the action team’s blockade head-on?”

“Are you dreaming! This is the headquarters! The action team is made up of the most elite soldiers, with at least twenty Wasp-type Combat Ships. We only have one Wasp Ship, and it’s already severely damaged. What if you get shot down? Do you want to tear apart Warships with your bare hands?”

Chen Feng said helplessly, “You’re right. The equipment is too weak, limiting my strength. I can’t create a significant gap with others.”

“Be quiet! Listen to my plan. In thirty seconds, a passage will open three hundred meters north of our position. The diameter of this passage is twenty-two meters, just wide enough for us to fly into.”

Ou Qinglan said this while taking control of the Wasp Ship.

Chen Feng asked in surprise, “How do you know? What passage is that, and where does it lead?”

“Why do you have so many questions! Before I left the Xuanwu Institute, I set up a timed-trigger backdoor in the Central AI through the Xuanwu Institute’s institutional platform. It will open that emergency passage leading to the headquarters’ research building. Passing through here will allow us to directly rush into the headquarters’ research area.”

Chen Feng was overjoyed. “Amazing.”

Having someone who understood technology by his side was good. He didn’t know how Ou Qinglan managed to trick the Central AI’s defense mechanisms or how she found out about this emergency passage.

Anyway, this was definitely a good thing.

“One! Two! Three! Let’s go!”

Before the action team could arrive, the Wasp Ship had already entered the passage.

Not only that, but the passage entrance’s opening time was less than five seconds. As soon as Chen Feng and Ou Qinglan’s Wasp Ship went in, it closed again.

The action team arrived too late and couldn’t give chase.

While they were briefly confused, the Wasp Ship here was already approaching the inner research area of the headquarters at high speed.

The benefits Ou Qinglan brought Chen Feng were far more than just discovering this secret passage. While the Wasp Ship was rushing forward, she pointed at a box placed in the cramped crew cabin at the rear of the Combat Ship.

“The damage level of the Starblade Armor on you has already exceeded eighty percent. Throw it away quickly. In that box is my newly completed prototype.”

Chen Feng was delighted and quickly opened the box.

After putting on the armor, he carefully examined the characteristics of this prototype Starblade Armor.

The standard-issue armor was black all over, with a strong metallic texture.

This prototype, however, was an azure blue, with a slight flowing light effect. Although it also had some reflective texture, overall it looked more like crystal.

Chen Feng called up the Intelligent Assistant system of the prototype Starblade Armor, pulled up various parameters, and briefly scanned them.

Material flexibility, toughness, ductility, stress resistance, rigidity after switching forms, energy transmission efficiency of the fibers…

In all these aspects, this prototype was much more powerful than the standard-issue armor, with an average improvement of at least 30%.

“This improved version is very impressive.”

“Of course, this is my hard work. I named it Azure Star! It’s just a pity that the alloy I added must be biosynthesized, so the production is too low. I estimate that with the resources of all humanity combined, we could only make seven or eight sets of Azure Star.”

“A limited edition! That’s good.” As Chen Feng spoke, he began to check the various function options of the Intelligent Assistant system. “Strange, why are so many simplified operation functions grayed out in the control panel?”

“Oh, that’s because this is still a prototype and hasn’t passed reliability verification yet. The functions of the Intelligent Assistant are all turned off by default, with only the most basic central control operation system active. You can turn them on by entering this password. OJL19940503.”

Chen Feng did as he was told.

After a long while, he asked anxiously, “Could it be that while I’m running, this Azure Star might just fall apart?”

“Theoretically, it’s impossible.”

“In reality?”

“It remains to be verified.”

“Fine.”

…

“We’re almost there. The entrance ahead is sealed. Fortunately, this is a passage built fifty years ago. The performance of the alloy material isn’t that strong, and there’s no Force Field Shield. We can blast it open directly!”

Ou Qinglan pressed the firing button. The eight beam energy particle cannons on the top of the Wasp Ship suddenly opened fire, hitting a single point on the alloy plate sealing the entrance ahead.

A terrifying stream of high-energy particles converged at that point. Heat rapidly accumulated in a short time, making the temperature at that point quickly exceed 5500 degrees Celsius.

The heat buildup caused an explosion. The thick alloy plate suddenly blew apart.

Countless streams of molten metal exploded into fiery flows, raining back down on the Wasp Ship like a storm. But Ou Qinglan had already activated the Combat Ship’s forward Force Field Shield in time.

She whispered, “Crash in!”

With a loud bang, the menacing Wasp Ship suddenly appeared in a massive underground hall.

The explosion earlier, of course, didn’t just wreak havoc inside the emergency passage. Many superheated metal flows also blasted forward.

Each metal flow particle, after traveling a certain distance, would undergo a second or even multiple explosions, scattering more sparks that could instantly kill an ordinary person.

This hall wasn’t empty; many technical personnel were preparing to evacuate and were suddenly caught in the aftermath of the explosion.

For a moment, the place became filled with cries of misery, a scene too horrible to endure.

Ever since Chen Feng and Ou Qinglan’s Wasp Ship entered the passage, the research area had been notified to take emergency shelter, but it was still a bit too slow.

Chen Feng watched as the unarmed technical personnel ahead were affected, and finally felt a twinge of sympathy in his heart.

But what was done was done; there was no turning back once the arrow was loosed. He could only pretend not to see it.

Chen Feng secretly glanced at Ou Qinglan beside him, only to find she remained expressionless, calm to the point of seeming indifferent.

As if the people dying before her eyes were just illusions.

“Later, I will break open the ceiling above the signal hall and fly out. You jump out first wearing the Azure Star, activate stealth mode, and then go directly to the residential area where Sister Tianxin is under house arrest. I’ve already transmitted her location to you; take a look yourself.”

“What about you?”

“I’ll make it look like I’m breaking out and escaping to attract as much of their attention as possible.”

Chen Feng felt a bit worried. “Are you going to be okay?”

After all, Ou Qinglan wasn’t a professional combatant, and her Combat Ship piloting skills weren’t better than his.

Ou Qinglan shook her head. “Don’t worry, I’m one of the designers of the Wasp Ship. I can activate extreme mode, which can boost performance by another twenty percent on top of the normal overload capacity.”

“That’s good.”

“Once you rescue her, notify me immediately. I’ll come back to pick you both up.”

Chen Feng nodded. “OK.”

As they talked, Ou Qinglan once again activated the beam energy particle cannons, aiming them at the ceiling above the hall.

This time, however, it seemed to take a little longer to blast through the ceiling.

Chen Feng’s gaze wandered, and in his heart, he hoped those technical personnel who hadn’t been killed yet would evacuate quickly.

“Huh? What’s that?”

Chen Feng’s attention was drawn to a huge metallic structure in the center of the hall.

This metallic structure was about three hundred meters tall, almost reaching the ceiling.

There was a huge metal cylinder in the middle, connecting nine metal spheres from the bottom to the top.

The higher up the metal spheres were, the smaller they became.

This thing looked very much like the spherical antennas that were widely used many years ago.

“This is a creation left behind by Dr. Sergey Ponomarenko. It’s called the Sergey Signal Amplifier. It’s said to be able to release some neutrino waves, which can to some extent help humans resist the mental shackles imposed by the Invaders. Of course, personally, I’ve never believed in any mental shackles, and no one in the World Government believes it either.”

“Then why not turn it off?” Chen Feng looked at this super-large antenna. The indicator lights representing that it was powered on were still flashing, so he asked this.

“Probably to show respect for Sergey. Anyway, keeping it on does no harm. Alright, I’m going to blow open the ceiling now.”

As soon as the words were spoken, another violent explosion rang out.

A huge hole over thirty meters in diameter appeared in the ceiling, and a ray of sunlight shot straight down.

Ou Qinglan once again controlled the Wasp Ship to soar upward, flying straight toward that hole.

Chen Feng held his breath, sat in the ejection pod, released the safety, and prepared to eject himself.

As the Wasp Ship ascended, getting closer and closer to the opening, it also drew nearer to the very top of Sergey’s signal amplifier antenna.

“Chen Feng, let’s turn ourselves in. Both you and I are important. The Military won’t sentence us to death.”

With success seemingly within reach, Ou Qinglan suddenly spoke somewhat randomly, while also slowing the Wasp Ship’s upward rush.

Chen Feng was shocked. “What? What kind of joke is this!”

Ou Qinglan, sitting in front, turned her head. Her gaze was hollow, but her expression was firm. She spoke in a tone almost like a robot’s: “It’s a pity that Sister Tianxin died like that. Humanity will lose an excellent Commander. But she wasn’t that crucial in the war; someone can take over her Tianxin. She shouldn’t have supported your wrong views. Executing her helped maintain unity in the will to fight.”

In that instant, Chen Feng felt that this Ou Qinglan, who had fought alongside him for so long, had become utterly unfamiliar.

He completely failed to understand what was happening.

Had he been betrayed?

Was Ou Qinglan a loyalist of the Military from the very beginning?

But that didn’t seem right.

Where exactly did the problem lie?

Chen Feng’s mind briefly stalled for about two seconds, then he figured it out.

Without hesitation, he pressed the ejection button.

The Wasp Ship did not exit the hall. After being ejected, Chen Feng was still suspended in mid-air inside the hall.

Ou Qinglan’s voice came through the communicator, “Since you remain stubborn, I have no choice but to execute you.”

A signal flashed on his Azure Star helmet interface; someone was remotely canceling his equipment control permissions.

This was undoubtedly Ou Qinglan’s doing.

Not only that, the Wasp Ship’s beam particle cannon began charging again.

Meanwhile, Chen Feng reacted swiftly.

He first disabled the Intelligent Assistant to prevent remote control, leaving Azure Star with only its most basic core functions.

Its operational difficulty reverted to the state of the earliest primitive Individual Combat Armor, making it much more troublesome to control, but at least it could still move.

Chen Feng ignited his engines mid-air, particle jets fired from his back, and he lunged toward the Sergey signal amplifier.

Thump!

He slammed headfirst into an invisible Force Field Shield, nearly knocking himself out on the spot.

But Chen Feng used the momentum to spin once along the surface of the Force Field Shield, narrowly dodging the concentrated fire from the Wasp Ship behind him.

High-powered cannon fire struck the Force Field Shield, creating ripples, and the field effect weakened.

At the same time, Chen Feng switched to sniper mode and fired another shot at close range at the spot on the Force Field Shield that had just been hit.

The ripple expanded, and light no longer refracted at the center.

A breach had appeared in the shield!

Chen Feng accelerated again and whooshed through the opening.

What followed was simple.

The metal material used in this Sergey signal amplifier was undoubtedly a high-strength technological marvel five hundred years ago. But faced with the Azure Star of five hundred years later, it was as fragile as a sheet of paper.

Even though Chen Feng could now only use an extremely complex manual mode, which slowed his actions considerably, he still managed to dismantle this important “artifact” that had been preserved and operating for five hundred years into scrap metal within five seconds.

In a dazzling explosion, the amplifier was utterly destroyed.

Chen Feng hid in a corner to avoid the blast wave. The intense heat outside enveloped him, nearly cooking him alive. Only when Ou Qinglan’s confused exclamation sounded in his ears again did he hurriedly reactivate the Intelligent Assistant and deploy the native Force Field Shield of the Azure Star.

“I… what just happened to me?”

“Nothing. Just a little accident. I’ll explain in detail later. Let’s focus on the main task for now.”

Chen Feng rose into the air, grabbing the wing of the Wasp Ship with one hand.

The two finally broke through.

Ou Qinglan had expected to face a fierce barrage of cannon fire waiting for them. To her surprise, the numerous Warships and armor-clad soldiers who had been waiting outside showed absolutely no reaction.

Outside, a strange chaos had descended.

“Great opportunity! Charge!”

Chen Feng first activated stealth mode, then slowly descended.

He shut down ninety percent of the extra energy, minimizing the energy radiation emitted by the Combat Armor. Rising onto the balls of his feet, he relied purely on his physical abilities to sprint rapidly toward the residential area.

Meanwhile, Ou Qinglan in the sky immediately turned and flew into the distance.

Along the way, Chen Feng continuously avoided soldiers blocking his path. Sometimes the sound of his footsteps drew attention, but ultimately no one truly detected his movements.

He arrived without major incident in front of the small building where Tang Tianxin was being held.

The two-story white-walled building was enveloped in a pale blue Force Field Shield.

Outside the Force Field Shield, at least two hundred heavily armed Starblade Armor Warriors stood densely packed.

Judging by the codes on their helmets,

at least thirty of them were elite soldiers ranked within the top hundred of the entire army.

Furthermore, there were twenty multi-purpose combat vehicles, indicating the presence of twenty command-type armor warriors who could operate as one-man armies.

After experiencing brief chaos, these people seemed to have received orders from superiors and regained their composure.

Chen Feng could not sneak in anymore.

A fierce battle was inevitable.

He took a deep breath and slowly revealed himself.

The menacing azure blue armor glittered brilliantly under the scorching sun.

“Chen Feng! This is a betrayal of humanity! Surrender now!”

The Starblade Armor Warrior numbered 03 stepped forward first and shouted loudly.

Chen Feng recognized him.

His name was Zhou Yihui, with the third-highest overall evaluation index in the entire army, second only to himself and Lin Bu.

Chen Feng shook his head. “Whether it’s betrayal or not, only I know the truth. I don’t need lectures. If you don’t want to die, get out of my way.”