Chapter 322 Cultivating Prosperity from Desolation
With the initial success of the project to extract the power of the sun in the shadow area, the "Extreme Yang Slow-Release Array" and the "Sun Guiding Array" have been officially incorporated into the highest research and development sequence.
But at the Guanghan base, rather than thinking about how to use this planet to become stronger, they must first solve another fundamental and practical problem—how to truly survive on this barren celestial body.
Earth, Kyoto Joint Control Room.
Wang Mingyuan was reviewing the "Logistics Loss Report of Guanghan Base" that the Coordination Agency had just submitted. The glaring crimson data on the screen were not the casualties on the front lines, but rather an extremely heavy logistical bill.
"Over the past four months, in order to sustain the 1,200 permanent personnel at the Guanghan Base, we have transported 4,000 tons of pure water and 2,800 tons of liquid oxygen to the moon..."
The Minister of Logistics stood before the conference table, his tone somber, "and a total of eight hundred tons of dehydrated synthetic rations, highly concentrated organic base, nutrient solution, and life-sustaining reserves. These supplies, specially allocated for the monks engaged in high-intensity work, are being consumed at an alarming rate."
"Professor Wang, although the interstellar teleportation array has been built, its initial overload risk and cost are very high, and it can only transport high-value samples and core personnel. Bulk supplies are still crowding out the transport capacity of the gravity array's links. If the base continues to expand, our logistics will be dragged down."
Wang Mingyuan threw the report on the table with a dull thud.
"A base that relies on Earth for food is not called an outpost; it's an iron coffin hanging in space that could run out of food at any moment."
Wang Mingyuan raised his head, his gaze sweeping over the representatives of the Academy of Sciences and the Array Court present: "The Extreme Yang True Fire has been extracted, and the Taiyin Cold Pressure has also been refined. Since we can tame such extreme energies, there's no reason why we can't grow an edible crop on this rock."
"Initiate the fourth phase of the Guanghan Base planning." Wang Mingyuan issued an extremely firm order, "Formally transforming the base's function from a 'frontline construction site' to a 'sustainable settlement.' I want to build the first fully closed-loop ecological life support system on the moon."
Guanghan Base, 380,000 kilometers away.
Within the crater's sheltered zone, five kilometers from Mine No. 1, lies a deep basalt basin. What was once a desolate meteorite crater has now become an extremely large underground heavy industrial construction site.
Old Liu was piloting a heavy engineering mech, directing a hundred engineering monks to lay the final armor.
The first "long-term living area" for humans on the moon will not be the crystal-clear, romantic glass dome depicted in science fiction movies. In the face of constant bombardment by micrometeorites and penetration by high-energy cosmic rays, such a design would be suicidal.
This is an extremely heavy steel bunker, buried thirty meters below the lunar surface.
"Filing of the No. 5 load-bearing arch is in place! Welding of the titanium-steel armor plates produced by the Taiyi furnace begins!"
Amidst Lao Liu's roar, dozens of array masters, wielding plasma psionic welding torches, forcefully welded a two-meter-thick, dark lunar titanium steel blank into the top-floor frame of the bunker.
These materials, which have been cut and remelted by sword energy in the Taiyi Furnace, possess compressive strength and radiation protection thresholds far exceeding those of Earth's alloys.
"The physical casing is now sealed. The pressure test has been passed."
Old Liu wiped the cold sweat from the inside of his helmet and connected to the internal channel: "Academy of Sciences, Array Court, the bare shell of the house has been built for you. Now it's up to you."
Inside the bunker, it was still an absolute vacuum and extremely cold.
Ecology experts from the Academy of Sciences and array masters from the Array Court, clad in heavy life-sustaining suits, stepped into this dark space. Their task was to address the most fundamental survival issues facing humanity.
"Water circulation module, connected to the main pipeline."
Li Xiang's research team assembled several massive physical centrifuges and psionic filter arrays at the core of the life support capsule.
Water is essential for the survival of the moon.
The prospecting team has found deep lunar ice deposited over billions of years in the shadowy region of the Aitken Basin. However, these ice blocks are mixed with highly toxic heavy metal dust and high-energy cosmic isotopes; drinking them directly would be tantamount to ingesting poison.
"Activate the [Five Elements Microscopic Water Refining Array]." The array masters of the Array Academy solemnly formed hand seals.
This is not the legendary "rain-summoning magic" that creates something out of nothing, but an industrial water purification process that forcibly stitches together physical filtration with immortal cultivation array patterns.
The massive crusher swallowed the mined dark lunar ice blocks, which were then instantly sublimated under the high temperatures provided by the array. Toxic cosmic dust was forcibly ejected by the gravity centrifuges at the bottom, while steam carrying water molecules was forced to pass through a microscopic molecular sieve composed of [Gui Water Array Pattern] and [Taiyin Cold Pressure].
Under the extreme condensation of the Yin energy, the first drop of pure water, filtered by both the array's physical properties and spiritual pressure, fell with great difficulty into the titanium steel reservoir.
For the first time, the pressure sensor at the bottom of the reservoir showed a faint reading.
As the array operates at full power, the readings begin to climb slowly, and the tiny water streams gradually converge into a stable cycle within the sealed pipes.
"Water quality test passed. Heavy metal content is zero, and isotope radiation is zero. It can be used directly for drinking water and agricultural irrigation." The monitor's voice trembled slightly as he looked at the green indicators flashing on the screen.
"A portion of the pure water is diverted into the electrolysis chamber. The extreme Yang True Fire of the [Great Sun Spirit-Drawing Array] is introduced as the energy source to drive high-voltage electrolysis!"
Under the violent tearing of the extreme solar energy, the chemical bonds of water molecules were instantly severed. High-purity oxygen, flowing through titanium-steel pipes and accompanied by the roar of the life support system's massive fans, was for the first time brutally forced into this steel fortress buried deep underground.
The high-risk hydrogen separated by electrolysis is rapidly compressed by an array and pumped into a specially designed hydrogen storage tank, serving as a basic raw material for subsequent fuel cells and lunar chemical synthesis.
Closed-loop gears, meshing tightly.
"The air pressure is rising. The oxygen concentration has reached 21%. The ecological circulation array is operating stably."
As the indicator lights inside the bunker changed from the red of an alarm to a dark blue signifying safety, Li Xiang stood in front of the control panel and very slowly, tentatively, pressed the physical latch on his armored helmet.
hiss--
With the sound of the airtight valve releasing pressure, Li Xiang took off his heavy helmet.
He took a deep breath.
The air was thick with the pungent smell of metal filter oil, and even a hint of burnt ozone from electrolysis by the extreme solar flame. It was far from fresh, but it was full of the physical texture of life.
He didn't hold his breath or suffocate.
His lungs, underground on an alien planet 380,000 kilometers away, completed their first truly independent breathing.
"The life support system is working." Li Xiang reported in a low voice over the channel, his eyes slightly red.
But solving the problems of breathing and drinking water is just the bare minimum for survival.
To truly cultivate prosperity from desolation, the problem of self-sufficiency in food must be solved.
Deep within the bunker, the first "Lunar Spirit Plant Greenhouse" was officially powered on.
This is an independent compartment with an area of approximately two thousand square meters. There is no sunlight like on Earth, nor fertile black soil. The ground is covered with deep lunar soil that has been physically ground by a pulverizer.
"Lunar soil itself is completely dead, lacking any organic matter and nitrogen-fixing microorganisms." An agricultural monk accompanying the team squatted on the ground, picked up a handful of grayish-white powder, "but it is rich in trace amounts of stellar minerals that are scarce in Earth's soil."
He carefully mixed a small jar of high-concentration organic culture medium he had brought from Earth into the lunar soil, and then activated the light array on top of the greenhouse.
That wasn't an ordinary simulated sun lamp; it was a stream of "Extreme Yang True Fire" that had been depressurized, simulating the most primordial photosynthetic radiation of a star.
Meanwhile, freshly extracted "Taiyin Spirit Liquid" flows through the bottom pipes of the greenhouse, used to stabilize the extreme temperature difference in the soil and prevent the plant roots from being scorched by the real fire.
The forces of Yin and Yang have achieved an extremely delicate agricultural balance here.
"Sowing experimental second-generation Xingsha rice".
The agronomist solemnly pressed dozens of dark golden seeds, which had been catalyzed by arrays and genetically recombined, into the rough lunar soil.
The waiting process was extremely long.
Over the next few dozen hours, the greenhouse ecosystem experienced dozens of minor breakdowns. Slight fluctuations in the output of the Yin cold pressure caused the soil to freeze; a slight increase in the radiation of the Yang true fire caused the soil surface to crystallize.
The engineering monks and array masters were like those who were tending to the most exquisite magical artifacts, working day and night outside the greenhouse to check the array pattern parameters.
It wasn't until four months after the Guanghan base was laid that...
Old Liu had just finished a round of heavy-load transport work in the permanently shaded area and dragged his tired body into the bunker living quarters. As he passed the greenhouse observation window, he suddenly stopped in his tracks.
In the gray, lifeless, and heavy-metal-like lunar ruins, a faint yet dazzling green shoot violently pushes through the rough soil.
It was a seedling.
Its leaves are not emerald green, but rather a dark blue-green color adapted to a high-radiation environment, and its stems even have an extremely fine metallic cuticle.
It is anything but graceful; it is like a miniature steel warrior, clinging tightly to this alien land.
Over the next two weeks, these crops, genetically modified for cultivation, exhibited an extremely terrifying growth cycle under the violent catalysis of extreme yang and yin.
When the first batch of mature Star Sand Rice and Lunar Rock Moss was harvested, the atmosphere in the entire Guanghan Base was even more solemn than on the day the interstellar teleportation array was completed.
The first canteen at Guanghan Base.
Three hundred engineering monks, who had just finished their shift, sat neatly at a long titanium steel table.
Because the yield of the first batch of [Star Sand Rice] was so small, every single dark golden grain was protected like the apple of the eye by the agricultural scholars, and all of them were reserved as the mother plant for the next round of expansion.
So, all they had in front of them was a bowl of steaming hot clear soup and a small bunch of dark green boiled moon rock moss.
Old Liu picked up the bowl of clear soup made with water purified from lunar ice and vegetables from a lunar greenhouse, his hands trembling slightly.
He tilted his head back and took a big gulp.
The soup tasted extremely strange, with a lingering mineral bitterness. The seaweed fibers were extremely coarse, like chewing some kind of cheap nylon rope.
This was definitely the worst meal Lao Liu had ever eaten in his life.
But instead of spitting it out, he swallowed it with great force.
The only sounds in the cafeteria were chewing and swallowing.
Three hundred men, who had bled and sweated in dire straits, ate the extremely unpalatable food in front of them cleanly.
Because this is not charity sent from a hometown 380,000 kilometers away.
This was the first morsel of food they had painstakingly carved out of this absolutely desolate cosmic ruin with steel, arrays, and blood and sweat.
Old Liu put down his empty bowl and exhaled a long, warm breath. He turned his head and looked out the window at the dark, deep universe.
"We've made it a reality to farm on the moon."
……