Chapter 339 The News Spreads

Kyoto. The first foundation of the space elevator.

The hall's dome is a hundred-meter-high transparent psionic glass. On the floating screen, the intersection curve of the star iron blank is drawing an extremely steep red line.

Each time the red numbers jump, it represents hundreds of millions of spirit stones flowing wildly between the accounts of various heavy industry groups.

This is the third day since the Guanghan Base issued the "Supreme Lockdown Order".

The hall was packed with purchasing agents from various factories, representatives from the Hunter's Guild, and delivery personnel from military enterprises.

Everyone was looking up, staring intently at the cable that pierced the sky.

Following the scheduling conventions of the era of large-scale infrastructure construction, at noon, a heavy-load cargo hold will land directly from the Guanghan Base. It will be filled with top-grade star iron and high-purity lunar rock freshly produced by the Taiyi Furnace.

The clouds high in the sky were forcibly torn apart.

The twelve carbon nanotube hybrid cables, each two meters thick, began to vibrate violently.

Gears meshed. The hydraulic array emitted a dull hum.

The massive deceleration array exploded layer by layer outside the stratosphere, bursting out in large swaths of blue light. The heavily loaded cargo pod, following the cables, slammed heavily into the ground's cushioning base with a piercing screech of physical friction.

The crowd in the hall instinctively surged forward.

laugh--

The airtight valve suddenly released pressure. White condensate gas gushed outwards.

The hatch slowly opened.

The first thing to emerge was not the engineering robotic arm that was moving goods.

It was a row of dark gun barrels.

Hundreds of fully armed internal security troops stepped out of the hatch. They wore heavy, fully enclosed [Black Tortoise] tactical exoskeletons, their dark red tactical goggles exuding absolute coldness.

The cold mechanical boots slammed onto the metal floor.

The heavy psionic shield slammed into the ground.

The blockade was instantly erected, and the armor-piercing array patterns engraved on the gun barrels emitted a chilling glint, forcibly keeping all the delivery personnel ten meters away.

A military officer with general's stars on his shoulders strode out, clutching a physical document stamped with a top-secret red seal.

"Joint Control Room Command".

The officer did not use a megaphone; his cold, hard voice, imbued with his inner energy, directly suppressed the clamor in the entire hall.

"Effective immediately, the civilian and commercial access to the space elevator will be closed indefinitely."

"Singapore Iron & Steel has ceased supplying raw materials to the surface market."

"Guanghan Base is now under full wartime military control. All non-essential personnel, step back."

There was a two-second silence in the hall, which then erupted into chaos.

"Supply halted?! The flying swords we ordered from the front lines are due for delivery next month!"

"Why is there martial law? What exactly happened on the moon?"

The officer did not answer any questions.

He simply raised his right hand.

The first rank of the inner guards pulled the bolts of their rifles in unison.

The spiritual striker is locked.

Click.

The extremely crisp, rhythmic clanging of metal was like a bucket of ice water poured over everyone's heads. The protesters in the front row instantly fell silent.

……

A blockade can shut down a spaceport, but it can't stop the flow of data.

The official plan was to "absolutely block the news".

However, an entire planet's heavy industrial system cannot operate silently in a vacuum.

The load on the Taiyi furnace was reduced by 85%.

All operations in the No. 1 deep mining area have been suspended.

Physically severed the gravity transport link.

This means that the three mega-factories in geosynchronous orbit ran out of main materials that very afternoon. Even a tiny leak of abnormal data from these massive industrial sites would be enough to send a whiff of bloodshed to the world's brightest minds.

Late that night.

An anonymous post with only a dozen or so words popped up on the lowest level of the Hunter's Guild's encrypted black market forum.

The poster's IP address was disguised through more than thirty intercontinental psionic base stations, eventually pointing to a decommissioned reconnaissance satellite in low Earth orbit.

The Taiyi Furnace has shut down. The lunar exploration team has lost contact. There are living creatures below.

The post lasted less than twenty seconds.

Subsequently, the entire black market server was forcibly disconnected and burned by the Kyoto cyber security department.

But those twenty seconds were enough for the screenshot to spread to every dark corner of the earth.

Lost contact.

In the early stages of space exploration, this term was actually quite common. Mechanical fatigue, meteorite dust, leaking life support suits, and array overload could all be fatal.

However, if we combine "mine shutdown", "furnace load reduction" and "internal security military control" together.

This is definitely not a simple engineering accident.

This is a strategic retreat on a war-like scale.

The monks on Earth finally realized a chilling truth.

The sudden disruption of lunar resources was not due to the higher-ups' desire to monopolize the market.

Instead, it's like humans on the moon accidentally kicked a hot plate.

……

Kyoto. Joint Control Room.

On the public opinion monitoring screen, the dark red curve representing the panic index has completely straightened out, exceeding the highest threshold.

The head of the Coordination Agency stood in front of his desk, sweating profusely.

"Professor Wang, the rumors outside are completely out of control. Some say the moon itself is a living behemoth, while others say it's a forbidden land left behind by ancient immortals and demons. The price of star iron on the black market has increased tenfold in three hours, and some mercenaries have even started organizing private spaceships, trying to forcibly take off to the moon to seize minerals."

He swallowed hard.

"The truth can't be hidden anymore. We need to refute the rumors immediately."

Wang Mingyuan stood in front of the huge floor-to-ceiling window.

Outside the window, the endless neon lights and streaks of flying swords illuminate the new Chang'an City, a prosperous fortress built on the foundation of plundering the resources of the starry sky.

"What rumors are you debunking?"

He turned around, his eyes extremely cold.

"Should we tell them there's just a piece of scrap metal beneath the moon? Or should we tell them that the black door could open at any moment?"

The head of the Coordination Agency was stunned.

"But the previous contingency plan was to keep it absolutely secret..."

"Keep it secret to prevent panic," Wang Mingyuan interrupted him without hesitation. "But now, the unknown toxicity is greater than panic."

boom.

The conference room door was pushed open. Lin Feng strode in, not even having time to take off his anti-static suit, and slammed a data board onto the table.

"The high-orbit industrial ring has forcibly activated three backup meteorite capture lines. The dismantling of abandoned starships has accelerated by 200%." ​​Lin Feng's voice was hoarse, and his eyes were bloodshot. "But the shortage of high-grade star iron in the deep space environment simply cannot be filled. The equipment upgrade plans for the three major war zones must be postponed."

Lin Feng looked at Wang Mingyuan.

"Professor Wang, we can't hide it anymore. The break in the industrial chain has already caused panic down below."

Wang Mingyuan walked to the front of the control panel.

Instead of looking at the out-of-control public opinion curve, he pulled up the mountain of "applications for lunar missions" that had piled up in the past few days.

Densely packed.

Tens of thousands of people are desperate to go to heaven, even willing to sign a death warrant.

"They're too comfortable in the greenhouse."

Wang Mingyuan tapped the screen twice heavily with his fingers.

"Do you really think the starry sky is a playground for low-level cultivators to turn their lives around and pick up scraps?"

He suddenly raised his head.

"Issue an official announcement."

"Declassify some of the files."

The head of the Coordination Agency was startled: "How far have we declassified it? Are we mentioning Blackgate?"

"Don't mention the door. Don't mention the void."

Wang Mingyuan's voice was like a heavy hammer striking an anvil.

"Only state the results."

"The defense level of Guanghan Base has been upgraded to Level S. The far side of the moon is now designated as an absolute no-life zone."

"Liu Jianguo, Li Xiang, and the other five members of the deep exploration team are listed as missing in action."

He stared intently at the grayish-white celestial body on the screen.

"Pour this basin of cold water over me thoroughly."

"Tell all mankind that the starry sky is not just a gold mine."

"And there's a cannibalistic abyss."

……

The moment the announcement was issued.

The "gold rush in the stars" that lasted for several months on Earth was like being doused with a bucket of liquid nitrogen at minus two hundred degrees Celsius.

Central Plains Third Academy. Low Gravity Tactical Training Ground.

Hundreds of students, dressed in heavy simulation suits, were sweating profusely from the pressure of the gravitational field.

They were staring blankly at the big screen.

The crude photograph of "Lunar Orbit Station One," once considered a symbol of triumph for countless people, was forcibly overwritten by a cold, blood-red system notification. Everyone's personal tactical terminals were simultaneously locked.

The lunar mission is frozen.

[Lunar far side classification: S-level extremely high risk.]

[Liu Jianguo, Li Xiang, Zhou Huai... lost contact during the battle.]

The instructor took the whistle off his neck and looked at the stunned, bloodless faces below.

There was no explanation.

There wasn't a single word of comfort.

"Training session dismissed. Everyone return to the dorms."

The once bustling cultivation forum fell silent instantly.

The refresh rate plummeted from tens of thousands of posts per second to single digits. Posts clamoring to get rich on the moon were frantically deleted by their publishers.

Countless people left their homes, climbed to the top of tall buildings, and looked up at the moon in the night sky.

That planet still hangs quietly above the metallic debris and satellite remnants in near-Earth orbit. The shadows of the lunar maria piece together a familiar outline that Earthlings have seen for thousands of years.

But behind that calm, lifeless shell lies a darkness that will never face the earth.

Old Liu, Li Xiang, Zhou Huai, and those two Golden Core sword cultivators whose names were barely mentioned.

These names have become a group of cold tombstones hanging high in the history of space exploration.

……

Kunlun. Heavenly Palace on the Clouds.

The fierce wind from the heavens was like a knife, silently annihilating Gu Qing three inches away from him.

He stood with his hands behind his back in front of the cliff, looking down at the blue home planet below.

The system's data stream was being refreshed rapidly within the mind's consciousness.

Overall morale in the civilization has plummeted.

The panic threshold has been reached.

[Underlying physical fluctuations are occurring in the output of Faith Power.]

Gu Qing ignored him.

The growth of civilization is always accompanied by excruciating pain.

Humanity's previous victories came too easily. The teleportation array was completed, the Taiyi Furnace was ignited, and the Taiyin power was easily extracted. They thought that with their heavy industrial machine tools, they had already grasped the key to the stars.

In fact, they had only just reached their hands out through the crack in the door and touched the cold, hard scales of the monster behind it.

The Shushan Killing Formation of yesteryear, the resurgence of the demon race, and even the Void Vanguard Army that he personally ended were ultimately just a brief period of pain that he had protected in his arms.

Now, the shadow that he had forcibly dispelled, carrying the chilling reality of millennia, has truly descended upon us.

Gu Qing looked towards the far side of the moon.

In that abyss beyond the reach of human sight and probes, the Black Gate's siphoning of the moon's core continues at an extremely slow pace.

The countdown did not stop just because people closed their eyes.

"Did you see that clearly?"

Gu Qing murmured to herself, her voice instantly dissipating in the extremely thin air.

"This is the real universe."