Chapter 428: Familiar, Pros and Cons

Oh?

Hearing the assistant's reply, Shirley immediately became interested.

Because Gabriel Angelos submitted this application to the legion and the company, it's obvious he wants to rely solely on their Blood Raven Battalion and their charge of Gu Si Te Wa to single-handedly handle this space gate incident.

Gaining more battle merits and honors is one thing; most importantly, they want to fight a proper battle! Their Blood Raven has been resting and recuperating for nearly sixty years; if they stay idle any longer, problems will arise.

Coincidentally, Shirley shares the same thought—who wouldn't want to achieve even greater battle merits and honors?

Of course, the prerequisite for them to handle the space gate incident on their own is that their Intelligence Department completes reconnaissance of the space gate and determines the basic situation of the parallel universe on the other side.

Thus Shirley asked, "How did the company side respond?"

"Superiors want our Intelligence Department to finish reconnaissance before drawing any conclusions," the assistant immediately replied.

"That's exactly what I thought." Shirley nodded slightly, then ordered, "Begin preparations for investigating the vortex space gate…"

Saying this, Shirley glanced at the holographic clock at the front of the bus, then continued, "I want you to launch the investigation by 2 p. m., that is, in twenty-three minutes, and promptly clarify the cosmic situation over there."

Also, don't forget to remind Blood Raven and the UNSC to dispatch appropriate forces to the space gate side to guard against hostile forces and unknown life invading the main universe.

"Okay, Chief BoKen, the Blood Raven side has already begun operations," the female assistant replied.

"Mm, if anything sudden happens, contact me immediately."

"Yes, Chief BoKen."

As the call ended, Shirley looked toward the base through the bus's one-way window and saw that the Blood Raven fleet, just as the female assistant had said, had already begun deploying against the space gate.

All that could be seen was the super-heavy cruiser responsible for the fleet's firepower swiftly gaining altitude, leaving the base starport, and heading outward beyond the atmosphere.

Meanwhile, unseen by Shirley, the UNSC similarly dispatched a fleet consisting of one 3-kilometer-class battleship and three 1.5-kilometer-class Swallow-class cruisers, taking advantage of their docking in low orbit around Gu Si Te Wa to activate their jump engines ahead of Blood Raven and rush to the space gate for defense and vigilance.

In contrast, the bus driver, the rookie intelligence officers inside the vehicle, and all the inhabitants of Gu Si Te Wa were temporarily unaware that beyond the star system's outer asteroid belt lay a vortex space gate capable of linking other universes; life and work proceeded as usual, unaffected.

However, even if people knew of the space gate's existence, they would no longer panic or worry as they did a century ago; instead, they would be eager and impatient to have the UNSC and Umbrella Legion rush to other universes—this…

This, too, counts as another kind of influence, for if people become overly preoccupied with the space gate, it disrupts normal life; thus, unless it is a grave matter requiring the whole legion or even all of humanity to deal with, Umbrella and the UNSC still tend toward secrecy.

Soon, the authorized bus passed unimpeded through the checkpoint with the drone cannons and entered Blood Raven's surface base.

It arrived at the designated parking spot.

Having come to a stop, they disembarked; Shirley led the group of recruits to transfer to the Warthog convoy, shuttling through the surface base beneath the sky‑covering Blood Raven fleet.

Not long after.

Shirley and her party then left the convoy and arrived at the Command Center installed underground.

As the large safety gates swung open to either side, Shirley and her party waiting in the corridor could directly see the busy clerks inside the Command Center, as well as the tall figure standing beside the main console, gazing at the holographic screen—

Gabriel Angelos.

The recruits who followed Shirley into the control center felt an ever‑greater intangible pressure as they approached the main console.

Wearing his armor—predominantly dark red with black and white accents as the exclusive Terminator plating—with his helmet deployed, Gabriel reached a height of three and a half meters.

The mere visual impact was enough to make the newly graduated recruits, who had hardly ever observed an Astartes up close, feel suffocated—especially since every pixel‑specialist is highly adept at Spiritual Energy, let alone a battalion commander faintly exuding Spiritual Energy fluctuations; just how great an effect this has on the rookies is immense.

Meanwhile, Shirley, already accustomed to such sights, walked to the side of the main console, placed her left hand on her hip, looked up at the holographic screen displaying real‑time intelligence and data, and asked Gabriel, "How did the higher ups respond?"

"Father told us to finish scouting the intelligence and then see how things go," the post‑surgery Gabriel replied briefly in his low, resonant voice.

"The Chairman himself sent this reply?" Shirley exclaimed, somewhat surprised.

As for her uncle‑generation Sui Bian, Shirley hadn't seen him in twenty years; the last time was when she returned to the Solar System to visit her parents, who had given her a little brother and two little sisters, and then went with her family to the Terra Shield to call on Sui Bian.

To be honest, Shirley truly misses the time she spent as a child in the mother nest.

But she never imagined that a 'small'‑scale space gate would attract the attention of humanity's supreme leader.

After experiencing several space gate incidents, Umbrella classified space gates into four grades: 'small,' 'medium,' 'large,' and 'super‑massive.'

For instance, the sudden space gate with a mere six‑kilometer diameter on the outskirts of the Gu Si Te Wa star system naturally falls into the 'small' category.

Whereas the space gate linking the main universe and Universe 03, spanning the entire star system, is rated 'large,' and as for 'super‑massive' space gates, Umbrella defines them as being sufficient to affect the order of the entire galaxy, even the whole universe.

Therefore, Shirley believes that an anomalous event involving a single small space gate is still insufficient to draw Sui Bian's direct attention.

"After all, it's a space gate." Gabriel nodded and continued, "It should be that Father isn't too busy, and since he sensed the space gate's formation, he took an interest in directly replying…"

"Exactly." Gabriel said, turning his head slightly sideways to look at Shirley, who is half his height, and asked back, "How are the investigation and reconnaissance arrangements coming along?"

"Already arranged." Shirley laughed, raised her hand, made a fist, and tapped Gabriel's side armor: "Once we finish gathering intelligence, we'll see how your Blood Raven performs, haha!"

"Don't worry, our Blood Raven has always liked to take the initiative and meet force with force." Gabriel also showed a confident smile.

??

On the other hand, the intelligence‑rookie newcomers to Gu Si Te Wa, who all gathered beside the main console with even their postures appearing restrained, became utterly confused because of the conversation between their direct superior and the legendary battalion commander.

Space gate?

Chairman?

"Children!" At that moment, Shirley glanced at the recruits present and raised her voice:

"Your luck is not bad—on your very first day on the job, you can take part in the joint operation of the Intelligence Department and the Legion Headquarters, and even learn at first hand what the parallel universe looks like; study well, for in the future you too will independently handle all sorts of thorny problems!"

———————

…

Soon after.

On the outskirts of the star system where Gu Si Te Wa resides, there are many asteroids and chunks of ice of various sizes orbiting the star, and the vortex space gate lies within this asteroid belt.

Moreover, the four warships of the UNSC and Blood Raven are also stationed near the space gate, maintaining vigilance.

Whoosh—swish—!

Suddenly, a mere 400‑meter‑long engineering vessel belonging to the Gu Si Te Wa Intelligence Department finished its jump transit and then slowly approached the front of the space gate.

Next, the engineering vessel released a probe linked by communication cables, resembling a gigantic number‑one octopus, with optical camouflage activated—the reconnaissance robot 'Fearless' shot straight through the space gate.

At this moment, inside the engineering vessel's bridge.

Seated toward the rear center, wearing a dark‑gray baseball cap and sporting a white beard, the 'old' captain had his eyes fixed on the holographic screen displaying the real‑time feed sent back by the reconnaissance robot.

Only the scouting robot smoothly reached the parallel universe; using its various auxiliary cameras and detection and scanning equipment to observe, we can tell that the universe on the other side of the Space Gate is almost identical to the main universe.

At the same time, the location of the Space Gate is in the outer gravity field of a giant gaseous planet with rings and many satellites orbiting it, estimated distance about 1.5 million kilometers.

However, from the real-time feed, the captain always felt that the gaseous giant planet looked quite familiar.

"Officer!" Coincidentally, a crew member reported to the captain: "Based on the information provided by the scouting robot, we can basically confirm that the gaseous giant planet shown in the real-time feed is Saturn, which we are familiar with; this means that the star system on the other side of the Space Gate is the parallel universe's Solar System."

"Very well, upload the gathered intelligence, then dispatch the shipborne engineering team and escort fighters to set up temporary wired communication bases at both ends of the Space Gate, ensuring our upcoming reconnaissance operation can proceed smoothly." The captain issued a series of orders.

"Yes." The crew members who received the order immediately carried it out.

Outside the engineering ship.

Then two transport craft and four Viking Fighters left the engineering ship's hangar, splitting into two flight formations—one remained in this side of the main universe, while the other activated stealth mode, passed through the Space Gate, and headed for the parallel universe's Solar System.

Not long after, the engineering team efficiently built two temporary communication bases resembling small space stations.

Then the two bases performed wired connections; after testing to ensure communications were normal, the engineering ship likewise activated optical camouflage and shielding effects, and proceeded slowly through the Space Gate to minimize the chance of detection.

Upon reaching the parallel universe, the engineering ship first recovered the scouting robot and the two flight formations, then used its onboard high-power detection equipment to conduct a full scan of Saturn and all its satellites.

From the results, they detected energy reactions on Saturn II and Saturn VI, and the scan images showed that these two moons host artificial structures roughly the size of a town, likely scientific outposts, exploration stations, or defensive/military bases and colonies.

Inside the bridge.

"Oh?" Looking at these scan results, the captain couldn't help but mutter to himself: "It seems this universe's compatriots have just entered the space age, and they still lack the ability to fully leave the Solar System."

"Captain, what should we do next?" the helmsman crew member asked.

"Next?" The captain rose from his seat, walked slowly to the console, called up a simulated star chart of the parallel universe's Solar System, placed his hands behind his back, and his gaze fell on the blue planet in the Third Orbit, and he said in a low voice:

"This is the Solar System; to gauge the civilization level of this universe's compatriots, we naturally go directly to Earth, upload all the information we have discovered to Supervisor BoKen, lock the coordinates, and permit warp travel."

"Yes."

"By the way," the captain added at this point: "Although we subjectively judge that this universe's compatriots lack the capability to step out of the Solar System, we cannot rule out that their tech tree might be skewed, so have the emergency team and escort fighters ready; if they happen to detect warp traces and show hostility, then we'll give them a little lesson."

"Yes, Captain."

After the words fell, the crew members began preparing for warp travel; while listening to their conversation, they maintained usual vigilance and defensive measures, yet also had full confidence, as if a single reconnaissance engineering ship could handle any extreme situation.

In fact, humans of the main universe, especially the employees of Umbrella, have the confidence to say such things because this group of higher-ranking crew members likewise possess high-level access to browse the company's internal network, allowing them to know the latest technology or products of the Mother Nest, Peru, and Luna research centers or bases.

Not long ago, the Mother Nest team led by Wang Zhaofeng dropped another bombshell within the company: that Mother Nest had completely mastered safe, effective, and stable extraction of antimatter technology and methods.

Antimatter can not only be used for power and battery material replacement; moreover, when humans discovered the existence of antimatter, they immediately wanted to apply it to militarization and weaponization.

The way antimatter energy is released is through annihilation with normal matter—the moment 'anti' meets 'normal' it vanishes into nothing.

At the instant when positive and negative matter meet, they also convert into tremendous energy; such energy released as light and heat strictly follows Einstein's mass‑energy equation, namely E=MC^2.

According to the mass‑energy equation, the reaction of 1 gram of antimatter with 1 gram of normal matter releases energy equivalent to 2 grams, which is 1.8×10^14 joules—equal to 50 million kilowatt‑hours of electricity, or 43,000 tons of TNT, i. e., the yield of 3.3 Hiroshima atomic bombs.

Know that this is merely the energy released by the reaction of 1 gram of 'anti' with 1 gram of 'normal'; moreover, Wang Zhaofeng said that Mother Nest has already begun to 'simplify' it.

Although the term 'simplification' is ambiguous, based on Wang Zhaofeng's past articles one can infer that Mother Nest is turning antimatter weapons into individual‑soldier systems…

Leaving aside antimatter, speaking of Umbrella, which controls the major equipment, including the captain and all crew members, if they lacked absolute confidence, that would be abnormal.

(End of chapter)