Chapter 242

At the Kyoto National Convention Center, the main venue, which could accommodate five thousand people, was packed.

The aisles were also crowded with standing reporters, their long lenses all aimed at the inconspicuous silver box in the center of the stage.

The box wasn't large, about the size of a laptop.

But everyone in the venue had their eyes focused on it.

"Distinguished guests, media friends, good afternoon."

Zhao Kaiyuan walked onto the stage, wearing his signature gray work jacket.

He was only thirty-five years old, but no one in the room dared to underestimate him.

Founder of Open Source Energy, creator of Xuanwu fusion technology, he is now a recognized leader in the global energy field.

"I invited you all here today not to talk about technical principles," Zhao Kaiyuan said, getting straight to the point.

"We have already published seventeen papers on those formulas, models, and parameters in academic journals; interested friends can check them out themselves."

He paused, his gaze sweeping across the room: "Today, I just want to show you one thing."

His finger pressed lightly on the lock of the silver box.

"Click."

The lid popped open.

Inside lay a silver flake the size of a palm, less than a centimeter thick, with a surface as smooth as a mirror and a faint blue halo flowing around the edges.

"Xuanming-2, civilian fusion battery," Zhao Kaiyuan said, picking up the flake and holding it above his head.

"Just that big?"

"Are you kidding? A fusion battery?"

"How much energy can that thing have?"

Zhao Kaiyuan waited for the noise to subside before speaking slowly: "I know you might not believe it. So, we won't say much; let's demonstrate it directly."

He walked to the edge of the stage, where a full set of household appliances was set up, including a refrigerator, air conditioner, TV, washing machine, and an electric water heater that was currently running.

"The total power of these appliances is twelve kilowatts," Zhao Kaiyuan said, plugging the Xuanming-2 battery into a special socket.

"Now, I will cut off the power grid of the entire venue."

He nodded to the backstage.

With a "pop," all the lights in the venue went out simultaneously.

Only the green lights of the emergency exits remained on.

But the next second—

The refrigerator compressor restarted, emitting a low hum.

The air conditioner vent blew out cool air.

The TV screen lit up, playing the news.

The washing machine began to fill with water.

The indicator light on the electric water heater turned from red to green.

And on the main screen of the venue, a line of data was displayed in real-time:

【Current Power Source: Xuanming-2 Battery】

【Output Voltage: 220V±1%】

【Output Power: 12.3kW】

【Remaining Energy: 99.997%】

"Starting the timer now," Zhao Kaiyuan said, glancing at his watch. "Let's see how long this battery can last."

Time passed minute by minute.

Five minutes.

The appliances were running normally.

Ten minutes.

The air conditioner lowered the venue temperature to twenty-six degrees, and some people started rubbing their arms.

Thirty minutes.

The news on the TV finished a cycle and started replaying.

One hour.

The washing machine completed a full wash-spin cycle.

Three hours.

The electric water heater had already boiled its third pot of water.

And that palm-sized battery was still lying quietly in the socket, with the remaining energy on the screen showing: 99.893%.

"That's about enough," Zhao Kaiyuan finally said.

He walked over to the battery and unplugged it.

All appliances stopped simultaneously.

Then he reconnected to the power grid, and the venue lights came back on.

"Demonstration over. Three hours, twelve kilowatts of power supplied, 0.107% energy consumed. Calculating at this rate—" Zhao Kaiyuan held up the battery.

A formula and calculation result popped up on the large screen behind him:

【Continuous power supply at full charge: approx. 2800 hours (approx. 116 days)】

【Actual service life: 50 years (based on material fatigue limit)】

【Energy density: 1037 times that of the current highest-performance lithium-ion battery】

【Cost: 9.2% of a lithium-ion battery with equivalent energy storage】

Seeing this data, all the reporters stood up, and the flashes in the room merged into one.

Representatives of various companies in the room took out their phones and started making frantic calls.

"This is impossible!" someone shouted from the audience—it was a foreign reporter wearing gold-rimmed glasses.

"How can fusion technology be miniaturized to this extent? And the cost is so low? You must be hiding something!"

Zhao Kaiyuan smiled.

He had been waiting for this question for a long time.

"This gentleman asked a good question," he nodded to the questioner. "We are indeed hiding a little something."

He switched the slide, and a complex structural diagram appeared on the screen.

"Traditional fusion requires huge magnetic confinement devices, laser ignition systems, and massive energy conversion equipment."

"But Xuanming-2 uses quantum field resonance topology."

The image zoomed in, showing a microscopic structure.

"Simply put, we no longer try to confine the entire plasma, but let the energy self-organize and self-sustain at the quantum scale. It's like..." Zhao Kaiyuan thought for a moment.

"It's like letting water find the path of least resistance to flow on its own, instead of building a canal to force it to go a certain way."

"So the device can be made extremely small, the energy consumption can be made extremely low, and the cost naturally comes down."

He paused and added: "Of course, the specific technical details involve national security, so I can only say this much."

"Next is what everyone is most concerned about: the price." Zhao Kaiyuan switched the screen.

A price list popped up on the screen:

【Xuanming-2 Standard Edition (Home use, 500kWh storage)】

Launch price: 8888 yuan

Target price in three years: 2999 yuan

【Xuanming-2 Industrial Edition (Factory use, 50MWh storage)】

Launch price: 880,000 yuan

Target price in three years: 290,000 yuan

【Xuanming-2 Vehicle Adaptation Module】

Launch price: 2888 yuan

(Can increase the range of existing electric vehicles to 50,000 kilometers)

There was also a line of small print at the bottom:

【Electricity cost calculation: 0.003 yuan/kWh (amortized over a 50-year lifespan)】

"Zero point... zero zero three yuan?" an auto company representative muttered.

"Current civilian electricity is six mao per kWh, industrial electricity is one yuan two... how many times is that difference?"

Someone next to him calculated quickly: "Two hundred times. That means, in the future, driving an electric car, charging once to run 50,000 kilometers, the electricity cost will only be... fifteen yuan?"

"It's not fifteen yuan," another person who knew the industry corrected.

"The battery itself has a cost, but if you use it for fifty years, amortized, it really is that price. This is no longer an energy revolution; this is the... endgame of energy."

Endgame.

This word spread rapidly through the venue.

Yes, when an energy source is nearly infinite, nearly free, and nearly perfect, what need is there for other forms of energy?

Oil? Coal? Natural gas? Even solar and wind?

In the face of fusion batteries, they all became transitional products.

Zhao Kaiyuan looked at the reaction of the crowd, the corners of his mouth slightly raised.

This was the effect he wanted.

"In addition, we have reached a cooperation agreement with the State Grid," he continued to announce.

"Starting next month, remote areas such as the Northwest, Southwest, and Northeast will be the first to pilot Xuanming power stations."

A map appeared on the large screen, with dozens of red dots lighting up.

"These areas previously failed to achieve stable 24-hour power supply due to high transmission losses and high construction costs."

"But now, you only need to build a small substation and insert a set of Xuanming-2 batteries to solve the annual power consumption of a township."

The screen switched to a live connection.

A poverty-stricken village in the mountains of the Southwest, night had just fallen.

On the largest open space in the village, over a hundred villagers gathered.

Old people, children, women, and young adults, everyone looked up at the newly erected light pole.

At the top of the light pole was a brand-new LED street light.

"Three, two, one—" the village party secretary shouted into his phone.

"Light it up!"

The street light suddenly burst into a warm white glow.

The elderly stared blankly, several raising their hands to rub their eyes.

A seven or eight-year-old child suddenly jumped up, pointing at the street light and shouting: "It's lit! It's really lit! I can do my homework at night now!"

His grandmother crouched down, hugged the child, and her eyes turned red.

The village primary school teacher raised his phone, the lens sweeping over the excited faces of the children, the moist corners of the elderly's eyes, and finally settling on the street light.

"Our village... finally has light," the teacher's voice was a bit choked.

"The children don't have to use candles to read anymore."

The live stream switched back to the venue.

Zhao Kaiyuan took a deep breath and said calmly: "The meaning of technology's existence is not to make the strong stronger, but to let everyone live with dignity."

A white-haired academician in the front row stood up and applauded vigorously.

Then the second, the third... soon, all five thousand people in the venue stood up.

The applause lasted for three minutes.

Zhao Kaiyuan waited for the applause to subside before speaking slowly: "Finally, regarding international cooperation."

He switched to the last slide.

The title was: "Belt and Road Energy Sharing Plan."

"Xuanming-2 technology will not be transferred for the time being," Zhao Kaiyuan's tone was firm. "But we can export clean electricity."

The screen showed a world map, starting from the western part of Longguo, with several cable paths extending to Central Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.

"We will build a transnational superconducting power grid to transmit fusion power to countries along the route with nearly zero loss."

"The electricity price can be one-tenth of the local existing electricity price."

"There is only one condition: peace, cooperation, and common development."

In the audience, the expressions of representatives from various countries were complex.

Some were excited, some hesitant, some vigilant.

And in the VIP section in the back row of the venue, the Energy Minister of Foot-Chicken, Sato Ichiro, had a livid face.

His phone vibrated three times, all encrypted calls from home.

When it vibrated for the fourth time, he finally couldn't help it, got up, left his seat, and walked into the restroom.

Locked the door and connected.

"Minister!" the voice on the other end was urgent.

"Just got the news, twelve oil-producing countries including Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Iran have submitted applications to Longguo to join the Energy Sharing Plan!"

"Our oil reserves... are only enough for three months of domestic consumption. If Longguo really lowers the electricity price to one-tenth, our industry will collapse completely!"

Sato Ichiro gripped his phone, his knuckles turning white.

He looked at his pale face in the mirror and asked slowly: "What does the Cabinet... say?"

"Representatives from Eagle Country and White Elephant are visiting secretly. The Prime Minister's meaning is... we must join forces to make a final stand before Longguo completely controls global energy."

"A final stand?" Sato laughed miserably, "With what? Our Eight-Headed Serpent Project has become a joke, our submarines are being picked out of the sea like toys by mechs, and now even our energy is being throttled..."

"Minister, now is not the time for pessimism." The other side lowered their voice.

"The three countries have reached a consensus: if negotiations are ineffective, we will use force to break Longguo's rhythm. At least... we must delay the progress of Longguo's so-called Heaven's Punishment project."

Sato closed his eyes.

He knew what this meant.

And he knew this might be suicide.

But he knew even more that if they didn't do something, Foot-Chicken would really be finished.

"I... understand." He hung up the phone, turned on the faucet, and splashed cold water on his face.

When he looked up, the look in his eyes in the mirror had become cold and resolute.

Walking out of the restroom, Sato did not return to the venue.

He left the convention center directly and got into the waiting car.

"Go to the airport," he told the driver, "Return home."

Outside the car window, the night view of Kyoto was brilliant.

And Sato knew that it wouldn't be long before all these lights would come from that palm-sized silver battery.

From Longguo's technology.

From... that neighbor they once thought they could easily surpass.

"Drive faster," he urged the driver, as if slowing down by one step would mean falling into an abyss.

And in the main venue of the convention center, the press conference was nearing its end.

Zhao Kaiyuan answered the last question and was about to step down when he suddenly remembered something, turned around, and added:

"By the way, someone just asked me why the lifespan of the Xuanming-2 battery is 50 years."

He held up the battery to the light.

"Because this is the current limit of materials science, not the limit of the battery; it is the fatigue limit of the shell material."

"In other words, after 50 years, you only need to spend one hundred yuan to change the shell, and the energy core inside... can be used for another 50 years."

He paused and revealed a meaningful smile:

"After all, once the fusion reaction is started, as long as it is not artificially stopped, it can theoretically continue until..."

"The heat death of the universe."

After speaking, he bowed and stepped down.

Leaving the audience in the venue stunned, and an energy world about to be completely overturned.

And the live stream of the press conference was being broadcast simultaneously on 1.7 billion screens worldwide.

Keywords like #Xuanming2Launch#, #EnergyEndgame#, and #ThreeCentElectricity# surged to the top of all global social media hot search lists thirty-seven seconds after the launch.

A new era officially began at this moment.

It's just that no one knew that the vested interests of the old era were sharpening their knives in the dark.

A storm was quietly brewing beneath the glorious facade of the energy revolution.