Chapter 288: Farewell and Resolve

Finally, the image froze on a photograph: in a primary school classroom somewhere in Longguo, children smiled at the camera, and on the blackboard behind them were written crooked characters, 'We want to survive.'

Subtitles appeared:

【This is what we must protect】

【Irrelevant to efficiency, irrelevant to calculation】

【Just, wanting to survive】

The livestream ended.

Social media did not flood as usual.

Everyone watched in silence, turned off the screens in silence, and continued their work in silence.

But something grew in the silence.

At 2 a. m., the original site of Lao Wu's barbecue stall.

Now this place is a temporary supplies distribution point, but Lao Wu secured the rights for one final night—not for barbecue, but to hand out candy.

Under wartime rationing, sugar is scarce.

But Lao Wu had saved up three months' quota and exchanged it all for fruit hard candies.

Each piece wrapped in old newspaper and handed to passersby.

'Take it, it's sweet.' he said to a young soldier.

The soldier hesitated, then took it: 'Thank... thank you, uncle.'

'Come back alive.' Lao Wu patted his shoulder, 'When you return, I'll treat you to real barbecue.'

The soldier nodded firmly, slipped the candy into his pocket, turned and ran toward the assembling military vehicles.

The convoy stretched several kilometers, its headlights linking into a ribbon of light in the night.

At the same time, the food delivery platform's final batch of orders.

Generated automatically by the system, it sends a hometown dish to every soldier about to go to the front.

Mecha delivery agents shuttle between the camps, their mechanical arms holding insulated boxes.

Soldiers from Sichuan receive mapo tofu, those from Shanghai get xiaolongbao, and those from Guangdong get claypot rice—although all are replicas from the central kitchen, the flavor is kept as close as possible.

A young soldier opened his lunchbox, saw the braised pork inside, and froze for a while.

Then he squatted on the ground and cried.

The delivery mecha stood silently nearby, its chest display flickered and showed a line of text:

'Wait for you to come back, then order takeout again—free delivery.'

At 4 a. m., Moon Base.

At the Qiming Computing Center, Chen Guang performed the final check.

The purple crystal at the algorithm core hovered silently, its luster stable.

The surrounding quantum arrays were all on standby, data streams ready to surge at any moment.

'Are you afraid?' Chen Guang suddenly asked.

Qiming's voice sounded:

【I have no fear emotion module.】

【According to γ-7 data……their final moments were calm.】

【Knowing why one fights, one does not fear death.】

Chen Guang nodded, then turned and left.

As he reached the doorway, he glanced back.

The crystal flickered once, as if saying goodbye.

At 6 a. m., on the bridge of the Penglai-2.

Li Yang stood before the main console, behind him a standby sequence of three hundred Yinglong-Omega mechas.

On the screen, the indicator lights of all units in the global defense line were green.

'Readiness rate 99.8%.' the system reported.

Wang Hao ran over from the weapons control room: 'Missiles fully loaded, warheads 30% artistic, 70% live. Besides, I secretly installed a fireworks mode—it will launch automatically if we win, visible throughout the solar system.'

'What if we lose?'

'If we lose, just consider it a send‑off.' Wang Hao grinned, 'Either way, it'll be bright.'

Chen Guang walked in, holding a tablet: 'Civilization signal bombs loaded, first batch of one hundred, distributed across the Heaven's Punishment Platform array. Launch authorization requires three-person simultaneous approval.'

'Which three?'

'You, me, and Elder Brother Feng.' Chen Guang pushed his glasses up, 'To prevent accidental touch.'

'Reasonable.'

Feng Yan finally entered the bridge.

He wasn't wearing military uniform today, just an ordinary Dragon Chant work uniform, with the Iron Wolf Workshop badge from three years ago pinned to his chest.

The four stood before the huge observation window.

Outside, Blue Star slowly rotated below, blue and white intermingled, unrealistically beautiful.

And in Blue Star's orbit, 912 Heaven's Punishment Platforms hovered like guardians, their purple coating glowing faintly in the morning light.

Farther off, in the direction of Jupiter's orbit, an unseen enemy was approaching.

'Countdown: 30 days.' Feng Yan said softly.

Everyone fell silent.

Then Li Yang said, 'I am ready.'

Wang Hao: 'I'm ready too.'

Chen Guang: "Data ready."

Feng Yan nodded, pressing his hand on the authorization panel of the main console.

The other three also pressed down.

The system alert sounded:

【Final Confirmation: Solar System Defense Network Fully Activated】

【Civilization Fire Seed Project: Ark Fleet has set sail, heading for the edge of the galaxy】

【Human Survival Covenant: All signatory nations confirm execution】

【War State: Officially Entered】

The numbers on the countdown panel began to jump:

【29 days 23 hours 59 minutes】

Feng Yan turned around, gazing into deep space.

There, 1.2 light-years away, the Harvester fleet is crossing the interstellar darkness.

His voice was calm:

"Come on."

Morning light shone into the bridge, falling on the four's shoulders.

Behind them, billions of people on Blue Star were waking from their slumber in the underground cities, beginning a new day.

The last day before the war.

The final thirty days of human civilization.

Or——

The first day of the new era.

【Time until Harvester main fleet arrival: 30 days】

【Jupiter defense line contact countdown: 6 hours】

Outside Jupiter's orbit, the Penglai-2 Aerospace Mothership hovered like a dormant metal leviathan at the edge of the gas giant's eternal storm eye.

On the bridge's main screen, a hundred red dots were approaching from the Kuiper Belt at a steady 0.18c, a bit slower than expected, yet that made people uneasy.

"They're adjusting their formation," Li Yang said, staring at the tactical map.

"Shifting from a dense charge to a fan-shaped spread, keeping spacing at fifty kilometers, just beyond the optimal concentrated fire range of Heaven's Punishment Platform."

Wang Hao whistled at the weapons console: "You've learned well, knowing our laser cannons love to clump together."

"After all, we blew up one of their probes," Chen Guang's voice came from the Moon Base.

"The Harvesters' learning speed is 27% faster than estimated. According to Qiming's analysis, they've already updated the human defense system's tactical database."

Feng Yan stood by the observation window, Jupiter's Great Red Spot slowly turning in his view, like an eye watching the battlefield.

"Execute the plan," he said, "Deploy the decoy fleet."

Inside Jupiter's orbit, twelve retrofitted old transport ships slowly emerged from their hiding place.

These were thirty-year-old relics, their hulls mottled, engine nozzles still spewing abnormal black smoke.

This was Zhao Gong's deliberately tuned "failure mode," to make them look like a hastily assembled main force.

The transport ships were painted with exaggerated Longguo flags and humanity-must-win slogans, which Wang Hao insisted on adding: "If you're going to act, go all out!"

"The decoy fleet has entered the enemy's detection range," the communications officer reported, "The enemy vanguard... has turned! They took the bait!"

On the hologram, those hundred red dots suddenly accelerated, charging straight at the decoy fleet.

"The show begins," Wang Hao grinned, pressing the launch button.

Callisto, the icy moon's surface, three hundred engineering mechs had lain in wait for seventy-two hours.

Beneath the ice beneath their feet lay twelve antimatter bombs.

This was reverse-engineered by Zhao Kaiyuan from detector wreckage, yield equivalent to five million tons of TNT, yet the size of a refrigerator.