Chapter 749: Bottom-line Assessment

That Swindle, that two-faced turncoat, would have some tricks up his sleeve—Sun Cheng was not surprised at all.

His current situation is not much better than Sun Cheng's.

Years ago, the high-spirited Swindle was lured into a trap by Starscream and dragged into the political struggle between Starscream and Megatron for the position of commander of the Decepticon Legion.

Whether in terms of methods or schemes, Swindle was clearly no match for Starscream or Megatron.

Thus, he was reduced to a pawn for Starscream, pushed to the forefront to wave flags and shout for him, openly rebelling against Megatron.

Branded with the name of a tyrant, one can imagine Megatron's methods.

Swindle's first rebellion resulted in him being escorted to the Skull Fortress prison, a place within the Decepticon Legion specifically for detaining those who resisted Megatron, where he suffered endless torture.

Later, following Starscream's second rebellion, he was thoroughly purged after being suppressed and handed over by Megatron to Shockwave, who cruelly brainwashed him into a re-formatted warrior loyal to himself and the Decepticon Legion; he died through who knows how many generations before finally reawakening his past memories after meeting Sun Cheng.

With such a background, Swindle's choices are far fewer than even his own.

Having been forced to submit to Sun Cheng before, it would be strange if this old-school Decepticon were actually convinced.

During the peak of the Cybertronian civilization, far too many black technologies were created.

For instance, the seemingly unremarkable Swindle, an arms expert who once mingled in the weapons black market during the final days of the Council of Ancients, still possesses some incredible black technology.

Since joining Sun Cheng's command, over the past few months, he has, according to Sun Cheng's requirements, successively manufactured and handed over eleven weapons capable of threatening Elite Warriors.

These types of weapons could also be manufactured by the Decepticon engineers under Base No. 2, but they have been deeply influenced by the Hunter Civilization's plasma technology line, traveling further and further down the path of designing and producing energy weapons like plasma weapons.

Their research and modification of traditional chemical-energy weapons are only a tiny bit ahead of the current nations on Earth.

However, the weapons Swindle manufactures are not all energy weapons; most are traditional weapons that use chemical-energy ammunition.

There is an inherent difference between traditional chemical energy being converted into destructive power and energy being directly converted into destructive power.

This involves issues such as energy consumption during the conversion process, which is why energy weapons inherently have more development potential than chemical-energy weapons.

From Swindle, it is not hard to see just how advanced the technology of the Cybertronian civilization was at its peak.

And it is precisely because of this skill that Sun Cheng has shown him a bit more patience.

Of course, it is also very limited.

Thunder stood to the side, waiting quietly for a while; seeing that he had been deep in thought, he suddenly took the initiative to speak: "Master, do you need me to go and call Soundwave?"

His train of thought interrupted, Sun Cheng came back to his senses and was stunned by the question, only shaking his head a moment later.

"No need, I will have Atlas temporarily halt the manufacturing of his New Body so he can come see me himself!"

With the deaths of The Fallen, Soundwave, and other Decepticons, Earth can now be considered to have temporarily entered a period of peace.

However, whether it is Optimus Prime, Starscream, or Sun Cheng, they all likely know that this fragile period of peace cannot last long at all.

Megatron could return at any time, and the main force of the Decepticon Legion led by Shockwave could also arrive on Earth at any moment.

Optimus Prime is also constantly summoning more Autobots, rushing in from all corners of the galaxy.

This growing sense of crisis has led Sun Cheng to start spending heavily to strengthen the power he holds in his hands.

In addition to selecting a batch of the most excellent workers from the hundreds of Decepticon workers under his command and promoting them directly by one rank to Decepticon engineers.

Sun Cheng plans to expand his team of Decepticon engineers to one hundred within the shortest possible time.

The remaining second, third, and fourth batches of cultivated workers will also all be promoted to Technical Officers, one rank lower than engineers, though the most excellent batch will be selected from them to fill out the team of one hundred Decepticon engineers.

As for the earliest batch of Decepticon engineers, Sun Cheng naturally also needs to consider their thoughts.

He plans to spend one year promoting the twenty-plus Decepticon engineers who were the first to follow him to Senior Engineers.

Senior Engineers already possess combat power not inferior to Advanced Warriors, and their bodies also require professional design specifically tailored to the technical path they follow; the manufacturing difficulty is more than ten times higher than simply manufacturing a body for a Decepticon engineer, or even simply manufacturing a body for an Advanced Warrior.

Sun Cheng does not have many available warriors, so the promotion opportunities they can receive are more numerous than those for workers on the technical path.

Swindle is no exception; after he defected to Sun Cheng, Atlas and the others received instructions from Sun Cheng and also took the opportunity to design a New Body for him, though the manufacturing sequence is ranked behind Pioneer and Thunder, and on par with Sprint and the others.

Before the partial restrictions on the Requiem Blaster were lifted, the power Sun Cheng held was insufficient to threaten powerful warriors at the Leader level, which is why he had his eye on the Bounty Hunter, Lockdown.

Now that he has the Requiem Blaster, he can already injure a Leader, so the importance of Swindle, who holds the contact information for Lockdown, has naturally plummeted in his mind.

However, Sun Cheng will not abandon Swindle immediately; his side is severely lacking in combat power, and the workers he is cultivating will also need a very long time to advance to warriors above the Advanced level.

Therefore, he does not mind giving Swindle one more chance; at the very least, Sun Cheng is willing to set a timeline for him.

Before the time point he has set in his mind arrives, if Lockdown arrives on Earth, or if Swindle takes the initiative to explain things clearly to him, he will treat the matter as if it never happened.

But if that time point passes, then he is sorry.

"I will have someone find an opportunity to reveal this matter to Swindle and see what his own choice will be..."

Thunder did not question his decision and answered some of Sun Cheng's other questions, helping him fully understand everything that had happened on Earth over the past two months, before leaving.

After returning to Earth from Mars, Sun Cheng did not rush to leave Base No. 2.

He stayed at Base No. 2 for over a week, first explaining to Atlas and the others some of the problems encountered during the construction of the Mars Base, as well as the supplies that needed to be replenished by Base No. 2 in the next batch, and so on.

It is rare for Sun Cheng to have the time to conduct a bottom-line assessment of the current strength of Base No. 2.

He also took the time to inspect the New Bodies currently being manufactured in the base for Pioneer and Thunder.

Sun Cheng's return was quite timely; there happened to be three workers from the earliest batch cultivated at Base No. 2 who, because they had accumulated enough Task reward points over the past year, had earned the opportunity to be promoted directly by one rank to Decepticon engineers.

He personally met with the three excited young workers; the scientific research team belonging to Base No. 2 is still continuing to expand.

Reading URL: n.