Temporary center.

The Seventh International Multilateral Symposium on Mars Rescue.

This meeting was of a very high standard.

The meeting venue was also moved from the small stools in the lounge to the meeting hall in the temporary center.

The conference banner was changed from a casually printed A4 sheet to a huge red banner with yellow subtitles in the center of the venue.

The attendees at this meeting were also surprisingly high-profile.

Those present included: the Secretary-General of the EU rotating presidency and French Deputy Prime Minister Phillips, the Deputy Minister of Defence of the EU Joint Forces and English Minister Motte, and the Director of the EU Joint Aerospace Agency, Brosnan, among others.

In terms of position, our Xiao Liao was the person with the lowest status in this meeting.

Facing a group of bigwigs, Xiao Liao, who was specially arranged to sit in the center of the podium, was trembling a little.

Holy crap! That's some serious bragging! Holy crap! I'm doomed!

Liao Changtian was extremely nervous, after all, he was just a junior director at the division level.

Splash splash splash splash splash—

Everyone in the hall stood up and applauded, and Xiao Liao quickly stood up as well.

All attendees took their seats, and Xiao Yimin chaired the meeting.

"Let me set the tone for this meeting first," the leader said, "Everyone, please feel free to speak your mind! The problems humanity faces today cannot be solved without boundless imagination. I hope everyone will speak freely."

After the leader spoke, the meeting room fell into a brief silence.

Xiao Yimin gave Liao Changtian a meaningful look.

Although Liao Changtian was an important person designated to attend the meeting, he held the lowest position and dared not be the first to speak.

"Let me first introduce 'Sun God' to everyone, so that you can have a general idea." He stood up and walked to the large electronic touch screen.

"The 'Helios II' heavy nuclear fusion interplanetary cruise missile is 18.26 meters long and 1.67 meters in diameter. It carries 10 warheads and can attack 10 different targets simultaneously. Each warhead has a yield of 4 megatons."

"After launch, the missile adopts full inertial guidance, shuts down all receiving units, completes electromagnetic shielding, and no longer receives any information from outside the missile body."

"In other words, even before the 'New Age,' our electromagnetic interference technology was ineffective against 'Helios.'"

"The warhead of 'Helios' is made of tungsten carbide alloy and will penetrate the atmosphere at Mach 20, using the warhead's high temperature and kinetic energy to penetrate 1,000 meters underground to detonate heavy nuclear fusion."

"This is a new type of weapon that can effectively 'kill' the Earth's plate tectonics."

"Is there a way to intercept it?" the leader asked.

"No," the Air Force chief replied. "The warhead will pass through the atmosphere at Mach 20, making interception impossible."

“If, I mean if…” he continued, “if we still have the full CNMD national missile defense system, we can intercept ‘Helios’ outside the atmosphere, which is currently the only effective means of interception.”

"How is our defense system in good condition?" the leader continued to ask.

"The CNMD National Missile Defense System launched all its missiles on the day the 'New Era' began, and the ground-based launch system has been destroyed by meteorites and tsunamis." The reply continued, "Even our short-range air defense missiles were exhausted in the process of defending against the meteor shower. We currently only have a small number of anti-tank missiles, which is meaningless."

"The Type 057 cruiser outside..." Xiao Yimin interrupted.

"The Type 057 cruiser is indeed equipped with CNMD, but it has guns but no ammunition." The reply was, "Director Xiao, the current Type 057 is actually no different from a large civilian ship."

"I wonder if the situation is better in the European Union?"

"The EU still retains a small number of air defense missiles. However..." said Mott, Deputy Chief of Staff of the EU Joint Forces and Minister of Defence of England, "those are all old 'Sahin' class air defense missiles that have been mothballed, with a maximum altitude of 12,000 meters..."

“I think it’s pointless to discuss intercepting Helios within the atmosphere,” added ESA Director General Brosnan. “Helios will pass through the atmosphere at Mach 20, at which speed it is uninterceptable.”

"Before 'Helios' enters Earth's orbit, it will decelerate multiple times to be captured by Earth's gravity, which is the best time to intercept it!"

"Therefore, all our plans should revolve around intercepting 'Helios' outside the atmosphere."

"What other weapons or means do we possess to intercept 'Helios' outside the atmosphere?" the second-in-command continued.

The room fell silent; no one responded.

"Or rather, let's lower our expectations a bit," Xiao Yimin said. "With our current military technology, can we achieve electromagnetic interference against 'Helios'? We don't need to intercept it; we just need to change the missile's target, for example... Antarctica?"

“Not including Antarctica in the list of 100 targets is indeed a good idea, but…” he said, “Director Xiao, after the ‘Helios’ is launched, it will use full inertial guidance and complete electromagnetic shielding. This is a complete shielding in a physical sense. It will no longer receive any information from outside the missile body.”

"In other words, even the United States, as the manufacturer, cannot interfere with the missile."

"Here, I'd like to add a digression," the Secretary of Defense said. "The U.S. 'Helios' strategic nuclear strike force is designed entirely against us. It also takes into full account the breakthroughs we've made in electromagnetic interference technology in recent years. The U.S. solution is to relinquish full control over the 'Helios' launch. Once launched, no one can change the outcome."

"..."

The meeting room fell into a long silence once again.

"Xiao Liao," the leader suddenly smiled and looked at Liao Changtian, "tell me your thoughts."

"Yes!" Liao Changtian stood up energetically and walked to the touch screen.

He had been listening for a long time, and he had already done various calculations and predictions before the meeting regarding the various situations mentioned by others, so he was confident.

"I believe that all the leaders present here are thinking in the wrong direction."

Xiao Yimin's heart skipped a beat.

Goodness, they refuted all the big leaders' words right from the start.

Don't let me down at this crucial moment!

"It's not only impossible to intercept 'Helios' from within the atmosphere," Liao Changtian continued, "but it's also impossible to talk about intercepting 'Helios' from within the Earth's atmosphere."

"Not even within the entire Earth?" The leaders present all looked puzzled. "Then where else could we get it from...?"

"Mars!"

"I believe that the only thing that still has the potential to intercept 'Helios' is Mars!"

"Xiao Liao, do you mean Zhang Fan?" the leader asked after thinking for a moment.

"Yes."

"What methods could he use to intercept 'Sun God'?"

"I don't know!" Liao Changtian answered confidently.

"Uh..." The leader was speechless.

At this moment, Xiao Yimin really wanted to slap Liao Changtian to death. How dare you be so self-righteous when you don't know anything!

“But…” Liao Changtian continued, “There are bird nests and ‘phoenixes’ on Mars, so it has the potential to intercept ‘Sun God’!”

"I think all the leaders here already know that Zhang Fan has obtained the highest level of authority over 'Phoenix,' right?"

The people present looked at each other and nodded.

"Therefore, Mars at least possesses the possibility of intercepting 'Helios,' whether the possibility is high or low, it is still a possibility. The possibility of intercepting 'Helios' on Earth, however, is..."

"zero."

“Based on this, we can think about it differently.” Liao Changtian wrote on the screen, “For example, if we set the probability of Mars successfully intercepting ‘Helios’ at 5%, then as long as we have a way to let Mars know that we exist, we have that 5% chance of success.”

"Because as long as Mars Boy knows that there are still humans on Earth, he will definitely try his best to intercept the 'Sun God's' attack on Earth."

"So the key issue becomes how to make him aware of humanity's existence?" the Defense Secretary asked. "But with humanity's current capabilities, we can't even send a signal to the moon, let alone Mars."

"We will not send signals to Mars."

"Not issuing it? Then..." Everyone was stunned.

"We'll send Mars Boy to find us!"

? ? ?

!!

The entire room fell silent.

"How do we find it?" the leader asked with a smile. "As long as the plan is feasible, all the units present will give you their full assistance."

"Not enough, there aren't enough people."

Pfft, cough cough—

Xiao Yimin was about to take a sip of tea to calm his tense nerves when he choked on the tea.

Good heavens, he really wants to run over and strangle Liao Changtian right now. The army, navy, and air force are all here, and you still dare to say we don't have enough manpower?

“It really isn’t enough.” Liao Changtian shook his head seriously. “If we want to implement my plan, we have to mobilize the entire nation.”

“These past few days I’ve watched all the Mars live stream recordings, especially the ones where we can hear the sound. I’ve found an opportunity for Mars Boy to discover us.”

Liao Changtian opened the presentation file on the screen and began to demonstrate his solution to everyone present.

"First, the first step of the plan must be to mobilize the entire nation..."

Liao Changtian scrolled through the presentation slides, explaining intently. At first, some people in the audience whispered and discussed amongst themselves.

Ten minutes later, all the attendees were watching the big screen intently and listening quietly.

Only Liao Changtian's voice remained in the room...