March 2685, Ceres.

Tong Ling finished a day of training and was taking an underwater shuttle to leave the No. 3 pilot training ground of the Ceres branch of the Star Front Research Institute and head to the residence 30 kilometers away.

Ceres, also known as Ceres in English, is the smallest dwarf planet in the solar system and the only one located in the asteroid belt.

In the solar system, Ceres has attracted much attention as early as the 21st century because of its special structure.

There are a large number of water-containing minerals on its surface, and there is a large amount of ice water in the mantle.

As early as the middle of the 22nd century, humans had already taken root and multiplied on Ceres.

After hundreds of years of transformation, Ceres, which was originally covered with rocks, has now become green.

Under the restraint of the force field shield, Ceres has an atmosphere that is almost identical to that of the Earth.

Humans have implanted a gravity device in the core of the planet, and the simulated gravity environment is exactly 1G.

Otherwise, with the gravity conditions of Ceres, with a little effort, you can jump into space.

...

In the residential building No. 37851 in the intermediate residential area.

Tong Ling's parents arrived home almost at the same time as her.

Both are senior employees of the Ceres Machinery Manufacturing Plant.

As native Ceres, the Tong couple, who are now in their eighties, are very mediocre. They grew up in obscurity and worked in obscurity. When they were in their sixties, fate brought them together, and they suddenly hit it off and decided to raise a child.

This decision changed the lives of both of them.

At the age of nine, Tong Ling had already shown her talent in mechanical manufacturing and debugging, and was selected to join the Ceres branch of the Star Research Institute.

Three years had passed before she knew it, and the twelve-year-old Tong Ling had become a senior student at the Ceres branch, and was about to graduate and take up a job.

"Xiaoling, what was your rating in the pilot professional training graduation assessment?"

Tong Ling's mother asked a little nervously at the dinner table.

Tong Ling raised her head and chin slightly, and said proudly: "The comprehensive index was assessed as A-level, and the potential index was assessed as SS-level."

Her mother's expression froze a little, and there was some sadness on her face that she could not hide.

The father nudged his wife's arm slightly on the table, signaling her not to show it too obviously.

"Congratulations. Our Xiaoling will definitely be able to enter the military factory, or at least be a technical person in charge."

Tong's mother forced a smile and said.

Tong Ling looked at her mother in confusion, "Mom, you don't look very happy?"

"No, it's not true. We are of course happy to see that everything is going well for you."

Tong Ling's father defended his wife.

But how could the smart little Tong Ling be kept in the dark?

The atmosphere at the dinner table became inexplicably depressing.

Since 2675, with the launch of the first fleet capable of traveling at 200 times the speed of light in secondary curvature space, the full-scale counterattack of mankind was sounded in advance, and similar conversations occurred in many families.

Every couple hopes that their children will become successful, but deep down they hope that their offspring will live a peaceful life.

Parents would rather go to the battlefield than let their children live a peaceful life.

However, with the continuous advancement of human technology, the gap between people of different abilities is getting bigger and bigger.

If mediocre parents give birth to genius children, they will be trapped in this dilemma where they can only watch their children fly away.

They can't even stop their children.

This also violates the wartime laws of the empire.

After dinner, the family of three gathered together and checked the conditions of the other dozens of children from a distance.

Some children are still embryos, and some are already two or three years old.

These dozens of children are in an infant training center more than 20 kilometers away from the No. 37851 residential building.

Since Tong Ling showed her talent, training new offspring has become their responsibility.

In recent years, the couple has trained dozens of offspring at a high frequency.

The two usually go to the training center once every three days on average. As for Tong Ling, she can only take one day a month to visit her brothers and sisters because of her busy studies.

The army's call-up order for new graduates is very urgent. The allocation result will be announced tonight, and Tong Ling will have to pack her bags and rush to the front line immediately.

Tong Ling has no chance to go to the training center anymore, and can only meet with her brothers and sisters at home through the holographic network.

In fact, she can still communicate long distance after she gets on the transport spaceship, but the distance is far, and the feeling will always be a little different.

The big family chattered on the Internet for a long time.

An hour later, the communication time was over, and the family of three returned to seriousness.

In another five minutes, the assignment report will be issued, and Tong Ling will know where she will go and what position she will hold.

The mother clasped her hands together and prayed silently, hoping that Tong Ling would not be assigned to the front line.

It would be best to work in a research institute in the rear, which would be stable and not easy to be sent to the battlefield.

But Tong Ling was somewhat excited and expectant, and she spoke very quickly: "I heard that the frontline Witeng Galaxy has completed a new type of weapon called Folger Armor, which uses virtual energy tunneling circuits and a new type of pulse hyperwarp engine, and also uses a double folding system. And it is loaded with semi-intelligent artificial intelligence. I really want to go to the Witeng Galaxy to see how powerful this legendary Folger Armor is, which is ten times more powerful than the current mainstream equipment. It would be great if I could become a commissioning pilot for the Folger Armor."

Virtual energy tunneling circuits are one of the several conjectures left by Sergei before his death, and later it was realized.

According to Sergei's idea, humans can use virtual energy to build a small pipeline-type force field interweaving network similar to the characteristics of the solar dome.

When electron currents circulate in these interwoven networks, their shape will change, becoming a purer vibration frequency energy, no longer existing in the form of complete electrons, and the circulation speed can reach twenty times the speed of light.

This greatly improves the energy operation efficiency of human equipment, allowing some previously unattainable ultra-high performance to move from theory to reality.

The effect of the pulse hypercurvature engine is that it allows small units to enter the second curvature space, and the overall flight speed reaches two hundred times the speed of light.

As for the double folding system, it allows two folding engines of equal size and efficiency to take effect alternately to obtain twice the folding distance and a shorter stiffness time.

As for the energy system of the Forge Armor, it uses a composite system of classic antimatter, dark energy and high-energy biobatteries, with a large energy reserve.

As a small combat unit, its designed high-speed cruising range can reach thousands of light years, and the economic cruising distance of twenty times the speed of light can be almost infinite.

The theoretical stable operating life of the equipment is one million years, so the Forge Armor can fly a full 20 million light years in the universe.

It is the first small unit ever created by humans that can achieve such a long-distance voyage.

There was no such thing in the 41st century in the previous timeline.

Its design concept uses a lot of virtual energy, the unified rules of the previous universe, and the physical laws revealed in the dome.

"Shut up! Do you know what you are saying? How can this new type of equipment not be used on the battlefield? The fighting on the front lines is so intense right now. If you really become a pilot of Forge's armor, I'm afraid you will have to start military training tomorrow."

Tong's mother couldn't help but yelled after hearing this.

Her tone was heavy and urgent.

Tong Ling was stunned at first, and then she looked like she was about to cry.

This was the first time she was scolded by her mother since she was old enough to understand things.

Seeing this, Tong's father quickly acted as a peacemaker.

Unexpectedly, Tong's mother didn't buy it and angrily said, "You are still speaking for her. Didn't you hear her tone? She said so, she must have filled in her intention in the allocation of volunteers."

Tong's father was shocked and turned around to ask, "Is it true? Xiaoling."

Tong Ling lowered her head slightly and nodded, "Yes."

Hiss!

The spacious and bright living room fell into silence in an instant.

With Tong Ling's SS-level potential index and her fame in Ceres, if she really filled in her inclination volunteer, the possibility of her being selected by the Witeng Galaxy would be at least more than 90%.

After a long time, it was Tong's mother who adjusted her mood first.

She sighed, "Okay, since it's already like this, let's wait for the result."

A few minutes later, Tong Ling's personal information system received a prompt.

She got what she wanted.

She was selected to join the Second Special Operations Squadron of the Intelligent Armor of the Witeng Galaxy.

Although her position was not clearly stated in the transfer order, the Second Squadron, which had just been established for less than half a year, was named a special operations squadron. There must be something special about it. It is very likely that it is really a combat squadron that controls the Forge armor.

Tong Ling's mouth curled up, as if she was happy and wanted to laugh, but she looked at her mother with a guilty conscience and did not dare to laugh out loud.

Tong's mother lay on the sofa helplessly, staring at the ceiling, "You are only twelve years old! You are obviously still just a child, this..."

Tong Ling explained, "Mom, I will take the latest shuttle with a speed of 200 times the speed of light to reach the Vitten Galaxy, and it will take at least fifteen years. By then I will be twenty-seven years old, no longer a child."

Tong's mother: "..."

After a while, Tong's mother finally relaxed her expression and held Tong Ling's hand tightly, "Forget it. Since you have been selected, there is no point in me saying sad words. It is even more unfair to those soldiers fighting on the front line. Since you are going, you have to do your job well."

"With my level, I don't have the authority to know the specific parameters of the Forge Armor. But I think that thing must be particularly important to the warriors. I hope that you and your armor can become the most trustworthy support for your comrades. Xiaoling, I believe you can do it, you have the potential."

"You have been well protected by us since you were a child, and you have a weak temper, but you must remember that the front line is a battlefield, and others will not tolerate your crying temper like we do." "

You must learn to be strong, and even more importantly, you must learn to be considerate of others. Finally, you must remember the mission of a warrior. If you receive a mission, you must hold your ground even if you die. There is a third-level assessor among our ancestors. So whether we can prove our value again actually depends on you."

Tong Ling nodded heavily.

"Hmm!"

Since the liberation of the solar system, most of the third-level examinees who underwent the colonization transformation have left the solar system one after another.

Some died alone in the universe.

Some are still continuing their boundless and aimless voyage.

Others have found an uninhabited planet and lived in seclusion.

Of course, some people followed the instructions of the information and tried to go to alien civilization planets that look similar to their own life forms.

Although they have no hope, they also want to find their own kind.

This group of people is destined to become the eternal regret and scar in the hearts of the human beings in the solar system.

We failed to save them.

We even used them.

They helped the solar system with all their strength, but they also clearly realized that they were no longer human and could no longer integrate into human society.

When they were free, their will to leave was even stronger than those low-level alien civilizations.

Before the colonization transformation, some of these people chose to leave their descendants.

Both of Tong Ling's parents were from the third-level assessors.

They were incompatible with the surrounding environment and felt sad for the fate of their fathers. This was the reason why their fathers chose to leave the earth early and settle in Ceres.

Forty-five minutes later, a small shuttle carrying dozens of new graduates from different majors took off from Ceres and headed straight for a large dock suspended in the Kuiper asteroid belt.

There, Tong Ling and her classmates would transfer to a large fast spaceship that could reach 200 times the speed of light and fly directly to the boundary between the Sagittarius Arm and the Orion Arm, which was the front line of the war.