The implementation of the Great Wall Project was fraught with difficulties from the outset. The transformation of the expeditionary fleet required a large number of skilled technicians, and the fortress system's demand for resources was like a bottomless pit.
However, these are not the most troublesome things. The 15 million fortress galaxies located at the key nodes of the Milky Way that must be built first are the most deadly.
Each of these galaxies is located at the transportation hub of the Milky Way. Due to its unique geographical advantages, each galaxy is home to a large population. Before building a fortress galaxy, this population must be relocated first.
To relocate this massive population of hundreds of billions and the countless stubborn residents hidden within, the Galactic Alliance, led by the Earth United Nations, has resorted to every possible means, from demolition compensation to forced resettlement. They even resorted to paying the entire orbital habitat to go on free tours to other star systems, then dismantling the habitat before they returned.
Even so, the project's progress was severely slowed. With only four years remaining in the originally planned two millennia, only 86% of the 1,500 fortress systems within the Milky Way were complete, and only half of the 40 million systems along the outer defense line were halfway complete. The progress of the artificial fortresses along the galactic disk was even more dismal.
In order to race against time, the Galactic Alliance decided to prioritize the completion of internal node fortresses and extremely difficult artificial fortresses, while the outer defense node planets were handed over to an artificial intelligence cluster called Border Guard.
These border defenders were designed by the best engineers in the galaxy and programmed by the most advanced artificial intelligence "Noah" on the stellar nesting doll computer near the galactic center.
The Stellar Doll Computer resides on the surface of a mature yellow dwarf star, 0.8 times the mass of our sun. Thanks to human intervention, the star's combustion remains stable and sustained. The computer's massive structure, naturally curved by the star's gravity, forms layers of energy, computing, and cooling, enveloping the star and collecting its pale yellow light to power the computer, whose surface area is larger than the star itself.
As the latest generation of mass-produced AI, Border Guardians possess considerable intelligence but have made little progress in creativity. This is largely due to the limitations humans impose on them.
After all, it is impossible to be completely assured when the entire galaxy is handed over to AI for management, especially a purely military unit.
Although these restrictions will slightly weaken the combat effectiveness of the marginal galaxies, the marginal galaxies, as the name suggests, are expendable after all. If they are lost, they are lost. They can be regarded as strategic buffers.
Of course, all of the above refers to the standard Border Guard AI. As Bai Yi's carrier, a human soul deeply coupled to the core code has completely erased the various limitations of the Border Guard core.
"Fusion reactor is online, currently outputting 70% power."
A reminder interrupted Bai Yi's confused thoughts.
The facilities required for the initial stage of development have been fully deployed, and the microscopic von Neumann machine is expanding the area of the base in an orderly manner.
A von Neumann machine, also known as a von Neumann self-replicating automaton, is a special type of machine that can reproduce itself. While the technical principles of the von Neumann machines used in the Milky Way today are vastly different from those of ancient human blueprints, humans have retained this contemporary name out of habit.
Bai Yi took a look at the current status of the base. The construction progress is normal. The nuclear fusion reactor after ignition has completely solved the current energy problem. Now all he has to do is mine.
Before mining, geological exploration was necessary to locate the ore veins. However, Bai Yi didn't need to search the entire planet. The Border Guard's AI had already conducted a rough remote sensing survey of the planet from low-Earth orbit and selected a landing site near a relatively flat crater near the ore veins.
Craters are everywhere on this planet, whose core has long since cooled. Its current state is a replica of Mars in the solar system: a thin atmosphere, a fragile magnetic field, low gravity, red soil rich in iron oxides, and a sea of craters.
Following the pre-recorded blueprint, a cloud of von Neumann machines began to gather under Bai Yi's command. These microscopic machines, each only a few microns in size, gradually converged into a visible gray mist, flying in a straight line towards the location of the mineral vein.
Wherever the fog passes, the desolate red ground like Mars will be cut into a gully like a stream.
If someone could observe from the sidelines at a microscopic level at this moment, they would find that the land that was cut away was actually being swallowed up by the von Neumann machine. The mechanical cloud passed through like a locust, collecting all the usable materials in its path and using them to replicate itself.
As the distance increased, the fog began to grow larger and larger, and when it finally reached its destination, it grew from a ball the size of an adult's fist to a mechanical swarm as big as a car.
This is the closest point to the surface of the mineral vein as detected by the stratigraphic radar. Bai Yi plans to officially start farming from here.
The mechanical swarm composed of von Neumann machines is divided into two waves, one large and one small. The machines in the larger group rely on each other, and the adjacent machines connect with each other through chemical bonds by changing their own properties.
This type of connection would destroy the internal structure of the von Neumann machine and render the participating machines inactive. However, as long as the number is sufficient, this one-time combination method can quickly be combined into a large macroscopic structure.
Although for various reasons, the combined structures are far inferior to the alloys manufactured by professional metallurgical plants in terms of precision and strength, these swarm-like mechanical groups have been active at the forefront of interstellar development in the past thousand years due to their flexibility, efficiency and easy repair.
After more than ten minutes, the outline of a mining device had taken shape. The original mechanical cloud had completely deactivated, and the descendants of the smaller mechanical cloud that had split off at the beginning were now responsible for adding to the structure.
Since its disintegration, the smaller cloud has been diligently cultivating the surrounding land. In just a short while, the soil covering a radius of several miles has been shaved off by ten centimeters. The useful components of the soil have been completely converted into new von Neumann machines, some of which are used to manufacture drilling equipment, while the rest continue to expand the number of individuals in the mechanical cloud.
On this planet, which Bai Yi named New Mars, this bustling scene wasn't unique. With the base as the center, Bai Yi had separated six von Neumann mechanical clouds in six directions. They would expand in their respective directions and merge into a single entity on the other side of the planet.
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