Deep Space Wandering Fleet-Chapter 102 - 104: The Unknown Darkness
Chapter 102: Chapter 104: The Unknown Darkness
So, should I devour it all before hibernation or wait until I wake up from hibernation to enjoy the blissful times?
How to achieve the highest level of satisfaction while reducing the risk of spoilage is a tough mathematical problem.
Bored out of his mind, Zhang Yuan constantly constructed “satisfaction functions” and “spoilage risk functions” in his mind, trying to obtain a higher degree of satisfaction at the cost of two kilograms of beef jerky.
Half an hour later, with a soft “rumble,” the elevator they were on reached the surface, and the outside temperature displayed on the instruments was minus 170 degrees Celsius.
“Mr. Zhang, this is as far as I can take you.”
...
“Maybe we’ll never see each other again, could we… hug?” The young girl who had been hosting Zhang Yuan hesitated for a moment and then whispered in his ear. Nothing much had happened over these days, yet she still felt it was a pity.
Zhang Yuan was stunned for a moment, then opened his arms and embraced the girl he had known for just five days.
Despite the pain of parting with his prized beef jerky, he still gave some to her.
“Thanks for looking after me these past few days. Please take this little gift.”
The girl jumped up happily: “Ah, you’re really a good person! I haven’t had Earth beef jerky for such a long time… Sigh, everything here is so expensive…”
From the surprised look in her eyes, it was clear that here on Jupiter’s Moon, this was definitely considered a “luxury item.”
No wonder the organizers treated them like little gifts.
Jupiter’s Moon had begun to farm some livestock, but in order to maintain the health of the ecosystem, the output was inevitably low.
“It’s just some beef jerky. It’s nothing.”
Zhang Yuan felt a pang of sorrow in his heart; the astronauts like him might also face such bleak tomorrows.
Perhaps even bleaker.
“Bon voyage!”
With a slight nod, Zhang Yuan turned and boarded the train to leave, and in the distance, he could still see the girl waving through the glass window.
The Space Elevator was hundreds of kilometers away.
“Goodbye!”
Along the way, one could see various bustling construction sites.
The light of nuclear fusion had already been ignited on this planet, and further development was just a matter of time.
With the efforts of generations, this place would become another home for humanity.
Maybe…
Jupiter’s Moon had its flaws compared to Earth. Its surface was all ice blocks. Water resources were not lacking, but the planet was extremely short of metals, rare earth elements, and organics.
Current mining companies could only develop large meteorite mines that had fallen on the surface. However, the reserves of these meteorite mines were all quite limited; once they had been mined, there was nothing left.
There was another larger moon of Jupiter, Jupiter’s Moon, and mining it was even more difficult.
Jupiter’s Moon’s size was similar to that of Jupiter’s Moon, another Earth-like planet, but the frequent super volcanic activity and severe earthquakes made it an extremely dangerous place.
No one would invest in an unstable place, where years of investment could be ruined by a violent earthquake.
From this perspective, humanity’s interstellar development level still had a lot of room for improvement.
If we had the capability to calm volcanoes and earthquakes, there would be many more places in the Solar System that could be inhabited…
“Senior Brother Zhao, I noticed that perhaps due to poor maintenance, a part of the population has severely deteriorated bodies, their muscle contours are quite different from those of normal people,” Zhang Yuan quietly asked while riding the Space Elevator back to Earth Era.
“Such significant physical changes might cause some irreversible damage. Even if they eventually return to Earth, it would be hard to recover, right?”
This question had been nagging at him, with no time to ask. Now that he asked, it felt like a weight had been lifted.
Under low gravity conditions, the pressure on the intervertebral discs caused by body weight disappeared, relieving the compression of the discs, making a person taller.
Usually, if the damage was not severe, an astronaut’s height would return to normal after returning to Earth.
But low gravity environments have a series of impacts on gene expression. For some with severe deterioration, they may never be able to adapt to Earth’s environment again.
“Have you also noticed…” Zhao Qingfeng thought for a moment and said in a low voice, “Do you think they could be Xia Country people?”
“It doesn’t seem likely. I also can’t understand their language.”
“Could they be American or Lan Country people?”
Zhang Yuan shook his head, “That’s probably not the case either.”
“Then who do you think they are, where might they come from…”
Could they be from some small countries?
After pondering for a moment, realization dawned on him.
Behind all the glitz, there were countless unknown nights.
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Here, the wages of a regular technician were extremely high, starting at a million a year. Moreover, most people had only a three-year contract and would ultimately return to Earth.
Three years was actually too short compared to the development cycles spanning several decades. Frequent personnel turnover was definitely detrimental to the whole development project.
Therefore, for civilization and some capitalists, there would inevitably be some more “cost-saving” and “economic” methods.
Even though automation industry had developed considerably, in complex environments, the role of humans could not easily be replaced.
Zhang Yuan quietly asked, “So these people have settled here?”
“Yes, it started decades ago.”
“Why would anyone agree to this?”
Senior Brother Zhao smiled and sighed: “What you consider good or bad, willing or unwilling, is all relative. Why do people choose to live in harsh, desolate places? Why do they dwell on the loess plateaus? Why do some still live in the countryside to this day, instead of the city?”
“Compared to the hard times before, what’s so bad about settling here? As long as you sell your labor, at least you won’t starve to death. Life here can be quite flavorful, with much more prospects than on Earth…”
Zhang Yuan fell silent, realizing he had asked a foolish question. He then asked, “So, can they reproduce offspring?”
Senior Brother Zhao glanced around and said, “Allegedly, they can.”
After a pause, he added, “With current medical standards, it’s still possible. There’s just a bit of risk; the chances of getting pregnant aren’t high.”
The air fell into a silence as still as death. Zhang Yuan originally wanted to ask if, with such drastic environmental changes, generations upon generations of evolution could lead to reproductive isolation, forming different human races.
But after thinking it over, he swallowed his words.
Genetic selection would take at least tens of thousands of years, right? To ponder such a question indeed seemed like an overestimation of his own capacity.
