129: What to do with too much energy? Attach a "Godzilla" throat to the warship!

"Go... go back where?"

Old Chen’s hand on the control stick jerked violently, wondering if his ears had been damaged by the noise just now.

He stiffly turned his neck to look at Jiang Ran, who stood behind him with a calm expression. His voice was as dry as two pieces of parched bark rubbing together:

"Boss, you’re not joking, are you?

That pit... that’s the center of the nuclear explosion that just went off!"

Although the black iron had completed its reconstruction and now looked majestic,

In the subconscious of a survivor of the old era like Old Chen, there were some things that were absolute taboos.

Like nuclear radiation.

"Just now, when we brushed against the edge, the radiation value soared to 3500 Sv/h.

If we charge directly into the center where the radiation dust is still floating now..."

Old Chen pointed at the cloud of deep-sea dust on the screen, which was still turbid and emitting an eerie glow. Cold sweat flowed down his cheeks from his forehead:

"That would be suicide.

Even with armor protection, that intensity of high-energy particle flow would penetrate the hull within a minute and break all our DNA chains.

It would turn us into a pile of sludge!"

This wasn't cowardice; it was common sense.

In this wasteland world, radiation was the invisible reaper.

No carbon-based organism could survive in such a purgatory.

"That was before."

Jiang Ran didn't explain much, only glancing faintly at the [∞] symbol on the dashboard representing infinite energy.

Then he raised his hand and pointed toward the terrifying dead zone ahead:

"The current black iron is no longer the kind of industrial machine you know."

"Execute the order. Full speed ahead."

His tone left no room for doubt.

Old Chen gritted his teeth and glanced at Su Qingyu beside him.

This usually extremely rational female adjutant also had a flicker of worry in her eyes,

But she still nodded silently, her fingers flying across the console to input the route confirmation command.

"...Crazy, everyone's crazy."

Old Chen muttered, but he didn't dare to delay his movements.

He took a deep breath, like a death row prisoner about to head to the execution ground, and slammed the power lever forward.

"Boom—"

The blue plasma flame at the tail instantly surged.

The black steel beast, which had just been reborn, carved a sharp arc through the deep sea.

It performed an action that went completely against survival instinct—instead of fleeing danger, it accelerated toward the mist of death.

Getting closer and closer.

The seawater outside the portholes began to turn turbid and unclear; those were countless vaporized particles suspended in the water.

An eerie green fluorescence enveloped the surroundings—the radiation was so highly concentrated it was ionizing the seawater.

"About to enter the core radiation circle!"

Su Qingyu's finger hovered over the emergency lock button, her voice tense: "Estimated contact time: 3 seconds!"

"3..."

"2..."

"1..."

The black iron plunged headlong into that lethal cloud of fluorescent mist.

Old Chen closed his eyes.

In his subconscious, the next second his ears should be filled with that heart-stopping, continuous radiation alarm—

"Beep————————!"

That was the shriek of the reaper, the wail of a Geiger counter hitting its limit.

Immediately after, the electronic components inside the hull would fail due to the bombardment of high-energy particles.

The screen would be full of static, and their bodies would even feel an indescribable burning sensation.

However.

One second.

Two seconds.

Three seconds passed.

The anticipated ear-piercing alarm did not sound.

Inside the entire command cabin, it was so quiet it was almost eerie.

Only the steady and powerful heartbeat of the power furnace continued to echo: "Thump, thump."

"...Eh?"

Old Chen cautiously opened his eyes into thin slits and looked at the dashboard.

The data displayed there made him instantly doubt if he was already hallucinating from radiation overdose.

[External Environment Radiation: 4800 Sv/h (Extremely High Risk)]

[Internal Radiation: 0.02 μSv/h (Safe)]

[Radiation Penetration Warning: None]

"Is... is it broken?"

Old Chen slapped the console hard: "This thing must have been broken by the shock just now!

With such a high concentration outside, how could there be no reaction at all inside?!"

"The sensors are not broken."

Su Qingyu's voice rang out, carrying an incredulity as if she had seen a god or ghost.

She pointed at the real-time monitoring screen of the ship's exterior on the holographic display:

"Look outside."

Following her finger, Old Chen's mouth slowly opened wide enough to fit a duck egg.

Outside the porthole, the black iron was sailing through that turbid cloud of radiation dust emitting its lethal glow.

Those tiny, high-energy radiation particles were like a swarm of frenzied fireflies, throwing themselves one after another against the hull of the black iron.

If it were before, they would have easily penetrated the armor and killed everything inside.

But now.

When these lethal particles contacted that new layer of dark gray "Dragon Scale" armor arranged in hexagons,

A shocking scene occurred.

They didn't penetrate, nor were they bounced away.

Instead, like water droplets merging into the sea, or iron filings meeting a powerful magnet, they were instantly "sucked" in by that layer of Dragon Scales.

After the originally dark scales absorbed the radiation particles, the flowing blue halo on their surface instantly became bright.

It was even moving about cheerfully.

It rapidly channeled this external energy along some invisible network deep into the ship's hull.

This wasn't resisting radiation.

This was clearly... feeding.

That terrifying Dragon Scale armor was like a greedy mouth,

Frenziedly devouring the surrounding death energy that was enough to kill any living creature.

"Beep—"

Just then, zero's always cold and objective prompt finally gave a conclusion to this eerie scene:

"High-energy environmental radiation detected."

"[Radiation Devour] trait activated."

"Energy conversion efficiency: 100%."

"Charging the entire ship..."

Accompanying zero's announcement,

In the center of the main control screen, a green charging icon that usually only appeared when connected to a supply ship

Actually lit up here, in this deep-sea ruin without any supply facilities.

And it was flashing at the highest power "fast charge" frequency.

[Drawing environmental radiation energy...]

[Current draw rate: 48,000 KW/s]

[Energy reserve status: Overflow]

"How... how is this possible..."

Su Qingyu looked at that frantically jumping green number, her fingers somewhat stiff as she swiped across the screen to pull up the defense system's sub-menu.

The next second, her pupils contracted sharply.

"Klein Field strength... has broken the upper limit!"

"120%... 150%... 200%! It's still rising!"

Under the support of that continuous injection of massive energy,

The pale blue energy shield on the surface of the black iron's hull underwent a qualitative change.

Originally, to save energy,

The Klein Field was usually maintained in a minimal "thin film" state, only strengthening locally at the moment of impact.

But now, because there was so much energy it couldn't all be used,

The shield system, like a nouveau riche, directly activated the most luxurious "Full Power Constant Mode."

"Buzz—"

Through the porthole, one could see that the shield was no longer a transparent, illusory shadow.

Instead, it had condensed into a thick, nearly solid blue light wall as brilliant as crystal.

It wrapped the entire warship tightly within.

Those turbid radiation dust particles hit the light wall, creating ripples of gorgeous light, but they couldn't shake it in the slightest.

"Before, activating an omnidirectional shield of this intensity, our fuel rods could only last five minutes."

Su Qingyu murmured to herself, looking at the energy gauge that seemed frozen at full capacity:

"But now... as long as the radiation outside doesn't dissipate, this turtle shell will never be broken."

This was a terrifying fact that could overturn the logic of naval warfare.

In conventional understanding, harsh environments consume a warship's supplies and weaken its combat effectiveness.

But for the black iron at this moment,

This nuclear dead zone, which would make other fleets stay far away, had become its best "hot spring."

It was like a super battery thrown into a pile of power banks.

The harsher the environment and the more violent the nuclear explosion, the faster it recovered and the harder its shield became.

"This is the true way to use the fission heart."

Jiang Ran looked at the defense reading on the screen, which had never been so firm, and a cold smile curled at the corner of his mouth:

"To others, nuclear radiation is poison and death."

"But for the current black iron, this is a free buffet and inexhaustible fuel."

He reached out and made a grasping motion in the air, as if holding this fearsome sea of death in his palm:

"In future battles, we'll head wherever the radiation is strongest.

If the battlefield isn't 'dirty' enough..."

A flash of ruthlessness appeared in Jiang Ran's eyes: "Then we'll drop a few nukes ourselves to make it 'dirty'."

..."This is the last piece of the puzzle we were looking for."

Jiang Ran's finger lightly swiped across the indestructible shield reading on the screen, his gaze showing a composure that controlled everything.

In this scarred, radiation-riddled apocalyptic deep sea, for other survivors and fleets,

Every high-radiation sea area was a forbidden zone that must be bypassed, a killing field that consumed life and resources.

But from this moment on, for the black iron, the rules were rewritten.

As long as there was radiation, it was immortal.

How was this a cursed wasteland?

This was clearly a "home field" custom-made for it.

"In the future, if we encounter an enemy we can't beat..."

Jiang Ran turned around, looking at Old Chen and Su Qingyu, who were still immersed in shock and unable to recover for a long time.

He said half-jokingly:

"We'll just run into the center of a nuclear explosion.

Or, we'll simply detonate a dirty bomb right under our own feet."

"When the time comes, they will be the ones who die, while we will only get stronger as we fight."

Hearing these words, Old Chen couldn't help but shiver.

He looked at the young Commander before him, and a sense of awe even stronger than facing radiation suddenly rose in his heart.

This was a truly ruthless person.

Drinking poison like a beverage, and strolling through dead zones like a backyard garden.

"Test drive over."

Jiang Ran pulled back his smile and resumed his calm demeanor.

He took one last look at this crater that once buried the glory of the old era and now brought about the rebirth of the black iron.

He issued the final command:

"Old Chen, set the course."

"Leave this place."

"Where to?"

Old Chen subconsciously gripped the control stick; the current power of the black iron was so surging it even gave him the urge to race the ship.

Jiang Ran looked up, his gaze seemingly penetrating the deep seawater toward the extremely distant north.

That was the second thing he had to take back after his rebirth, besides this ship.

"Go to the K-19 Sea Area."

Jiang Ran's voice was low, carrying a determination to succeed:

"To pick up that fellow... who still owes me a life."

"Boom—"

Two blue plasma light streams suddenly erupted in the deep sea.

The black iron, with a full load displacement of five thousand two hundred tons, was now as agile as a fish.

Carrying those black Dragon Scales that were greedily devouring radiation,

It carved a brilliant trajectory in this dark and silent world.

Without looking back, it charged out of the crater and sped toward the unknown deep sea.

And behind it,

That originally lethal cloud of radiation dust actually became a bit thinner because of its passage.