731: Building a lunar base

Online, however, the high-level officials of various forces held the opposite view; they did not believe this was a “show.”

Having dealt with each other for so many years, they had come to deeply understand one truth: the other party never fired without purpose!

To confirm the news, high-level officials of various forces contacted their respective embassies or consulates in China to ascertain the specific situation as soon as possible.

…

At this moment, in the Black Palace, within the Golden Hall where a routine Condolences activity was being held, the Head of State was preparing to express condolences to all foreign immigrants through major media outlets, hoping to gain some goodwill from the National People!

After all, most of those who could immigrate were elites, and it would be very beneficial to have some of them support him.

But upon learning the news of the Moon landing by the Zhonghua family across the ocean, his entire face instantly darkened.

“Who can tell me what exactly is going on???”

“Head of State, we are also unclear; this manned Moon landing came too suddenly, with no prior notice at all!”

“Then why aren’t you going to investigate? Do you want me to go myself?!!!”

“Yes!”

The Head of State took a deep breath and continued speaking to the audience below.

“Dear compatriots…”

“FK!”

The Head of State cursed in a low voice.

He was about to continue expressing condolences to the specially invited immigrant representatives below, when he suddenly realized that no one in the audience was paying attention to him, the Head of State.

They were all engrossed, heads bowed, seemingly watching some live video stream on their phones, occasionally blurting out a few dialect phrases.

Seeing this scene, the Head of State was so angry his lungs almost exploded!

What the hell was he supposed to offer condolences for now?

Offer condolences to his sister!

......

Moon.

Kwe crater.

After Liang Wei was the first to land on the Moon, all other crew members also stepped onto the lunar surface in sequence.

“This is…the Moon?”

Looking at the barren expanse before him, Mr. Ma’s hands trembled uncontrollably with excitement.

“Good…good!”

In the eyes of this old Scientists, the Moon was not barren!

Hidden beneath its dead surface was “gold” everywhere!

“We’re rich, we’re rich…” Mr. Ma murmured to himself.

This Moon landing would secure millions of tons of “helium-3,” the third-generation nuclear fusion fuel, as well as other scarce strategic metal resources like titanium, antimony, and rhenium!

From now on, they would all become the motherland’s “ancient heritage” and “pocketed treasures”!

......

“Slow down, slow down…” Li Bing and Lu Kai, these two lucky koi, felt their legs turn to jelly when they descended to the lunar surface.

“Moon landing…Moon landing! This is a Moon landing!…”

Lu Kai, whose cultural level wasn’t high, was so excited he couldn’t even speak properly, directly saying he wanted to buy everyone present a cup of cappuccino!

“I never thought I, Lu Kai, would have a day where my head landed!…”

“No, head landing…no…”

Interrupted by Lu Kai, Li Bing’s excitement finally subsided.

He swallowed hard and reminded him through the communication channel.

“Brother Kai, it’s ‘making a name for yourself’!”

“Yes, yes, yes!”

“Making a name for myself, it’s making a name for myself…!”

Liu Yang and Wang Yaping also felt extremely excited looking at the gray-white soil in front of them.

Three months ago, they had just been selected as Aerospace from pilots.

They hadn’t even been in intensive training for long, so it could be said they weren’t even familiar with Aerospace knowledge, yet they were sent by the country to perform their first Aerospace mission, and ended up directly landing on the Moon!

This kind of thrilling feeling, who among their family and friends could understand?

Coming back to their senses, Liu Yang and Wang Ping quickly adjusted their mood; although they were special crew members, they also bore important work responsibilities for this mission.

Jiang Hai, as the deputy commander, came before everyone and gave deployment orders.

“First Squadron, all personnel!”

“Listen to Captain Liu and Lieutenant Wang’s command, immediately set up the New Year's Day gala sub-venue!”

“Second Squadron, all personnel!”

“According to the established plan, immediately execute the designated scientific research tasks!”

“Yes!”

Under the command of the two female Aerospace, the 10 Mecha Warriors of the First Squadron quickly began to busy themselves according to their respective divisions of labor.

Due to thorough preparation, the construction of the New Year's Day gala sub-venue was incredibly fast.

Soon, a festive, brightly decorated small New Year's Day gala stage was continuously taking shape on a flat ground.

However, at this time, the attention of the domestic audience was not here, but was attracted by the Mecha Warriors of the Second Squadron.

Through Liang Wei’s first-person perspective, watching the Mecha Warriors move things one by one from the Avenger Fighter, the audience in front of the screen was astonished.

“What the hell! What are those things?”

“Holy cow! What’s in these big boxes?!”

“No, no! Isn’t that an impact drill?”

“What are they doing, drilling holes?”

While the audience was puzzled, the ten Mecha Warriors worked hard, methodically moving things down.

They placed eight enormous metal boxes neatly and stably on the ground, then directly picked up impact drills, engineer shovels, and other tools, furiously loading lunar soil and rock fragments into the boxes!

It was then that the domestic audience realized what these ten Mecha Warriors were doing!

“Oh my goodness!”

“These soldier brothers, they are excavating lunar soil! They even brought impact drills!”

“Is this called a scientific research task? This is practically like migrant workers digging!”

“Right! And it’s Mecha Warriors digging!”

“The scene is too beautiful, I dare not look! I’m dying of laughter, hahaha…”

“We are indeed descendants of an agrarian civilization; this digging is truly skillful! Hahaha!”

“I can’t, I can’t!”

“Are they planning to make me laugh to death and then inherit my Huabei?!”

“……”

Watching the rough actions of those Mecha Warriors from afar, some audience members burst into laughter.

In front of a national live broadcast, was it really this simple and unpretentious?

Just then, Liang Wei’s live first-person perspective began to move, hopping towards the area where lunar soil was being excavated, and his commentary followed.

“Reporting to the National People!”

“Currently, our crew members have been divided into two teams!”

“The first squadron is setting up the New Year's Day gala sub-venue over there!”

“What everyone is seeing now is the second squadron, currently performing the lunar soil excavation scientific research task!”

Pointing to the eight neatly arranged metal boxes on the ground, Liang Wei said with a smile.

“Each of these boxes can hold approximately one ton of lunar soil,”

“Eight boxes can hold a total of about 8 tons of lunar soil!”

“After this lunar soil is transported back to Earth, it will be used as resource samples for scientific research, for the subsequent construction of a Moon base this year…”

Before Liang Wei could finish his words, all domestic audience members watching the New Year's Day gala live broadcast were deeply shocked by these words!

8 tons?

My goodness!

Are you kidding me???

You know, even the previous Pineapple Project, which claimed to have landed on the Moon six times, only brought back a total of 380kg of lunar soil and rocks!

The most important thing was, after getting so much lunar soil, they only gave us 1g!

This left our Scientists in China with only a pitiful 0.5g of lunar soil for scientific research, and the other 0.5g had to be used for display!

Now, you’re directly bringing 8 tons of lunar soil back to Earth??

“Wait!”

“What did General Liang just say?”

“Moon base???”

“Holy cow! Did I hear wrong?!!!”

Many audience members, realizing later, suddenly discovered something was amiss and exclaimed in surprise!

In the New Year's Day gala live broadcast, Liang Wei’s introduction continued.

“The Moon base is our outpost and experimental site for exploring the vastness of the universe!”

“The plan is to build at least 3 experimental bases within two years, or as quickly as half a year, in the eastern and northern regions of the Moon, as well as in the shadowed areas of the far side!”

“And utilize about five years!”

“To achieve full coverage of closed-loop ecological circulation systems for all lunar bases!”

“By establishing stable, permanent artificial biospheres, the lunar bases will be developed into space ecological cities integrating scientific research, production, living, tourism, and more!”

At this point, Liang Wei’s voice became increasingly excited.

“At that time!”

“All citizens!”

“Will have the opportunity to come to the Moon for tourism and vacation!”

“Those with financial means can pay their own way! Those with financial difficulties need not worry!”

“We will hold a Koi activity once a year, which will be a regular fixed item for the annual New Year's Day gala!”

“The number of New Year Koi will also increase to 20, and will increase year by year!”

“I believe that by next New Year's Day!”

“Audience friends in front of the TV and in the live broadcast room will surely have this great fortune and the opportunity to become a Koi!”

“……”

Liang Wei’s words immediately caused an uproar among the domestic audience!

Lunar surface ecological city?

Self-funded Moon tourism?

Regular Koi activities?

Holy cow!

This great step, wasn’t it…too big?!

How could they talk about building a Moon base and a space city right after a manned Moon landing?!

Hadn’t the big brother across the ocean landed on the Moon decades ago, and not only hadn’t they mentioned building a Moon base, but they hadn’t even made a peep about another manned Moon landing?!

Oh…could it be that their Moon landing itself was a conspiracy?

Then everything would make sense!

......

Five minutes later.

“Report!”

“All lunar soil has been boxed!”

“Excavation mission successfully completed!”

“Please instruct!”

The squad leader of the Second Squadron hopped over and saluted Liang Wei and Jiang Hai.

“Take those black rocks too!”

“They look like space meteorites!”

“Maybe they are some rare materials!”

Looking at the few black rocks that stood out in the gray-white expanse not far away, Liang Wei casually instructed.

“Understood!”

The Second Squadron leader received the order, and the Mecha Warriors first loaded the black rocks into boxes, then moved the eight large boxes onto the Avenger Fighter.

At the same time, on the First Squadron’s side, the New Year's Day gala sub-venue had also been set up.

Twelve spotlights from different directions shone brightly, illuminating the festive sub-venue stage, making it look especially joyful on the gray lunar surface.

Jiang Hai was very satisfied with this: “Hmm, very good, the effect is excellent!”

With everything ready, everyone was about to go onto the stage.

Just then, Liang Wei spoke.

“Mr. Ma, you first!”

Mr. Ma was startled at first, then nodded solemnly, and then slowly stepped forward.

Upon reaching the bottom of the sub-venue stage, he stopped and, from the storage compartment of his left chest plate, carefully took out an item.

This item was a plastic-sealed, yellowed photograph, a joint photo of Mr. Ma and another person.

Looking at the person in the photo, Mr. Ma’s eyes welled up with tears.

“Old friend, I’ve brought you here this time…”

“The Moon, the Moon you always yearned for,”

“We’ve finally made it up here!”

......