Chapter 55: The Abandoned Base on Mars

The transport ship lacked any exterior simulation function.

Nevertheless, through the surveillance system, Jiang Chen could still observe the outside world on the large screen in the control room.

Ahead lay a crimson planet, its desolation palpable. The ship rapidly approached, soon piercing the planet’s atmosphere.

Mars’ atmosphere was far more tenuous than Earth’s, its composition wholly unsuitable for life of any kind.

“Don’t rush the landing—circle the planet first and search for structures resembling pyramids,” Jiang Chen ordered, fitting a thin, lightweight mask over his face.

With his planetary-level strength, exposure to Mars’ atmosphere posed no problem, at least not in the short term. Still, Jiang Chen had no desire to suffer needlessly; it was hardly any trouble to wear a mask with air filtration and purification. Why rely solely on physical endurance?

Circling the Martian surface for half a revolution, Jarvis soon located nine enormous pyramid-shaped structures and, under Jiang Chen’s direction, piloted the ship toward them.

Each pyramid’s surface was decayed beyond recognition, yet their overall structures remained remarkably intact. Their distribution appeared random at first glance, but upon closer inspection, they seemed subtly interconnected, as if nine smaller pyramids together formed a vast “super pyramid.”

Beneath the pyramids, the faint outlines of a city could still be discerned—roads and buildings not yet completely crumbled. Countless years had passed, but time had not wholly erased this place. From the remnants, one could still reconstruct, however faintly, a vision of its former glory.

“Land in that city,” Jiang Chen instructed, pointing to an open space at its center. “Deploy the SCVs and the transport teams, and search for the warehouse.”

Moments later, the ship descended slowly, its hatch opening as squads of SCVs and transport vehicles surged out, scattering in all directions to scour the city for remaining resources.

“Remember, this is a mining facility. The warehouses should contain large quantities of metal ores. I don’t know if one trip will suffice—bring back as much as you can.”

As he gave orders, Jiang Chen summoned his squad of Magemark Mechs from his spatial ring, instructing them to accompany and protect the exploration teams.

While the original text suggested there was no danger here, Jiang Chen chose caution. After all, the number of transport vehicles and SCVs he’d brought was limited; any significant loss would greatly reduce the efficiency of resource extraction.

Each team included an SCV equipped with advanced detection instruments, capable of scanning a vast area. Thus, only a handful of squads were needed to scour the entirety of this colossal steel city.

Of course, finding the storerooms was one thing—how much they could carry away was another. Though Jiang Chen had brought a transport ship, its cargo capacity remained finite.

Beneath the nine pyramids, the steel city sprawled. Jiang Chen did not idle while waiting; accompanied by two Magemark Mechs, he made his way to the nearest pyramid.

“It’s said these are ‘Energy Towers’ built in imitation of the Mechanoid race’s technology, able to generate enormous energy in some unique fashion.”

Staring at the pyramid ahead, Jiang Chen could not fathom how such a structure produced energy. Was it nuclear? Solar? Or did it perhaps draw from the planet’s core, harnessing geothermal might?

For any civilization or power, energy was the linchpin. Jiang Chen was deeply intrigued by these towers and resolved to study them.

The city beneath the pyramid was in ruins, yet the Energy Tower itself had not fully ceased operation. Some critical areas even maintained defensive systems. But after tens of thousands of years, most vital modules had decayed and failed, rendering them little threat to Jiang Chen.

What troubled him most was a barrier gate over a hundred meters thick, which took considerable effort to force open.

Once inside the Energy Tower, Jiang Chen wandered for some time before finding the control room, as there was no map to guide him.

“Fortunately, the central computer still works. Hopefully, its data remains intact.” After a quick inspection, he breathed a sigh of relief and activated his wristband. “Jarvis, connect to the central computer and attempt a data transfer.”

“Connecting now, attempting to breach the firewall…” Jarvis’s voice replied.

Over two hours passed before Jarvis spoke again. “Firewall bypassed. Data copy complete. This language and script are not in our database. With the ship’s full computational resources, decrypting it will take approximately seventy-two hours.”

A language barrier was entirely within Jiang Chen’s expectations. Thankfully, any systematic language or script could be deciphered with sufficient samples.

On Earth, many archaeological discoveries had been made by using computers to decode ancient, long-lost scripts.

The same approach applied to languages and scripts across the cosmos.

“Let’s return. First, we’ll crack the language and translate the data.” Satisfied, Jiang Chen nodded and returned to the ship.

A day later, one exploration team reported discovering a warehouse of Blackiron Ore and was transporting it back to the ship. Over the next two days, more teams found additional storerooms, including one filled with a trove of refined Blackiron Essence.

Blackiron Ore was an A8-grade metal; once forged into armor, it could withstand planetary-tier attacks. Blackiron Essence, meanwhile, was a B8-grade metal, with a strength reaching stellar-level standards.

More importantly, these materials contained “extraordinary properties” that could, through alchemy, be converted into other equally powerful substances, though some loss would occur in the process.

With this haul, Jiang Chen’s confidence in forging formidable weapons of war—and in contending with the Golden-Horned Behemoth—increased substantially.

Transporting these resources from the vast steel city took considerable time.

During this period, Jarvis also used the ship’s main computer to finish decrypting the data obtained from the Energy Tower.

“The ship is fully loaded. Time to return. Leave the SCVs and transport teams here to continue scavenging the city’s resources.”

Jiang Chen ordered, “Jarvis, you pilot the ship home. I’ll review the Energy Tower data.”

“Yes, master.”

Jarvis engaged the ship, swiftly leaving Mars’ atmosphere and setting course for Earth.

Meanwhile, Jiang Chen called up the data retrieved from the Energy Tower and began his detailed study.