Rare Earth Expeditionary Corps

Ever since Einstein broke down the concept of absolute mass and absolute energy and came to the conclusion that mass and energy are interchangeable, mankind has not stopped researching in this area.

The atomic bomb and the hydrogen bomb are the best proof of this. To put it bluntly, nuclear fission and nuclear fusion are just a way to convert mass into energy, only that the conversion efficiency of nuclear fusion is a bit higher.

With the previous research results of all mankind as a reserve, and the personal teaching of the great nature teacher on Jupiter, Hawke was confident of breaking the technical barrier of controlled nuclear fusion.

Five hundred kilometres away from the base, Hawke rebuilt a small base and used Wind God One to deliver fifty specially built robots for research purposes.

This is a specialised institute for controlled fusion research. Although Hawke was confident that he had mastered the technology, he had to take some risks, as a fusion reactor explosion would be no joke, and could wipe out the base that Hawke had worked so hard to build.

Taking out the deuterium and tritium from the old ship, Hawke began his research.

Meanwhile, in another direction, nearly a thousand kilometres away from Hawke, a bright spot suddenly appeared in the darkness, then a second, then a third, seven in all.

It was a prospecting squad. These seven robots were carrying enough instruments to carry out a field reconnaissance of a rare earth mine here.

Behind the robot formation, an odd semi-circular aircraft made a roaring sound, and after a powerful jet of air ejected from the bottom, the whole aircraft took off quickly, heading towards the base.

It was the Wind God One that had completed its delivery mission and was heading home.

On the ground, in the pitch blackness, only the seven lone robots remained, striding forward with odd steps.

Hawke had divided his spirit by a few hundred millionths, and was watching the place through the night vision of the seven robots.

It was still gentle ground, largely without much undulation, and the terrain here was essentially the same as the rest of Titan.

A robot slowly bent down, a searchlight overhead illuminating the ground brightly, a large area of orange ground was photographed and sent to Hawke's head through the satellites in the sky. Hawke gave the order for the next move.

The robot stretched out its right hand and a shovel poked out of it, shoveling a shovel of dirt into the ground, then the robot put its head up, its eyes glowing with an eerie red light, and began to analyse the stuff.

The remaining six robots went in other directions, each spreading out. One robot stopped after a kilometre out and then crouched down, a brazier poking out of its arm and dug into the ground.

Hawke was watching the area closely.

The brazier was sticking deeper and deeper. One metre, two metres, three metres ...

It reached all the way down to five metres below ground before it stopped. Then the robot began to slowly lift the brazier out.

At the bottom of the brazier, it had taken with it some samples taken from five metres below Titan's surface. The robot also put its head up and an eerie red light began to emerge from its eyes as it began to analyse the minerals.

Meanwhile, Hawke, a thousand kilometres away, had been given the data in real time.

The field survey lasted for two days, and the seven robots surveyed a total area of about five kilometres. Combining the data obtained by the seven robots, Hawke took a soft breath: "This is, this is a rare rich mine, the reserves are so rich and easy to mine, such a vein is not even rare on Earth."

And, most importantly, not far from this vein, there was a not-so-small methane lake, which meant that Hawke could get energy replenishment close by and just need to replenish the oxygen here regularly. Such conditions are truly unique.

This result made Hawke extremely happy.

He even made up his mind to build an industrial base in this high-quality rare earth mining area.

Hawke was now so rich that he could not compare with the time he had spent wandering in the stars. With the almost unlimited energy on Titan and the open-air veins of high quality metals, there was no need to worry about either energy or material sources, and building an industrial base would only take a little time.

The main base is base number one, the Institute for Controlled Fusion Research is base number two, and here, it is base number three.

During this period, ten more robot production lines have come online and now, almost every day, more than seventy robots are born. If it weren't for the scarcity of certain metal materials, Hawke could even increase this production rate to over 120 units per day.

Of course, this "day" refers to the time on Earth, which is twenty-four hours a day. One must not forget one's roots, even after leaving Earth. So said Hawke.

"For the sake of this vein, we have to suspend the manufacture of the rest of the less important equipment ... and design and manufacture some special mining equipment for this rare earth mine. Also, there's no iron ore there, and building materials for various plants have to be prepared."

The company has a schedule, ready to use two months to complete all the preparations.

The machines roared and the robots were busy shuttling, and countless kinds of strange machinery were created and gathered in a temporary storage site on the outskirts of the base.

Luckily for Hawke, with the powerful computing power provided by the photonic computer, Hawke was not overwhelmed by the huge amount of computing data.

Inside the huge machine room, countless red or blue lights were constantly flashing, and in the liquid hydrogen cooling pool, a faint white mist was constantly wafting out, proving how much heat Hawke's brain was generating at the moment. There were at least a few dozen robots going in and out of it, busily handling all the daily tasks.

It took a full two months for Hawke to finish preparing everything. In the temporary storage site for supplies, there was a large group of robots lined up in neat rows, pulling various simple crates with countless various supplies stacked on top of them, as well as a large piece of machinery.

"Rare Earth Expeditionary Corps, let's go!" At this moment, Hawk shouted out an unusually bold slogan.

The so-called Rare Earth Expeditionary Legion consisted of a thousand robot troops including construction robots, mining robots, flamethrower robots, repair robots and other format robots, and all kinds of rare earth mining equipment, and a lot of construction materials, as well as the Wind God One helicopter. Because the amount of materials was too large for Hawke to transport with the Wind God One, he simply formed what he called the Rare Earth Expeditionary Force, which was actually a group of transport convoys. The Wind God One helicopter acted as the navigator.

As Hawke gave the order to depart, a thousand robots stepped forward at the same time, pulling the crates behind them and starting to move forward. The large machines with wheels then automatically opened up and followed closely behind the hordes. Simple computer equipment was also installed on those, and under Hawke's control, it was easy to go wherever it wanted to go.

The huge army set off, looking like a bunch of fleeing refugees under the dust. Hawke was a little dissatisfied with the flying dust, as it was a little different from the magnificent scene he had conceived in his head.

"A small place is a small place, it can't compare to Earth." Hawk bristled and began to prepare the next batch of supplies to be delivered to the troop.

This force had almost every droid pulling tons of supplies. This was something unthinkable above Earth, but this was Titan, where the gravity was less than a sixth of Earth's, and where everyone was a Hercules.

Dozens of flame-throwing robots carrying heavy, weird-looking canisters and huge flame-throwing guns in their hands are constantly sweeping the ground with their flame-throwing guns in front of the troops, vaporising any small lakes of liquid methane and clearing the way for the big troops behind them. Overhead, the sci-fi-infused Wind God One helicopter hovered low in the sky, constantly roaring and guiding this force forward under Hawk's control.

The huge robot army moved forward in good order, rain could not stop them, wind could not stop them, and darkness could not stop them. The Rare Earth Expeditionary Force marches on with determination, vowing to illuminate this dark corner of the solar system with the light of technology.

They advance at a speed of around twenty-five kilometres per hour. As long as there is enough energy, they do not need to rest. At this rate, they will reach their designated location in about two days.

The Rare Earth Expeditionary Force had to take a long detour due to a small mountain range and a large lake on the way, which delayed it a little, but even so, it reached the rare earth vein forty-seven hours after setting off.

At this time, it was exactly dawn in the rare earth mining area. The faint sunlight reaches here through the long distance of 1.7 billion kilometres and penetrates the thick atmosphere of Titan to shine on the Rare Earth Expeditionary Force.

In the middle of dawn, above an orange-red earth, stood a thousand robots, as well as countless supplies and countless heavy machinery. Overhead, the massive Wind God One helicopter hovered constantly, its searchlights sweeping arrogantly around until it was confirmed that the Rare Earth Expeditionary Force had reached its destination without incident, then it let out a low roar and flew off.

The sun reached the middle of the sky and it was already noon time. After doing rest and inspection, a thousand robots and all kinds of machinery began to get busy.

The construction of the third base had begun.