The Owl Dragon System · the Imperial Military Industry Research Institute
After a month away, Zhao Chen had found the time to come here again.
When Zhao Chen stepped in, the three chief engineers were already waiting there.
Chief Engineer Nana pushed up her glasses, frames she wore with no need of them.
Spider Queen Iris held in her hands a tool like a book; most functions could be run now from a handheld terminal and holographic projections, true,
but Spider Queen Iris still liked this kind of operating board; it basically never left her hands, around the clock, and when she rested it lay at her bedside.
Only Chief Engineer Annie seemed out of place beside the two of them: she gave a sleepy yawn, her body draped lazily there as though she might topple over at any moment, now and then pursing her lips and looking down at her toes as if there were something there.
The angel assistant Nicole beside her, seeing Zhao Chen appear, at once gave Chief Engineer Annie a quiet push from behind.
Only then did Chief Engineer Annie put away her laziness and open her eyes a little wider.
"Your Majesty," the three chief engineers and the staff present said in unison.
"We'll talk as we walk." Zhao Chen did not stop walking, and everyone at once fell in beside him.
"Test ship No. XLCJ001 has been completed; today it goes on its first trial voyage," Chief Engineer Nana said first.
"How long will the trials take?" Zhao Chen asked.
"Finishing the core of them will take a week; running the whole procedure will take a month. Because almost every figure for this starship is something we're testing for the first time, with nothing to go by," Chief Engineer Nana answered.
"If the order is given to go into production, how are the production lines coming? And what will the output be?" Zhao Chen looked at Spider Queen Iris beside him.
Spider Queen Iris was mainly in charge of production.
Holding the data panel in her hands, Spider Queen Iris said, "We've actually had the templates for the production-line structures ready on our side for a long time. At a word, we can finish setting up the first batch of five production lines within three days, using the T6 Steel Star City system. As for output, leaving resources and raw materials aside, the first five interstellar warships off the five production lines can roll off the line in two months at the fastest."
Zhao Chen stopped short and looked at Spider Queen Iris, somewhat startled. "Only two months? That fast? There won't be problems?"
Zhao Chen's face grew grave.
Spider Queen Iris said at once, "As to the starships' quality, please rest assured, Your Majesty. Our department can guarantee there won't be any problems. As for why it can be so fast, that has to do with the technology we're using this time, which greatly cuts down the time production takes. And many production parts we can farm out; what we really have to do ourselves is only the core modules, half of the whole. That way production efficiency can go up greatly. Two months is enough."
Zhao Chen nodded, satisfied, and walked on.
Ahead appeared a huge gate, and past the gate a still larger space.
In it was a super-gigantic interstellar warship, held up by tens of thousands of mechanical arms, a magnificent sight.
Zhao Chen swept his eyes over this interstellar warship from left to right.
The hull had no paint yet; it kept its original brown.
In form the hull was much like an interstellar battleship's or an interstellar destroyer's, the most ordinary kind of hull.
"This is test ship XLCJ001," Chief Engineer Nana said beside him, her eyes shining.
"The detailed figures," Zhao Chen said.
Neither Chief Engineer Nana nor Spider Queen Iris said a word.
Only when the angel assistant Nicole nudged Chief Engineer Annie, who was looking blank, did Chief Engineer Annie go "ah," notice everyone's eyes on her, and come to.
She at once raised her wrist and pressed a few times on her handheld terminal.
Then a data window appeared before Zhao Chen.
"Steel Star City No. 1, Restaurant No. 077: the beef fried rice made by Cook No. 7 himself is the best! Ten stars."
"Steel Star City No. 1, Restaurant No. 003: twenty percent off every Wednesday, plus special dishes! Eight stars."
"Steel Star City No. 3, Restaurant No. 001: the signature dish, Glittering Galaxy, is delicious, but the cook puts in cilantro! Cilantro! Cilantro! Remember to say no cilantro! Nine stars (one star off for cilantro)."
……
Seeing line after line of this, with matching pictures and detailed reviews,
black lines of exasperation appeared on Chief Engineer Nana's face.
Chief Engineer Annie's cheeks went red; she shut the window at once and opened another document window. "Wr…… wrong one…… this is the one……"
Only now did the real figures for this interstellar warship appear before Zhao Chen.
Zhao Chen tapped through it with a finger and looked over some of the important figures.
"This interstellar warship follows the ideas you set out before. It uses hive-race technology and mechanical technology, along with some of the core technology of our Owl Dragon-line interstellar warships. It can't reach true T7 grade, but calling it a quasi-T7-grade interstellar warship is no exaggeration. Its fighting power as we've calculated it is still somewhat below that of several of our Owl Dragon flagships. But compared with the other Owl Dragon-line interstellar warships, it surpasses them completely. And most important of all: once the trials pass, it's a quasi-T7 interstellar warship that can be mass-produced!" Chief Engineer Nana said, her eyes shining.
A quasi-T7 interstellar warship!
That's right: this was a research project Zhao Chen had set up earlier.
Since a true T7 interstellar warship could not be developed in a short time,
and since the Owl Dragon Empire's development now needed it, what was needed was a mass-produced quasi-T7-grade interstellar warship.
He could not build a T7 interstellar warship, but of a quasi-T7-grade interstellar warship Zhao Chen was fairly sure.
Combine some of the technical files kept in the Owl Dragon Empire's technology database, including hive-race technology and mechanical technology, with the core technology of Owl Dragon-line interstellar warships,
upgrade them and wear them in together,
and the result was this test ship XLCJ001 before him.
"The key to this interstellar warship is that while using star-shield technology, it also gets the benefit of hive-race biological-armor technology. And for fear of running short of core energy, we used a dual-core energy system. One is our ordinary starship core energy, mainly the Owl Dragon-line core, upgraded with some of the fine points of the Mechanical Race's core energy. The other is a Hive Mothership's biological core energy. In it are the core energies of three T6 Hive Motherships, which are in fact their hearts. That part was set up with the help of engineers from the hive-race side. Working together, we made these two core energy systems fully compatible," Chief Engineer Nana explained.
At this point Zhao Chen turned his head and saw some unusual figures at the workbenches beside them.
They were engineers in robes, only the outlines of their faces visible; they all came from the Owl Dragon interstellar hive-race, chosen by the Hive Princess.
Apart from the Hive Princess, the Owl Dragon interstellar hive-race still could not communicate in language for now.
But Zhao Chen and the Hive Princess had developed a communication device both sides could use.
These hive engineers were using this tool now to communicate with their colleagues of other races.
Before each pair hung something like a chat window.
Had other interstellar races seen this scene, they would likely have been dumbstruck.
The interstellar hive-race, seen as a natural calamity, actually living in peace with other interstellar races!
Truly beyond belief!
Chief Engineer Nana went on, "At the same time, we gave this interstellar warship a dual interstellar-battleship and interstellar-destroyer design, combined with some features of other interstellar warships. It can be counted an all-round interstellar warship. It uses biological weapons, energy weapons, heavy guns, a bow gun, main guns, interstellar missiles, hive combat units, interstellar drones and more. You could say one interstellar warship like this is as good as a fully equipped interstellar fleet."
Zhao Chen listened to all this and nodded, satisfied.
These were all his own ideas from before; he had set down some outlines of the figures too, but it was these engineers and scientists who had truly worked out the details.
It had to be said, they were truly very able.
"Besides that, because we used the traits of mechanical starships, we've raised automation to the very top. This interstellar warship has three high-level artificial intelligences, a hundred and nine mid-level artificial intelligences, and over a thousand low-level artificial intelligences. It cuts combat posts by eighty percent, and raises combat efficiency by at least 30%. An interstellar warship of this grade would normally need tens of thousands, even several hundred thousand people at its combat posts. But this interstellar warship's standard combat complement is only ten thousand people. And those ten thousand cover three shifts through the hours of combat."