Having laid out his instructions, Zhao Chen sat in the captain's chair and began "resting with his eyes closed." In truth, he'd opened the System interface, unable to wait a moment longer to go and dote upon his little darling.
Challenge-task reward claimed — acquired 9,000 System points.
Zhao Chen's System points at once began to climb.
System Points: 9,500
And this was not even the most important part; what Zhao Chen's attention was fixed on now was another rich System reward.
Branch-mission reward claimed — acquired the "T4 Lucent-class Interstellar Jump Ship" technical blueprint.
Zhao Chen was taken aback.
An interstellar jump ship?
What was this strange ship-type? How was it he'd never once seen it in the Starlight Empire's study materials?
Zhao Chen looked over its detailed data.
Lucent-class Interstellar Jump Ship
Ship-type: interstellar auxiliary-type ship
Tech grade: T4
Hull armor strength: 3,600–3,800 units
Shield energy value: 30,000 units
Warp engine: tier-8 warp engine
Length: 2,800 meters
Mass: 890,000 tons
Crew posts: 500
Ship weapons: none
Special performance: Lucent-type Jump Gate
Zhao Chen knit his brows slightly; the ship's basic data seemed to have nothing about it that stood out, and strangest of all, it was fitted with no combat weapons whatsoever — not even the most basic point-defense guns! Mind you, even the T3 Andromeda-class Interstellar Medical Ship had its own point-defense guns, which could put up a defense to a certain degree.
The one thing that set it apart was, perhaps, that "Lucent-type Jump Gate," and Zhao Chen looked with particular attention at this piece of ship technology.
And this look left Zhao Chen dumbstruck.
Lucent-type Jump Gate: The wormhole-type Lucent-class jump engine fitted to the T4 Lucent-class Interstellar Jump Ship can briefly deploy a small-scale jump star-gate, permitting an interstellar fleet of a certain scale to make a group interstellar jump.
As the name implied, though this T4 Lucent-class Interstellar Jump Ship itself had no combat power at all, it could let an interstellar fleet appear, at any time, in any region whatsoever! It was no simple warship — it might be called a mobile star gate!
Zhao Chen's breathing, in this moment, quickened somewhat, for he clearly grasped the value of this ship. Its strategic significance even far exceeded that of any T4 combat-type warship!
Just think.
You're at home, your arm around your wife, eating your dinner, drinking your wine, humming a little tune.
And suddenly a batch of interstellar warships appears right overhead!
Delighted, are you? Caught off guard, aren't you? Dare you make a move?
This was, quite simply, a strategic weapon for the blitzkrieg and the long-distance surprise assault!
Zhao Chen, in his enthusiasm, went on looking over more of the T4 Lucent-class Interstellar Jump Ship's data.
The first point of attention was, naturally, how many interstellar warships it could project in one go. There was a numerical limit to this, and it was tied, moreover, to the grade of the interstellar warships. If they were all T3-grade warships, then a single T4 Lucent-class Interstellar Jump Ship alone could project roughly 1,000 T3 warships — the equal of three corps-grade interstellar fleets! And a single use consumed energy worth about 10 million star coins! This was money-burning indeed; it could be called the most luxurious "gate travel" there was! At the same time, after a single use, its reset-cooldown recharge required about a week's time.
As for the jump distance, Zhao Chen took a look — there was no specific limit; but in cases of excessive distance, the number of the fleet it could project would shrink as well. Yet at the very least, as things stood now, within this region of the Galactic Alliance one could still hop about freely as one pleased.
Having finished with the performance, one had to look at some of the substantive things.
First was the build cost. A T4 warship — and a functional-type warship of this sort besides — the build cost of it made prominent a single word: "expensive." The build cost of a single unit ran as high as 5 billion star coins!
"Bloody hell — that's very nearly caught up with the build cost of a T3 star gate of mine!" Zhao Chen couldn't help cursing inwardly. As technology kept advancing, the build costs of T3 and T4 warships had likewise climbed by a great margin. This was perhaps, too, why to this day there'd been no business of publicly selling T4 warships. For if one were to be taken out and sold, the sale price of a single unit would, by all estimates, run as high as several tens of billions of star coins! Save for the Empire itself and an extremely small number of top-tier plutocrats and nobles, there'd likely be scarcely anyone who could afford it; for the most part they were self-researched and self-produced, or researched and produced by several parties in cooperation.
Expensive though the money was, so be it — its strategic significance stood there plain, after all.
Zhao Chen took a look at its build requirements. Happily, its build requirements weren't high; even a T3 interstellar industrial ship could undertake it. Were it undertaken by the T3 Furnace-class Heavy Interstellar Industrial Ship now in Zhao Chen's hands, it would need about 10 months. But with multiple T3 interstellar industrial ships building it at the same time, the build time could be shortened to two months at the least.
"Next year I'll build one!" Zhao Chen made his decision firmly; a warship of this kind was exceedingly useful at a crucial moment — whether for fleeing or for attacking. Above all for attacking; even some combat missions that might originally have been impossible to complete could be carried out by relying on it.
And just as Zhao Chen was studying this T4 Lucent-class Interstellar Jump Ship in careful detail, the battle outside had, too, very nearly come to its end. By Zhao Chen's instructions, the great mass of slaves had all been gathered aboard the captured interstellar warships.
The fifth hour of the Owl Dragon Fleet's strike on this slaver starport.
Lilith reported that all the work was complete.
"110,000 slaves in all, along with over 100 captured interstellar warships, have now all been fully outfitted. What we've kept are all T2 warships — this ensures that, when we withdraw, these warships won't drag at our heels," Lilith reported.
System mission "Rescue the Imprisoned Slaves"
Content: Within the slaver starport, and among the slaver interstellar fleets around it, there are imprisoned slaves. By rescuing a certain number, activate the task's completion rate.
Completion rate above 90% will earn a T3-grade interstellar warship technical blueprint!
System mission complete — completion rate 96% — reward may be claimed.
Over on his side, Zhao Chen received yet another reminder of a mission reward, and with this he could be counted well and truly content. Nor had he wasted all those steps he'd schemed out beforehand — all of it for the sake of completing these two System missions.
"Then we can make ready to withdraw." Zhao Chen instructed.
"Yes." Lilith began arranging the matter of the withdrawal route.
The Owl Dragon Fleet, along with those captured T2 interstellar warships, began to retreat along the route by which they'd come.
Meanwhile, Zhao Chen went on sitting in the captain's chair, and claimed his second mission reward.
System mission reward claimed. For completion above 90%, acquired one "T3 Triceratops-class Interstellar Heavy Assault Frigate" technical blueprint; for completion above 95%, acquired 5,000 System points, and 20 task points.