At noon, the sun was high and there was a huge city on a plain.

It was a huge city made entirely of alloy, and the walls alone were nearly a hundred meters high, and the cold steel reflected slightly in the sun's rays.

And above this steel giant city, every hundred meters there is a floating diamond-shaped mechanism, the device has blue lines. Countless diamond shapes floated above the steel giant, covering the entire city like a huge lid.

When the deer-headed man saw this steel city, his originally tense heart finally relaxed, and a smile appeared on his face.

"Great, I'm finally back alive."

The steel city was his shelter, and being near it meant that he no longer had to worry about an enemy attacking him.

Then the Deer-Headed Man wore his ragged armored nest that was close to falling apart, and the steel giant ran wild. Along the way, a convoy of gatherers drove past him, the roar of engines reaching his ears, and diesel fuel drilling directly into his nose.

In this interstellar age, the Gatherers are riding on these old-fashioned chemical-fueled vehicles that are unusually abrupt and even a little incomprehensible. There is no way around it, and civilizations want to equip these gatherers with better vehicles and use sustainable energy.

However, the energy response of the human team is extremely sensitive, and the various equipment carried by the gatherers is already the limit. If you add a high-energy original vehicle, it may be sensed by humans just near the human city, and then ascend to the sky on the spot.

At the same time, this is also the reason why major civilizations do not use robots to harvest energy. Humans are extremely sensitive to high energy, and robots need huge energy support. Even if they invent a robot that uses diesel to operate to collect energy, it is already the limit to support the normal collection of robots with the conversion rate of diesel to energy, and it is impossible to fight.

The early Erd civilization took advantage of its mechanical civilization and developed a variety of robots that did not rely on high energy, such as diesel robots, steam machines... It is used to harvest energy. At the beginning, these robots relied on their numbers and fear of death to collect a lot of earth energy for the Erd civilization.

Other civilizations followed suit, and suddenly Earth was like a steampunk world, filled with all kinds of rugged diesel robots and steam robots. But suddenly one day, I don't know which shameless civilization actually let its collectors rob the energy that the robots collected from the human city.

In the face of a team carrying a variety of advanced equipment, these low-energy robots are no match at all. After all, in order to prevent humans from sensing the robot, the robot itself is set to reduce the energy response as much as possible, and it is impossible to carry various energy weapons.

Some civilizations have sent out snatching teams almost one by one, snatching a lot of money from civilizations that use low-energy robots to harvest energy. The robbed civilization also immediately responded, but to no avail.

For example, elite troops are dispatched to protect the gathering robots, but the team of gathering robots that win by numbers is already extremely large. If there is another group of well-equipped troops, armed with all kinds of advanced weapons, it will definitely attract the attention of mankind. And the long-range guards give those raiders the opportunity to grab, and they can take advantage of the opportunity to grab a wave and run.

It is even more impossible to send a battleship to escort it, and it is possible that the battleship was shot down by humans not long after it took off from the shelter.

As long as these civilizations still rely on huge low-energy robot troops for collection, then other civilizations can rely on small and elite troops to constantly rob them.

In the end, the Erd civilization, which relies on low-energy robots to collect energy, was completely destroyed by this group of shameless guys, and had to give up this low-cost and high-yield method.

As soon as these civilizations gave up, other civilizations found that there was nothing to grab, and slowly came up with something similar to low-energy robots. And the next thing can be said to be feng shui in turn, the Erd civilization, these civilizations that are good at mechanical artificial intelligence, see them doing this, turn their heads and hack all their robots, and continue to steal energy from them.

In this way, all civilizations can only honestly continue to maintain the collector system, mainly gathering energy by small elite squads.

All the gatherers who passed by the deerhead looked at him with a look of schadenfreude. This deer-headed man is fully equipped with tattered equipment, and the mecha lacks a piece in the east and a piece in the west, which is no different from the broken copper and iron that is falling apart. In addition, he was the only one, and he didn't even have a teammate by his side, not even a vehicle.

It's not hard to guess what's going on, this unlucky guy should have encountered a human, and he should be the only one left in the whole team.

The deer-headed man also noticed the comings and goings around him, collecting the eyes of the team, but he ignored it and ran all the way to the steel giant.

The walls of the steel giant city are twenty meters high, and countless collection teams have driven out of the city gate after passing the inspection with their own vehicles, and have begun a collection activity that lasts for about a week.

At this time, a robot came to the deer-headed man and shot a green light, scanning the deer-headed man in all directions.

"The equipment damage rate has reached eighty percent, and there are multiple injuries on the body, which are predicted to be caused by energy weapons." The cold mechanical sound sounded.

The deer-headed man stood silently in place, allowing the robot to scan him. Generally, all aspects of the shelter are scanned to check for anything unusual, mainly to prevent the invasion of other civilizations into the shelter.

Of course, this inspection was done the moment he passed through the gate, but now his situation is more special. The rest of the team is dead, and only he is left to come back alive, which in itself is very suspicious, and the probability of being a spy of other civilizations is very high, and the strictest inspection must be carried out.

This is a very suspicious case of a spy, but it is not uncommon, after all, there are too many dangers on this planet, and hundreds of gatherers die every day, and some of them are lucky enough to come back alive. In this regard, the Erd civilization, although it knew that there was a high probability that these people who came back were spies, still chose to accept it.

Because if they don't accept this kind of gatherer who miraculously comes back alive, then the other surviving gatherers won't return to the shelter in the future. Although the Erd civilization is not uncommon for these surviving gatherers, after all, the gatherers can produce as much as they want, but the Erd civilization is afraid that these gatherers will run to other shelters and sell their information in exchange for a chance to survive.

Although the gatherers belong to the lowest level of the shelter and don't know much about the shelter, the energy they carry on a daily basis and various daily stacks can deduce the general situation of the inner and outer layers of the shelter.

Ten seconds later, the robot used the huge detector at the city gate to scan the deerman's whole body, inside and out, along with the bones.

"Nothing unusual, number 02200821, please describe what happened to you, explain why you were the only one who returned to the shelter, and if the rest of the team is still alive," the robot said in a mechanically unique synthesized voice. ”

"Since your personal terminal has been completely damaged, we can't get the process of collecting activities from it, please tell us more about the process."

The deer-headed man replied, "Yesterday at around thirteen:20, we had just finished collecting energy and were about to return to the shelter, but we were suddenly attacked by other shelter collection teams. ”

"We fought these attackers, and then due to the excessive fluctuations in energy generated by the battle, we attracted an ordinary human. The attacker was instantly blown to pieces by the human, and our team turned around and ran, and the human chased after him. ”

"During this chase, my teammates were blown to pieces by humans, and I accidentally rolled down a hillside. Humans didn't continue to chase me, so I survived. ”

The deer-headed man briefly explained his "real experience".

"The brain waves are normal, and there are no signs of incorrect information at this time." The robot then took out a black collar and handed it to the deer's head.

"Given your particular situation, there is a suspicion of being a spy, so you will have to live with this necklace for the next period of time. For the next seven days, you will be monitored twenty-four hours a day by nanobots. ”

Without any hesitation, the deer-headed man took it and put it around his neck, and asked, "May I go into the city to rest?" ”

"Checked." The robot is back at its place.

After handing in all the equipment that had been completely scrapped, the deerhead dragged his tired body towards the city, and through the gate he was greeted by the diesel vehicles that came in and out and the gatherers who were resting near the gate and preparing to leave.

Looking up into the distance, all the buildings were made of steel, whether they were buildings or roads. It was all cold steel, and I couldn't see even a little dirt or a little green.

At the same time, the buildings in the city are very uniform in shape, as if carved out of a mold, without the slightest difference. The whole city is like pasted and copied, steel buildings, roads, steel buildings, roads.

The whole city seems to be very orderly, and this order has reached an extreme, even pathology. Everything is strictly planned by artificial intelligence, and every action of everything in the city, except for the gatherers who have life, is clearly defined, and every minute and every second of their life is strictly followed.

The deer-headed man turned and walked towards the avenue on the right side of the city gate, and the more he walked this way, the less the cold aura of this steel city faded. Half an hour later, the deer-headed people saw their place of residence, the gathering place of the gatherers.

All the buildings here, including the roads, are made of steel, but the steel here is different from the steel outside. It does not emit a metallic luster, but instead has a large area of sound.

Small dwelling pods are stacked on top of each other, like beehives, and all kinds of upright lifeforms walk among these chaotic dwelling pods.

Such a cluttered and cramped dwelling place filled with the smell of rust made the deer-headed people feel inexplicably reassured, at least it was not as cold as outside.

The deer-headed man made his way back to his quarters, put his hand on the door lock, and slowly opened the heavy door with a click of his fingerprint.

The rooms inside are very simple, and it is not an exaggeration to describe them as having four walls. A seven-metre-long sheet steel bed, a huge sofa and steel table with a huge stainless steel cup and stainless steel rice bowl on it. Nothing else, this is the living environment of most gatherers.

It's not that the gatherers don't want to improve their lives, but the supplies are so expensive that the points they get from their daily life at the risk of collecting activities are already a bit difficult to pay for their living expenses, and it is impossible to buy those expensive furniture and change the living environment.

Every day, collectors can only spend what little points they have left in bars and virtual reality to enjoy themselves. After all, if you don't enjoy it now, maybe you will die the next time you go on a mission.

Living in harsh conditions, extremely scarce materials, and risking their lives every day to go to human cities to collect energy.

Because of the existence of human beings, various civilizations can only rely on space jumps if they want to safely transport materials into the shelter on Earth. Dying a few times or hundreds of spatial jumps is nothing for these second-level civilizations, but if they die thousands of times, even they can't bear it.

Especially now that they are far away in the solar system, very far away from their own five stars, it is difficult for all kinds of energy sources and devices to be abundantly replenished. Coupled with the fact that a lot of energy has to be used to defend against humans, it is impossible to transport large quantities of supplies into the shelter for gatherers.

The deer-headed man picked up the rice bowl on the table and walked out of the living quarters, came to the food vending machine downstairs, put his hand on the fingerprint verification, and then put the rice bowl under the inlet.

Since it was already ten o'clock in the morning, it was past the meal period, and a new round of collection operations had begun, so there was no one in line before the physical goods were sold.

Backbite!

A thick, yellowish fluid flowed out of the inlet and landed in the huge stainless steel rice bowl. These thick fluids are nutrient liquids, which are extremely high in nutrients, and the only drawback is that they taste unpalatable and are filled with a disgusting and strange taste.

The deer-headed man glanced at his points, sighed, and said, "These points are not even enough for a visit to the bar, so we must sell that thing as soon as possible, hoping to sell it for a good price." ”

Next, the deer-headed man, after eating the food, lay on the bed and closed his tired eyes, and fell asleep, under the monitoring of the nanobots, everything was so normal.

As for what the deer-headed man was talking about, what was that? Robots have already been tested, but they are nothing more than books on humans from the old days. The major civilizations of mankind have long collected books, and there is nothing for them, but for the collector, these books are priceless, and the contents contained in them may save his life at a critical moment.

For example, the gatherers have learned some words from some books or other objects that can effectively arouse humans, and as long as they are spoken, they can generally attract the attention of humans, such as the most typical lying groove, 666, grass.

Usually collectors make robots to play these sounds, throw them out when they encounter a human, and then turn around and run. These robots, which constantly emit words that attract human attention, have a chance to attract human attention, increasing their chances of escape.

……

The next day, in a bar in the Gatherer's quarters.

As soon as the deer-headed man walked in the doorway, the strong smell of wine came to his face, and a large number of gatherers drank cheap liquor here. There are even some poor people who drink "ordinary wine" mixed with industrial alcohol and clear water.

The whole bar gives people the feeling of being extremely messy, the arrangement of the wine tables is irregular, and the collectors are crazy about drinking, imitating the drinking table culture of human society. At the same time, there are some drunken gatherers who fall asleep on their heads, and most of them sleep on the ground, and many sleep directly in the aisles.

The messy scene here is the same as the residential area of the gatherers outside, and one feature stands out is that it is chaotic, how chaotic it is.

The gathering is chaotic and chaotic and the surrounding steel, which is like pasting and copying, forms an extremely sharp contrast, the two sides are obviously close together, but they are like two worlds.

All the way to the depths of the bar, the deer-headed man saw a large door with two werewolves standing in front of it.

The deer-headed man approached the two werewolves and said, "I want to exchange some of the things I got from the human city for points. ”

A werewolf glanced at the deer-headed man with a sharp gaze and asked, "What is it exactly?" ”

"Books." The deer-headed man replied.

Hearing this, the two werewolves did not stop and turned around and opened the gate.