The engine is one of the most core components of a spaceship, it is like the heart of the human body, and without a healthy heart, it is impossible to maintain the high strength of the body.

The restoration of this naval version of the Kitty Hawk-class frigate was carried out to the highest standards with components and engines.

The Black Snake 130 engine comes from one of the few top parts manufacturers in the alliance, the Dark Sky Snake Company, the conventional frigate engine can produce a maximum thrust of one hundred standard units, and the Black Snake 130 engine can produce one hundred and thirty standard thrust through the optimization of the energy system and mechanical structure, which is thirty percent higher than the conventional engine of the frigate.

With the development of technology, many technologies have been pushed to the extreme, and it is extremely expensive to improve even the slightest bit of performance.

Although the performance of the Black Snake 130 engine is only 30% higher than that of the conventional engine, the technical difficulty of this is unimaginable to ordinary people.

It is said that in order to increase the power of the engine, Dark Snake made more than 10,000 improvements to the conventional engine, and it took more than 100 years to design this top-of-the-line engine.

It is precisely because of the extremely complex manufacturing process of these top-of-the-line devices that the production volume is very low, and it is rarely available in the market, and even if one or two Black Snake engines are occasionally sold, the price is far higher than that of the regular model.

All the top manufacturers have a convention that the products they produce first take care of the privileged classes of the universe before they are sold to the general public.

Xia Fei knew very well what it meant to miss a top-level engine, he was silent for a while, and said with a smile: "Uncle Potter, you don't have to be too discouraged, we can find another way to deal with the engine, the universe is so big, I don't believe that I can't even buy a top-level engine." ”

Potter nodded silently, and walked with Xia Fei towards the way he came.

On the way back, the atmosphere was a little heavy, Xia Fei had been thinking about Lao K, Xia Fei didn't know this person, and he didn't want to know him, but this stranger interfered with Xia Fei's spaceship assembly plan, which made Xia Fei feel a little unhappy.

The parts ordered by Porter were constantly being shipped to the factory through various interstellar delivery companies, and these parts were not enough to assemble the ship, and the missing parts required the factory design office to design a 3D model and then send it to a high-precision automatic machine tool for machining.

Although this method can be used to machine the missing parts, it is not very efficient, because each part requires a lot of time to redesign, and the progress is slow.

In charge of the design room is a distant niece of Porter Sr., Lina, a black girl in her twenties, with thick eyes and a meticulous attitude, Porter Sr. stays in the design room all day and night, working with this girl on the design of parts.

Xia Fei carried the universal pliers and carried out the maintenance of the battleship with Proton, and a month passed quickly, and Xia Fei also grew from a novice who knew nothing about the battleship to a qualified maintenance worker.

He worked fifteen hours a day, ate the same meals as the workers, and occasionally got together to drink two glasses of spirits, no matter how hard and tiring the work, Xia Fei never complained.

At night, when everyone else is resting, Xia Fei has to spend six hours on his own cultivation, occasionally satisfying Avril's curiosity, chatting with her, talking about the progress of the project, listening to her complain about her music teacher or art teacher, every day is busy and fulfilling.

Soon, the workers led by Proton fell in love with Xia Fei, and they often gave Xia Fei some local snacks, and Xia Fei also distributed the cigarettes and tea he brought to these workers.

Everyone likes the tea very much, but when it comes to cigarettes, these workers start to shake their heads, they don't understand what it means to inhale this choking thing into their lungs, watching Xia Fei light a cigarette and smoke it every time he rests, everyone laughs and says that Xia Fei is spending money to find guilt.

Xia Fei could only smile and ignore their laughter.

I have to say that the workers trained by Old Porter are all maintenance elites, and each of them has their own specialty, some specialize in repairing circuit systems, and some specialize in repairing air filtration systems.

Slowly, Xia Fei had one more task in addition to his daily maintenance work, that is, to learn their skills from different people.

As the maintenance knowledge in his head continued to increase, Xia Fei also began to try to raise his own questions and implement some of his ideas.

The maintenance work is slow and boring, but Xia Fei has been making rapid progress, especially some of his whimsical ideas, many of which even Old Potter will praise when he listens to them.

In recent days, the supply of parts has begun to keep up with the maintenance progress, often working for an hour and resting for an hour, and every new part comes out for a while, and then resting until the installation is completed, until the new parts are produced.

Looking at the increasingly anxious old Porter, Xia Fei didn't say a word, and he never even asked about the progress of the parts manufacturing, because he knew that Porter had done his best to repair the ship.

No matter how difficult these parts are, they can always be manufactured, it is nothing more than a matter of how fast or slow the progress is, and what is in front of Xia Fei is a more realistic and important big problem, the engine.

During this time, Xia Fei often searched for a suitable engine on the Starnet, and he even did not hesitate to spend 10 million Starcoins to increase the level of his Starnet account to the point where he could access three nearby star fields.

It's a pity that the number of top engines on the market is scarce, and even if there are, they must be given priority to those so-called big people, and it is not Xia Fei's turn to buy them at all, and it is not suitable to occasionally encounter a few top engines, and they cannot be assembled on the spaceship.

At the beginning of the design of this spaceship, Xia Fei made up his mind to improve all its performance to the top, if he couldn't buy a suitable engine, it would be like a sprinter missing a leg, which would greatly drag down the overall performance of the battleship.

For more than a month, Lao K did not come to find Porter again, but there were often some fighter planes flying at an inexplicable ultra-low altitude near the factory, and the huge noise and air flow disturbance shook the rumbling of the factory, and even a strong wind brought by the fighter plane blew down a warship in the factory area, and the workers took a lot of effort to get it up again.

There are also some big men who probe their brains and look at the factory, and Xia Fei has encountered these people several times when he was training at night, but Xia Fei has been holding back and not making a move.

Don't look at everyone working and laughing as usual, but everyone knows that a storm is coming, and everyone's heart is depressed.

Early in the morning, Xia Fei got up from the bed as usual, washed his face and came to the factory with universal pliers, ready to start the day's work.

At the door of the factory, Proton sat alone on the ground, looking at a loss.

Xia Fei walked up with a smile and asked, "What?" Did you quarrel with your wife again? ”

Proton shook his head heavily, "No one came to work today, and it should have started in the past." ”

Xia Fei was slightly stunned, and looked at the time display of the ultra-microcomputer on his wrist, he chatted a little late with Avril last night, so he got up at the right time to get up today.

Porter Sr.'s workers all have a strong sense of time, and they start work at least fifteen minutes earlier every day, and they should have started to get busy by this time.

Lighting a cigarette, Xia Fei sat next to Potter and looked up at the heavy black clouds in the sky, "Does Uncle Potter know?" ”

Proton nodded silently and did not speak.

Sweeping his gaze around, Xia Fei found that there seemed to be a person far away in the northwest corner of the factory, monitoring the situation in the factory with the equipment in his hand.

"Humph!" Xia Fei snorted coldly, stood up and patted Boteng's shoulder, "Someone is watching us, let's start work as usual, otherwise others will think that we are afraid of them." ”

Proton slammed himself up from the ground, his face serious, "You're right, the more they want to see our jokes, the more we have to insist." ”

Silently picking up the tools, Xia Fei and Proton started the day's work.

The workload of the original nine people is now only done by two people, and the pressure on Xia Fei and Proton can be imagined.

But instead of being overwhelmed, they worked harder and sweated like rain.

Old Porter came out of the design room twice, and saw that Xia Fei and Botton were sweating hard, Potter sighed and shook his head and went back, walking heavily.

At noon, Xia Fei and Proton sat on the ground, holding their lunch boxes in their hands, and ate their lunch in large gulps.

The whole morning of high-intensity work made them tired and didn't even want to speak, after all, the energy of the two people was limited, even if they worked hard, they only completed half of the usual progress.

In the sky, an earthy yellow shuttle hurriedly landed in the factory area, and Schneider, who was in charge of the circuit, stepped off the shuttle in a panic and trotted all the way to the factory.

"Where's Uncle Potter?" Schneider asked hurriedly.

Botton glanced at Schneider fiercely and continued to eat his lunch with his head down, as if complaining about him.

Schneider bowed his head sadly, a look of shame.

Xia Fei smiled slightly, put down the lunch box and walked to Schneider, "Uncle Potter is in the design room as usual, have you had lunch?" ”

At this time, Schneider lowered his head and shouted behind Xia Fei, "Uncle Potter." ”

Xia Fei turned his head to take a look, only to see Old Man Potter standing behind.

"I... I..." Schneider choked up for a long time, speechless, sad and only wanted to cry.

Old Potter took out a stack of envelopes from his pocket and handed them to Schneider, and his calloused palm patted him on the head twice, as if patting his own child.

"This is your salary and bonus, it is not difficult to find a job in another factory with your skills, you haven't made much money with me all these years, I will pay you an extra three months' salary, even if it is to compensate you." Old Potter said wistfully.

"No, no, no, I'm not here to ask for a salary, I just think that I have been following you for so many years, and I have to talk to you when I leave, otherwise I won't forgive myself." Schneider cried as he spoke, like a wronged child.

Porter Sr. thrust the envelope containing his salary into Schneider's hand and turned around and walked towards the design room.

Poof!

Schneider fell to his knees, slapping himself desperately with both hands, and soon his face was swollen.

Xia Fei wanted to dissuade him, but he endured it again, at this time Schneider needed to vent, otherwise his heart would definitely be tormented.

"Uncle Potter! We just can't stand it! They, their means..."Schneider sobbed, "I can't stand you!" I'm a bastard! I'm not human! ”

Old Porter's pace stopped abruptly, and he said in a trembling voice: "I know, I know, you don't have to blame yourself, let's go." ”

Schneider beat himself like crazy, blood gushed out of his mouth, and he stood up and left in despair.

Proton watched the rickety earthy yellow shuttle disappear into the sky, spat at the end and said, "I wish you a happy job in Old K's factory." ”

Xia Fei lit a cigarette, frowned and said, "Boton, why don't you leave?" ”

Botton gritted his teeth and said firmly, "I will not leave Master." ”

Suddenly, the old-fashioned phone in Proton's pocket made a ticking sound, Proton took out the phone and looked at it, stood up and said, "I'll go answer the phone." ”

He took the phone and walked towards the corner of the factory, Xia Fei thought about it, and quietly followed behind him.

On the phone was a woman's voice, which should be Proton's wife, who was already a little hysterical at the moment, shouting frantically at Proton on the other end of the phone.

Botton stood silent, like a log, letting her wife cry and curse there, but he remained motionless and did not say a word.

Xia Fei didn't know what kind of pressure this wooden man was under at the moment, but Proton's next words deeply touched Xia Fei.

"Let's get a divorce, send the formalities to the factory and I'll sign it." Proton said in a hoarse voice: "No matter what happens, I will not leave the master." ”

After saying that, Botton hung up the phone, grabbed his hair with his hands in pain, and let out a low wail.

After a long time, Proton stood up, straightened his clothes, took a few deep breaths, and walked towards the factory with red eyes.

It was now clear that the man named Old K was constantly putting pressure on the employees of these factories in order to get what Potter had in his hands.

During this time, although these workers did not say anything on the surface, they were all silently suffering.

When the pressure grew too great to bear, some people chose to give in, and a man as determined as a rock like Botton had to break his arm with tears.

The factory, which was originally quite lively, is now empty, leaving only Proton, Old Porter, the lame Song San who cooks, Lina in the design room, and Xia Fei.

In addition, an old dog star, who is too old to walk, has lost most of his hair, and lies on the ground all day in the sun, without eating or drinking, and it will not be long before it will go.

Xia Fei leaned against a battleship, smoked several cigarettes in a row, and his head was thinking quickly.

Throwing the cigarette butt on the ground and stepping on it, Xia Fei pressed the communication button on the ultramicrocomputer.

"Sonny, I have something you need to do." Xia Fei said coldly.