Zhuang Xiaolin's voice resounded through the radio to every corner of the battleship.

All the members of the Tyrant Tiger Mercenary Regiment on the battleship, whether they were resting or cultivating, immediately rushed to the first deck. Xin Lin came out of the room and went to the meeting point with the others. In telepathy, many members of the group were whispering, and they obviously didn't know what Zhuang Xiaolin meant by this.

He felt a slight chill in his heart, as soon as Zhuang Xiaolin came back, he would gather everyone, something big must happen, but it should have nothing to do with him.

In less than three minutes, everyone was gathered in the first deck hall.

Xin Lin walked up to Wei Lin and stood with her. The next few people are also Raven Drack's henchmen, as well as his son Gordon Drake. Lei Wen himself was not here, he hurried to the bridge above, and asked Zhuang Xiaolin in a low voice, "Commander, what's going on so urgently?" ”

"Raven," Zhuang Xiaolin nodded lightly and said hello, "There is indeed a big event, I will announce it when we are all there." ”

"Okay." Raven had no choice but to stand on the side and wait.

Although he is the deputy head of the regiment and has a group of people under him who obey orders, Zhuang Xiaolin is the boss of the entire mercenary group, and as the founder, he has always been the same, and no one dares to disobey. He and the other two deputy heads are also subordinates, at most they are deputies, and they don't have much right to speak, and it is Zhuang Xiaolin who really makes decisions.

After that, the mercenaries scattered in the space city rushed back one after another to join the crowd on the deck.

Everyone turned their heads to each other and inquired about each other's news, but no one knew the reason, and they all turned their eyes to Zhuang Xiaolin, who was sitting on the captain's throne and closed his eyes.

However, Zhuang Xiaolin couldn't see any clues on his face, and obviously didn't wait for anyone to arrive.

Taking advantage of this time, Xin Xiao mingled in the crowd and carefully observed Zhuang Xiaolin through telepathy. In the sense, this high-level martial artist who is suspected of being a "butcher" is like a volcano on the verge of eruption, and his thermal energy is extremely deep, although it is not as terrifying as the few martial saints he has ever seen, but it is enough to crush everyone present.

In contrast, the strength of the mid-level martial arts general Evil Wolf that Xin Lin had fought against was more than a step different from Zhuang Xiaolin, even if he wore the armor of the iron-blooded general, he was afraid that it would be difficult to match.

"Luckily, I just want to get news from him, not from him." Xin Xiao secretly rejoiced that if Zhuang Xiaolin had a martial saint-level cultivation, he wouldn't even dare to use telepathy indiscriminately.

Half an hour later, a shrewd and capable mercenary reported: "Commander, the brothers have arrived. ”

Zhuang Xiaolin opened his eyes, a glimmer of light flashed in his eyes, swept past the crowd on the deck, and frowned: "Only so many people? ”

The reported mercenary hurriedly explained: "More than half of our more than 1,000 brothers are currently on missions outside, and Deputy Regiment Commander Liu is not there, if they are urgently called back, about 300 people will be able to arrive within seven days." ”

"Forget it, don't say seven days, you can't wait a day."

Zhuang Xiaolin waved his hand, shook his head and said, "More than five hundred people are barely enough, and the rest of the brothers who are outside can only say that they are unlucky, and they will be compensated afterwards." ”

He stood up and walked down the bridge to the high platform on the side of the deck, his eyes swept over the mercenaries, all the mercenaries he saw puffed up their chests and showed a high posture.

Zhuang Xiaolin nodded with satisfaction, and then said in a loud voice: "Brothers, there is a very urgent task that we need to do now, and I won't hide it from you, this task is very dangerous, but ......" He paused, saw that everyone was looking at him, and continued: "But as long as the task is completed, all of us, every brother of the mercenary group will become billionaires!" ”

The crowd exploded, and the mercenaries shouted.

"Commander, can you tell me what the task is?" On behalf of everyone, the deputy head of the regiment, Raven, asked the things he was most concerned about.

"The stakes are high, so as not to leak the news, so I can't reveal to you in advance what the task is, but you'll know when you get there." Zhuang Xiaolin replied without a smile.

The mercenaries' cries lowered a little, and someone asked loudly, "Commander, how dangerous is this mission?" ”

"Extremely dangerous, more than ten times more dangerous than all previous missions, and I can't guarantee that everyone will come back alive." Zhuang Xiaolin's face was serious, and he said: "If any of you don't want to go, you can bring it up now, I don't force it." ”

The mercenaries looked at each other, and even if someone really had the intention of quitting, they were embarrassed to quit in full view of everyone.

At this time, quitting the mission is equivalent to quitting the mercenary group, and the reputation of the mercenary industry is also stinky, unless you don't mix in Juling Space City in the future, you don't want to make money anymore.

What's more, risks and benefits coexist, and if you are lucky enough to complete the task and come back, you will be rich!

Since you are a mercenary, don't think about your life too seriously, which mercenary has not encountered danger, and everyone is in blood, isn't it just for money? If you can become a billionaire by taking a single risk, the vast majority of mercenaries are more than happy to do so.

"Commander, we're doing it with you!" The mercenaries hesitated for less than half a minute before making a decision.

"Yes, the danger is a hairy, my life was given by the regiment commander......"

"That's right! We did it too! ”

The mercenaries scrambled to show their loyalty, shouting one by one, their eyes flashing with excitement.

"Good!" Zhuang Xiaolin was very satisfied with everyone's performance, and announced: "I will give you ten minutes to deal with personal matters, this may be the last time you will talk to your family or friends. Ten minutes later, the battleship will be shielded from electromagnetic signals, enter communication silence, and then immediately set off. ”

"For the sake of secrecy, you can call here, and no one can leave the deck."

Most of the mercenaries are singles, there is no family drag, they don't have much contact with their parents, and even if they have a few friends, they are brothers in the group, they don't have to worry about anything, and they don't need to make any phone calls. Of course, there are also a small number of people who need to say goodbye to others and take out their mobile phones to talk.

More than a dozen of Zhuang Xiaolin's henchmen will supervise the mercenaries who are calling, patrolling back and forth, preventing them from divulging mission-related content, and they cannot send text messages.

Xin Lin stood in the crowd, he didn't call, but he was shouting bad luck in his heart!

He had no interest in the task that Zhuang Xiaolin had said, and he didn't want to take risks at all, because he was already a billionaire. The previous 30 million deposits plus 100 million bounties for killing evil wolves, and tens of millions of virtual currencies for looting Nelson's property, all of which add up to nearly 200 million, is enough to spend a long time.

But Xin Lin didn't dare to say quit.

This is not like the style of a mercenary, and he has only joined the Violent Tiger Mercenary Group for less than half a month, once he says that he wants to quit, it will immediately arouse Zhuang Xiaolin's suspicions. With Zhuang Xiaolin's methods, in order to avoid leaking the news, he would never let himself leave safely.

As a powerful killer who kills like hemp, Zhuang Xiaolin obviously will not be afraid to kill a mercenary who has just joined the group.

Xin Xiao thought to himself that he was not Zhuang Xiaolin's opponent, not to mention that there were hundreds of mercenaries around, even if he was lucky enough to kill the battleship, there was nowhere to escape in the space city.

He can't say if he is suffering now, there are people staring at him, and he can't even make a phone call to inform Xiahou Zheng or the Lu family.

"Damn, this time it's really self-defeating."

Ten minutes later, the battleship entered a state of communication silence, and all mobile phones were disconnected from the signal, losing contact with the outside world. In this case, only the quantum repeater on board the battleship can still maintain contact, but the operation authority is firmly in the hands of Zhuang Xiaolin and a few communication officers, who are always guarding the bridge and not leaving a single step.

The mercenaries scattered and returned to their rooms.

As soon as Xin Lin returned to the room, he noticed that the battleship's engine had started, and it slowly broke away from the central axis dock of the space city, and sailed into the vast space under the surprised eyes of countless people.

The battleship accelerated at full speed, reaching sub-light speed in less than twenty hours, ten hours faster than a civilian spacecraft.

In the process of accelerating the battleship, Zhuang Xiaolin and the two deputy commanders always stood in the bridge, scanning his eyes back and forth, staring at everyone who piloted the battleship, including the pilot, navigator, communications officer and others, although these people were his absolute henchmen, but he still did not relax his vigilance.

It wasn't until the battleship was about to reach the critical point of superluminal speed that Zhuang Xiaolin took out a chip and ordered: "Adjust the sailing direction according to the coordinates in the chip and enter the superluminal speed." ”

"Yes."

The navigator took the chip and inserted it into the battleship's optical brain core, and a three-dimensional star map was immediately projected, with conspicuous points of light flashing on it, marking the destination.

"M42, Orion Nebula!" Raven, who had been guarding the side, recognized the coordinates of the star map at a glance, and couldn't help but shout.

The other people on the bridge also looked at Zhuang Xiaolin who was sitting on the captain's chair.

The driver was hesitant, obviously struggling in his heart, and couldn't help but ask: "Commander, is this ...... Are we really going to the Orion Nebula? ”

Zhuang Xiaolin said categorically: "Of course you have to go, you can carry it out." ”

"Wait!"

Another deputy regimental commander spoke up to stop him, his name was Eugene, and he was also a junior general.

Eugene's face was full of caution, and he said: "Commander, the Orion Nebula belongs to the territory of the Steelmane Empire, and it is less than a hundred light-years away from their home planet, almost right under their noses, this risk is too great, if the whereabouts of the battleship are discovered by the Steelmane Orc, none of us will be able to come back alive." ”

Xin Lian, who was secretly visiting the bridge through telepathy, also had his eyelids beating wildly, wondering if Zhuang Xiaolin was crazy and wanted to go to the Orion Nebula!

The Orion Nebula is a very famous deep-sky object in the history of mankind, with extremely high brightness, which can be observed with the naked eye on the Earth, shaped like a large bird with spread wings, 1600 light-years away from the Earth, classified as a diffuse nebula, with a diameter of 16 light-years.

This is a young celestial body with hundreds of stars inside, most of which are less than three million years old, and some of them are only a million years old, less than a thousandth of the age of the Sun and the Earth!

The nebula is extremely volatile and unstable, and usually there are no planets, let alone intelligent life, which is equivalent to a forbidden area for life.

In addition, the nebula itself is composed of a huge amount of gas dust, all over the universe, the density of these gas dust seems to be extremely low, only a few dozen atoms per cubic centimeter, but it is enough to form a strong resistance to the spacecraft in high-speed navigation, so that the spacecraft cannot reach the sub-light critical point and enter faster-than-light travel.

In fact, even if it was forcibly raised to sub-light speed at the risk of the ship's disintegration, the spacecraft would not dare to enter a warping state easily. Because the stars inside the nebula are densely distributed and extremely close to each other, their gravitational fields affect each other, and the spacecraft is very easy to lose its direction or be pulled out of the warped space by the huge gravitational pull of the stars, resulting in the destruction of the ship and the death of people.

In interstellar voyages, the ship's course is to circumnavigate the nebula, which is almost as dangerous as a black hole.

These dangerous factors formed by the natural environment of the universe can still be avoided if you are careful, and the most deadly is the location of the Orion Nebula, which is in the hinterland of the Steelmane Empire!

The war between the Steelmane Empire and the Earth Federation has lasted for centuries, and it can't be described with a deep feud in the sea of blood, if this warship that knows at a glance that it belongs to the Federation has exposed its traces, the end can be imagined.

Xin Lone's scalp tingled for a while, and he thought about it, what would be the result of a warship of the Steelmane Empire appearing in the territory of the Federation?

Not only him, but everyone on the bridge understood the great danger involved, and this was simply self-defeating!

The danger of this mission is far beyond imagination, no one wants to die in vain, and everyone hopes that Zhuang Xiaolin can have a reasonable explanation.

Zhuang Xiaolin's gaze was still calm, and he said lightly: "I know the danger, your worries are very reasonable, but this trip to the Orion Nebula, our mercenary group is imperative." ”

"Why?" Raven stared at Zhuang Xiaolin tightly and asked.

Zhuang Xiaolin looked around, there were only two deputy commanders and the operator of the battleship in the bridge, all of whom were his trusted henchmen, so he no longer concealed it, and said: "Three months ago, a private expedition ship of the Federation found the remains of a suspected super civilization in the Orion Nebula, but they had an accident and got stuck inside, so they had to send back a distress message and ask for support. ”

As soon as these words came out, it was like dropping a metal hydrogen bomb on the bridge, which shocked everyone and didn't come back to their senses for a long time.

Super Civilization Ruins!

Everyone suddenly realized, no wonder the regiment commander was so anxious, willing to take risks, and even broke into the territory of the Steelmane Empire.

Everyone in the Federation understands what it means to be a super-civilization relic, and as long as they obtain one or two super technologies, or a few rare things, they can be exchanged for astronomical wealth. If it is done properly, the technology obtained can be used to promote and establish a company, and it may not take a few years to become a super consortium and promote the technological leap of the entire federation!

All of a sudden, the people on the bridge were breathing a little fast.

On the contrary, Zhuang Xiaolin was not too excited, and said lightly: "I said, it is suspected of being a super civilization, and it cannot be confirmed yet." Don't forget, the Orion Nebula is only a few million years old, which is shorter than the history of the Galactic Empire, how can there be a super civilization? ”

"The regimental commander has a point." Deputy Head Raven immediately reacted, the super civilization hidden in the diffuse nebula was indeed too strange, and it seemed a little unreasonable.

You must know that the history of the Galactic Empire is more than 10 million years, and it cannot be called a super civilization.

But even if it is not a super civilization, as long as it is a civilization relic, it will definitely have a lot of gains, and it is worth the risk of the mercenary group.

Zhuang Xiaolin continued: "This private expedition ship used to have a personal relationship with me, so it sent me a rescue message, but I can't guarantee whether they have asked others for help, so we must hurry up and not delay any longer. ”

"I see, Captain."

The pilot no longer hesitated, modified the course according to the coordinates of the star map, and prepared to enter the faster-than-light voyage. Tempted by huge interests, no one raised any objections.

Ten minutes later, the battleship lost a trace in space.