In July 2076, after half a year of construction, the perfection of the Hope Star Base has been improved, not only the water and energy problems have been alleviated, but even the construction of the 400,000-square-meter airport has been completed, and it can be used at any time.

So as more construction work was transferred to unmanned units, the advance team members who were born with adventurous genes became active again, wanting to see the outside world, no longer within 100 kilometers, but at least 1,000 kilometers, 10,000 kilometers, and even exploring the world, remembering that the perimeter of the Hope Star is 65,000 kilometers.

"Settle on this place first!" Qiao Canal examines the map of Hope Star, the 19,000-kilometer diameter brings a vast explorable area, there is no ocean, all of them are composed of bare mountains, hills, canyons and plains, even if it is technological progress, if you want to explore it all, you don't know how much time, so you have to choose.

"A sea of dust at the equator?" The team members looked at the aerial photos and muttered, "What's the temperature like there?" Is there any value to explore? ”

The temperature is about 200 degrees Celsius on average, which is slightly hotter than ours..."Qiao Canal recalled the data, "However, we are also staying in the moon-level spaceship, but we are not going on foot, and in a short time, we still have a way to withstand the scorching heat." ”

"The reason why we chose there was because the aerial footage shows that there have been several anomalous geological changes in the area, which don't look like meteorological or geological activity at all, but maybe some alien life."

"Life? True or fake? There is not even organic matter, does it really allow us to discover life? Isn't it more important for us to discover mineral deposits? ”

"There are only 50 of us, and the unmanned units managed by Miss Wuyue have just exceeded 10,000 units, and it will take hundreds of years just to consume the mineral deposits within 100 kilometers around us, so the mineral deposits are not a critical issue."

"Alien creatures are different... Except for the unknown, the origin of which has not yet been clarified. Since the establishment of the East Galaxy Company, we have not found alien creatures on any planet, and if we do, it will be a big discovery, even if the exploration of Centaur Alpha is generally a loss, we can still use it to regain some prestige. ”

Hear the commentary of the Joe Canal. The team members became intrigued, and then asked, "So, what is the probability of discovering alien life?" ”

"There is about a 2% probability of discovering alien life on the Hope Star, and a 0.1% probability of discovering intelligent life, as for life beyond humans, it is obviously impossible, and if there is, it will definitely be exposed when we land."

"It's a pitiful probability, but. Since we haven't made discoveries on Mars, Ganymede, Ganymede, Titan... If there really is other life in the universe, it will be almost time. ”

All the team members agreed, and Joe Canal happily arranged the exploration plan, which would take at least 3 months this time, and most of the advance team members would participate. There are a few left, so you have to make careful arrangements.

10 days later. The 30-member expedition team set off on a moon-class spaceship, slowly rising into the air under the constraints of huge gravity, that is, maintaining a speed of Mach 5 and flying fast, it is impossible to imagine that without the spaceship, they would want to climb over the mountains and mountains under their feet. How much time it takes to get through the layers of obstacles.

Half a day later, they arrived at the equator of their destination, first looking for a relatively safe and shady place to avoid the moon-class spacecraft from being baked, and then drove the engineering truck to dig out the underground space and build a temporary camp step by step.

The top floor of the underground space is covered with a metal film that is resistant to high temperatures. Along the more than 10-meter-long corridor, you can enter a camp that can accommodate dozens of people to rest, and even includes a simple communication station to the outside, which can keep in touch with the base.

The team members gathered around Qiao Canal and heard him say: "After the preliminary preparations are completed, there is no way to rely on spacecraft and unmanned units anymore, but on our own." “

"The length of the sea of dust is 450 kilometers from north to south, 350 kilometers from east to west, with a total area of about 150,000 square kilometers, the surface soil is soft, the density does not exceed 2.5 tons / cubic meter, and it extends to a depth of 500 meters underground.

"As for what to explore, first of all, there are 5 points that have been found in satellite aerial photography, and 11 geological key points found according to alien geology and deep geological exploration equipment, I will first divide you into 6 groups, usually leave a team to be responsible for taking care of the camp and collecting materials, and the rest of the teams will go to the above points to explore one by one."

1 day later, Joe Canal took the group to the first point.

It was the morning, and the strong light was shining overhead, making people dizzy and distracted from work, so everyone had to hurry up and use the excavation truck to collect rock samples and find a relatively comfortable place to complete the analysis and rest.

"Wow, that's cool!" In a hidden underground space, it seems that due to the special geological structure, the temperature under the sea of dust drops extremely quickly, and at 20 meters underground, the surrounding temperature instantly drops to 50 degrees Celsius, which makes everyone feel extremely comfortable. If you add the cold drink you brought with you at this moment, as the cold liquid enters the stomach along the esophagus, it transmits all the cold air, causing muscle contractions until it spreads all over the body, and the pleasure is indescribable.

On the other side of the space, two employees with experimental analysis foundations are busy back and forth on the experimental bench next to them, analyzing layer by layer of soil samples one by one, and then combining the information obtained by other teams and the information captured by satellite aerial photography.

It didn't take long for a team member to understand the specific elemental composition of the dust sea, its surface is rich in a considerable amount of zinc and copper, and if you go 100 meters underground, it will be very easy to find a lot of discrete high-quality rich mineral deposits, which is simply a natural mineral cornucopia.

If the search for alien life and the discovery of mineral deposits are additional work, the results of the analysis of another team member are of concern to many people.

He found some strange features in the composition of the soil, especially the rich mineral deposits, most of which showed a regular clumpy structure, so they did not seem to be naturally generated, and may be related to alien life.

At the same time, one after another, as the team members came to the anomaly in person, more useful information was exposed, just as Qiao Canal guessed, there might really be something under this place called the Sea of Dust, otherwise it would be impossible to explain what they had discovered so far.

"Very good, it looks like we're getting closer and closer to the goal, guys, with a little more effort, we might find it." (To be continued.) )

PS: The first update of the new year, please ask for everyone's recommendation and monthly pass