Age of Cosmic Exploration Chapter 70

"There are so many things waiting to be done!"

After the big plant harvest, with the addition of so many supplies, the Hope was over the suggested warp weight limit. In fact, if the Hope were to attempt a warp right now, the fate awaiting it would be instant explosion.

However, these additional supplies were necessary for survival of the Hope. They would allow the Hope 30 more years of survival in space without the need of another restock. That number was not one to be scoffed at; that was already half of a lifetime.

Therefore, the upgrade on the Hope must be completed to accommodate these extra loads. With an update on the ship's energy circuit, not only could they support these loads, they could also space warp without fear of its dangerous side-effects anymore.

With that goal in mind, after the plants were cleared out of the cavern, architects and engineers started drawing up a layout for the underground base. Within two months, they planned to finish fitting the base with necessary life support systems like an anti-gravitational system, indoor lightning, and an air recycling system.

The whole series of projects was first drafted by experts and architects, then it was discussed by the House of Representatives before being sent to Yao Yuan to be approved.

The procedures were extremely streamlined. The addition of a Hall of Innovation and Communications had indeed increased the overall efficiency on the Hope. This was because the workers here were all experts in the field, and this included Yao Yuan's new secretary…

Yao Yuan's secretary, a strawberry blonde with a sparkling resume who happened to also have a voluptuous figure and a penchant for wearing black lace during work had attracted many a meaningful stare from other Black Star Unit members when they came for their appointments with Yao Yuan. Yao Yuan was initially reluctant to hire her due to obvious reasons, but he caved due to her impressive resume. His decision had raised a few suggestive eyebrows within his close circle of friends.

There were five candidates up for the secretary post. Two of them were public servants while the other three were international companies' secretaries. Before affirming the appointee, Yao Yuan had a face-to-face interview with all five of them.

At the end of the interview, it was obvious that Barbie Isle, who had a mastery of five languages, a sharp mind, broad knowledge, especially in fields of natural science, and who also happened to be a survivor of Virus X, was the best candidate.

The optics aside, Yao Yuan had to choose her for the job. And his choice was validated because Barbie has proven to be a very capable secretary.

Other than Barbie, other personnel in Hall of Innovation and Communications were experts at their job. As a middleman between Yao Yuan and the rest of the Hope, this hall had made life a lot easier for Yao Yuan. He even had time to enjoy a daily meal at the Barracks' Restaurant and visit the residential tenements once in a while. These were things that he didn't have time to do before.

Nevertheless, with the advent of the new underground base, Yao Yuan returned once more to his busy schedule.

First, there was the engine room proposal for radioactive resources collection. They suggested using radiation detection devices to harvest these deposits instead of the alien plant because the plant would directly ingest the valuable deposits. This meant that collection had to be done manually, the traditional mining way.

Therefore, a mining party had to be formed. It would consist of engineers and technical workers to help transport the yield and soldiers to guard it. Preparations needed to be made for supply lines, spacesuits, gas masks, machinery, etc…

When this workforce was assembling, representatives from the Workshop came with a proposal to build a factory that specialized in manufacturing spare and fine parts…

According to their inventory, the parts they had brought from Earth had been exhausted, especially after constructing the fleet of mining airships.

Even though there were already multiple forges and factories on the Hope, they only handled the manufacturing of factory-scale products. These included furniture, machine parts, automobiles, and the likes. To prevent overload, the fine parts assembly line was jettisoned during departure.

This situation needed to be fixed because the Hope currently had no spare parts available for emergency replacements.

Therefore, the Hall of Innovation and Communication had an emergency meeting to discuss this issue with pertinent engineers and experts, and to draft a budget…

Before this issue would reach a conclusion though, representatives from the Barracks came with their report.

The Barracks wanted to build more shuttles, not the flimsy ones like the mining airships, but ones replicating the Hope's original shuttles, the ones with an anti-gravitational system, a long term homeostatic system, and an engine powerful enough to shoot through a planet's atmosphere.

The Barracks asked for five such shuttles to be built. The reason given was because the Hope needed a dedicated shuttle fleet to handle delicate situations that were too unwieldy for the Hope, situations like incoming meteorite rain and future planet invasion or defense. Having these shuttles would allow the Barracks to have more tactical options. Furthermore, they wanted the shuttles to be equipped with missiles to increase their combat capability.

Yao Yuan initially thought that the proposal was preposterous, but after giving it some thought, he found that there was validity behind it. Even the Academy said that they were prone to stray asteroids idling outside the cluster, and having a shuttle fleet with missiles would resolve that worry. Plus, who knows what else they might encounter in the wondrous cosmos…

As so, Yao Yuan launched another meeting with another set of experts. After double-checking the Hope's store of missiles and their combat ability, that proposal was accepted as well, but the five shuttles had been reduced to three…

Right after that, another report came Yao Yuan's way and it was from the agricultural committee…

Ever since the introduction of currency, the citizens' buying capability had seen a tremendous increase. This led to a high demand for food items like meat, eggs, and dairy products, so the Hope was running dangerously low on food. The biomes, with their limited fields of wheat, potatoes, corn, and vegetables, weren't big enough to feed 120000 people.

The report suggested either increase the price for these items or finds a new spot for plantation and farming.

And this new spot suggested by the committee was equally preposterous…

They suggested adding an additional cabin on the seventh level, using the biomes as its foundation.

The Hope's architectural structure was a predesigned marvel that was built to maintain a perfect balance throughout the ship during space travel. It couldn't afford any additional attachments, or the delicate balance could be destroyed, which would in turn lead to disastrous result.

Therefore, the committee's report came with a solution that would bypass that limitation. They wanted an external cabin because during flight, it would be attached to the biomes but be supported by zero gravity space, so it would not affect the Hope's sense of balance. During landing or warp, the seventh level could be brought within the Hope because the balance wouldn't matter then.

Once more, Yao Yuan was persuaded because the other option would be to introduce a price hike. That would decrease the morale on the Hope and that was totally undesirable.

Therefore, at the end of a long to-do list, construction of an external cabin was added…

Next, a second recruitment was conducted to supply workforce to all of these projects. The wage had increased from the previous 300 H-coins to 400.

The renaissance of the last human community that everyone was hoping for seemingly had arrived…

Chapter end