Juggernaut: Rise of the Zerg

Chapter 196 A "Big Bang"

The Zerg's sphere of influence has expanded to four star systems, and they still haven't encountered any life.It was as if in the universe, except for Ori, everything was dead silent.

But that's clearly not the case, at least the Octopus can attest to.

The birth of life requires too many coincidences. The Zerg is definitely not alone. Among the trillions of stars, there must be some lucky ones who can obtain the unique external conditions like the lizard people. A stroke of luck finally ignited the spark of civilization.

What kind of environment is around the swarm, what kind of civilization exists, all of this is unknown.

Zero once touched the idea of ​​sending the Zerg version of the "Voyager" as a pioneer to explore the universe, but then quietly gave up.

Because for the Zerg, they can be colonized by exploring, and there is no need to waste that time.

Among the colonization teams released in the first round, only the team heading to the Plov galaxy 9.1 light-years away is still on the way.

At the moment when other teams have launched vigorous colonial activities, they still need a full 100 years of journey to their destination.

However, even so, Zero has already begun to plan for the next round of expansion.

Today, the Zerg space unit can reach a maximum speed of [-]% of the speed of light using stellar energy. This is also the highest speed that Sass can currently allow the Zerg to achieve.

If a team is sent from the three star systems that have already begun to colonize to the nearest galaxy, there will be more than double-digit galaxies within [-] light-years.

For these unknown stars, Zerg has limited knowledge and can only infer through rough observations, but this method is actually not very reliable.

For example, the planets hidden under the light of stars in the Heli galaxy, before the Zerg arrived there, Zero never thought that it could exist stably in such an environment.

A long time ago, Zero began to number every star that the Zerg could observe exactly in the starry sky. The so-called exact observation naturally refers to being able to determine the type of star.

In the dark night sky, it's not just the stars that shine. Some of the light may have come from millions of years ago, and it may have come from a distant star field!
Regarding the cosmic environment in which he is currently located, the Octopus also judges that he should be in a spiral galaxy with a diameter of about 15 light-years by observing other star fields in the universe and combining the common characteristics of the star field he is in. Among them, and located outside the center of one of the cantilevers.

Naturally, Ori, who is only fifty light-years away from the octopus parent galaxy Krichtel, is also within this area.

Determining one's own position is crucial to the development of civilization. Unfortunately, when one is in it, it is always difficult to see the whole picture, and one can only make rough estimates. Fortunately, at least the nearby stars are basically Observable.

When the Zerg started the interstellar voyage, everything went on the fast track.

Traveling in the universe at 17% of the speed of light, it only takes less than [-] years to travel a light year. Before Sass and Dagos pushed nuclear energy research to a controllable level, this may be the Zerg's in the universe. The maximum speed of sailing between.

Therefore, Zero quietly changed his colonial thinking, and this development is still too slow.

The insect swarm that went to the only planet in the Heli galaxy to carry out colonization activities, used the abundant geothermal energy on the planet to turn the resources available on the surface of the entire planet into space units at the fastest speed, and then went all out Start accumulating energy for their long voyages.

Yes, in this round of colonization activities, Zero decided to abandon the plan to prioritize the development of colonized planets, and instead perform the interstellar enclosure mission.

That is, after the Zerg colony team arrives in the new star field and completes the basic exploration, it will first accumulate resources, send a small number of space units to the new star system within ten light years, and then develop itself.

This decision is quite bold, almost completely opposite to Zero's steady decision when he launched the first round of colonization activities in the Ori galaxy.

However, referring to the process of the first round of the interstellar colonization plan, after careful consideration, he thinks it’s okay to be bold, and the risk is still within the controllable range.

Compared with the powerful threats that may be encountered, accelerating the colonization activities will not make the swarm more dangerous, and may make the existence of the zero-sum zerg safer.

A larger area means that the Zergs are everywhere, and as long as they survive, the Zergs will not perish.

If it is really that unfortunate to encounter a civilization or other threat that is powerful enough to destroy the Zerg, it is okay to start an escape plan.

Compared with the benefits, this risk is nothing, but the investment in time may make Zero feel a little uncomfortable.

However, he believes that Sass and Dagus, as well as the many brain worms who joined the Zerg scientific research team in the future, will one day improve the Zerg's spaceflight capability again, or find a more developed civilization and steal knowledge and skills from them .

Although it is a big taboo to change the order from day to day, more than 200 years have passed, even if the furthest colonial team has not reached the goal, it is not considered to be a change from day to day.

What's more, during the first round of colonization, Zero basically figured out the environment in the void of the universe. Generally speaking, it was almost the same as expected before, and did not encounter any unpredictable dangers, and everything seemed very ordinary .

This place is indeed dead, except for the meteorite belt, which has been drifting randomly here since the birth of the universe and has no laws of existence at all. It can be said that it is very rare, there is only eternal silence and darkness.

The swarm did not encounter the light brought by the supernova explosion during this process, nor did they encounter the cosmic event of the black hole colliding. This is the ordinary cosmic void. Except for the darkness, most of the time, what is here? nor.

Therefore, there is a basis for early exploration to speed up the expansion, even if it is pitifully small.

I don't know when the brain worms will be able to come up with a deterministic answer in space navigation, so Zero prepares to start commanding the worm swarm to conduct enclosure movements.

As for Viser, he is responsible for presiding over the overall situation, developing and developing the galaxies occupied by Zero and the swarm according to the plan.

The era of blooming on all sides will finally come.

...........................

After the first four star systems from which the colonization team was sent, in order to more conveniently distinguish the numerous stars, they were numbered zero.

To put it simply, it is from the four star systems closest to Ori, and they send colonization teams to directly occupy them, and they are numbered A-001. For a more detailed distinction, the starting point, namely HA-001, is added. It represents the first round of colonized galaxies starting from Hurley. Similarly, there will also be TA-001, SA-002, etc., which represent the first round of the first round of colonization from the Torrell galaxy and the first colonization by the The first round of colonization from the Sommer system.

If there is no significance, zero will no longer name them, and they will be replaced by numbers.

According to observations, there may be more than 500 billion stars on the cantilever where the Zerg is located. If you name them one by one, even if Zero is persistent in naming, he will always be at a loss for words.

The numbering is different, the numbers are endless, if it is not possible, just create another set of numbers.

In addition, since the numbering of the stars has already begun, zero can be regarded as a whim, and they are determined to record the time system of the entire Zerg according to Ori's revolution year.

He counted the year when Sass was born on Island No. 635 as the first year of the Zerg, and then accumulated successively until the establishment of the first alien system colony, Heli, which was [-] years of the Zerg.

So far, a crude record system covering time and space was born.This system does not have much practical significance for ordinary Zerg units, or even Cerebral Worms. Even without these codes and numbers, Cerebral Worms can distinguish every galaxy that the Zerg Swarm has visited and remember every year.

With the help of the will of the hive, this is not difficult.

But for Zero, who was born as an individual of intelligent civilization, this is quite important.Even though these codes and numbers appear crude and simple, in His eyes, they represent proof of existence.

In 662, three equally weak colonial fleets set off from Heli and took the lead in launching the second round of interstellar colony enclosures. Afterwards, the Sommer and Torrell galaxies also successively dispatched many colony squads, entering the dark world once again. Deep space.

Then, the Zerg in these three galaxies really started their own era of great development, resources and energy began to accumulate, and a large number of Zerg units began to multiply.

The Dyson sphere project was put on the agenda in the new galaxy, and the three galaxies began to change with each passing day.

In 704, the Plov colonial fleet arrived at the destination, and the huge swarm quickly launched exploration and colonization activities.

This is the last galaxy in the first round of galaxy colonization, and it is also the most special one.

Because according to the records and reports of the octopus people, there is a frozen planet here, and there is a probability of life.

The swarm quickly found this frozen planet. While everything was going according to the established plan, a group of swarms landed on the planet first while the space base was still under construction.

There are no signs of civilization activities in the galaxy, and no artificial satellites have been found in the extraterrestrial space, which means that even if there is life here, there is no overly developed civilization.

In the first step of exploring the surface of the planet, the swarm found nothing. This seemed to be an ordinary dead planet, except for the atmosphere, there was only a thick layer of ice.

This represents an extremely large water resource, and it may indeed provide the soil for life to survive. Unfortunately, it is too far away from the stars.

It is worth noting that there are peaks on its surface, which means that at least in the past, there has been intense geological activity on it, that is to say, it has a hot and active heart.

And that means geonuclear energy.

So the Zerg established a base on the spot and began to develop on this planet as before.

Even the ice covering almost the whole world can't prevent them from developing here. According to Zero's judgment, it is unlikely that there is a civilization that has developed to a high level. Even if there is, the probability is not much different from that of the lizard people. For For the Zerg, there is no threat at all.

Therefore, the first colonized planet in the Plov galaxy was born, and the entire galaxy began to be ruled by the Zerg.

Only 12 years later, that is, in 716, four alien system colonization teams dispatched by Prov set off. At this point, the first round of the Zerg's star system colonization activities began to enter a period of full-scale development.

The research on SARS and Dagos has been going on for 135 years.

Nuclear energy, for the Zerg race, is indeed not easy to achieve. Even after so long, even if it is just nuclear fission, the power of three brain worms is gathered, and they still cannot be completely conquered.

The difficulty lies in thermal neutrons, tiny particles that exist in atomic nuclei, and until now Sass has not been able to find a way to restrain them.

Imitating the octopus is a way of thinking, and it has always been the main direction of Sass. After all, there are precedents before, which can reduce a lot of difficulty.

Over the years, there has been some progress, at least in the capture of decaying neutrons in nature.However, after bombarding and decaying elements, after the research progressed to a certain level, it gradually began to make no progress.

I don't know how many bugs with special functions have been produced, and some of them can no longer be called bugs, because they are even a living machine!

However, even so, it has not been able to achieve results.

For hundreds of years, countless problems have plagued the cerebrates, many of which have been overcome a little bit, but in the most critical steps, progress is still slow.

And it was at this point in time that the Zerg found the primitive civilization hidden under the ice layer on the fourth planet of the Prov galaxy, that is, the frozen planet.

There is life here, it was established shortly after the swarm landed.When they broke through the surface ice and headed all the way to the earth's core, many small lives appeared in front of them.

At first, Zero thought that they were just like planet No. [-] in the Ori system, with only a few creatures and no conditions for the birth of intelligent life, but shortly thereafter, a huge ice layer was lifted by the swarm , a strange tribe with tens of thousands of individuals appeared in front of the Zerg.

Speaking of strangeness, it is actually not that special. In the entire universe, every species can be said to be special. It is nothing more than a strange appearance, but they are actually ordinary.

From Zero's point of view, this primitive civilized individual hidden under the ice layer is like an elf made of ice crystals, crystal clear. From the perspective of human aesthetics, they seem to be a little cute.

It's a pity that the Zerg don't know any aesthetics and pity. Apart from being able to move quickly in the ice, they don't show the power to make the Zerg afraid, and they don't have the ability to spit out ice pucks like in myths and legends. Due to the particularity of the environment, they are just ordinary carbon-based life forms.

Under the guidance of Visser, the Zerg began to hatch surface troops in a targeted manner, and began to clear up this primitive civilization on a global scale.

This is undoubtedly an unwarranted disaster for this group of little things, but it is indeed necessary for the Zerg.

After the extinction of the two previous civilizations, Zero already had some guesses about the technological explosion that followed the Zerg. After hundreds of years of slow development, Zero also wanted to verify his guesses again.

Even if the first two times were coincidental, it doesn't matter, the left and right are just some recyclable resources. In the space age, it is insignificant to the Zerg.

And this is the only value of this strange primitive civilization to the Zerg.

It didn't take much energy for the swarm to kill this group of cuties.Today's Zerg and the Lizardman above Ori can be said to be two races when they are facing each other. Whether it is hatching speed or individual strength, they can easily reach the level of crushing.

Under this premise, these small alien lives had no ability to resist, and they were completely wiped out in just one year.

"Coincidentally", five years later, a "loud noise" exploded at the Zerg "Moon" base in the Ori galaxy.

Of course, there are not so many coincidences in this world, and there will be no loud noises in the universe lacking a transmission medium. There are only scattered biological structures and clusters of sparks.

After all, Dagus did a stupid thing, because it actually detonated the Zerg's first real biological nuclear bomb in the Zerg base.

Fortunately, because of the danger of the experiment, Zero insisted on putting this research on the "Moon" base even if it had not been successful. Otherwise, Dagus would very likely kill himself and all the cerebrates. send away.

However, it cannot be blamed for this. This research has been stuck on the last step of neutron bombardment for the past few decades. Variety!
The chain reaction had already occurred within a very short period of time, and before they could react, the violent flames had already exploded above the orbit of the "moon".

Over the years, with the development of the swarm, the orbital base has become a space junk at this moment, including a large amount of energy and nuclear materials stored in it, all of which have become victims of the explosion. "The behemoth that has been in orbit for hundreds of years has become history today.

However, compared to the results, what is this loss?

The core energy of the entire "moon" is about to be drained by the swarm, and it is also rapidly entering the countdown of life. There is nothing to miss here. Now that the system energy is extremely abundant, it is not difficult to rebuild.

But what this silent "loud noise" brought to the Zerg was nuclear fission!

Driven by Zerg's biological technology, it has been conquered to the last step. After hundreds of years, this technology has finally been turned into reality again in the hands of Zerg.

The nuclear fission reaction can convert nuclear energy into thermal energy, and in terms of the application of thermal energy, the Zerg has long had a mature solution.

Releasing the most energy with the smallest mass has always been the pursuit of the Zerg.Therefore, if it is used in space travel, perhaps the space speed that was originally tending to the upper limit will be broken again.

Of course, it will take some time to explore from nuclear explosion to controllable output of nuclear energy, but there is no natural barrier that hinders the swarm.

In addition, the "nuclear bomb" blaster transformed from the Zerg's characteristic biotechnology will also be an important attack method for the Zerg in space in the future.

And the inexplicable occurrence of the fission reaction clearly told Zero that the guess about civilization was true.

(End of this chapter)