Chapter 358 - 355: Supreme Directive

The date was still January 28, 2023.

Deep beneath the surface of the vast and desolate Southern Ocean, within the region known as the Astronaut Sea, five submarines sailed in silence.

These five nuclear submarines were the Pacific-class Battleship—the fifth ship of its class, the *Southern Ocean*; the Super Luzon-class *Madah*; and Orca-class submarines 34, 35, and 36.

The captain of the *Southern Ocean*, Carlos Don Quixote, also served as the commander of this special task force. The fleet's internal affairs officer was Li Xin, and the fleet's psychological counselor was Wu Yongxing.

Carlos studied the nautical chart. They were currently in the Astronaut Sea of the Southern Ocean, less than 172 kilometers from Endeby Land in Antarctica.

They had been submerged ever since resupplying at a secret submarine base on the southern side of Sumatra Island in Southeast Asia.

"Report. Penguin Station in Kathy Bay is sending us an inquiry signal," the communications officer reported, interrupting Carlos's thoughts.

"Reply to them. Say we will arrive at Kathy Bay in five hours."

"Yes, sir."

The magnetic field radar displayed a variety of surrounding magnetic signals, which were integrated by the supercomputer's magnetic field imaging system into a three-dimensional image.

Besides their five submarines, there were few signals of man-made objects on the seabed. On the surface, however, numerous vessels were busy fishing for krill.

As it was summer in the Southern Hemisphere, ships from Kangaroo Country and New Zealand would fish for seafood in the Southern Ocean near Antarctica.

Of course, scattered across the vast expanse of the Southern Ocean, a few dozen fishing boats still made the area seem utterly deserted.

Homo Sapiens Company had two research stations in Antarctica: Penguin Station, located inside Kathy Bay in Endeby Land, and Blue Whale Station, on Mill Island near Queen Mary Land.

After five and a half hours of submerged travel, they finally entered Kathy Bay.

However, the task force did not surface. Instead, it followed a hidden trench into a massive undersea tunnel.

This undersea tunnel had a radius of 240 meters. It was an enormous project completed by the staff of Penguin Station, who had spent over half a year digging it by using bacterial corrosion technology to eat away at the rock strata.

To prevent the entrance from being discovered, a special type of composite, genetically engineered seaweed had been created to form a rock-like mimetic layer over the opening.

The seaweed layer was now open, and the massive *Southern Ocean* slowly cruised inside.

The tunnel was located on the continental shelf, at an average depth of 350 to 400 meters. A thick glacier lay above it, effectively blocking entry for ordinary civilian vessels.

After traversing the 6.3-kilometer-long undersea tunnel, the *Southern Ocean* finally reached its destination: a large submarine port.

The port had 20 berths, two of which could accommodate 100,000-ton class vessels.

After surfacing, the *Southern Ocean* carefully adjusted its position in the port's waters to allow for a quick dive upon departure.

Over an hour later, the other four submarines also surfaced one by one and docked at their respective berths.

Base Commander Fang Zhan was waiting on the dock.

"Carlos, welcome to the Antarctic Branch."

Carlos saluted, then smiled and shook his head. "The honor is mine."

Li Xin, who had been transferred over to serve as the Director of the Antarctic Branch's Internal Affairs Department, and Wu Yongxing, the branch's psychological counselor, also greeted Fang Zhan.

Suddenly, they all fell silent, their expressions solemn as they watched the cargo bay doors of the *Southern Ocean*.

A special Life Support Pod was being carefully unloaded by soldiers. The pod's glass window was covered.

Fang Zhan turned his head and asked in a low voice, "Is that the 'item' from the mission?"

"Yes," Carlos nodded.

"I'll go and get this Life Support Pod settled then."

The psychological counselor, Wu Yongxing, followed him.

Soon, escorted by Fang Zhan, Wu Yongxing, and their team, the Life Support Pod was brought to a special room deep within the base.

Several technicians checked the wiring and various backup systems.

Wu Yongxing asked, "What's the security level here?"

"Class A-1. As long as it doesn't take a direct hit from a bunker-buster hydrogen bomb, you can rest easy in here even if a full-scale nuclear war breaks out outside," Fang Zhan replied directly.

But Wu Yongxing shook his head. "We need to prepare several more sets of backup power supplies and backup Life Support Pods. Also, one safe room isn't enough. This is critical to whether the Company can continue to exist."

"One isn't enough? But even if we build more, we can still only use one at a time."

Wu Yongxing explained his idea, "We can do this: as the base expands, we should position the safe rooms along the subway line. That way, if a problem occurs in one safe room, we can quickly transfer the Life Support Pod to another."

'Is that so...?' Fang Zhan thought for a moment before finally nodding. "Alright. I'll have the design team adjust the construction plans for each area in a few days."

Wu Yongxing reminded him, "Remember, the entire purpose of this base is to serve that Life Support Pod. Everything else must be secondary."

"Yes, I will definitely urge the design team to make the changes."

Wu Yongxing turned his head and looked at the Life Support Pod, now connected to the safe room's power supply. His eyes filled with fanaticism. He immediately put his hands together and gave a slight bow.

After one last check, the group exited the safe room.

The safe room's super-alloy door slowly sealed shut.

Only three people had the authority to open this safe room: Fang Zhan, Wu Yongxing, and the leader of the maintenance team.

「In the base commander's conference room.」

Fang Zhan gave everyone a brief overview of the base's situation. "Our base currently has three 50-megawatt thorium-based molten salt nuclear reactors. Two are operational, and one is on standby."

"The base has 3,827 personnel, consisting mainly of young families. Our food supply can support the daily needs of 20,000 people."

"In terms of armament, we are equipped with 5,000 sets of exoskeleton armor and 3,000 sets of work-type exoskeletons. We can produce our own small arms and ammunition."

"Regarding civilian life, we have already built a hospital, a school, and various recreational facilities..."

Carlos looked through the base's profile. "Our task force will be permanently stationed at the Antarctic Branch from now on, so we need to add our 7,252 personnel to the count. The food production lines should be expanded."

Li Xin, who was in charge of internal affairs, did a quick calculation. "Considering future personnel increases and accounting for contingencies, the base's food production must be able to support 100,000 people."

He continued, "Additionally, all facilities must have secure backups and be decentralized to prevent a problem in one area from shutting down the entire base."

Carlos added, "We should also prepare several more emergency escape routes. No one can predict what the future holds."

No one else had any objections to this.

After all, the base in Antarctica was established for the very purpose of restarting human civilization after the end of the world.

Otherwise, Homo Sapiens Company wouldn't have gone to such great lengths to build such a massive underground base in a desolate region like Antarctica.

The people selected to come here were all married young adults, each carefully chosen to ensure that even if this was the last base remaining, they could still repopulate and create a healthy new generation.

All the facilities in the base were designed with the feature of rapid replication.

At the same time, the base also needed to be highly self-sufficient, requiring no external supply of resources.

This was thanks to a series of practices previously carried out by Homo Sapiens Company at its Assam Branch, which had perfected various underground survival techniques and technologies for achieving self-sufficiency in an isolated environment.