Chapter 1396 - 453: The Pitch-Black Sea Region

Chapter 1396: Chapter 453: The Pitch-Black Sea Region

The ocean, covering 71% of the Earth’s surface, harbors countless resources.

Minerals, oil, natural gas, combustible ice, biological...

Its quantity and quality are far beyond what the land where little skinny monkeys live can compare to.

But as the saying goes, a spendthrift doesn’t care about selling his ancestor’s land, this territory is even ownerless, so there’s no limit to exploiting it.

There are countless instances of violent resource exploitation, blowing up a hundred dollars’ worth for a dollar is routine practice, especially when attacking a rival company’s resource point, it’s often preferred to destroy it rather than let you exploit it normally.

Leaking oil, pouring nuclear waste, and household waste discharged by coastal cities have caused large-scale extinction of marine life worldwide.

The azure sea surface has turned pitch black, coastal zones have become death zones, emitting a putrid stench of decay day and night, with migratory birds nearly extinct.

Even reaching this point is not the end; to prevent attacks from enemy naval fleets and submarines on one’s own maritime territory, someone suggested placing intelligent automated factories in the ocean, letting robots independently excavate resources on the seabed and mass-produce intelligent mines to repel enemies.

Thus, the strategic plan proposed by the brilliant minds was approved by the genius government.

They packaged up an entire mine production line and dumped it onto the seabed, allowing artificial intelligence to control the mine production line while simultaneously deploying a massive reserve aimed at creating an impenetrable underwater defense network.

More mines than they dropped in Vietnam.

These smart mines aren’t the big lumps of iron from WWII that wait for you to ram into them, but underwater missiles equipped with quality control chips and engines.

This brainstroke of an operation is something a normal person could never learn in a lifetime. They learn the technology only to end up harming themselves.

Only fifty years ago was truly a mystical era, the entire world was degenerating at an incredible speed.

I’ve even thought of a novel title for it: [The Worldwide Moral Baseline Drops Ten Thousandfold, Only I Remain Unchanged]

That era entirely deserves to be called a time of a human-like galaxy’s brilliance.

On the day of the network collapse, when the smart mine controlling AI went mad under the impact of data waves and broke away from military control, only then did people realize what a foolish thing they’d done.

The ocean was already filled with out-of-control intelligent mines, indiscriminately attacking ships no matter friend or foe, exploding upon sight.

Their numbers have far exceeded the limits humans can manage, with the navy being the first to suffer.

The aircraft carriers of the United States were sunk by the AI.

What a disaster!

The ocean has since completely slipped out of human control, with only coastal zones still where low-draft boats can operate; venture near the deep sea and you’ll suffer, as those smart mines even have central sonar.

Evil begets evil; goodness begets goodness; the results may delay, but they will arrive.

The disastrous consequences of destroying the ocean ultimately still end up consumed by humanity themselves.

After fifty years of clandestine AI development, no one knows how many mines are under the sea today, or if there’s anything else besides mines.

It’s a known fact that among all war weapons, the weakest part is always humans. If humans are disregarded, many weapons’ metrics could be made even more absurd and exaggerated.

Even to this day, humanity, or maybe something dirty besides humanity, is once again setting its sights beneath the ocean’s surface.

[Wildman: Anyone with experience in underwater operations, type 1, there’s an important task to delegate.]

[Woodworker: I’ve played Diver Dave, Deep Sea Adventure, and Subnautica, do they count?]

[Wildman: Have you gone underwater?]

[Woodworker: Does learning freestyle swimming in a bathhouse count?]

[Wildman: Scram, scram. Disturbers, keep out, this is serious business.]

Even at Tokyo University, ocean underwater operations are quite rare.

The vast majority of people’s understanding of the ocean mostly comes from SpongeBob and various online sea bloggers; even maritime sailors typically don’t go underwater, as the turbulence from just the vessel’s movement could drag someone into the water and drown them.

Especially the world beneath thirty meters below the sea surface is no longer a realm that normal diving can reach, the pressurized atmosphere multiple times stronger would make one expel all their air from the chest and possibly burst their lungs; even professional divers typically wouldn’t delve into such a world.

But with numbers come diverse abilities.

The player community is varied, and they truly found a player with saturation diving and seabed operation experience, ID: Endless.

His appearance is unique, customizing himself with an Agent Smith face from the Matrix, suit, sunglasses, Mediterranean style, quite fitting.

[Wildman: What do you work on, master?]

[Endless: Maintaining underwater cables, currently employed. Took leave two months ago, wanted to try gaming, and lucked into a slot.]

[Commander-in-Chief: Maintaining underwater cables? That’s a badass job, one of the most dangerous professions worldwide. The salary must be high, right? I’ve heard it’s tens of thousands per month.]

[Endless: Haha, only thirty-five thousand.]

Their line of work might be considered the pinnacle among regular salary workers globally, but not many are fortunate enough to earn this money; their psychological and physical qualities must be exceptional, otherwise underwater work equals descending into Hell.

However, the cyber world’s underwater cables don’t require maintenance anymore, as due to the network crash, continents can only use local area networks and satellite communications, so nobody cares if the underwater cables are maintained.

Yet players did encounter Endless, the cyber AI located in Antarctica in the old online world.