254 Greeting a Visitor (1/2)
Chen Mu looked at the big pile of materials in front of him, as well as the countless pieces of equipment, and felt helplessly excited. Those materials would be difficult to buy on the market. If it weren't for the fatty's cooperation, he wouldn't have even been able to imagine them.
The quantity of materials was more than he had seen the last time at the Yang Clan Auction House, and they filled three entire small storerooms. The equipment the fatty had sent over was just as valuable, with quite a few items he had never seen. All of that equipment couldn't be less than several hundred million, which was a pretty serious gift. Chen Mu had no way to refuse them and could only remember the favor in his heart.
Directing the group to help stow them, they were busy for a whole afternoon before they had properly placed all the equipment and materials.
A card analysis instrument, a precision liquid-quenching device, a temperature maintenance apparatus—looking all around, Chen Mu couldn't help but feel plenty satisfied. To have an advanced lab had always been his dream. But he had never thought that dream could be so easy to realize. Although those pieces of equipment weren't the most top-notch in the federation, they certainly weren't something any ordinary firm could purchase.
What could be more wonderful than that?
It was already dark outside before Chen Mu realized he had forgotten the time and had never eaten. Just as he was getting ready to look for something to eat, a sudden warning sounded.
”An unknown intruder has been discovered! First-level alert. All units immediately take your stations!”
The announcement in the building was incessant, and everyone immediately went on alert. The card artisans on rotation were ready for battle in the first instant, while those who had been resting also quickly took up their battle stations.
The vacant base appeared immediately more vacant.
For 20 people to guard such a huge base was far too skimpy. Having taken that into consideration, they were only using a single passageway for the entire base, and all the rest were sealed. That meant they only had to concentrate their firepower on that one passageway. The building's defensive capabilities were perfectly outstanding; if any single card artisan had wanted to break through the wall to enter, he would need to keep up the attack for a long while before he could accomplish his goal without some specialized card.
* * *
At the operations command center, Bogner sat casually on the command chair surrounded by a circle of 12 screens, each about two meters tall and two meters wide. The command chair could swivel in any direction, and images from beyond the base could clearly be seen on all the screens.
The screen in front of him showed a dark, crouching shadow on the edge of the turf.
It was Chen Mu's first time to see such an advanced operations command room, with every person having several screens in front of them and some incessantly manipulating them. The thing he found most novel was that on some of the screens were symbols constantly flowing past. Looking more closely, he found out that those rapidly scanning symbols were complicated strings of numbers.
Chen Mu had never systematically studied mathematics. Math was something seldom seen among card masters. But that wasn't to say he was completely ignorant of math. On the contrary, he had a rather deep attainment in some math fields.
That had a direct connection with his study of Token Theory. At the core of Token Theory were calculation and optimization. At the beginning of his study of it, the abstruse and esoteric content made him suffer quite a bit. In order to study Token Theory, he had to delve into math for quite a while. But his study of math wasn't anything more than learning Token Theory. In other words, it was severely lopsided.
Such a large operations command center only sporadically had three or five people, and Bogner was lazily half-lying in the chair with his eyes half closed. It wasn't clear if he was watching the screen in front of him or was about to fall asleep.
Bogner suddenly noticed Chen Mu having entered the operations command center. He rushed to sit up. ”Why have you come?”
”I heard there has been an intrusion, and I came to watch.”
”You may relax; there's only one, and I reckon he's just a scout.” Bogner was pointing at the screen as he spoke.
Chen Mu then paid attention to the squatting dark shadow on the screen. Looking again at Bogner's unalarmed expression, Chen Mu suddenly wanted to see how he commanded a battle.
”What is he doing?” Seeing how slowly he was moving, Chen Mu couldn't help but ask.
”Ha ha,” Bogner said with satisfaction. ”He's worrying and probably wondering how he can get closer.”
Bogner had certainly taken thorough measures, which was something Chen Mu completely admired. If it were him out there, he wouldn't even have known how to approach the base without being discovered. He felt to himself that a professional was a professional, after all, and he would never have thought up so many ideas.
After half an hour, that dark shadow still hadn't moved. Bogner had maintained his unconcerned expression, however, remaining plenty patient all along.
After another ten or more minutes, the intruder finally couldn't restrain himself and started to approach the new base. Only his crouching shadow slowly advancing could be seen. His movements were quick, which made him truly difficult to discern given the cover of darkness. Those who had discovered him had surprisingly good eyesight to have seen him from such a distance.