Alien Relic Hunter

"What do you think that... could be?" Zofia asked solemnly.

"I don't know, but..."

Before he finished speaking, all the lights in the entire villa suddenly went out - not only that, even the light sources on the street outside disappeared, and the entire neighborhood suddenly fell into a strange darkness.

But soon, the lights that went out came on again one by one, and the light returned to the villa again.

"What's going on?" Caroline asked as she poked her head out, but the members of the first team stationed outside also looked confused and said they didn't know what was going on.

"Power outage accident?" Ke Lan glanced at his mobile phone, but the original full signal has now changed to "not in the service area." It seems that the signal base station in the Ark has also been affected by the power outage. It looks like this Come on, they are not the only neighborhood that is without power.

"The emergency backup power supply is being used now..." Zofia glanced at the orange indicator light on the villa's terminal meter. "The power supply handle of the main line has not been restored. The existing emergency energy should be able to last for about forty-eight hours. ."

"Impossible..." Caroline raised her head in confusion, looking at the lights on the ceiling that had returned to normal and said, "The power supply system on the Ark has so many safeguards. Over the past hundred years, in addition to regional maintenance, , the power outage lasted no more than 0.1 seconds... It has been almost a minute now, and I don’t know how much direct damage will be..."

"I'm afraid it will be very big." Ke Lan looked at the mobile phone and said, "The mobile phone cannot find the signal of any base station, which means that at least the industrial area is also affected by the power outage..."

"It's really weird... If the power supply of the main line is not restored, what about the backup secondary line network? There can't be a problem with the Ark core control center, right?" Caroline tried to use the power armor to hide herself He used the communication equipment he brought to contact the headquarters, but there was also no response.

"It seems you are right." Ke Lan put his hand into his pocket and took out a universal interface adapter cable. "I even think this is not an accident."

Because the size of the Ark is so large, it is difficult to completely cover it with conventional radio equipment communication radius, so people have set up a large number of base stations for signal relay inside the Ark, but now it turns out that even any base station cannot be searched. If so, it can only mean that wireless communications in at least half of the area on the Ark have been paralyzed.

"But wired communication should still be available, unless there is a problem with the optical fiber network buried inside the Ark." Ke Lan walked to the monitoring screen and used an adapter cable to connect the mobile phone to the villa's wired network.

"Fortunately, those who invaded the villa only destroyed the security system, but did not cut off the external network..."

As soon as Ke Lan's mobile phone was connected to the Internet, he immediately received a communication request. He glanced at the screen. It was a completely unfamiliar number, and judging from the prefix of the number... the call should come from a military communication terminal.

"Hello?"

"Is it Ke Lan? I'm Maginot. I heard from Nick and the others that you were also attacked?"

"Well, someone attacked Miss Zofia Soma's residence, but I'm not sure whether their target was me or Zofia... but it's possible that they were both."

"Is your place safe now? Do you need me to send troops there?" Maginot asked.

"No need for the moment, reinforcements from the Soma Consortium have arrived, and the attackers have been dealt with... By the way, General, do you know what happened with the power outage just now?" Ke Lan seized this opportunity and asked quickly .

"...To be honest, I'm not very clear. It seems that a very powerful energy pulse appeared in the power supply network, which burned the core control center of the Ark's power supply mechanism. The entire Ark has a power outage. Now in the core area It’s being repaired urgently.”

"A very powerful... energy pulse?"

"Oh, this is what the Security Bureau said. I don't know what happened now. By the way, Ke Lan, do you know the identity of the person who attacked you and Miss Soma?" Magino asked Dao, he had told Ke Lan before that his superior had given him a very special "task", which was to secretly protect Ke Lan and others - although the power outage in the entire district was not a trivial matter, for him Said that the priority of the attack should be higher.

"It can basically be confirmed that he is a member of the Arasaka Consortium. One of the attackers is Gunzuo, one of the six samurai members of the Arasaka Samurai Club."

"Oh... I knew it..." a lamentation came from the other side of the phone, "The people who attacked Nick and the others are also from the Arasaka Consortium..."

"Then what does the Arasaka Consortium have to say about this? According to Ark's laws, this crime must at least start with exile, right?"

"This is where I have a headache... Now I can't contact the Arasaka Consortium at all. All communications in the East 9th District where their headquarters is located have been cut off. I sent a team to rush over, but they are entering the East 9th District. After that, there was no news at all.”

"All communications are cut off? Is it because of the power outage? What about the wired network?"

"It's all broken... Now the entire East Ninth District seems to have become an isolated island. No one knows what is going on inside." There was an irritation in Maginot's voice.

East 9th District is not only the headquarters of the Arasaka Consortium, but also the place where the Arasaka family made its fortune. The residents living in this district are either members of the Arasaka family, or employees working in the Arasaka Consortium and their families - for As for the Arasaka Consortium, although the hardware conditions in the East Nine District may not be as good as those in the first districts, their ability to control the district where the headquarters is located is unmatched by any consortium or family... The entire East The Ninth District is like a piece of iron. When many people refer to the East Ninth District, they will directly refer to this district as "the territory of the Arasaka Consortium". Outsiders want to infiltrate without anyone noticing. It’s just more difficult.

"I think this power outage was caused by the Arasaka Consortium." Ke Lan said to Maginot.

There was a silence for several seconds on the other end of the phone. Just when Ke Lan was wondering if there was another problem with the signal, Maginot asked in a low voice: "...Do you have any evidence? Although I also think it's strange. ...But judging from the information currently available, there is no direct connection between the two events."

"The general should already know about the ultra-pure crystal, right?" Ke Lan suddenly changed the subject and asked about the crystal.

"……Know."

"Manstein, the former head of the Leviathan Base of the Soma Consortium, secretly hid a radioactive object worth more than ultrapure crystals. He wrapped the object with some kind of material that could isolate radiation. Hidden within one’s own body.”

"What is this thing?" Maginot asked urgently.

"No one knows... Manstein was assassinated just now. When the people from the Soma Consortium found the body, the thing had been taken away. As for the identity of the assassin, although it is not certain, there is a high probability that it is the same as the one who attacked us. People come from the same place." Ke Lan analyzed.

"...You continue."

"Suppose this thing is a crystalline mineral, and the energy contained in it is higher than that of ultra-pure crystal... Using the high-intensity energy pulse artificially created by this thing, not to mention burning the core control center of the power supply mechanism, or even Even the Ark’s central computer could be compromised.”

"...I understand. I will immediately report the situation to the superiors and send additional manpower to blockade the East Ninth District." Maginot said seriously.

"Well, I will also rush to the East Ninth District immediately." Ke Lan said... In the depths of his mind, there was always a voice urging him to go to the headquarters building of the Arasaka Consortium. There seemed to be something there. Something was waiting for his arrival... Although Ke Lan didn't intend to completely follow the instructions of the voice, at least he had to find out the situation there first.