space elevator

In Xiao Yu's grand design, even the smallest "County" class ships were to be at least 100,000 tons, with a minimum length of 500 meters. After evaluating his material reserves and carefully calculating, he decided to construct a flagship of 300,000 tons, with the remaining two vessels slightly smaller at 200,000 tons each.

Given the immense size of these ships, constructing them on the ground was impossible. The sheer volume and mass would make it unfeasible for the ships to launch from the surface with Xiao Yu's current level of technology, risking severe damage to their structures if attempted.

If damage to the ship's body were the only concern, it might still be manageable. However, for even larger vessels—like the "City" class ships of a million tons or "Province" class ships of ten million tons—they would be utterly incapable of surviving within the Roche limit of a massive celestial body, where gravitational forces would tear them apart.

Although Xiao Yu's ships were built using the strongest and most resilient materials, their hollow interiors meant the overall density was even less than that of water.

The Roche limit refers to the closest distance a rigid body or fluid can orbit a massive celestial object without being torn apart by gravitational forces. For instance, at Xiao Yu's current technological level, a ten-million-ton "Province" class ship within 20,000 kilometers of Earth would be shredded into fragments by the uneven gravitational pull. The small size and resilient materials of earlier human-launched satellites protected them from this fate.

In science fiction films, gigantic alien ships effortlessly ascending and descending from Earth's surface would only be possible with mastery of anti-gravity technology. Without such advancements, such feats would remain beyond reach.

Xiao Yu's technology, while advanced, was still a step away from achieving anti-gravity capabilities.

Although constructing the "County" class ships on the ground was unfeasible, Xiao Yu had already devised a solution: building a shipyard in a synchronous orbit 2,000 kilometers above Titan, Saturn's largest moon, to assemble the ships.

However, this posed a significant logistical challenge for transporting materials. Currently, only the Hope and Dawn ships were capable of space travel, but their cargo capacity was insufficient for the tens of thousands of tons of materials needed for the construction of the "County" class ships.

This was where Xiao Yu's previously established materials research institute came into play. During this period, he developed a new type of nano-polymer material, at least a hundred times stronger than steel.

Xiao Yu named this material the "Life Rope" and planned to use it to construct a space elevator.

He deployed a vast army of robots to dig a deep pit, hundreds of meters wide, on Titan's equator, burying a massive metal block weighing several thousand tons. The Hope ship then positioned itself 2,000 kilometers above the pit, hovering in place.

From beneath the Hope ship, a milky white cord-like structure emerged—the pinnacle of Xiao Yu's materials science, the Life Rope. With a radius of just one millimeter, the Life Rope could withstand nearly ten tons of tensile force, a testament to its incredible strength.

The Life Rope extended from the Hope ship had a radius of two centimeters. It was estimated that this cord could endure a pull of nearly 4,000 tons.

One end of the Life Rope was fitted with a small nuclear fusion engine. Once activated, the engine would lower the rope towards Titan's surface, stopping only after ten kilometers had been deployed.

The other end of the Life Rope was also equipped with a small nuclear fusion engine, keeping the ten-kilometer rope suspended in space, rotating gently in tandem with Titan's rotation.

The Hope ship then returned to pick up another length of Life Rope and returned to its previous position. After connecting the new rope to the first one, the process continued, lowering the rope further.

After over two hundred trips, one end of the Life Rope was finally anchored to the massive metal block buried on Titan, with the other end secured in space by the Hope ship.

And thus, a rudimentary space elevator was constructed.

The principle behind the space elevator was straightforward: when an object's speed exceeds the second cosmic velocity of a celestial body, it escapes into space, never to return. The space end of the elevator was already moving faster than Titan's second cosmic velocity, but it was anchored by the Life Rope, creating an upward force that kept the rope taut.

Titan's rotation continuously accelerated the metal block at the space end of the Life Rope, keeping its speed above escape velocity and preventing it from falling.

Remarkably, due to centrifugal force, the space end of the Life Rope generated a gravity-like force, eliminating the complications of weightlessness during the construction of ship bodies.

In essence, the space elevator functioned like a person swinging a chain with an iron ball at its end. The iron ball, though trying to fly off, was held in place by the chain, which straightened as a result.

With this never-falling Life Rope, Xiao Yu could now transport materials to space continuously. Eventually, he could even install a pulley system on the ground to send materials directly into space.

However, that would only be possible after the entire space elevator was completed. At present, it was merely in its infancy.

In the following months, Xiao Yu made significant improvements to the space elevator, including reinforcing and thickening the Life Rope to a decimeter in diameter, installing numerous devices, and stationing a large number of robots at the space end to begin constructing the shipyard.

The construction of the space elevator took Xiao Yu half a year. While this was ongoing, he also began work on two additional space elevators. By the time the first elevator was completed, the other two were nearing the final stages of construction.

The three space elevators provided Xiao Yu with powerful logistical support. On the ground, countless specialized steel materials, advanced components, and various types of robots were transported to space, fueling the construction of the shipyards.

Simultaneously, the ground base witnessed an explosion of activity. Xiao Yu initiated the construction of three additional bases, each working tirelessly on the "Village" and "Town" class ships, while the three space shipyards focused entirely on the "County" class ships.

Materials were consumed like water, but in return, Xiao Yu gained three large shipyards, each capable of building a 300,000-ton ship, along with hundreds of "Village" class ships and dozens of "Town" class ships neatly arrayed on the ground, the smallest of which were comparable in size to the Hope.

As the "County" class ships were being built, Xiao Yu deployed the hundreds of "Village" class ships to Saturn, where they busily stockpiled materials. After all, once they left the Solar System, there would be no chance to replenish even a scrap of metal.

While focusing on shipbuilding, Xiao Yu also began work on the next generation of photon computers. Recent research into the architecture, computational models, and instruction sets of photon computers promised a fivefold increase in computing power once the new machines were completed. This would allow Xiao Yu to control the fleet of over a thousand ships while simultaneously working on the "Record of Heroes in the Sky" and conducting various scientific research projects.

The newest photon computer would be installed on the flagship, serving as the brain of the entire fleet, while the older model would be installed on another "County" class ship, handling auxiliary tasks that did not require Xiao Yu's direct involvement.

At this point, Xiao Yu had abandoned concerns about sustainable development. He launched an all-out assault on the methane lakes harboring the black insects on Titan, using either nuclear strikes or conventional high-explosive munitions, depending on the size of the lake. Aside from a small number of black insects kept for artificial breeding, he exterminated every last one he could find, collecting their remains for shipbuilding and future use.

Titan was ravaged by Xiao Yu's actions. In the space of a few years, explosions and mushroom clouds frequently lit up the moon's surface, leaving it utterly transformed.

This was Xiao Yu's final act of madness before departure—since he would never return, he wanted to leave his mark here.

So Xiao Yu thought.

Three years passed in a flash, and the three "County" class ships were finally completed. Along with them, a thousand "Village" class ships and seventy "Town" class ships were also finished.

Xiao Yu's long-awaited interstellar journey was about to begin.