Chapter 222: Intrusion
As Chen Chen pa.s.sed through several mansions, he would occasionally drop by for a quick inspection. Unfortunately, there were still no lifeforms to be found except for a few robot butlers scattered around.
Just like the houses on the ship, the robot butlers had been unpowered for a long time while vines grew all over their bodies.
It seemed like more than a century had pa.s.sed. Even the robot’s bodies were beginning to rust.
“Looks like something happened here in an abrupt manner.”
Chen Chen made this conclusion after observing many past traces of a normal life. For instance, most mansion’s doors were still left open, which implied that its owners were living a normal life before having to abandon this place.
On the other hand, the robot butlers were also seen to be mostly suspended in a posture that resembled their former duties. Some were carrying cups of coffee whereas others were attending to an opened pot on the stove.
This implied that the residents of the Elysium had probably rushed to leave this ship. So urgent was the emergency that most of them could not bring their robot butlers with them...
Yet, something was still at odds with Chen Chen’s conclusion.
Even if a catastrophe had taken place on the Elysium, perhaps leakages of radioactive materials, poison gases, and even viruses – why was n.o.body sent from Earth to clean up this place after such a long time?
Could it be that an entire man-made celestial object was abandoned just like that?
Chen Chen once again set his sight onto Earth as he visibly became more perplexed.
There could only be one reason if no one from Earth had come onboard the Elysium when it was completely unguarded and that was if Earth itself was also in destruction...
“Does that mean that the root of the entire problem originates from Earth?”
Chen Chen had cracked his head trying to unravel this mystery but failed to arrive at a satisfactory answer. He decided to continue his journey toward the tall tower building.
Strictly speaking, the Elysium was not a huge place.
After all, it was a ring-like structure that had a diameter of sixty kilometers. At most, it could only fit the population of a city. It took only an hour’s walk before Chen Chen arrived at the base of the tower building.
As usual, vines grew rampantly near the entrance as it gradually spread into the main hall.
The entrance door of the building opened as two security robots were seen lying near two sides of the door. As veins wrapped around its bodies, the robots were also showing signs of decay.
“Did this government-owned tower suffer the same fate?”
Chen Chen was feeling more tense now. If even the security robots were not evacuated, the situation must have been dire.
“Kap, kap, kap...”
The six laser sights on Chen Chen’s armor were activated as he walked cautiously into the building.
Although there was probably little threat in the building now that so much time had pa.s.sed, Chen Chen thought it was better to be safe than sorry.
As the power supply had long been cut off, it soon turned dark when Chen Chen walked deeper into the building. Fortunately, Chen Chen’s vision was unaffected even without a light source as the PK Armor came equipped with an infrared thermal vision.
As Chen Chen walked deeper into the building, he began to come across an increasing number of security robots. They were armed with Cousar Crowe rifles that could penetrate metal surfaces that were a few centimeters thick. These were incredibly destructive weapons.
Fortunately, these armed robots had long exhausted their powers and were laying dormant on the floor.
Chen Chen had yet to come across any human beings.
Not even a single corpse.
It could not be that these bodies had rotted completely as for as long as they were not buried, there would surely be traces to be found, such as leftover skulls or some dried out corpses.
Yet, Chen Chen had seen nothing close to that.
The government tower was different from the mansions on the Elysium. It had a structure that bore a closer resemblance to that of a s.p.a.ceship. Most of the building’s walkways had airtight doors separating them into sections. As Chen Chen ventured further, he observed that most of these airtight doors were initially shut.
Due to the airtight doors’ ability to seal the rooms better, Chen Chen noticed far lesser signs of decays in the inner rooms. He had even seen a coffee mug resting on a table in one of the leisure rooms.
Of course, there were no more liquids left in the coffee mug. What was left were only the black sediments that solidified in the mug.
“Everyone has left at the same time. There were also no signs of panic.”
The more Chen Chen looked around the room, the stronger Chen Chen’s intuition became. His intuition told him that the people on the Elysium did not leave due to a disaster at all. Rather, they had all left quietly.
It did not matter whether they were drinking coffee, swimming or in the middle of other routine tasks. It was as if suddenly, everyone received a message at the same time and they all stopped their tasks and left without saying a word.
How was that possible...
Chen Chen felt uneasy and continued exploring. At last, he arrived at the entrance of the Elysium’s control center on the third floor.
This was the same room where the movie’s protagonist had overridden Elysium’s system.
The room was completely sealed off.
Luckily, this did not bother Chen Chen at all as he aimed a cannon on his right shoulder at the door. A loud blast was heard as a blue orb was momentarily seen!
“Boom!”
A large hole that was two meters in diameters instantly appeared on the steel door while molten steel could be seen around the circ.u.mference of the hole.
Such was the destructive ability of a plasma cannon.
Chen Chen waited for the molten steel to cool down before entering. To his surprise, the lights of the control room switched on on their own.
The once pitch-black room was suddenly illuminated by the increasing intensity of lights.
“Warning! An intruder has entered the premise! Initiating checking of defensive mechanisms.”
A female robotic voice was heard and was accompanied by a deafening sound of alarms throughout the entire building. “Warning, checking of defensive mechanism incomplete! Checking of defensive mechanism is incomplete!”
“Is this building tapping into its reserve power supply, similar to the Hive in Resident Evil?”
Chen Chen came to the operation interface and saw pieces of transparent boards that displayed his face and the words “Illegal Intruder” beside it.
He wondered if the system possessed the same intelligence as the Red Queen.
“Can you hear me talk?” Chen Chen raised his head and asked.
“Warning, warning! An intruder has been detected. Please initiate defensive mechanism immediately!”
The voice continued blasting its warnings while completely ignoring Chen Chen’s question.
“It only screams when met with problems. It definitely doesn’t have higher intelligence than the Red Queen.”
Chen Chen complained. After all, aside from the machines guarding outside, the movie did not feature any other signs of AI. Even then, this system was a pleasant surprise to Chen Chen.
After all, the existence of this intelligence system suggested that there was still a power system available. This meant that the system could easily be hacked by Little X.
Furthermore, if Little X could not breach into the system, Chen Chen could use the same method the movie’s protagonist, Max, used to override the system from the control center.
According to the movie’s plot, after overriding the system, one could easily allow anyone to become a citizen of Elysium. Indeed, the movie was concluded when the protagonist had given everyone on Earth citizenship in the Elysium.
Then, Chen Chen turned around and exited the main control center. As he made his way to the exit, the airtight doors would close and lock themselves behind him. Eventually, the entire tower building was completely locked and sealed.