As one of the five major cities on White Tower Floating Land, Jiangyuan City had a population exceeding twenty million, with each cohort of students surpassing one hundred thousand.
With such a sizeable number of students, it was natural that not only the First Torch Academy existed. Even though the First Torch Academy gathered all the elite student sources of Jiangyuan City, it was not possible to encompass all the awakening students of Jiangyuan City.
According to past practice, the number of students who successfully awoke each term was generally around a thousand.
Half an hour later, in the suburbs of Jiangyuan City, on the ultra-long-range Starry Sea launching platform.
The number of citizens from Jiangyuan City gathered here had already surpassed five thousand.
As one of the few major events in Jiangyuan City each year, the crowd that came to watch the Alien Star Domain launching ceremony was not small. Moreover, if you added the newly arrived students, teachers, and parents, the number of people around the launching platform at this moment had reached the tens of thousands.
About twenty minutes later, once the district director of the Torch Bureau in White Tower verified that all of this year's awakening students from Jiangyuan City had arrived, the Alien Star Domain launching formally began.
The students of Jiangyuan's First Torch Academy were not the first to take the stage; on the contrary, they were scheduled as the finale.
Even far away in Jiangyuan's central city district, every twenty minutes or so, you could still see the giant pillars of light soaring into the sky, and after each pillar of light, that represented 100 newly awakened students from Jiangyuan City, being launched into the unknown Starry Sea light-years away.
Song Chi and Sun Hao were in the same batch; they went up on stage together, quickly summoned their Spectral Shuttles and lined up neatly. When 100 Spectral Shuttles were in formation, an officer from the Torch Bureau just outside the launching platform gave the command.
A kilometer-wide column of light shot up into The Vault of Heaven.
As 100 Spectral Shuttles disappeared above the platform, the parents and many other relatives outside the launching platform, including Song's father and mother, did not choose to leave. Instead, they took outdoor-specific tents from their backpacks and started to slowly set them up.
They were going to wait here all night because the initial phase of the Alien Star Domain exploration lasted 24 hours, and in case of emergency, one could choose to return home actively. Out of concern for their children, no parent was willing to go home, preferring to wait here all night.
...
The strong sensation of weightlessness caused Song Chi to instinctively close his eyes, and the violent shaking made the shuttle's body seem to creak. If he hadn't already fastened his seat belt, he didn't dare to imagine what would happen to him.
As the sense of weightlessness and dizziness acting on him significantly decreased, without waiting for his body to calm down, Song Chi, fighting the extreme discomfort in his heart, forced his eyes open and rapidly activated the Spectral Shield components on his shuttle.
Song Chi firmly agreed with a phrase his old class teacher often said, the Starry Sea Alien Race will not wait for you to recover your senses. What you need to do is to always be one step ahead of your opponent, whether it's taking action or fleeing.
The Spectral Shield, enhanced to LV7, had a charging time of 23 seconds; a little over twenty seconds later, when the black shield on the surface of the Spectral Shuttle was fully activated, Song Chi finally breathed a sigh of relief.
Only then did he have time to adjust his physical state and check the environment outside the shuttle.
As for why he didn't activate the Spectral Shield before the launch, this involves another common sense of the Torch Human Civilization.
During ultra-long-range deployment, the warship actually needs to withstand tremendous forces of spatial compression. If one activated the Energy Shield in advance, under the effect of Spatial Power, overloading the Energy Shield would be inevitable, after all, even the strongest Energy Shield can't possibly match the mighty power of the Void.
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And what it meant for an energy shield of a Torch Warship to overload did not need to be belabored.
As far as Song Chi knew, once an energy shield overloaded, it would take at least half an hour to reactivate, with some even taking up to an hour. During this period, although the Torch Warship wasn't completely defenseless, its defenses were reduced by at least 70%, significantly increasing its vulnerability.
Therefore, activating the warship's energy shield before deployment was a major taboo for all Torch Ship Captains.
His gaze fixated on the screen, Song Chi furrowed his brows slightly. The screen was pitch black, indicating that there were no star-like celestial bodies or Floating Lands nearby. Turning to the radar detection results, it showed the same—within the detection range, there was no trace of large celestial bodies or Floating Lands. There weren't even any signs of small fragment belts.
Seeing this, a slight sense of unease formed in Song Chi's heart, but he didn't dwell on it immediately, as his mind was still preoccupied with another matter.
After repeatedly confirming that there were no dangers around the shuttle, he took out the Starry Sea Ruins Market Token that was still worn on his chest and quickly started channeling Spectral Energy into the token.
It's important to note that the Anger Tiger Model Starry Sea Floating Land Mining Cart, Mining Cart Specialized Prospecting Instrument, and other large items were still stored in the Ruins Market.
"I have to be able to enter!!"
Song Chi inwardly shouted desperately. Whether or not he could access the Zhu Tian Ruins Market in the Alien Star Domain was extremely important and could greatly determine the upper limits of his future achievements. How could he not be worried?
As the Spectral Energy continued to infuse, Song Chi's heart sank bit by bit, as the Star Sea Ruin Market Token showed no reaction.
Just as he was about to give up, a familiar force of attraction abruptly acted upon his body.
Feeling this pulling force, Song Chi could hardly conceal his excitement, his face brimming with joy. The next moment, his figure vanished from within the Spectral Shuttle.
At the same time, in the Zhu Tian Ruins Market, Song Chi's figure quietly appeared.
Having confirmed this result, he didn't stay in the marketplace any longer. With a thought, he exited the Ruins Market and returned to the Spectral Shuttle.
At the Shuttle's control console, having resolved the most crucial issue, Song Chi could finally focus all his attention on exploring this unknown Star Domain.
The first few phases of a Torch Warship's journey in an Alien Star Domain were limited to only 24 hours. If one wanted to acquire resources, there was little time to waste.
Although the resources in the Shattered Starry Sea were extremely rich, it didn't mean that any given Star Domain would be teeming with a bounty of rare resources. To collect resources, the prerequisite was finding resource points like an Asteroid Belt, a small Fragment Belt, or a Starry Sea Floating Land, which had a high rate of resource presence.
The breadth of the Shattered Starry Sea was vast and stretched endlessly across light-years. A Torch Warship scattered within it was less significant than a grain of sand in a vast sea. Therefore, finding such resource points in a mere day's time was actually much more difficult than one might imagine.
That was why Torch Human Civilization had always repeatedly stressed that a good space radar was more valuable than anything else.
With the level 7 Spectral Engine fully activated, Cang Qiong set off at cruising speed at the speed of light in one direction, while Song Chi's eyes repeatedly swept over the space radar, filled with anticipation.
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