Chapter 103: Return to the Ground Plan
Chapter 103: Return to the Ground Plan
“Friends, countrymen.”
“For thirteen long years, we have finally returned to this land from our Underground Shelter Cities.”
“The disaster, the Doomsday Crisis, did not break our resilient Human Civilization. Our strong Human Civilization was destined to rise again, reborn in fires, during this doomsday.”
“Perhaps this land no longer feels as familiar as we remember,”
“But soon, we will build it up, restore it, and rebuild our civilization right here.”
Apart from the Stellar Port, no surface city had been built near the area above Lingchuan Underground Shelter City.
Looking out from the square of the Underground Rail Station, the entire world appeared desolate. Aside from sparse, man-made ecological forests scattered like small, insignificant dots on a vast, gray canvas,
nothing much else could be seen.
However, none of this mattered to the people at this moment.
Just like Qin Yu’s words now—though not delivered with fiery passion, his calm tone still stirred the hearts of those intently watching the live TV broadcast.
In everything, only one thing truly mattered:
Human Civilization had finally returned to the surface.
After speaking, Qin Yu turned his gaze once more toward the distant horizon.
Long ago, before the Doomsday Crisis arrived,
during a conversation with that Senior Leader,
it was mentioned that soon after hiding in the Underground Shelter Cities to survive the Doomsday Crisis, Human Civilization would be able to return to the surface.
From the perspective of confronting the Doomsday Crisis,
over a decade was indeed quite brief.
But for those living in the Underground Shelter Cities, those who yearned to return to the surface, to their homelands,
this period was undoubtedly tough, making the time feel painfully long.
Beside Qin Yu,
after he removed the helmet of his protective suit, the other Researchers accompanying him also took off their helmets.
Some gasped for air, like drowning people finally breathing fresh air.
Objectively speaking, the air on the barren surface wasn’t that fresh right now,
but after more than a decade, the Researchers breathed it in greedily.
Even though the sun scorched their skin in pain, they couldn’t be bothered.
Qin Yu withdrew his hand, which had been spread open towards the sunlight.
It could be expected
that for a long time after returning to the surface,
people would need to limit their time outdoors.
Also, though many surface issues had been resolved,
the Doomsday Crisis and disaster had likely left Earth with extreme climates that would persist for a long time.
The climate would not be as mild as before for a long while to come.
But again,
this didn’t really matter to the people.
Turning back, Qin Yu spoke his final words to those watching the live broadcast:
“Friends, countrymen.”
“Starting now, we will gradually begin the process of returning to the surface.”
These words
caused many people in the various Underground Refuge Cities to tear up repeatedly, or burst into even louder cheers.
After this,
the live broadcast of this historic event came to an end.
That night,
many people across the Underground Refuge Cities drank themselves into a stupor in restaurants managed by Intelligent Robots, until these robots carried them back to their rooms.
Some, chatting tirelessly in small groups of friends about returning to the surface, stayed awake all night.
Others drifted off to sleep and dreamed—dreams of being in their original homes, fiddling with familiar objects as if nothing had ever changed.
Dreams of walking along streets near their old homes, where shops run by Intelligent Machinery operated as usual.
Dreams of lying on grass under warm sunshine, and standing on a beach as waves gently washed over their feet.
Purely from the perspective of basic needs,
people’s obsession with returning to the surface might seem too strong.
Yet emotionally, this deep longing for life on the ground was perfectly natural.
For those dreaming of the surface that night,
the good news was that very soon, all this would be more than just a dream.
…
After the live broadcast ended,
Qin Yu’s team, already on the surface, did not return immediately.
The Researchers had their own specific tasks,
which could theoretically be done remotely via Intelligent Robots. But since they were there, they proceeded on-site.
Only as evening approached, watching the sun dip toward the horizon,
did Qin Yu and the accompanying Researchers board the Underground Rail Transit and return to Lingchuan Underground Shelter City.
Meanwhile,
released on behalf of the Negentropy Research Institute, Huaxin News Agency
published to the public the detailed “Plan for the Re-migration of Human Civilization to the Surface from Underground Refuge Cities.”
First, following Qin Yu’s group as the first to set foot back on the surface, this initial return marked the beginning.
The overall return of Human Civilization to the surface was now officially underway.
Additionally, it officially announced and confirmed the surface environment, including the atmosphere.
Under the combined efforts of 236 Algae and Entropy Algae, atmospheric oxygen levels had recovered to 24%,
slightly higher than normal but largely harmless to humans.
The Negentropy Research Institute 011 Lab and other labs continued moderate human intervention,
since the surface ecosystem differed vastly from before, and oxygen balance couldn’t be swiftly achieved even with Entropy Algae.
The goal of the 011 Lab and related teams was to maintain oxygen levels between 23% and 26% in the short term.
Other toxic gases in the air, thanks to ongoing efforts by the Negentropy Research Institute, no longer posed a major threat to human survival.
Furthermore, regarding surface conditions, ultraviolet radiation intensity was significantly higher than before the Doomsday Crisis. However, limiting daily outdoor time would minimize its impact.
In this Intelligent Era, hardly any work required people to stay outdoors for prolonged periods anyway.
Based on all these factors, the Negentropy Research Institute believed that Human Civilization had satisfied all the foundational prerequisites for returning to the surface.
As mentioned in the plan for ‘Human Civilization Relocating Back to the Surface’,
starting from today,
the productivity within all the Underground Shelter Cities
would broadly be divided into three parts.
The first part would ensure the survival and daily life of the people within the Underground Shelter Cities.
The second part would continue preparations for restoring a richer terrestrial and marine ecosystem on the surface.
The remaining majority of productivity would be poured into constructing Surface Cities.
People would officially begin restoring Surface City areas, preparing for the collective return of Human Civilization to the surface.
More specifically,
at this moment, the more than two hundred Underground Shelter Cities
would each rebuild one Surface City near the corresponding surface location above them, capable of accommodating everyone living within their respective Underground Shelter City.
This was a massive project.
Fortunately, however, Human Civilization’s productivity was sufficient.
Having completed the construction of these numerous Underground Shelter Cities in a short time previously,
building cities on the gradually stabilizing surface now would certainly be easier than creating those underground shelters before.
Besides this main part of the resettlement plan,
the announcement
also mentioned something that excited many people.
Namely,
starting now, each Underground Shelter City would open a fixed number of slots daily,
allowing those who secured a slot to take a trip back to the surface via Underground Rail Transit for sightseeing.
However, considering the lack of completed infrastructure on the surface currently, it was essentially a same-day trip—going up and coming back the same day.
Still, even being able to spend just a few hours on the surface
was an incredibly pleasant surprise for the people who heard this news.
“…If it were over a decade ago, I reckon I couldn’t even dream that just getting a chance to walk around on the surface could be this thrilling,”
“What was that saying… back then, I never realized how precious it was because it was ordinary… I never imagined a trip up there could feel so novel to me.”
Many people who stayed up all night were also excitedly discussing this online.
After this information was released, the number of people signing up on the website dedicated to registering for the ‘Surface Day Tour’
climbed to a staggering figure.
Many were shocked when they saw it.
Even though the lottery was only contested against people from your own Underground Shelter City,
if you were unlucky and had to wait for your turn in the lottery, you might be waiting until the Surface City was already built.
After all, right now, it was impossible to use the significant transport capacity between the Underground Refuge Cities and the surface primarily for letting people experience surface tourism.
More of it had to be spent on building the Surface Cities and restoring the surface ecosystem.
“…I feel like you all really want to go up?”
“Well, duh, don’t you want to? …But you guys go on ahead. I feel like I can’t count on getting picked. I’ll just wait until the Underground Shelter City construction is done, and we all return to the surface together.”
“If that’s the case, you shouldn’t sign up then! That way, my chances are bigger.”
“No, I am signing up. What if I get lucky?”
Online, it was bustling.
Perhaps because the plan for the collective return to the surface was now officially on the agenda,
the atmosphere on the internet seemed much lighter.
……
The construction process for the Surface Cities
kicked off immediately and vigorously after the resettlement plan was announced.
Once again, the Strong Artificial Intelligence from the Brain Intelligence Project handled coordination and overall planning. The Intelligent Programs within Intelligent Machinery were responsible for executing the specific tasks assigned to them.
The overall construction plan, meanwhile, had its broad strategy and framework developed by the Negentropy Research Institute. The detailed design specifics for each Underground Shelter City’s corresponding Surface City were completed by the Strong Artificial Intelligence and research teams outside the Institute, including other Researchers.
After all, this task posed absolutely no difficulty for the Institute. Having the Institute’s relevant Researchers handle all of it would have been quite the case of using a cannon to kill a mosquito.
The newly designed Surface Cities,
taking Lingchuan City as an example,
inherited the style of the original Lingchuan City. But the new Lingchuan City would definitely not be identical to the old one.
Or rather, there was no real need for it to be identical.
The old Lingchuan City had developed its urban areas gradually over time, naturally accumulating design flaws and less-than-optimal layouts.
Now, however, the new Lingchuan City could be entirely planned in a more logical way, based purely on the needs of city operations.
For this, people also referenced some of the logic used when building the underground shelter cities.
First, Intelligent Industrial Clusters and residential areas were largely kept separate.
Manufacturing and production were now almost entirely handled by Intelligent Machinery, requiring minimal human intervention.
Therefore, there was no real need to extensively nest residential zones within the industrial clusters.
With sufficiently advanced transportation systems, producing goods in the Intelligent Industrial Clusters and then shipping them to residential zones for consumption wasn’t a troublesome process.
Residential zones themselves were also undergoing decentralization for many services that previously functioned with centralized infrastructure.
Healthcare was a prime example. Even before the Doomsday Crisis, decentralization was beginning,
and now, in the new Lingchuan City being established, it would only become more pronounced.
Intelligent ambulances carrying Medical Robots would likely operate around the clock on fixed routes in streets throughout various city districts.
Upon receiving a request for medical support, a Medical Robot carrying the appropriate intelligent medical equipment would immediately arrive to provide care at the patient’s location.
Only when specific, difficult-to-move smart medical instruments were needed would a patient, accompanied by a Medical Robot, need to go to the city’s medical center for further treatment.
Similarly, education might undergo changes.
By this point, AI Teaching Robots were already fully integrated into the entire education system.
In the future, university campuses might still exist within cities, but the traditional concept of a ‘classroom’ would likely become much more blurred.
AI Teaching Robots would follow students, handling the delivery of instruction.
University campuses might be constructed to resemble comfortable parks, providing spaces for students to interact and discuss,
and more Laboratories for research across various fields would be built on campuses.
Additionally,
villages and hamlets from the past, except for future potential artificial resort destinations,
basically disappeared during the reconstruction of Lingchuan City and other cities.
Or rather, there was no real need to rebuild scattered small settlements.
This didn’t mean the whole city would just be blocks of high-rises with people living in individual rooms.
There would still be stand-alone houses, even ones resembling village dwellings, but they would essentially function as integrated parts of the city’s residential zone.
According to current plans,
a Surface City corresponding to a single Underground Shelter City
would basically be designed to accommodate twenty million people.
This was the case for Lingchuan City, and so would it be for the others.
Spreading out residential and industrial zones this vast on the surface made for a truly enormous urban footprint.
For some Underground Shelter Cities, if the surface terrain above them wasn’t suitable, minor topographical adjustments might be required, or a slightly different location might need to be chosen.
However, small-scale terrain changes were no big deal for Human Civilization at this stage.
Finding a new location was also feasible. The Earth, even after losing large land areas to rising sea levels, still had more than enough space to accommodate billions of people.
As for issues facing such megacities in the past,
like water sources and other fundamental resource challenges,
they wouldn’t present problems for the new Lingchuan City or any of the other cities.
Not now – not when energy was abundant and productivity was so developed.
This coming era
would see Human Civilization become both highly concentrated and highly decentralized.
Later, once geological activity was confirmed to remain fundamentally stable,
people would build Superconducting Maglev Train networks.
These would ultimately connect the over two hundred supercities built on the surface,
enabling more efficient collaboration between regional industrial clusters and fostering higher growth in Human Civilization’s productivity.
In this year,
across the land, more and more Intelligent Machinery was already busily at work under the coordination of the Strong Artificial Intelligence from the Brain Intelligence Project.
During the Surface City construction phase,
priority naturally went to building the industrial zones.
Once industrial zones reached a certain level of completion, the additional production capacity they generated could then be utilized in the broader construction of the Surface Cities themselves.
To a degree,
this process also became like a snowball gathering momentum.