Chapter 433: Changes in the Base (Patreon)

Transformers Begin : Table of Content/Chapter List

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After spending some time, Sun Cheng carefully briefed everyone on the next stage of tasks and things that needed to be handled.

Once everyone was assigned their duties and kept busy, Sun Cheng walked alone through the base, feeling quite deeply about the changes that had taken place.

"The changes are quite significant!"

Due to Starscream discovering his activities in North Dovinsk, Sun Cheng had to stay in Russia for several months. It had been a while since he returned to the second base. Walking around the familiar yet somewhat unfamiliar base, he felt a mixture of emotions.

The second base had been constantly changing. Despite being limited by the few All Spark fragments available, the speed of cultivating new Decepticons by Atlas and his team remained slow. Including the newly cultivated Decepticon soldiers, there were barely around a hundred under Sun Cheng's command, with most of them being the lowest-ranking Decepticon grunts.

However, the slow cultivation of mechanical life didn't mean that the manufacturing of robots was also slow.

The presence of Decepticons and Autobots always kept Sun Cheng on edge, making him feel like those politicians in the White House and Capitol Hill, never able to feel secure.

Under this unease, the second base was almost always on high alert. All production lines and workshops were running at full capacity, and efforts were made to resolve issues related to raw materials and energy sources. More production lines and workshops were continuously being put into use.

Almost every minute, various industrial robots were being manufactured in the base.

As for the combat robots created for war, they had already reached the third generation. Just based on their initial design and data, they were reliable products that could engage in combat with Decepticon grunts like Dust Up, Iron Hammer, and Boomerang for a considerable amount of time, although the cost was equally high.

The scale of robots under the control of the second base had already exceeded ten thousand. With an abundant labor force, the changes to the underground caves where the main base was located were relatively small. The underground structures had only increased by less than thirty percent since his last visit.

A large number of alloy pillars and explosion-resistant metal plates were fixed in the concrete, permanently blending into the mountainside. Even if it faced missile attacks or rare, catastrophic earthquakes, the base's integrity wouldn't be affected.

Compared to the relatively minor changes in the underground caves, within a nearly nine-thousand-square-kilometer area centered around the base, Decepticon engineers commanded robots to modify numerous mountains, rivers, and canyons. Hundreds of anti-aircraft missiles and combat robots were deployed in the seldom-visited mountainous regions and canyons of the western Brazilian highlands, forming a defensive barrier to protect the base.

Dozens of factories, hydroelectric power plants, and even semi-underground nuclear power plants were constructed and gradually put into operation.

Although he had been promoted to an engineer, the twenty or so Decepticon engineers under Sun Cheng were initially cultivated as grunts for constructing permanent steel fortresses and war fortifications. They had a passionate love for the memories of those war fortresses that were deeply imprinted in their memories.

If it weren't for Sun Cheng's refusal to expose the base at the moment, he would probably see a substantial steel fortress in the remote Brazilian highlands when he returned.

Speaking of the defensive system surrounding the second base, it was Sun Cheng who ordered Forerunner to construct it. Although Hysteria supervised Atlas and others to complete it later, the main framework was established during the Forerunner period.

Within this nearly ten-thousand-square-kilometer area, there were already 56 sets of S-00PMU anti-aircraft missile systems deployed.

According to Russian standards, one battalion consisted of four launcher units, which meant there were 16 sets of launch systems per battalion. Astonishingly, there were already 16 anti-aircraft missile battalions deployed around the second base.

This number might not seem small, but considering that when Sun Cheng asked to buy S-00 missiles from the Russians, they were willing to export these less advanced anti-aircraft missiles in exchange for more advanced alien technologies. However, it would take at least seven months for the Russian military industry to produce new stocks, and it would take five to six years to fully meet all of his requirements.

Yet Sun Cheng was in a hurry!

After several negotiations, he paid the price for the new missiles, and the Russians withdrew some of the older missiles that had been in service for over three years and handed them over to him.

Even so, they barely managed to gather enough equipment for four anti-aircraft missile battalions.

The reason the second base had so many missiles was evident.

Upon receiving his orders, Atlas and others had to draw a group of engineers and grunts to modify two production lines specifically for producing and modifying the S-00 series of anti-aircraft missiles.

They didn't make significant changes, as the S-00 series, while not the most advanced on Earth, was sufficient to deal with most fighter jets and missiles. Additionally, its power was enough to harm Leader-level fighters like Megatron and Optimus Prime. The engineers only added an automated control system to ensure that the base could defend itself when facing attacks from the sky.

Of course, being purely defensive without counterattack capabilities was not his style.

In fact, Sun Cheng had been seeking to obtain a decisive strategic weapon, such as medium and long-range ballistic missiles or even nuclear warheads.

Unfortunately, the two countries he had dealt with, both the Russians and the red regime in the Far East, had been extremely firm on this matter. Even when he sought to purchase conventional warheads as a compromise, they remained cautious.

With no other options, they had to produce the missiles themselves.

Using some unorthodox methods, Sun Cheng managed to steal some sealed data related to Mao Zi's SS-1, commonly known as the Beetle, a short-range ballistic missile. During the Soviet era, Mao Zi had signed a self-imposed disarmament treaty on medium-range missiles with the United States, which led to significant deterioration in Russia's technology in medium-range and short-range missiles.

Three months ago, after completely mastering the relevant technology, the first Beetle missile had been produced, and there were now more than fifty stored in the base.

These missiles, modified by the engineers to double their original range, were now short-range tactical missiles with a range of over 250 kilometers. Although they were still equipped with regular warheads, they were enough to harm Leader-level warriors like Megatron and Optimus Prime, making them one of the trump cards Sun Cheng held in his hands.

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Next Chapter >>Chapter 434: Illusion