The part that Cyborg No.1 was in charge of dissecting was the Slaad’s stomach. The stomach was amazingly large and could fit at least three people in it. Cyborg No.1 had performed a very thorough search after cutting the stomach open because he was looking for the Slaad’s enteroliths, which were worth quite a bit of money.
(TL: Enterolith: A mineral concretion or calculus formed anywhere in the gastrointestinal system.)
(TL: Calculus: Hard masses formed by minerals within the body, especially in the kidney or gall bladder)
An explanation must be made here about the future human race. During the interstellar colonisation era, there was a great integration of culture and race among the humans. Thus, both Western and Eastern medical practices had become widespread. Traditional medicines and practices like acupuncture had been slowly integrated with modern medicine.
In the concept of traditional Chinese medicine, treating diseases with animal calculuses had always been a very popular practice. For example, the three treasures of traditional Chinese medicine referred to the calculus bovis (dried cattle gallstone), dog kidney stone, and calculus equi (horse enterolith).
In Sheyan’s world, China’s annual demand for calculus bovis had reached a staggering figure of 450 tons, but China’s annual output of natural calculus bovis was only one ton, so it had become three times as expensive as gold. After the epidemic of mad cow disease in Europe, in order to prevent the spread of mad cow disease into China by means of medicine, China had decided to ban the import of bovine-derived materials for use in Chinese medicines, further driving the price of natural calculus bovis up by several times!
In the present interstellar colonisation era, the discovery of various new animals and plants had greatly expanded the scope of traditional Chinese medicine. There was even a Compendium of Milky Way Materia Medica now. The calculuses of high-tier beasts were collectively known as “beast cores”, and they could be used to treat a variety of diseases. Of course, their prices were astonishingly high.
(TL: The Compendium of Materia Medica (本草纲目) is a Chinese herbology volume written by Li Shizhen during the Ming dynasty. It’s like an encyclopedia of traditional Chinese herbs and medicines.)
Therefore, Cyborg No. 1 was very careful when he was dissecting the stomach, lest he missed any Slaad enteroliths. After all, a pea-sized beast core was worth more than five cyborgs.
It was precisely thanks to his meticulous search that he found the piece of metal stuck to the wall of the stomach. A large portion of the piece of metal, which was about the size of a lighter, was deeply embedded in the stomach wall. If it was not for the broken chain attached to the metal piece hanging outside, it would have been really difficult to discover.
The discovery of a metal product on such a barren planet was a bizarre thing, but the possibility existed that it was left behind by the Predators.
However, after picking the metal piece up and wiping it clean, Cyborg No. 1 immediately knew he had found something extraordinary. This was already something beyond his scope of authority, so he could only ask Sheyan and the other contestants over to take a look.
The piece of metal was actually a soldier’s dog tag!
The letters inscribed on a military dog tag had their specific meanings.
The first line showed the surname of the owner.
The second line showed the owner’s first name and middle initial (or just the initials)
The third line showed the owner’s Military Number, Social Security Number, blood type (A, B, AB, or O) and Rh factor.
The fourth line showed the owner’s branch of service and gas mask size (XS, S, M, L, or XL).
The fifth line showed the owner’s religion (C for Catholic, H for Hebrew, P for Protestant, etc.).
The sixth line showed the owner’s status (RA for Regular Army, NG for National Guard, ER for Enlisted Reserve, O for Officer, etc.).
***
A dog tag may be small, but it contained a vast amount of information. However, this particular dog tag had been soaked in gastric juice for quite some time, so it had been corroded very badly and the words on it were somewhat blurred. The group gathered together to study the tag. After spending a really long time, they finally concluded that the original owner of this dog tag was a Private First Class named Douglas.
After jotting down some of the information they could confirm from the dog tag, they asked the cyborgs to check these information in their offline database. They discovered that the unit he served in was a very special and highly confidential unit.
Mr. Douglas was obviously dead because a Slaad’s diet should not include metal, so it would never swallow a piece of metal for no reason. Of course, they could not rule out the possibility that another creature had eaten Mr. Douglas for dessert before being eaten by the Slaad.
More importantly, from the extent that the dog tag had been corroded, it had probably not soaked in gastric juice for more than two hours. The human limbs they found deep in the stomach after that were sufficient proof of this, so the problem was now very clear.
“There are other living humans on this planet?” exclaimed Hedi Curry incredulously.
“It’s definitely possible. Remember what they told us before? The Intergalactic Alliance had sent quite a few people to explore this place before us. The official record stated that no one had been able to pass through the asteroid belts, but it won’t be the first time that official records are found unreliable. There might’ve been a few lucky ones,” said Dardanian.
Sheyan’s eyes flickered, apparently recalling something very important. However, he was trying to keep a low profile at the moment. He would take a hard stance and never back down when it was necessary, but other times, he would try to draw as little attention to himself as possible. So, he said nothing.
The group had an intense discussion among themselves, but on the whole, they were more inclined to prioritise their main mission instead of poking their noses in matters that did not concern them.
But Vassily then said, “You guys seem to have forgotten one thing. If these humans are the survivors among those who were dispatched here, they would’ve been on this planet for a few months, perhaps even a few years! They’re also sent here to explore the planet, so they would also have the exploration devices we have! Which means that there’s a good chance they’ve mapped the locations of lots of Pi veins! The information they have may be of great value to us, priceless even!”
Vassily’s words were like a stone tossed into the water, stirring up a thousand ripples.
Hedi Curry and Azsa stared at each other and nodded firmly. At this point, everyone was thinking about Vassily’s words, so they did not realise that the eyes of all the cyborgs were flashing. But even if someone did notice this phenomenon, they would not think much of it. Whenever the cyborgs think, this effect would be triggered, just like a hard drive activity light would when a hard drive was being read.
***
Meanwhile, on the Kitty Hawk base 2.7 million kilometers away.
Inside the brightly lit central control room.
The majestic General had once again “descended” via holographic projection.
Major General Mungo and Major General Fiji were standing still like obedient elementary students. Although their backs were straight, there was apparent fear in their eyes.
“Great job! Not only did the two of you make use of military exercises and the research institute to delay the Predator’s spaceship, you also co-signed a joint order to overload the Kitty Hawk! How dare you make these kinds of decisions without authorisation!? Don’t you know that you’re damaging the interests of the Empire!?”
Although the General was an old man on a wheelchair, his voice was as deafening as thunder!
The heads of Major General Mungo and Major General Fiji hung low, but when they secretly looked at each other, their fearful eyes suddenly brightened. They could both hear from the old man’s tone that his emphasis was not on “damaging the interests of the Empire”, but on “making decisions without authorisation”!
Major General Mungo immediately stood upright and bowed his head as he said, “General, we had no other choice at the time. We only wanted to do everything in our power to accomplish the mission…. Moreover, the space-time turbulence was very intense back then, so data transmission would take a very long time. We had to make a quick decision; that’s why we couldn’t ask for authorisation in time….”
“You ARE expected to make some decisions on your own out in the frontline, so that’s not the problem. I’d even say that your ability to respond in time is a good reflection of your individual capabilities. But why didn’t you report to me afterwards? Do you think you can handle these things on your own?”
“Do you think a single person has enough authority to order the Imperial Laboratory to launch a particle storm? Do you think the proposal would’ve been passed if I hadn’t spoken to the Ministry of Energy? If I hadn’t intercepted Captain Ruth’s secret report to his immediate officer, do you really think your order would be carried out?”
Major General Mungo and Major General Fiji sweated profusely. They did not expect so many twists and turns behind the plan they came up with.
The General continued, “There’s nothing wrong with being cut-throat and decisive, but if you needed someone to clean up after you, you better show some humility.”
“Yes, sir.” Major General Mungo and Major General Fiji immediately bowed low.
Seeing his two subordinates acting so humble, the General snorted and nodded in satisfaction.
“Now then, after going all in, have you got any results to show for it?”
“Yes, sir!” Major General Fiji rushed to answer before Major General Mungo could. From Fiji’s action of grabbing the chance to report a piece of good news, it could be seen that he had a more scheming mind than Mungo. There was no doubt that everyone would like to listen to good news. How many people have you heard getting tips for delivering bad news?
Major General Fiji would be able to leave a good impression on the General by seizing the chance to report the good news. Maybe the effect of this incident alone was insignificant, but if he kept at it, the good impression would add up, leading to a favourable treatment from the General!
“We’ve already made a major breakthrough in the search of Pi ores. A medium-purity Pi vein was found right underneath the mushroom rock which we designated as the landing site! We have video recordings to prove this!”
As he said that, Major General Fiji played a recording of the contestants detecting Pi veins with their instruments.
“In addition, the people we sent have also obtained several pieces of high-purity Pi ores, and they’ve used the instruments we provided to process the ores to obtain Pi elements with purities of over 99%.”
