Cao Ge watched the blue planet that was drawing ever closer.
"Murphy, initiate the spaceship landing procedure and awaken the landing vanguard team," he said.
"Landing procedure initiating..."
"Awakening of vanguard team beginning..."
In the empty cockpit, Cao Ge stood with his hands behind his back, facing the Tanis Planet, which was tens of thousands of kilometers away, lost in thought.
Cao Ge's commands, transmitted through the spaceship's local area network, rapidly spread throughout the Elysium Space, progressively lighting up a level, a chamber within the spacecraft.
The spaceship's computer, following the awakening process, was conducting a series of awakening operations.
This was a large hibernation chamber, housing a dozen hibernation pods.
They were all part of the first vanguard team agreed upon early in the colonization plan, including all the personnel required for preliminary exploration.
There were atmospheric scientists, biologists, geologists...
Cao Ge turned and went back to the console, then sat in the pilot's seat and awakened Eric and others from the keyboard.
Soon, about an hour later, Elysium Space arrived at Tanis's synchronous orbit.
"Murphy, shut down the engines," he ordered.
"Engines have been shut down."
The jets from the mighty spaceship's engine nozzles petered out as Murphy began controlling the thrusters to adjust the spaceship's attitude.
The colonization plan thus officially got underway.
One day later.
The hall of Cao Ge's armory department.
"Eric, do you know the purpose of your mission this time?" he asked.
"Yes, Minister Walker," Eric replied. "The purpose of this mission is to explore whether Tanis Planet is suitable for human habitation and whether there are alien life forms."
"Very good."
"This time, I've assigned you twenty people, including seven scientists," Walker continued. "These scientists are vital for rebuilding civilization on Tanis; I hope you can ensure their safety during this operation."
"I will, Minister," Eric answered earnestly and solemnly.
Cao Ge looked into Eric's earnest eyes, then nodded, "Go."
Eric turned and left, departing from the armory department.
At that moment, on the deck of the Elysium Space where the landing crafts were docked, it was all brightly lit.
In the vast space, dozens of small spacecraft were stationed.
At one spacecraft near the shield, a dozen people were already there packing equipment, constantly moving things into the ship.
There were soldiers as well as scientists set to carry out the mission.
At this time, Eric, accompanied by a few soldiers, entered the area.
"Everyone, Minister Walker has passed on the orders to me. The exploration of Tanis can begin now," Eric announced standing before them.
"Captain Eric, we are ready and can depart at any time," a blonde, blue-eyed female officer replied immediately upon seeing Eric and his group approach.
Alec stood before them, looked around, and nodded his head.
"Depart."
......
Twenty people entered the spacecraft and took their places. The pilot then started the craft, while the protective shield began to rise slowly.
The spacecraft Eric was on moved onto the launch area through a movable deck.
The launching area for the landing craft was a rectangle runway about twenty meters long, with the outermost layer of the shield at one end of the runway.
After the spacecraft entered the launch area, the rear shield slowly descended.
With a clang!
Once the shield was completely sealed, the control system of the launching chamber began to gradually remove the air from the chamber.
About ten minutes later.
The air in the launch cabin was completely evacuated.
Only then did the outer protective shield slowly open, revealing the starry sky outside.
"Captain, we can take off now."
"Mm, take off." Captain Eric nodded.
The rear engines of the spaceship began to activate slowly, and finally, a blue flame was ejected, thrusting the spaceship out into the vast expanse of space.
Upon entering space, the rear engines gradually increased their thrust, and the four engines on the belly of the spaceship also began to start up one by one, steering the ship towards the atmosphere of Tanis.
About ten minutes later, the lander spaceship entered the outer atmosphere of Tanis Planet.
At this time, Cao Ge, standing in front of the transparent cabin wall with his hands behind his back, watched as the "lander" gradually disappeared from his view.
The reason why Cao Ge had not yet departed was that a year had not yet passed, and the Savior System's traverse function required at least a year of charging to use.
This meant that if he wanted to return to the Three-Body world, he would have to wait almost five more months.
Thus, for these five months, he still had to bear the responsibility of the highest human commander, doing his utmost to protect the last three thousand humans in the universe.
He did not know why he had to do this, but his system was called the Savior System.
He thought there must be some significance to it; otherwise, if he was to watch the humans of this universe perish,
perhaps one day some form of punishment would appear, since there had been no prior warning before that one cubic meter of reward.
So, before leaving this world, it would be better not to be too self-indulgent.
Cao Ge took one last glance at Tanis, then left the cockpit.
......
Inside the lander, the passengers were shocked as they looked out at the pale blue atmosphere and the enormous mountains stretching towards space.
The lander descended rapidly through the atmosphere, its underside burning red-hot from air friction.
Half an hour later, after passing through the high atmosphere and reaching the troposphere, the lander approached a coastline.
"Captain, shall we descend directly?"
The pioneers on either side of the lander looked towards the ground through the transparent windows behind them and then asked him.
Eric faced their gaze, turned his head again to look at the world outside the window, and finally said, "No rush, let's fly around the planet first."
Eric patted the pilot's seat, reminding him, "John, fly the ship forward."
"Yes, Captain."
John immediately took the control stick and flew the ship towards the inland.
Passing over the coast, the surface of Tanis was a dull yellow.
Vast tracts of land and rocks with only a few green spots; the region of their landing had no large vegetation, with nothing but barren sand as far as the eye could see.
The sky was also a deep blue, without a single cloud.
The lander flew towards the inland, moving fast with a loud frictional noise in the air.
In the whole sky, the lander was the only thing there.
The airspace was terrifyingly empty.
After about an hour, having traversed more than a thousand kilometers, the lander finally saw the "forest"—a blue forest.
Those plant-like things were blue in color.
The ship arrived above the blue vegetation, as if it had come to a blue ocean, the bamboo-like plants swaying in the wind.
"Stop," Eric abruptly said.
"My God, why are all these plants blue?" a young soldier inside the lander exclaimed, looking out at the plants.
"Our research on extraterrestrial life is extremely limited; blue plants are not impossible," another scientist, appearing to be about fifty years old, pushed up his glasses and replied.
"Let's land here, don't go into the forest," Eric said, frowning.
"Okay, Captain."
Upon receiving the order, John controlled the ship, flying back a short distance, then descended to a spot roughly twenty meters away from the plants.