Apocalypse Survival: Starting with a Shelter

A high-intensity laser slowly cut through the twisted metal casing of the tower's control unit, exposing a chaotic mess of wires and circuit boards inside.

With just one glance, Su Wu felt overwhelmed. He couldn't tell whether the components were salvageable. However, this didn't bother him.

After a brief pause, diagnostic reports began to scroll across the screen. Su Wu's eyes scanned through the data, quickly understanding the situation.

The damage wasn't as severe as it appeared. With some additional materials, the engineering robots could fully repair it.

Without hesitation, Su Wu gave the order to begin repairs.

When using survival points to upgrade equipment, the state of the item—damaged or intact—determines the upgrade path. Repairing first ensures a full restoration and then upgrades with higher technological functionality, while skipping repairs limits the potential enhancements.

Two hours passed swiftly. With the combined effort of several construction robots and the transport vehicles, the repaired signal tower was moved into the shelter's entrance tunnel.

All external activities at the shelter paused. The outer gate of the entrance slowly sealed shut, isolating the shelter from the scorching heat outside. At the same time, the blast door at the end of the tunnel opened, allowing the shelter's air-conditioning system to cool the area and dissipate residual heat.

Su Wu left the control center and made his way to the entrance platform. He stood silently before the signal tower, which nearly filled the entire passageway.

"Time to indulge a bit," he muttered to himself.

Upgrading the signal tower required a significant amount of survival points. According to his original plan, these points were reserved for installing a CNC machine and a 3D printer in the control center. This diversion would delay that plan, but Su Wu deemed it worthwhile.

Reaching out, Su Wu placed his hand on the tower's apex. A faint sting of heat against his palm made him instinctively pull back slightly.

The system interface appeared before him:

[Communication Signal Tower]

Evaluation: A communication base station with complete transmission and reception functionality.

Upgradeable Options: Increase Capacity, Expand Range, Enhance Penetration.

The upgrade choices were concise but impactful. Enhancing capacity would allow more simultaneous users, expanding range would increase coverage, and penetration would enable signals to bypass obstructions like soil and rock.

After careful consideration, Su Wu chose Enhance Penetration. While limited capacity might cause minor slowdowns, and reduced range would limit coverage, penetration was a game-changing attribute. It could bypass barriers and deliver signals directly to deep underground shelters.

This ability also made it possible to bypass the control of uncooperative shelter administrators, ensuring residents could access his network.

However, penetration only enabled one-way communication. Without a shelter's surface communication devices, the signal tower couldn't receive feedback. Essentially, it turned the network into a one-way broadcast.

Nonetheless, Su Wu wasn't overly concerned. Breaking the information monopoly would pressure administrators to cooperate, especially if network access became a vital resource for their residents.

Confirming the upgrade, Su Wu watched as ten survival points vanished. A white glow enveloped the tower, its twisted and dented exterior smoothing out into a pristine finish. The top of the tower morphed into a spherical, closed structure, exuding a minimalist elegance.

Curious, Su Wu ran his hand over the new surface. The cool, smooth texture suggested a high-grade metal, possibly an advanced alloy.

"Let's test it," Su Wu said, his anticipation evident.

He issued a series of commands through his tablet before returning to the control room. Behind him, the blast door closed, sealing off the signal tower and the nearby robots from the shelter's interior.

Minutes later, the 15-meter-tall signal tower was erected atop the newly completed small fortress.

[Wireless charging initiated.]

[Connection established.]

[Integrated into standard power supply network.]

[Communication signal tower initializing.]

[Initialization complete.]

[Wireless network active.]

In the control center, Su Wu unlocked his phone and found a network icon with full signal strength. Clicking on it, a clean, minimalistic search page popped up.

"It worked," he said, satisfied. From this moment, the signal tower had fully integrated into the shelter's local network and extended its coverage to a 15-kilometer radius.

Within this area, anyone with a wireless communication device could access or detect Su Wu's network.

A new internet was born.

Thirteen kilometers away, at another private shelter in the outskirts, a young man named Wang Hao was charging his phone with a hand-cranked generator. He flipped through the settings out of sheer boredom.

Having been in his underground shelter for days, Wang Hao had exhausted all the novels, movies, and videos stored on his phone. Now, he didn't know what to do with it.

"I should've downloaded more offline games," he lamented.

Previously, Wang Hao had installed several games that claimed to work offline. But to his dismay, none of them were accessible without an internet connection—a cruel irony in his current situation.

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