Chapter 110 109: No Reference
A two-fold increase in unit efficiency meant that a speed which originally required two units of fuel could now be achieved with just one.
With nuclear fission fuel—that is, uranium-235 or plutonium-239—the improvement wasn't actually that significant. It was nothing more than a reduction from 200 kg to 100 kg. A meager difference of 100 kg in mass wasn't a big deal.
For chemical fuel, however, the improvement was enormous.
This meant a reduction from 10 tons to 5 tons, or even from 20 tons to 10 tons!
With a full 5 or even 10 tons of fuel saved, how much more ammunition could be carried? Or, even if the fuel load wasn't reduced and the original amount was kept, how much would its operational range increase?
Yet, despite such a massive improvement, Li Qingsong remained somewhat dissatisfied.
The reason was simple: the current miniaturized nuclear fission propulsion module was still too massive.
Over two hundred tons!
It could barely be used on a Venus-class Warship; using it on a Mercury-class Warship was impossible.
In Li Qingsong's vision, for the propulsion module to be used on a Mercury-class Warship—the nuclear fission reactor, the internal combustion engine, and the secondary compression system—the total mass of these three components should ideally not exceed 15 tons. Only then would it have practical value.
This meant that Li Qingsong had to reduce its weight by another 245 tons from its current state, a weight reduction of a staggering 94%!
It seemed like an impossible task.
Except…
'The Human World could do it, so why can't I?'
Li Qingsong clearly remembered that the small spaceships built by the Human World used that very propulsion technology!
Before it vanished, the Human World had a total population of about ten billion. Among those ten billion people, how many were researchers?
The estimate was around 90 million.
And that was with the Human World placing extreme importance on scientific research.
But now, the total number of Clones under his command dedicated to scientific research was about 30 million. Furthermore, he could temporarily commandeer the brainpower of even those Clones engaged in industrial production.
Besides, how many communication barriers existed among the Human World's researchers? How many academic silos and conflicts of interest?
The combined research capabilities of his 30 million research Clones were at least ten times greater than those of the entire Human World's 90 million researchers.
That's right. Ever since Li Qingsong's maximum consciousness connections surged from 10 million to 100 million, his research and industrial power had already left the ten-billion-strong Human World far behind.
His only disadvantage at present was a lack of time and accumulated experience.
But that was fine. A lack of experience could be compensated for with superior quality and quantity.
'Any technology the Human World could master, I can master too!'
And so, supplied with abundant resources from such a massive industrial system, Li Qingsong commanded his Clones to once again launch a research offensive—one that spared no expense and touched upon nearly every scientific discipline.
Costly experiments were carried out one after another, launched without a moment's hesitation. After all, the resources of the Jupiter System were exceedingly abundant. And even if the Jupiter System couldn't keep up, there was the entire Solar System.
Need numerical simulations? Scientific calculations? Supercomputers?
Build a hundred of them first and ask questions later!
After all, the "human society" now composed of Clones had no other consumption needs beyond the very limited requirements for its own survival. This freed up the vast surplus of resources from the industrial society to be poured directly into scientific research.
Under these circumstances, Li Qingsong achieved another breakthrough in just ten years.
The nuclear fission Thrust Device suitable for the Mercury-class Warship was finally built!
Its total mass was only 14 tons, and its overall fuel efficiency had increased by another 20% compared to the previous generation!
In Li Qingsong's memory, even the most advanced small-scale fission Thrust Device from the Human World, including the one used on the original Deep Space Spaceship, had about this level of technology and performance—and was perhaps even slightly inferior.
This meant that, at least in terms of Thrust Devices, he had already caught up to or slightly surpassed the Human World.
But this was still not the end. Li Qingsong intended to charge toward even greater heights.
He hoped to miniaturize the fission Thrust Device to the point where it could be used on Interstellar Missiles!
An Interstellar Missile had a total mass of only a few hundred kilograms, with the largest barely reaching two or three tons.
It was too small and could only use chemical fuel.
But... if an Interstellar Missile could be equipped with a fission Thrust Device, to what extent would its acceleration and penetration capabilities skyrocket? How high would its maneuverability become?
All in all, how powerful would its combat effectiveness become?
Shrinking an entire fission Thrust Device down to just a few hundred kilograms, or even less than a hundred, truly seemed like a fantasy.
Li Qingsong himself didn't know if such a thing was even possible. After all, he no longer had a sample to reference, just as there had once been great controversy in the Human World over whether it was even possible to build an atomic bomb.
But it didn't matter. He would research it first and see what happened. What if it succeeded?
The great leap in Thrust Device technology and the massive increase in overall efficiency drastically changed the landscape of Li Qingsong's current space transportation network.
Fueled by his immense industrial capacity, the most advanced fission Thrust Devices were quickly developed into several different models, each suited for spaceships of various sizes, and were rapidly put into widespread use.
As a result, Li Qingsong's chemical fuel consumption saw a visible decline.
Over the entire previous year, Li Qingsong had consumed a total of about 1.06 billion tons of chemical fuel.
Since fission power plants were already the primary source for power generation, this chemical fuel was almost entirely consumed by spaceship transportation.
But this year, with the widespread application of fission Thrust Devices, chemical fuel consumption dropped sharply to only 620 million tons.
By next year, it was estimated to decrease by another 50% or more, falling to less than 300 million tons.
This meant that a massive amount of industrial power and transport capacity was freed up. In other words, Li Qingsong's industrial strength was once again further enhanced.
By now, Mercury-class Warships and Venus-class Warships using the new fission Thrust Devices had also been built. But Li Qingsong did not use the Wukong AI to conduct large-scale combat drills with them yet.
The reason was simple: the current Warships had only reached the peak Human World standard in terms of propulsion, while all other aspects were still lagging far behind.
Drills with such lopsided Warships could not accurately reflect battlefield conditions. The data they generated would not only be useless to the Wukong AI but actually harmful.
He could not tolerate such a thing happening, as the Wukong AI was the AI he valued most, second only to the Jade Emperor AI.
"It's time to develop a Warship whose every system can meet, or even exceed, the peak level of the Human World!"