Tanzania.
The massive explosion at the Mkukuyu River deposit did not prevent Atlas Group from continuing mining operations.
The first batch of workers—already modified with neural interfaces and trained through in-brain conditioning—lay in immersion pods, remotely controlling "Tanzania" engineering robots moving through the radiation zone.
The blast had completely reshaped the surface terrain, exposing sections of the deposit that had originally been only shallow underground, turning them into open-pit ore.
Normally, an explosion like this would flood the extraction environment with radioactive dust, and the geological shifts would drastically raise miner risk. But now, with Tanzania engineering robots in use, those risks had almost no direct impact on the workers.
The only downside was that the radioactive dust was drifting with the wind, slightly increasing radiation levels in settlements hundreds of kilometers away.
Related evacuation work had been ongoing for a long time.
Huff, huff.
A mass-produced robot stared at a drilling excavator in operation, a cable in its hand connected to the huge machine.
["Tanzania" Engineering Robot Type I]
[Height: 2.1 m]
[Weight: 225 kg]
[Max payload: 32 kg]
[Functions: multi-purpose arm, adaptive chassis (tracked + bipedal), advanced sensing suite, environmental monitoring]
Open-pit mining equipment had been erected directly on the contaminated soil left by the nuclear blast. High-purity ore was diverted to a crusher and sent straight into the next purification stage. Contaminated soil went to a waste recovery station, underwent rough processing, then fed into the SCFR waste recovery module.
From a distance, the robots looked like slightly stiffer humans—only stronger—and fully capable of using a variety of electric vehicles. Seen from afar, it barely differed from a human-run mine at all.
A few seconds later, the drill stopped. An electric heavy truck stopped at the same time near the drill's power connection.
Another identical robot climbed down, hauled a power unit out of the massive cargo bay, and the two robots worked together to swap the battery. The drill started up again.
The electric truck rolled out of the mine, and the sky gradually turned clearer.
Its route was a temporary road compacted with spider-silk solidifier, coated with asphalt. On the open ground along both sides were many solar panels and wind turbines already in operation, plus even more clean-energy facilities still under construction.
Electric vehicles moved in orderly formation at identical spacing, flowing efficiently—hauling ore, building materials, batteries, robots, and everything else needed for a city under construction.
Overhead, drone after drone maintained surveillance and data throughput. Along the roadside, engineering robots were also working on comm towers and substations.
The truck left the road and entered a gigantic construction site—
An SCFR in active operation rumbled like thunder. Through a newly completed bio-cable network, it sent a continuous stream of electricity toward factories not far away.
And those factories—built along the coast—were surrounded by soldiers wearing exoskeletons, alongside workers and managers who had just completed neural-interface surgery. They rode electric transport carts through the complex at speed.
Or rather, they were living inside a thriving, rising city still under construction.
Engineering robots and engineers were everywhere. Heavy machinery ran nonstop. Buildings of every purpose rose from the ground in rapid succession.
In the newly built harbor, Wakanda patrol boats were moored beside large cargo ships contracted by Atlas Group, and even a number of smaller freighters—ships not very big, their hulls covered in rust.
Onshore, a tall flagpole towered into the sky. Atlas Group's emblem flew high on the flag, flanked by the flags of the African Union and African nations, standing together to declare sovereignty.
This was Atlas Group's base in Africa—
Juya City, which in the local language meant sun.
Many captains and sailors seeing it for the first time were awestruck, their mouths hanging open.
This didn't look like the "backward Africa," the primitive bay of just months ago.
It looked like an advanced city from decades—or even a century—in the future.
Like a dream.
Along the shore stood a newly completed super-sized shipyard. Because it was open, you could see huge mechanical arms and complex facilities inside. A cluster of engineers and robots stood there, their eyes seeming to catch the light as they pointed at empty air, gesturing and discussing something no one else could see.
Bang.
Two comparatively leisurely robots walked along the coast, and one of them seemed to be staring at itself.
[Leo: Put simply, your neural damage is severe—but your muscle quality, sensory efficiency, and baseline neuron performance are all very high, so you've been compensating for it.]
[Leo: To keep you from going cyberpsycho and then turning into a normal person afterward, Little Octopus has been using a special algorithm to compensate for your damaged neural function.]
[Leo: But recently we suddenly noticed your symptoms seem to be improving.]
[V: Holy shit. That's insane, Leo!]
Yep. The robot that was crazily staring at itself was V.
The robot carried a lot of advanced sensors, but due to the tech gap, complex senses like smell were hard to make truly realistic.
Still, it was freer than pure braindance recording.
[Leo: Were you even listening?]
[V: Yeah, I heard you—my brain-thing is getting better—wait, are you calling me crazy?]
[Leo: I'm calling you something else right now: idiot.]
[Little Octopus: Boss, it really is braindance-triggered neural regeneration. This natural scenery seems to put her nerves into a state that's… not normal for most people.]
The robot ran to the shoreline and looked down at the water.
A bit dirty.
But there were miraculous seabirds.
A seabird cocked its head.
The robot cocked its head too.
Watching that, Leo suddenly had a strange thought:
In Cyberpunk 2077, there was also a mysterious monk who sold people braindances like this—said they were for meditation.
Could there really be something mystical going on?
Was V secretly born with some kind of cultivation prodigy body?
As the thought drifted on, the robot stood too close to the water and lost its footing. V instinctively tried to stabilize herself, but the engineering robot was far too heavy and clumsy—she couldn't adapt in time, couldn't move lightly the way she could in her own body.
Little Octopus appeared in the robot's view, several claws grabbing the robot's limbs.
To onlookers, it was as if the robot had suddenly achieved enlightenment in mechanical gymnastics, mysteriously saving itself.
[V: That scared the hell out of me… you've got some moves.]
Little Octopus climbed up by the robot's shoulder, proudly lifting its head. V patted it.
Leo shook his head—
He didn't think this was mysticism. The human body still had plenty of unsolved mysteries, sure—
And neurons weren't absolutely incapable of regeneration. Some cases suggested that in adult hippocampal regions, neurons could regenerate to a limited extent—neurogenesis—still a very cutting-edge research area.
[Leo: Keep monitoring. I'm going to check the situation in other zones.]
[Little Octopus: Got it, Boss. Long-range data transmission is ready.]
[Leo: Log off in one hour. Don't get addicted.]
[V: Roger.]
Leo looked toward the far end of the harbor—
Atlas Group soldiers were boarding ships in formation, preparing to sail somewhere else.
Where the conflict was hottest.
Somalia.