Space Odyssey from Abandoned Mining Space Station

Chapter 10: Chapter 10 Asteroid Belt

The next day.

The first thing Chen Ming did after waking up.

Was to clear the temporary storage space of the smelting furnace in the work cabin, to let it resume work.

Although the smelting furnace automatically expels the metal ingots inside once the space gets full,

due to the spaceship’s age and disrepair, the outlet for expelling smelted metal was damaged, causing the outlet to be blocked by various metal chunks.

After spending some time sorting out this heap of messy metal ingots and attempting to widen the outlet slightly, Chen Ming returned to the living quarters to wash up and refresh himself.

Then he returned to the storage cabin to tally up the gains from his rest period.

Overnight, the weight of iron ingots in the storage cabin reached 419.5 kilograms, followed by copper and tin, 51.4 kilograms and 43.3 kilograms, and then aluminum, which Chen Ming needed the most, 11.5 kilograms.

There were also some assorted metal ore products, typically weighing between a few hundred grams to several kilograms.

Among them, what caught Chen Ming’s attention was actually those few grams of gold.

This outcome made Chen Ming nod slightly.

Collecting from a small asteroid usually takes about an hour.

If one counts the consumption during mid-flight, having such a harvest overnight was beyond his expectations.

Although iron, the largest yield, isn’t valuable, the quantity of other metal minerals isn’t negligible.

At this rate, even just operating around the Mining Space Station, he should be able to gather the materials needed for repairing the Landing Module in about ten days.

Moreover, the spaceship’s computer would obtain the orbital data of the planet and the circular data of the Space Station orbiting the planet by this afternoon.

This means Chen Ming no longer needs the spaceship to follow the Space Station closely to lock its position.

He could then head to the deeper part of the asteroid belt to search for the minerals he needed the most.

Such an approach would inevitably increase the efficiency of mineral acquisition, bringing forward the start time for repairing the Landing Module.

Nonetheless, Chen Ming needed to pay attention to a few things thereafter.

The likelihood of acquiring high mineral-content asteroids rises when away from the Space Station, but likewise, so does the density of asteroids themselves.

This implies that the spaceship might collide with an asteroid within just a couple of steps, requiring the spaceship’s Weapon Guidance System to lock onto and preemptively fragment the asteroid.

Loose stones, as long as they aren’t moving too fast, only serve as a tickle to the spaceship’s Armor.

However, to be honest, Chen Ming found this Guidance System somewhat unreliable.

According to the spaceship’s operation manual, the Weapon Guidance System relies on a dynamic object scanning program, using scanned image signals to lock on asteroids.

This means there might be errors during the image scanning process, possibly missing or bypassing some asteroids.

Thus, it required Chen Ming to exercise some caution.

Therefore, Chen Ming opted to open the armor panel of the spaceship and pressed the Repair button.

Amid a mental fatigue, the metal ingots melted into a liquid with a metallic luster, seeping through the ship’s body, restoring the armor as good as new with just a flow.

The armor plates regained their thick hue; even after seeing it twice, it still left Chen Ming somewhat incredulous.

Of course, Chen Ming didn’t exhaustingly repair all the damages on the spaceship’s Armor, as his own mental state couldn’t endure that.

So he only restored all the armor’s durability to more than 70%, ensuring collision resistance against several asteroids at the least.

If the armor’s durability decreased to a precarious level, the capacity to retreat from the asteroid belt would be sufficient.

The remainder of the morning passed with Chen Ming paging through electronic books on two terminals.

A brief rest at noon revitalized his spirit.

Around the self-imposed two o’clock in the afternoon, the spaceship suddenly signaled that the orbital path of the Space Station was locked.

Initially a bit groggy from a nap, Chen Ming felt fully invigorated.

He returned to the captain’s seat, where a screen connected to two 22mm caliber Machine Guns appeared before him.

Spread all around were views from all external cameras aboard the spaceship, allowing him an uninterrupted view in every direction outside the spaceship.

Chen Ming had truly not figured out a way to resolve the Weapon Guidance System error besides repairing the Armor to allow the spaceship to withstand a couple more asteroid impacts throughout the morning.

Ultimately, all he could do was take direct control over the spaceship’s navigation and assist the Weapon Guidance System.

Covering the asteroids missed by the computer, and vice versa.

If both he and the computer fail to notice, then there was little that could be done.

The spaceship could withstand a few collisions.

Chen Ming made slight movements in his chair, familiarizing himself with the general controls of the spaceship.

Even dividing his attention to control the dual turrets, operate the spaceship’s movement, and focus on all external cameras of the spaceship,

Chen Ming felt neither rusty nor flustered.

It was as though he was the brain of the spaceship, with all equipment being extensions of his body, operating them seamlessly.

The dual task focus was inconsequential given what Chen Ming was doing now.

Relishing in the sensation of controlling everything about the spaceship, Chen Ming then activated the scanner.

At a certain distance from the Space Station, he chose an asteroid belt region of moderate density.

Being his first time actually operating the spaceship and weapons into a place holding potential danger, Chen Ming thought it best to proceed cautiously.

He planned to head into more hazardous, denser asteroid regions for mineral extraction once experienced and more adept at controlling the spaceship.

After a period of flight.

The spaceship entered a sector with a moderate number of asteroids that it had pre-scanned from the side near the Space Station.

Using the fine scanning function of the asteroid scanning detector, it analyzed the minerals inside the asteroids.

Soon, the scanner identified an asteroid that appeared ordinary but showed a high aluminum content from the scan results.

Chen Ming immediately took action to approach with the spaceship.

Along the approach, he controlled the Machine Guns to fire periodically, shattering asteroids heading toward the spaceship.

With the aid of the Guidance System, this task was relatively straightforward for Chen Ming.

Meanwhile, the automated system in the work cabin activated, swiftly capturing the asteroid within the traction range.

Though the work cabin could operate under Chen Ming’s consciousness control, engaging one work cabin wouldn’t burden his navigation of the spaceship.

However, Chen Ming opted to let the computer take charge of this function, focusing solely on the spaceship driving and Weapon System, to prevent the ship from being struck by dense meteors and asteroids here.

After all, attention might disperse after prolonged engagement in a single task, not to mention undertaking two prolonged, error-free tasks concurrently.

In this regard, Chen Ming also chose the most cautious approach.

Just so his previous planning could proceed smoothly in an orderly manner.