In the farmhouse courtyard, underground control center.
Su Wu browsed through the backend data of the last communication signal tower with a hint of surprise.
It was different from the expected coldness.
The signal tower, standing by the sea, had seen the number of receiving terminals rapidly climb to the million mark in less than an hour after it was established.
And only a small portion of that came from the land to the west.
More of it appeared from the other side of the ocean.
After a brief hesitation, unable to suppress his curiosity, Su Wu launched a reconnaissance drone from the seaside watchtower.
He directed it towards the addresses indicated by the signals deep in the ocean.
Soon, as more and more signal addresses were captured by the drone's camera, Su Wu discovered that these places with human activity were partly located in the mountainous areas near the former coastline, now on islands. The other part was directly beneath the surging ocean.
Those shelters that were once built along the coast had not completely disappeared with the tsunami and the emergence of the ocean.
Instead, they exhibited an extremely resilient vitality, surviving until now.
"From this perspective, the casualties along the coast back then..."
"Shouldn't have been as severe as speculated."
Looking at the camera, shrouded in heavy rain, the dark sea surface was constantly churning with waves.
Su Wu felt as if he could see, behind that danger and desolation, the settlements that belonged to humanity.
However, after staring for a while, Su Wu had no intention of taking further action.
After all, it was still the ocean.
Whether for rescue or trade, the difficulty was a level higher than on land.
With Su Wu's current capabilities, it was already extremely challenging to shelter the wandering refugees on land.
He simply did not have the extra energy to delve into matters across the ocean, a thousand miles away.
Retracting his gaze, Su Wu thought for a moment and slightly loosened the permissions of the seaside communication signal tower.
He allowed humans in the ocean area to communicate with each other through text on the forum, albeit in a limited manner.
Although the communication signal tower outside Jianghe City could not provide most people with free internet access due to limited capacity, offering some pure text communication was still feasible.
After all, a few million words of text was equivalent to just a few seconds of video.
With this forum for communication, it would also facilitate Su Wu in collecting information about those ocean shelters.
Providing a reference for future measures to be taken against those shelters.
On the surface.
The Garden fleet, returning from the seaside.
Just after sailing back for a few dozen kilometers, the remaining space on the ship was quickly filled by the newly sheltered refugees.
The refugees who had the ability and courage to leave the shelters and navigate through the heavy rain and floods accounted for only a small portion of the total number.
More people, even if trapped in the shelters with dwindling supplies, found it hard to muster the resolve to venture out and wander.
In this situation, the long-range fleet dispatched by Su Wu often faced not the challenge of finding refugees, but rather the need to select from countless desperate pleas for help, the small group of individuals in the most critical condition, who would face immediate death if not rescued.
The rest, who could still hold on for a while, were generally left to stay in their original places, waiting for subsequent capacity to be freed up before they could be picked up.
Shifting his focus away from the coastline, Su Wu no longer paid attention to the two fleets sailing outside.
Instead, he rarely directed his gaze to the surface of the farmhouse courtyard.
Only about 20 meters away from where Su Wu was located, the displayed temperature was merely 4 degrees.
"Such a low temperature."
"It seems the remaining time is running short."
"I hope there's still time."
Su Wu sighed softly, his heart once again filled with urgency.
Having long been in the warm underground shelter, during his leisure time, he strolled along the gravel paths and gardens by the underground fountain, surrounded by blooming, vibrant flowers.
It was hard to truly perceive the changes in the external climate.
But no matter how much he tried to ignore it, Su Wu could not be unaware of what a temperature of 4 degrees meant.
At this temperature, the rainwater falling on the surface no longer brought a refreshing feeling but instead a bone-chilling cold.
If exposed to the heavy rain without protection, it would not just be a matter of possibly catching a cold later; one could very well succumb to hypothermia and die on the spot.
And that was not even the worst of it.
Once the temperature dropped to zero and the water surface began to freeze, the two fleets would be unable to continue their journeys.
The operation of sheltering refugees would be severely impacted.
At the very least, it would be nearly impossible to migrate refugees hundreds of kilometers away as easily as they were doing now.
In a sense, they were currently battling against nature and natural disasters.
Su Wu needed to bring back as many refugees as possible before the temperature dropped to zero.
Temporarily suppressing his worries, Su Wu began to organize intelligence on the local powers along the route taken by the fleet.
Diplomacy with them was also a very important matter.
It was one thing to encounter them occasionally, but it was another to pass by their doorsteps daily, carrying tens of thousands of refugees.
Given the military deterrence accompanying the fleet, outright robbery was unlikely.
However, it was hard to guarantee that local powers wouldn't entertain the idea of setting up tolls.
When that time came, it would be difficult for Su Wu to decide whether to pay or not.
If he refused to pay, a war would be inevitable.
If he agreed to pay, not only would he incur losses in resources, but the time wasted during the toll collection and inspection process would be unbearable for Su Wu.
That could equate to thousands of lives.
To avoid such a worst-case scenario, it was necessary to make contact with the local powers in advance and gauge their attitudes.
In the next two to three days, Su Wu spent most of his time on diplomacy.
Starting from Tumen City, he approached each district one by one.
He first dispatched a negotiation team composed of business elites, former government officials, and psychological experts to make initial contact with the leading local powers through the network established by the communication signal tower.
Then, Su Wu personally stepped in to discuss matters with their leaders.
Overall, the results were quite good.
In addition to obtaining basic passage permits, they also managed to reach some trade agreements.
Su Wu's industrial strength, showcased in the television news with a daily production of 20,000 mobile phones, not only shocked ordinary people.
For the higher-ups of the shelters limited to their respective cities along the route, it was also a significant deterrent.
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