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Switchman House offshore launch platform, formerly known as Frontier Oil's No. 003 semi-submersible deep-sea oil rig, has been operating in the Caribbean Sea for more than 10 years. It weighs more than 40,000 tons and can handle over 40,000 tons of crude oil and 80,000 cubic meters of natural gas per day at its peak capacity.
With the depletion of oil and gas resources in the area, the rig 003 was eventually abandoned because of declining production. The Thoule Group acquired it for a very low price and converted it into a space rocket launch platform, 30 kilometers away from the coast.
As part of the Thoule Group's top-secret "Switchman" program, the Switchman sea launch platform is equipped with a vertical launch tower of more than 70 meters high and ancillary equipment such as a parking apron and fuel depots. From this platform, the Thoule Group's large ultra-high speed cargo and manned spacecrafts can depart for the Moon and Mars. Since the completion of the renovation in 2050, Switchman-1 has carried out more than 20 rocket launch missions.
Today, the Energy Centrifuge, key equipment in the Oswin's Mars Laboratory, is about to be sent to Mars. If successful, the Thoule Group could produce a steady stream of highly condensed energy concentrates called "Tungus Dust", to power loads of spacecrafts full of Replicae soldiers into the universe.
Paraíso, a South American seaside town, was built by immigrants at the beginning of the 20th century. Tourism and fishing used to be its main industries. There is even a local famous football team with a legendary player in its early years. At the end of the 20th century, driven by the return for retirement of the legendary player and attracted by the beautiful scenes, some rich people built luxury villas and enjoyed peaceful lives with the surrounding poor for many years.
In the 21st century, with the population growth and the expansion of Paraíso, gangs and clans from big cities started to infiltrate into Paraíso, leading to deteriorating security. The lower-class people became more and more miserable, risking even their lives. Some of the rich people moved away, while others turned their villas into fortresses. Shooting and illegal transactions were overwhelming, even discouraging the police.
Under the shelter of local gangs, several underground factories and laboratories operated in the slums, conducting secret criminal activities for big tech companiesIt has become one of the key nodes of the "Deep Web", where the customs are virtually non-existent. All kinds of experimental and contraband goods are smuggled in and out by yachts and cargo ships, then distributed to the black market and underground laboratories.
Goetsupolis is originally a small ancient town in East Asia. After being severely damaged in an earthquake, it was taken over by the female plutocrat "Matushka" in the name of reconstruction. Renamed as " Goetsupolis ", the town was turned into a movie and tourism site that integrated elements from other regions of East Asia. It quickly attracted many tourists because of its beautiful scenes and unique atmosphere. Many of the movies and games of the Kantele Group were produced here. Hanssen held many concerts here before he left the Uranus.
After Nash quit his homeland, he used to hide himself here, too.Due to its vibrant economy and highly mobile population, Goetsupolis becomes attracitve like a magnet for all kinds of immigrants, including both the good and the bad. If you don't live here for a long time, you will not experience this kind of fragmentation - the Viking pagan motorcycle gangs that occupy the streets are so incompatible with the antique architecture of East Asian style.
After Hanssen's leave, "Matushka" knew he would definitely hide himself here. As she still loved her son, she continued to adopt a permissive stance towards gangs in Goetsupolis. Some squads of Matr1x Alliance took the opportunities to grow here and carried out various training activities.
Gangs in the Cyber Age are controlling many industries, of which the lowest barrier to entry and the most unregulated is the recycling industry. All kinds of scrapped cars, robots, intelligent machinery, and bionic prostheses will eventually flow into the gang-controlled recycling black factory. Some useable parts will be either sold as spare parts or used for illegal assembly and transformation, going into their next use cycle, which is the main source of profit for the recycling industry. As for those parts that cannot be recycled, only some of them will be returned to the furnace, while the rest will be dumped into the landfill, playing a role in environmental pollution. Of course, such Cyber dumps are still a treasure for the renegade robots of the Deux Ex Machina, as well as for the underprivileged who won't even take in the gangs.
Black factories are everywhere in the city. They are usually not as simple as they appear, these are the veritable hidden places. These factories often hide businesses run by gangs and even gang lairs. Some are also disguised as long-abandoned, off-the-beaten-path states. For resistance forces like the Matr1x Alliance, battling against the gangs in black factories is a mandatory lesson. The environment here is much more complex than that of a residential area. Even with pre-scouting, the mission here would still be filled with unknowns. After the establishment of Matr1x Alliance in 2061, the first battle of the elite squad was fought in such a recycling plant.
Oswin and his Thoule company spared no effort in creating the new Ironman World Cup, a major event. They invested heavily while maintaining strict secrecy. On the eve of the opening of the first World Cup, a magnificent new city rose in the heart of a large desert and was made public, causing a global outcry. This is the venue for the New Ironman World Cup Breakaway and Combat events - and if one were to ask where the first race took place, it was the long and dangerous road to the city from the edge of the desert.
Wolf Citadel, named after the story of the twin brothers raised by a mother wolf who founded the city of Rome, looks like a large-scale replica of the ancient city of Rome itself. Famous sites such as the Roman Forum, the Colosseum, the Royal Palace, and the Pantheon have been restored to their heyday in the second century AD, as well as other buildings and intricate streets. In the early days of his career, Oswin had successfully restored the city-state of Athens in the meta-universe, and his father's company also started in the construction industry, so restoring an ancient Rome was a comfortable task for the Thoule Group.
In addition to being a competition venue, Wolf Citadel also has another important task: to act as a tourist city to compete with Goetsupolis created by the Kentele Group. Therefore, the stores, hotels, bathhouses, theaters, and other buildings in the city actually operate. In terms of aesthetics, the two Cyber Cities come with their own strengths. But on a technological level, Wolf Citadel is undoubtedly superior. To avoid damage brought by breakout sessions, all the city buildings are built according to extremely high explosive and flame-resistant standards, and every piece of glass and every lamp is made of strong polymer. Due to the scarcity of resources in the desert hinterland, Wolf Citadel has a large solar power plant and a nuclear fusion reactor, as well as an energy storage system to deal with unexpected power shortages. Water is obtained through a water supply and recycling filtration system built in the aquifer under the desert. In order to maintain ancient Rome's appearance as much as possible, the use of motor vehicles on the ground is prohibited, while mechanical horses or carriages are allowed. The underground waterway system of ancient Rome is replaced by advanced high-speed subways and closed car tracks, and transportation with the outside world is mainly done by intercity high-speed tracks and intercity car tracks with several large transit stations. During the Ironman World Cup, the Wolf Citadel generates a lot of broadcast traffic and online gambling, for which a data processing center has been built with one of the highest processing capacities in the world. The overall city look is enhanced by virtual reality technology, which can be switched between the magnificent historical mode and the Cyber Earth mode with flashing lights to cater based on different thematic needs. In addition, Wolf Citadel is equipped with a large number of bionic robots with the physical characteristics of ancient Roman citizens, dressed in historical costumes matching their occupations, and ready to serve visitors or handle various emergencies. They are also responsible for cleaning up the competition venue.
Wolf Citadel is also a testing ground for Thoule's Mars development technology. Oswin once declared that in the next few years, Wolf Citadel will be equipped with a glass-covered microclimate circulation system to form local climate and even seasonal, diurnal regulation, so that the tens of millions of visitors will no longer need to endure the torture of desert heat. Not to mention this is also an indispensable configuration for the future Mars colony. After long-term monitoring and observation, Matr1x Alliance has found that many things are not quite right in the operation of Wolf Citadel, under which there must be many hidden secrets, such as the following:
The network and physical security level are already higher than that of Thoule's headquarters.
Even though the desert city consumes enormous amounts of electricity, the installed fusion reactor capacity is still far greater than needed. However, almost all of the electricity generated is consumed.
Scans revealed that the underground buildings are extremely large and several high-speed rail lines are kept secret.
Water consumption is also abnormal, indicating the existence of alternative ways to produce water.
Matr1x Alliance executives believe that no matter what is hidden here if future action needs to be taken against Wolf Citadel, the first step should be to destroy its data center and other key facilities. With the help of reconnaissance satellites, Matr1x Alliance scanned Wolf Citadel and roughly reconstructed it in the metaverse. Before cracking Wolf Citadel's security system, the team started to train in the virtual arena.
The "turbine" is how the citizens of Vitemusk refer to the local hydroelectric power plant. Just a short distance away from this industrial city, flows a large river from a canyon. At the beginning of the Cold War in the mid-20th century, the authorities built a large hydroelectric power station at the exit of the canyon so that the industrial area of Vitemusk would not have to rely on electricity imported from elsewhere.
For a long time, the Vitemusk hydroelectric power plant was under military protection and was a restricted area, to which no one was allowed to have access. The hydroelectric power plant has four large hydroelectric generating units and the dam is designed to withstand unprecedented floods and a small-yield nuclear attack.
After the Cold War, the Vitemusk hydroelectric power station was decommissioned by the authorities due to high maintenance costs, and only the water storage function was retained. The dam and the reservoir behind it became a popular recreation spot for the citizens of Vitemusk. When it freezes over in the winter, the reservoir can be used as an ice sports venue.
Around 2050, the Faun Group bought the Vitemusk hydroelectric power station and did a thorough renovation and upgrade. Since then, the hydroelectric power station has once again been designated as a restricted area. On the one hand, the Faun Group draws water and electricity from it to supply the high-yielding crop greenhouses, genetically modified farms, and food factories they have built nearby. On the other hand, the dam itself has been turned into a fortified and secret experimental base, with a bioengineering laboratory and data processing center added to the existing power station and sluice gate. Citizens have witnessed many container trucks with mysterious cargo traveling between the reservoir and the city, but they know nothing about things happening there. But rumors of "monsters" living in the reservoir were once widespread. Some employees of the electricity department revealed that sometimes they even have to feed power from the newly built fusion power plant to the Vitemusk hydroelectric power station at night, which is very strange and something untoward must be going on there.
For the Faun Group, the dam of the Vitemusk hydroelectric power plant can hold many conspiracies for them, and if one day the conspiracy is revealed, they will not hesitate to blow up the dam and let the hidden secrets disappear in the flood with the city of Vitemusk. They think they are the "creators", of course, they have the right to send a flood to end this crazy experiment.
Neo-Danzig is a virtual city in the Metaverse, home to the players' virtual avatars. The project was jointly initiated by large consortiums, with reference to "modern free ports" such as Hong Kong and Singapore. The Neo-Danzig is also built in full accordance with the model of physical cities. However, its economic system is based on cyptocurrencies and NFTs, and the payment is through its own Coin, $Neo-Danzig Coin, issued by its municipal government. Based on the exchange rate of $Neo-Danzig Coin to USD, its GDP has surpassed that of Hong Kong since 2050.
Neo-Danzig, like any physical city, has different quarters and a well-connected underground transport system. Despite the wealth gap, Neo-Danzig is still one of the few places where people can climb up the social ladder by hard working, and can experience different lives from physical ones. A humble white collar in the real life might be a casino mogul here, while the real-life rich man might just be a gangster "shot" any time in the street. Later, the virtual avatars of some top members of the Uranus were uncovered by the Resistance and assassinated. As a warning, it proved that the Resistance had managed to break through the firewalls of Neo-Danzig and that its intelligence had gone beyond the expectations of the Uranus.
