Cataclysm: Undead Dragons and Zero Empire

Chapter 102 Design Evolution

"Combat experience requires a closed loop and iteration," Karen said, explaining her design philosophy.

"The brains of clone soldiers will be designed to be recyclable. We can connect the brains of fallen soldiers to biological brains via neural interfaces and upload all their combat experience and battlefield memories to a database."

"These new practical experiences will be integrated, learned, optimized, and iterated by the biological brain, and then downloaded to the newly born clone warriors."

"This means that our clone army will grow stronger as the war continues, maximizing the value of the clone army. The experience of fallen soldiers will become the learning material for those who come after, forming a closed training loop."

"Commander-in-chief—this is simply—turning war into a program that can be iterated and optimized continuously—"

"This is the way we can win this war," Karen explained, glancing around the conference room. "Now, who still opposes restarting the cloning program?"

There was complete silence. They all understood that the commander had made up his mind, and faced with the increasingly precarious situation at the front, there was no reason to object anymore.

"I agree to restart the cloning project," the first to speak was the legion commander guarding headquarters. This veteran of countless battles resolutely stood up for the product that might replace them in the future. "Everything for the new foundation, for the commander!"

Voices of approval began to rise one after another, and the previous hesitation and fear were replaced by the desire for victory. "Very good," Karen nodded slightly.

"Immediately restart the bioinformatics database, open all resources and permissions, I want to see the first batch of clone warriors emerge from the incubation chambers."

"Yes, Commander!"

After the meeting ended, all the core members present hurriedly left to their respective posts, and the entire rebel war machine began to operate at maximum efficiency.

The empty conference room was now empty except for Karen and his personal secretary, Leah. Leah, who knew Karen's thoughts best, asked softly, "Commander, is the cloning program really just for winning the war?"

She followed Karen throughout her life, knowing that this former diplomatic envoy would not be so short-sighted as to focus only on the immediate victory in the war and ignore the aftermath. His gaze was always fixed on the distant stars and the future of the entire civilization.

Karen walked to the porthole and looked out at the vast starry sky. The distant stars emitted a warm light, but the universe was even more vast in darkness, hiding countless unknowns.

"Winning the civil war is just the most basic function of the cloning project," Karen said softly, as if talking to herself. "Lia, the fate of the Humboldt Consortium has taught us a lesson: in this chaotic world, a civilization must possess sufficient power to survive. Even mediocrity means death. We must advance, and advance again, by any means necessary."

"Our race has stagnated on the path of natural evolution for far too long. The old guys on the board only care about the power in their hands and the profits on paper. They are afraid of change and the unknown. They regard all technologies that may bring about change as taboos, preferring to cling to the rigid system and rot slowly, surviving on the size of the foundation."

"The cloning project is only the first step."

Karen looked at his confidant, his eyes gleaming with the light of idealism. He opened a more encrypted file, the title of which read: "The Ascension Project. What I want to do is not just mass-produce clone soldiers. All of this is to serve the genetic reshaping of the entire Foundation's main race and redesign the genetic template of our race." This was an almost sacred ambition, with his sights set on the future of the entire civilization.

"We must abandon the randomness and redundancy of natural evolution, discard the defects and constraints etched into our genes, and guide the evolution of our entire race entirely through artificial design to achieve true ascension."

Leah stared in shock at the document titled "Project Ascension," her breath catching in her throat. She understood that what Karen truly wanted to do was something that could overturn the entire course of history.

"We are destined to become a more powerful race, a more powerful civilization, so that we may take a step toward perfection."

"We need to enhance intelligence, optimize the brain structure in our race's genes, improve the average logical thinking and learning abilities of individuals in our race, and produce more scientists, strategists, and engineers in the future. This will fundamentally accelerate the technological development of our civilization. We cannot always follow behind others; we must move to the forefront of science and technology ourselves."

"We need to enhance our physical bodies, redesign our genetic sequences, express entirely new organs and glands, fully unleash our potential, change our very nature, and give our individual races greater strength, faster speed, and more endurance. We must even be able to survive in most extreme environments in the universe, and allow damaged bodies to regenerate rapidly, even repairing brain damage over time."

"Most importantly, we must repair the flaws in our genes, resolve the errors and redundancies accumulated in natural evolution, and extend the natural lifespan of our race, rather than endlessly replacing our species with clones. Our scholars..."

Engineers and artists have more time to explore, to create, and to leave a greater legacy for the development of civilization with their limited lives.

At this point, Karen paused slightly, a look of awe flashing in her eyes at the dragon shadow soaring through the starry sky.

"We also need to add sequences related to psionic affinity to the new genetic template," Karen said firmly, pushing technological development into uncharted territory. "It's a difficult path, with invisible barriers blocking our way, but we want every individual of the entire race to be born with an affinity for psionic energy, so that even if they can't become powerful psionicists, they can at least have a basic understanding of the existence of psionic energy."

In Lia's eyes, the starlight outside the porthole fell on Karen, as if gilding him with a halo. She understood that the commander she followed was not a power-hungry opportunist, but a thorough revolutionary, a guide who wanted to lead the entire race to a phoenix-like rebirth.

"Commander, this—this is too ambitious. It will probably require more than one generation's effort and unimaginable accumulation of resources and technology," Leah said, trembling.

"Every road must take the first step," Karen said, looking at the ships constantly shuttling back and forth in headquarters. "The cloning project will give us enough experience in gene cutting, editing, and design."

"If we win, I will lift all restrictions on the civilian use of gene editing technology, approve the use of cloning vaults, fill the population gap caused by the war, and restore production and trade."

"I know this goes against ethics and the laws of nature, but Leah, tell me, when our ancestors first picked up stone tools, first lit a fire, first cleared the wilderness, first smelted metals, and first planted out-of-season crops, weren't they going against the laws of nature every time? The development of civilization is itself a process of constantly breaking free from the shackles of nature and constantly moving towards freedom."

"Stagnation leads to stagnation, and stagnation leads to corruption. Now I want to reopen this path, go further, and go to places I never dared to even imagine before."

Lia looked at Karen's retreating figure and bowed deeply: "I understand, Commander. I will always follow you and witness our race complete this great ascension."