The total number of 75,000 was a figure Tom arrived at through comprehensive calculations, combining his current maximum consciousness connection limit with corresponding engineering capabilities and technological levels.

A fleet of this scale was almost the limit he could currently support.

Over the years, Tom's maximum consciousness connection limit had been slowly increasing, accompanying the development of biotechnology and the continuous improvement and enhancement of Hestia AI.

Although there had been no dramatic surges like the previous jump from ten million to one hundred million, small increases, such as a few tenths of a percent each time, consistently occurred.

Almost every new generation of clone cultivated showed some degree of improvement.

Under these circumstances, Tom's current maximum consciousness connection limit had risen to 120 million.

Tom believed that for a normal communal intelligent civilization, the highest ratio between its total population and the completely non-productive population engaged in military-industrial and combat-related activities could be approximately one hundred to one.

That is to say, a civilization with a population of 120 million could support approximately 1.2 million military-related personnel. On average, 100 people could support one soldier.

After all, soldiers are completely non-productive; they produce no resources themselves but consume a large amount of resources.

The fuel for spaceships, the manufacturing of equipment, the salaries of personnel, even the electricity and equipment used for research—which of these isn't astronomically expensive?

One hundred people supporting one soldier—this is still under conditions of highly developed technology, abundant resources, and greatly improved productivity.

Of this one percent of military-related personnel, the vast majority would be taken up by those responsible for logistics, maintenance, production, scientific research, training, and civilian duties. The ratio of frontline combat personnel to total military personnel is roughly 1 to 50.

That is, 50 military-related personnel can support one frontline combatant.

Thus, this civilization with a total population of 120 million, supporting 1.2 million military-related personnel, could roughly support 24,000 frontline combatants.

Accounting for factors like rotation and shifts, even if all 24,000 frontline combatants operated Mercury-class battleships, with each Mercury-class battleship requiring eight people to control, it could only support a fleet of 3,000 Mercury-class battleships.

But don't forget, a Mercury-class battleship being operated by eight clones is something only Tom can achieve. For a regular intelligent civilization, it would probably require at least 16 people.

Consequently, the fleet size would shrink again, becoming only 1,500 ships.

If it were an Earth-class battleship, Tom would need 688 clones to operate it, while an ordinary civilization would require at least 1,300 people, which would only support fewer than 20 ships.

However, for Tom, the situation was different.

The reason is simple: the clone society under Tom's command is completely abnormal.

The entire society, apart from scientific research, military, and basic life support, has almost no other consumption.

There are no salaries, no entertainment, no leisure, no waste.

The resource utilization rate of the entire society has almost reached its limit.

Under these circumstances, although the effective total population is only 120 million, Tom can support the consumption of 12 million military industry-related personnel, reaching a ratio of one to ten, ten times higher than an ordinary civilization!

These 12 million military industry-related personnel can in turn support approximately 1.2 million frontline combat personnel, with the ratio still being one to ten, five times higher than an ordinary civilization!

In total, that's fifty times.

According to this calculation, although Tom currently has only 120 million people, in terms of military strength alone, he can roughly achieve the equivalent of an ordinary intelligent civilization with a population of 6 billion.

In fact, Tom believes a more accurate estimate should be around 10 billion.

The reason is simple: for an ordinary civilization to achieve the above ratios, it is based on the entire civilization being united, greatly reducing internal friction and waste.

If there is even a slight waste, to support the same proportion of frontline combat personnel, the total population size would need to increase significantly.

If one also considers the scientific research level, industrial capability, the contribution of a single effective individual, and various other aspects, Tom even believes that this number would increase threefold, requiring an ordinary civilization with a population of 30 billion to compare with himself.

It is precisely for this reason that Tom dares to build a massive fleet totaling over 75,000 various spacecraft, even with an effective population of only 120 million at present!

This goal is so grand, so enormous. Even Tom has no choice but to go all out.

Under his control, the entire Jupiter system truly entered a state of intense busyness.

A total of approximately 220 million clones rotated between rest and work, ensuring that 120 million clones were on duty at all times.

In numerous newly established mines, under the unified coordination of Hestia AI and the maintenance and decision-making of countless clones, countless machines roared, producing a continuous stream of minerals, which were then processed on-site and transported along railway lines or to space elevator bases, or to other factories.

In deep space, thousands of transport and passenger ships shuttled back and forth busily, like threads connecting every planet and every base.

In the uranium enrichment plant, tens of millions of high-speed centrifuges operated non-stop, extracting uranium-235 from natural uranium, either for use as fuel in power plants or transported to spacecraft as their propulsion.

Under this comprehensive support, Tom truly achieved assembly line manufacturing of various spacecraft.

A single spacecraft is composed of tens of millions of parts, and the tens of thousands of factories involved operate non-stop.

High-speed radar modules, chips, supercomputing modules, electromagnetic cannon modules, laser cannon modules, propulsion modules, fission reactor modules…

And so on, an endless supply of parts converged on a total of 100 final assembly plants.

Among these numerous final assembly plants, 80 were dedicated to the production of Mercury-class battleships, 15 to Venus-class, and 5 to Earth-class.

This production capacity was carefully calculated by Tom. Only in this way could the production speed of each class of battleship meet expectations.

Under these circumstances, all equipped with new-style armaments, whether it was the propulsion system, defensive weapons, or detection and attack systems, all of which were the most advanced and powerful at the current stage, various battleships were continuously produced.

Before his fleet was even fully completed, with only about 3,000 battleships produced, Tom had already begun his next move.

Live-fire drills!

Real, genuine live-fire drills where numerous clones would die and many battleships would be destroyed!

The existing total of approximately 3,000 battleships were divided into two parts, each with an Earth-class battleship as its flagship, and set off majestically into deep space, with a great battle imminent.

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