Chapter 131: The Workshop Underground

echnically, Hei Zi’s master happened to be Nan Nan’s grandfather.

Ye Chong tailed Hei Zi to the backyard. It was a new spot of Nan Nan’s home to Ye Chong as Hei Zi had never brought Ye Chong there before. The backyard was not totally secluded however, it was merely because Ye Chong had been to busy minding his own business to take a peek at someone else’s backyard. The place was spacious but Ye Chong’s animalistic intuition suggested him a kind of danger lurking in the place. He could smell it! In addition, Hei Zi was also acting quite cautiously as he led the road, “Stick to me. Closely!” he reminded from time to time as they moved. Ye Chong followed him closely, where he even mimicked the pace of Hei Zi’s step. Ye Chong did not intend to try anything funny at that moment. Certainly there was some catapulting or killing machine hidden in such an ordinary backyard…

“Great!” Mu’s voice rang, he sounded impressed, “This is a creative security.” Unfortunately there was no processor to transmit the data he received from the surrounding. Ye Chong could not speculate what sort of “creative security” there was in the yard. Well, if Mu complimented it, probably it should be rather powerful by nature. Regarding creativity… Who cares?

Since Mu had kind of “warned” about it, Ye Chong walked on as he literally laid the exact step as Hei Zi’s.

At the inner area of the yard there was a giant house made out of stones and bricks. It looked pretty normal from the outside. “Ye, let me remind you that the walls contain a fairly thick and highly dense alloy board.” The next comment had justified Ye Chong the anomaly of this house, “It also contains a certain standard of anti-detection ability.”

“Anti-detection ability?” Ye Chong wowed, “A certain standard of?” He became confused… What in the Haleyson he meant by “a certain standard”? What kind of “standard”? Mu shouldn’t be using a word this vague… Wasn’t there usually a range of figures at least?

“Mhm, that is correct. A certain standard of anti-detection ability, which even though are ineffective against me, it is effective even on the most advanced detection systems in the market,” explained Mu. “I see.” Ye Chong was enlightened.

He realized how roomy the inside was too. A purplish brown board was hung at the wall right opposite them, with a calligraphy written, “The Spirit Shines in the Bones of the Blade*”. Ye Chong’s attention was not on the meaning behind it, rather he wondered if the calligraphy was well-done, but he had zero expertise on calligraphy that he could not give his comment! There were numerous strange-looking apparatuses laid around the room while a variety of odd-looking things were scattered over the floor. A careful glance and Ye Chong recognized some of them! Those should be some skeletons of mutated lifeforms! He had seen countless of these back on Trash Planet-12! While the others… Ye Chong took a better glance… he could not tell. The texture was really peculiar though… with some of them having a metallic gloss.

“These are some substandard products… some people called it ‘defective products’… Well, they are defective by nature but it’s kind of a waste if we just throw them out of the window. So my master kept them here, considering how sometimes these could be useful recyclables!” Hei Zi looked much more relieved after getting into the house as he joyfully explained to Ye Chong.

Hei Zi’s step was broadened as they had arrived at the center of the house after a brief moment of conversation. A few taps on the interface and a few turns on the knob, Hei Zi clicked the apparatus by his side. He led Ye Chong to a corner after that. There was somehow… a square hollow at the ground. A flight of stairs was extended to the underground. The taps and turns were probably triggers to the opening here! Such an exceptional design! Hiding the switch inside here among the sea of junks and apparatuses, it sure would be a hassle for an intruder to even find the entrance.

Little glimmer shone through the first few steps by the hole. The staircases seemed endless… Ye Chong could not tell the end of the stairs, he could barely see the bottom! It should be a very, very deep underground… Why do these people like to get themselves this deep under the surface? Ye Chong did not get the logic behind this.

“Come,” Hei Zi initiated his steps as he walked downstairs. Ye Chong could do nothing else than tailing him quickly. “Mhm?” The place was of total darkness the moment Ye Chong got down, as the moving flooring on the surface had been closed. Ye Chong was a little surprised the fact that he was not aware of the flooring closing up. If it was not the sudden change of lighting, he could not tell… as he could hardly hear a sound from the surface even with his hearing. This was a trivial detail yet it was convincing enough to tell Ye Chong that even the flooring was of great craftsmanship!

“Now…” Stated Hei Zi as they walked on, “This is the real workshop. My master works here usually. And I’m here most of the time too. But I’m still doing the hammering, I’m not working on the important part.” His voice was already loud on the surface, it sounded like a roaring buzz underground.

“Oh,” Ye Chong responded as he followed on. He still had the slightest idea on calling from Nan Nan’s grandfather… The place was really concealed too, unlike the backyard… They should not be bringing guests for a simple greeting or whatever… Then what was this? Ye Chong did not worry about his own safety though. He was confident of his strength back then, besides, he had the Guardian, which indisputably was the lord of fighters!

And there was Mu too!

Yeah, that’s the point!

The stairs were much longer than he expected. It went way, way, down under the ground. Luckily they moved pretty quickly which the glimmering exit turned brighter and Ye Chong could hear the clinks of the machines. And Ye Chong sensed the ground shaking a little as they got to the bottom. No wonder they had it so deep into the ground! The shake would have alarmed anyone nearby!

What were they doing down here? Ye Chong was intrigued, very intrigued.

At the end of the stairs, a shocking scene awaited before him!

He did not predict such an airy space at the underground. This basement should have the size of a spaceship, he believed. The roof was of a metallic silver… which was unordinary as the frames appeared to be made out of metallic skeletons about an arm broad overlapping each other… The basement was not supported by any pillar! The skeletons were the only support to hold the room from collapsing! The lighting was great too. Ye Chong could see everything at one glance at least! By the stairs there were a rack of countless squares, which every of it contained a kind of parts of mech. It was the same part but of different models and qualities, so it looked dazzling to Ye Chong.

Overwhelming! These accessories were well-placed on the rack, like rows of armies. And judging by their appearance, Ye Chong could tell that all of these accessories were of top-quality! Such premium gears sitting together, it was like a parade, a carnival to Ye Chong. He was mesmerized, knowing that how many mechs one could make with these parts! It could fill the entire exhibition hall!

Between these racks there was an empty lane leading to elsewhere. Hei Zi gestured Ye Chong to move on this road.

On their way to the next destination, Ye Chong eyed the parts like a hungry wolf, covetous his sight wafted through the racks. “Great parts!” Mu reviewed with honesty, which further set Ye Chong on blaze!

“Really? Maybe I can show you some parts, only show, hahaha!”

…

Once Hei Zi stepped into a particular room, he went quiet completely, as his expression grew stern, even his steps came lighter.

After they left Ye Chong’s most adored area, he withdrew his longing sight and then he inspected the other places. Tightly connected to the area of parts of fantasy, there was an area filled with a lot of never-before-seen apparatus. The clinks and the booms came from these machines apparently. But they seemed a little outdated… they did not have the “techy” look of modern technology… However Ye Chong must admit that these machines were well-maintained. Likewise to the parts, the machines were properly placed too. An elderly was operating one of the machines and he seemed focused. The product was appearing in the machine. There was only a silhouette, but judging by the outline of the product, Ye Chong speculated it being some sort of connecting buckle of the mech’s inside.

Behind these machines there were tons of raw materials piling. Ye Chong could simply tell a few of them being the mutated lifeforms he recognized, like those he saw on the ground, but there were much more unidentifiable skeletons scattered on the floor.

With respect Hei Zi walked to the old man, he exchanged conversation with the old man in whispers, which Ye Chong could not hear a word. Nan Nan’s grandfather briefly pointed his machine and pointed the around, nodded as he turned to Ye Chong and he turned back to his work again. Hei Zi looked at Ye Chong awkwardly with a laugh. Well Ye Chong shook his head. It was okay, his face said. The old man probably asked him to wait as he was in the middle of something.

He waited for literally 30 minutes and finally Nan Nan’s grandfather had his work done, as he switched off the machine. The room turned dead silent after the machine was shut. The hair was snow-white on his head, his face looked laborious, “How do you feel…” His word came reluctant, “After seeing all these?” He forced a smile as he waved his arms open.

“Not bad!” Ye Chong replied concisely.

“Hehehe…” Nan Nan’s grandfather chuckled, “Good! Good! I was afraid that you aren’t even bothered with these outdated toys! You saved my beloved Nan Nan yet I could not find a chance to repay you. I heard from Hei Zi that you have a passion for mechs. You should have done quite some researches I assume? What I have here are some good old parts. I must admit, I don’t really know well about mechs… These parts happened to be the backup parts after the production on orders from the clients. Feel free to take any of these according to your needs. Well…” he chuckled again, “Piling here would only get all rusty. Nothing good would happen to them. Take them as a token of my appreciation. Don’t be shy, just take them on your liking! If you have any inquiry, you could ask my apprentice, Hei Zi. He knows the mechs much better than me. Yawnn…” His mouth went opened, “I’m so tired. I’m heading to bed now. Enjoy your excavation here, good night!” He dragged his steps to the other side piling with the raw materials, where there were 2 rooms surprisingly, those should be Hei Zi and his.

Well! Who cares!

Ye Chong was insanely merry! Was there anything much happier than this? He was naturally good at mech-assembling and Nan Nan’s grandfather was absolutely right! He, had passion! The parts might have looked all weird and foreign to him and there were a large number of them, but he had Mu! So no more worries!

After a moment of discussion with Ye Chong, Mu underwent a thorough scan over all parts in the area and had itemized them in various categories, grading and functions. “So how did you guys do mechs?” Ye Chong had a conversation with Hei Zi while waiting for the scan to be completed. Not only Mu did the scanning process, he also modified and improvised to generate a few final designs for Ye Chong’s reference.

Such a wonderful opportunity! Ye Chong was so obsessed with mechs at that moment. He could not wait! He was going mad as he could imagine himself swimming in the piles of treasure and embracing the liveliness of the gears! It was rare to have someone this generous, he had got to pick the best among them all!

“Well, generally you should start with the inside, it’s like the heart…” While they exchanged conversation, Hei Zi felt strange that Ye Chong had yet to make his move, wondering what in the Haleyson he was standing there when he should be picking the parts. The expression was relaxed too. “Ye Chong, you should be picking the parts you know, there are tons of them, it could take years to find the right part!” reminded Hei Zi.

“Understood.” Ye Chong nodded but his legs remained rooted, “I too agree the inside is important, sometimes…” He just carried on the conversation with Hei Zi!

“So what are you guys known as?”

Hei Zi’s lips lifted, words came uttered.

It was only then Ye Chong was informed of their title.

They were the Skeleton Artisans!

Translator’s Note:

The original word was “骨刀出魂”

Bone- Sword(or blade) – Out – Soul(or spirit)

Technically we tend to see similar terms at craftsman or blacksmith’s place, which suggests whatever you made, make it with a kind of spirit (your passion) and the product would be the greatest, that it felt like the spirit was imbued.

Chapter 132: Skeleton mech

nimal skeletons were a kind of organic material, with many unique physical properties; skeletons of mutated lifeforms were even stronger. Some mutants even have bones that were harder than high-strength alloys, and very resilient. Most importantly, they were much lighter than metals – a very crucial property, since lightweight materials could greatly reduce the burden on the mech’s engines, and would substantially improve the mech’s automotive performance!

However, skeletons, unique as they were, did not come in a consistent form, and processing them was difficult; one can imagine how hard it would be to mold them into the various parts of a mech. Even if they could be shaped into appropriate parts, the ingrained surface of the bones often led to uneven force distribution among the parts, thus reducing their resilience and introducing a random factor to the quality of the parts.

The sky high costs and low probability of creating satisfactory products were the reasons for the lack of interest in skeletons as building or manufacturing materials.

Nan Nan’s grandfather was a skeleton carver, and lived a poor life. One day, a client brought a set of giant wart frog’s bones and a schematics, requesting to use the frog’s bones to be processed based on the schematics. The client also promised a higher reward based on the sturdiness of the final product.

Nan Nan’s grandfather had tried his hands on skeleton workmanship since young, his years of experience allowed him to be deeply familiar with the pattern of skeletal surfaces. He made short work of the final product based on the client’s specifications. The product was determined to have excellent mechanical properties through examination using a professional device, and the client was much overjoyed. That was how Nan Nan’s grandfather earned a sizable sum!

From then on, more people came to him for his services, and he did not stop studying intensively to improve his skills. He grew more competent, and began to have a reputation in selected circles! However, while he was always making parts for skeleton mech, his unfamiliarity with mechs meant that clients would have to bring their own schematics for him to create the final product as desired.

Those who knew him called him the Skeleton Artisan.

As his life became easier, and his reputation became more widespread, more organizations began to attempt to win him over to their side. They used all sorts of tricks, but he was unmoved by sweet words or threats, and none could convince him otherwise. Soon, he was targeted by an organization whose methods were far, far more ruthless and brutal than the gentler persuasions he had experienced before! Nan Nan’s parents had perished in that incident, while Nan Nan was rescued and escaped with her grandfather, finally landing in the Orbits.

In this violent society, he quickly found a new home, and his skills won him great respect. No one would offend the Skeleton Artisan, and none of the local organizations dared to meddle with people who possessed such unique skills, since they were under the protection of the sanctuary. Even the mentalists from the sanctuary were very courteous to them.

Of course, this did not mean that all was safe and well, like the time when that group of people Ye Chong met had threatened Doctor Lu. When your life was in danger, you tend to be reckless. Besides, who here on the Orbits was not a desperate person?

That was why Nan Nan’s grandfather had installed a top-of-the-line security system!

Skeleton carving was a branch of carving skills that received little attention, and there were probably no education institution that would list it as one of their offered courses. It was only a traditional craft passed on from one carver to another, slowly losing its place in history!

Hei Zi was a student accepted by Nan Nan’s grandfather after they came to the Orbits. He was hardworking, practical, and eager to learn, winning the old man’s approval. The only regret was that Hei Zi was a little too old to begin learning the craft and limited in talent, thus he could only improve slowly over time.

Hei Zi saw that Ye Chong fully absorbed in his words, and could not help but feel excited as he continued on, “Look at this, this is the shell of a mantic locust. It looks like metal, but when I examined it, it does not have a scrap of metal in it. The thing’s strong, and very resilient, suitable for making a mech’s shield. Most importantly, it is light, try it!”

The shell spread across the size of 2 or 3 tabletops with a slight concave bend, and its surface shone with a metallic luster. The entire shell was in a greenish black, overlaid with wavy stripes of brilliant yellow, a dazzling piece. Ye Chong gave it few knocks, and heard the crisp echo from the material – it was solid hard. He reached for the edges of the shell and lightly lifted it , which came up with ease.

It was truly lightweight. If this shell could be made into a shield, it would definitely reduce the burden on the mech’s engines significantly, besides minimizing the reaction time of the arm that wielded the shield. However, his only concern was that the shell was strong enough to be a shield, as Hei Zi claimed.

“This is the mech’s mechanical arm. You see these 5 fingers? They’re all made from the femur of a scented salamander. Besides being tough, the scented salamander’s femur has a natural rough surface, good for anti-slipping. The scented salamander’s femur is also easier to work on.” Hei Zi spoke knowledgeably.

If a mech’s parts were all made of skeleton, like Hei Zi’s mech, an average engine would be enough for an outstanding speed performance. After all, speed is a critical weapon for victory! With a proper engine, a full-skeleton mech would be able to fly everywhere at warp speed. The thought was enough to make Ye Chong nervous.

“How many of these can you make in a day?” Ye Chong asked carefully.

“How many can I make in a day?” Hei Zi shook his head and said, “You should be asking, how many days do I need to make one! Every time someone sent over their skeletons, they’re always different, and before any work could begin, Master would have to examine them carefully and devise some reasonable way of approach. This usually takes days! It we come across an unfamiliar skeleton, it will take even longer! The next step is the crude processing of the skeletons. After that, we soak the skeletons in a special liquid, like a hardening liquid that makes the bones stronger. Master calls it the strengthening chemical.

“These strengthening chemicals were prepared by Aunt Guan. She’s the best chemist around here. Soaking time depends on the skeletons, usually it takes 7 to 21 days.

“Next is the fine processing. Fine processing is the most complicated part of the craft. It’s almost entirely done by hand. Any mistakes, and it’s over, all previous efforts gone down the drain. That’s why Master usually asks for at least two sets of skeletons. He’ll make two products, just to be safe.

“You see these mech parts on the floor, they’re all done by Master. Every time he passed one set of goods to his clients, there will be another set left here with us. These parts here were accumulated since Master began working here. Sigh, we nearly lost them due to the incident last time, but fortunately for Master, they were all returned to us by the sanctuary!

“Making a normal part usually takes at least half a month. If we’re talking about something like a mech’s main body, that’ll take even longer. I remember the longest Master had ever worked on a part was close to 3 months!”

“That long?” Ye Chong was surprised. In this technologically advanced society, where efficiency was worshipped, a normal mech could be manufactured in less than 10 minutes. If a single part would take half a month, one can only imagine the amount of time required to churn out the entire mech. However, Ye Chong quickly felt secretly relieved, since this meant that it was impossible to have a massive production of full-skeleton mechs. This was good news to Ye Chong. If these skeleton-only mechs could be manufactured in bulk, then the first to equip themselves with these skeleton mechs would be the Orbits’ Mentalist Sanctuary. Since he had just raised havoc, it was only reasonable that they had begun searching for him. The stronger the Sanctuary was, the riskier it was for him! Ye Chong realized this!

“Full-skeleton mechs, how do they perform?” Ye Chong asked Hei Zi, thinking that since he owned a full-skeleton mech himself, he should be familiar with their pros and cons.

Hei Zi pondered for a moment before replying, “It’s hard to say. Usually full-skeleton mechs are much lighter than mechs made of metal, and can fly longer! However, while the strength of the skeletons were greatly improved with the strengthening chemical, it was still slightly worse off compared to the mature workmanship with metals. So, skeleton mechs were usually not suitable for brute force combat, but more for fluid combat styles.

“Of course, that’s what it usually is like. A skeleton mech’s performance depends on the types of skeletons it’s made of. As for the skeletons, they’re usually quite different from one another. Some top quality skeletons can even be stronger than high-strength metals. However, these skeletons are usually much harder to process! Moreover, they’re quite rare!

“But there’s one important thing you should know. The price for a skeleton mech is on a whole different level than for average mechs. Besides, resupply and servicing would be very inconvenient. If any of the skeleton parts were damaged, it’s virtually impossible to repair it, the only way is to get a new one! So, unless you’re a skeleton carver yourself, it’ll be foolish to use a skeleton mech for usual business!”

Ye Chong could not help but nod in agreement – the man had a point! The advantages and disadvantages were clear, but Ye Chong could not afford to be choosy then – if he was offered a Blackbird right then, Ye Chong would probably accept it without hesitation, much less a skeleton mech that he had never even heard of!

Mu spoke in timely fashion, “Scanning is complete, there is a total of 372 parts. There are 3 recommendations for you. Ye, would you like to hear the details?”

Chapter 133: A Mech’s Style

Fifteenth from the left in the thirteenth row, that’s the mech’s main body; seventh from the left on the fifth row, eighth from the left on the twenty second row … These are for the first combination.” Mu’s voice was steady and resolute.

Hei Zi stared stupidly at Ye Chong with bulging eyes. A moment earlier, Ye Chong began to pick his way through the parts like a butterfly flitting from flower to flower. The huge mech parts weighed like nothing in Ye Chong’s hands. “This … This is ridiculous!” Hei Zi massaged his temples in disbelief. While these were relatively lightweight skeleton parts, they were still parts for a mech; to lift them so effortlessly – was he human?

Ye Chong seemed to move with purpose. Hei Zi was confused – wasn’t he listening to him all the while earlier? He was not eyeing those mech parts back then!

“What a strange guy!” Hei Zi muttered to himself!

Ye Chong looked at the three piles of mech parts laid before him. The three combinations that Mu proposed were now fully grouped together.

Ye Chong walked to the first pile of mech parts, frowned slightly in thought for a moment, and set down to work! One by one, the mech parts assembled themselves like magic through his hands. He moved adeptly like a professional mech assembler, and the whole process went smoothly. The mech presented itself before him, and it grew taller and taller from the legs upwards, giving the illusion of something growing rapidly upwards.

Hei Zi could feel his brain giving up!

Ye Chong stared with knitted brows at the three mechs before him.

While he was unsure of the performance of these three mechs, he knew just from their appearance that they were all excellent products, definitely outstanding! Hei Zi stared dumbfounded at the three mechs without a word.

The three mechs had peculiar designs. They lacked the common metallic gleam found on average mechs, and had a unique quality of skeleton texture. Ye Chong believed that Mu’s proposed combinations were most logical, but still, he felt that something was wrong!

“Strange, what is it?” Ye Chong frowned, studying the three mechs closely!

The three mechs were made of parts of all colors – since they were not originally part of the same set, they looked like a colorful mess, but these three combinations were excellent. Unlike Master’s complete unfamiliarity with mechs, Hei Zi understood mechs at a deep level. The way he saw it, these parts, arranged artfully by Ye Chong, fit very well with each other, unlocking the potential of these parts to their maximum. They were perfect!

“Guy’s a true genius!” Hei Zi grew respectful of Ye Chong. From his perspective, Ye Chong was only improvising, but this improvisation had led to such a degree of perfection. He knew all the parts here like the back of his hand, and had tried to assemble them together. However, no matter which combination he came up with, they cannot be compared with any of Ye Chong’s three mechs. Besides, it took only a short moment for three mechs of this perfection to be produced!

Hei Zi believed that Ye Chong must be infinitely more knowledgeable about mechs than him!

Ye Chong was still deeply frowning, deep in thought.

Hei Zi did not noticed Ye Chong’s perplexity; his eyes were only for the three mechs. If Shang were here and saw how the black-faced burly man could look at the three mechs with tender eyes, he would definitely not stop himself from snickering!

Ye Chong pondered over it, unsure of himself, and moved quickly towards the first mech.

“Ye, is there a problem?” Mu also thought it strange.

“Mu, don’t you think there’s something wrong with these three mechs?” Ye Chong’s voice was uncertain.

“Wrong? In what sense?” Mu was curious.

After some hesitation, Ye Chong said, “I don’t know, but I can feel that something is wrong.”

“How is that possible? My calculations should be infallible!” Mu’s voice held an arrogant undertone!

Ye Chong did not reply, but walked towards the first mech and began to disassemble it. “What’s this?” Seeing Ye Chong suddenly beginning to disassemble the first mech, Hei Zi grew baffled and could not help but asked, “What’re you disassembling it for?”

“Reassembling!” Ye Chong replied without looking back

“Reassembling? He’s really out of the ordinary, to strive for perfection even with mechs of this perfection, no wonder he’s miles ahead of me!” The honest Hei Zi grew even more respectful of Ye Chong.

Ye Chong disassembled the mech quickly. At least, Hei Zi had never seen anyone work as fast as him.

“Could I have assembled them wrong?” Ye Chong doubted himself first of all, since he was more likely to be at fault compared to Mu. Ye Chong even thought that the sense of wrongness was an illusion, since he could not exactly point out what was wrong about the mechs!

The fact was, Ye Chong was exposed to a great variety of mechs; with his own expertise, these exposures gradually developed a sense not unlike the intuition in him, and he could quickly evaluate a mech subconsciously. Like learning any language, when a person studies up till a certain point, he would develop a grammar sense; when constructing a sentence, he might not know exactly why, but through a vague decision process, he may choose to replace a word with another more appropriate vocabulary. Of course, this vague decision is not completely infallible, but is still usually quite accurate.

Through unceasing practice and learning, this vague decision making process could be honed to a higher accuracy. It would also mean that the person has advanced to a higher plane of understanding.

These three mechs were obviously styled from mechs of the Orbits, and Mu’s calculations and enhancements were based on physics. This method of combination was more suited for mechs like the MPA’s, where mech technology was more advanced, and the mech models were the result of extensive calculations. Mechs from the Orbits mostly had a natural feel to them, and so the combinations based purely on mechanical and performance-enhancing factors were not in harmony with the design style.

Mu was only a PSI, and emotions were his weakness; hence, things like style, which were not data driven, were naturally not part of a mech’s considerations.

Ye Chong was different. While he was always a logical thinking person, but it was inevitable as a human for him to have emotional senses. Due to his long experience with mechs, he had developed an acute awareness for them. While he could not pinpoint the exact source of the problem, he could sense the discord inside him.

Hei Zi, however, had not yet reached this level of sensitivity, and so did not notice it.

This vague feeling did not leave Ye Chong. He had reassembled the first mech thrive, but still could not see the problem. Ye Chong felt like he had reached a bottleneck, the solution to his troubles were ever closer but unreachable.

Ye Chong was vexed, but could not put his trouble into words for Mu.

If Ye Chong could one day understand his apparent intuition in great detail, it would mean that his knowledge in mechs would have reached a whole new level.

However, as Ye Chong was now, it would take him a very long time to reach that level by himself!

An ancient voice suddenly broke Ye Chong’s increasingly confused thoughts, “Oh, these three mechs look good, only that the style is a little incompatible!”

Style! Ye Chong’s eyes shone brightly as he realized then. “That’s right! It’s the style! The style!” he thought. Every mech has its own unique style. While these three mechs would perform well, their styles were not in harmony! No wonder he felt a little uncomfortable with them.

How should he proceed since he currently realized that style was the problem? Ye Chong’s initial excitement gradually receded to calmness. Ideas flew past his mind, but only aimlessly; even if he knew that style was the problem, how should he proceed?

Ye Chong could not help but lift his head to the voice that triggered his realization, and found it to be Nan Nan’s grandfather. He had focused intensely on disassembling the mech, and did not notice the time. The old man had already awakened from his nap and, upon returning to his workshop, found the three assembled mechs. The old man was a skeleton carver all his life, and had deep insights in abstract concepts such as mech styles. As he noticed the mechs, he could not help but comment on them, lending a hand to Ye Chong.

The old man saw Ye Chong turning to him, and smiled, “Who’d have thought you to be so knowledgeable in mechs. Looks like Hei Zi has much to learn from you, it’s hard to have huge ambitions with just skeleton carving skills in this line of work!” The old man ended his sentence blandly, probably dispirited from his inability to attain those huge ambitions that he had. The old man had become a master in skeleton carving, but his lack of knowledge in mechs had increasingly become a handicap for him.

Ye Chong lowered his head as though in thought, his expression hidden from the others.

They would not have guessed that Ye Chong was having an intense conversation with Mu.

“Mu, I want to learn how to make these skeleton parts!”

“Ye, our priority right now is to treat your illness, your current situation is very dangerous! Based on Lu Caite’s information, we first have to leave the Orbits and find his teacher. That’s what we should do now!” Mu was exceedingly calm.

“Hmm, you’re right, but the incident with Guardian raised a huge ruckus, they’re probably searching all over the Orbits for us now. It’s not a good choice to leave the Orbits now. Besides, all the starships in the Orbits are under the control of the Sanctuary. Without the starships, it’s impossible for us to leave the Orbits!” Ye Chong was equally in control of himself.

“You’re right! Based on Lu Caite’s information, you have to pass the so-called 5 tests by the Sanctuary! As it is, this is not a good time for us to take the tests! However, Ye, your health might suffer!” Mu was worried about Ye Chong’s physical condition.

“Nothing we can do about that! As long as it’s not fatal, I can handle it!” Ye Chong’s plain words were spoken with incredible determination!

Chapter 134: The Sanctuary’s Reaction

Oh, so you want to learn the craft from me?” The old man looked at Ye Chong, deeply moved by his request. Ye Chong’s earlier demonstration of his knowledge in mechs had impressed him. Hei Zi was looking delightfully at Ye Chong from the side. If Ye Chong could stay, then he would have someone to seek advice from! Since the beginning, he had always figured things out by himself, since Master could not help him in this respect.

“Yes!” Ye Chong replied steadily. After his discussion with Mu, they agreed that now was not the right time to take the five tests by the Sanctuary, since the situation outside must be tense! Going out recklessly now would be a foolish decision.

Ye Chong was not wrong. The situation was severely tense, much like what he imagined. Feng Su’s report to the Sanctuary about Guardian’s features and her thoughts on them had garnered great interest from the higher-ups. The report was collaborated by words from the MPA’s mech pilots. Hence, the Sanctuary higher-ups had ordered for the retrieval of this potential game-changing mech at all cost.

All citizens of the Orbits realized in trepidation that something had happened. The Mentalist Sanctuary’s forces were presented for the first time in full to the public. Even in the complicated environment such as the Orbits, they could still perform a thorough search of the area. No one dared to defy them; the first few rebellious people who refused to cooperate were met with indescribably horrible fates that chilled others to the bone! Such extreme methods employed by the usually moderate Sanctuary made everyone realize the firm resolution of the Sanctuary! With those few early examples, no one dared to challenge the Sanctuary’s powers again!

That was how, long after that incident, the Orbits came to be as peaceful as Heaven itself.

Ye Chong was unaware of all these facts. This was much due to the fact that the Sanctuary had not reached their area in their search, and secondly, that Ye Chong himself did not go outdoors often.

The good natured Hei Zi was overjoyed by Master’s acceptance of Ye Chong. He grinned stupidly, as if he was the one who was accepted instead. On the contrary, Ye Chong’s expression was neither joyful nor disappointed; he was calm as usual, and this won the approval of the old man – he believed this apprentice of his would definitely be someone extraordinary one day.

Ye Chong began by learning basic carving skills. The old man was pleasantly surprised to find Ye Chong improving quickly! Basic carving skills were fundamentally a practice in strength control. This had always been part of Mu’s training courses for Ye Chong, and Ye Chong was undoubtedly superior in it, second to none. This was the reason for his rapid improvement.

With a curved bone in his left hand, Ye Chong focused intently as his right hand wielded a carving knife, cutting vertically and horizontally. His every cut was precise, as his left hand held the bone steadily. The old man stood behind him, his expression portraying admiration. Beside Ye Chong was Hei Zi, staring unblinkingly at the knife in Ye Chong’s hand, afraid of disturbing him. Little Nan Nan put her hands tightly over her mouth, as she watched the curved bone in Ye Chong’s hand slowly took shape. Every since Ye Chong apprenticed under the old man, he had spent much of his time in the underground workshop, and little Nan Nan had followed him around like a puppy.

The solid curved bone was no match for Ye Chong’s knife; with every cut of the knife, skeleton dust fell to the ground. Ye Chong put his knife down gently with an easy expression, devoid of any emotions. His left hand held a lifelike engulfer, one of the animals he was most familiar with. Hei Zi exhaled in relief at his side, and spoke enthusiastically, “Hah! Junior Brother [1] is really talented, it’s only been a few days, and you’re already so good at this!”

It was Shang’s turn to come out, and the mech spoke condescendingly in Ye Chong’s mind, “What’s the fuss? You call this talent? What a bumpkin!” Of course, Ye Chong ignored Shang’s typical comments.

Little Nan Nan crawled onto the table and grabbed the engulfer out of Ye Chong’s hands, savoring her new toy!

The old man approved of the work deeply, but kept his expression calm as he said, “Hmm, that’s roughly it, you still need to practice more. From today onwards, you can learn about mechanical carving!”

He paused, but continued once Ye Chong was paying full attention to him, “Manual carving is usually for processing small parts or details of larger parts. We usually make do with mechanical carving. It’s not hard, I might even say it’s quite simple. The difficult part is in choosing the right skeleton materials. That’ll take experience. Your job now is to familiarize yourself with all the skeleton materials we have here until you get the hang of it. I’ll also be teaching you how to differentiate between them. That’s the essence of being a skeleton carver …”

Abruptly, the visitor’s intercom on the wall rang, and interrupted the old man’s word. Hei Zi quickly went to answer the intercom, and turned back to inform the old man loudly, “Master, it’s Uncle Yan!”

The old man frowned slightly, and said to Hei Zi, “Alright, go invite him in!”

Hei Zi replied in an affirmative tone and left in a hurry.

The old man spoke softly to himself, “Strange, why’s he here now?”

After a short moment, Hei Zi came back with a huge man.

The man was tall and muscular in build, his profile came with stiff angles, framing a pair of sharp eyes. His every move exuded a sense of power. Ye Chong realized then he was strong! Ye Chong was now quite experienced, and could tell just from the man’s build and movement that he was not someone to mess with. Ye Chong guessed right – this man with the surname Yan was called Yan Bingxuan, a patrolman of the area.

As the huge man stepped in, his eyes swept across the room. The sight of Ye Chong surprised him.

Hei Zi did not seem like to like this Yan guy, and brought little Nan Nan out to play.

The old man spoke, “Yan, something must have happened for you to visit us!” He then turned to Ye Chong and said, “Ye, this is the Sanctuary’s patrolman for our area, he’s quite strong! You can just call him Uncle Yan! His support will be very helpful for you in future!” He turned back to Yan Bingxuan and said, “This is my new apprentice, he’s quite knowledgeable about mechs, please take care of him from now on, Yan!”

Yan Bingxuan replied modestly, “Master Ge, you’re too courteous! The Sanctuary has explicitly ordered for your protection! It is my duty to attend to your safety. As long as it is within my means, it’s no problem at all!” Yan Bingxuan sounded respectful, and his words were flattering, but the meaning behind those words were not at all what they seemed to be. If he refused to cooperate, he could just easily say that it was not within his means.

Ye Chong realized then that Master’s surname is Ge.

The old man had a rich life experience, and could not possibly be ignorant of these social niceties. Even he himself had not truly meant his words.

Yan Bingxuan was impressed. “To think that such a young man could be approved by Old Ge, he has a bright future ahead of him!”

Ye Chong reciprocated lightly, “You’re too generous! I have much to learn!”

“Yan, what brings you here today?” The old man was getting impatient with these customary exchanges.

“You must not have heard, the world’s turned upside down out there!” Yan Bingxuan spoke mysteriously.

The old man knitted his brows in response. “What happened?”

“Word is, two people stole something from the Sanctuary, and the Sanctuary’s higher-ups were outraged! Sigh, it’s regretful that this had happened on this planet! For now, all the starship flights are cancelled. The higher-ups want us to search every house for the thieves. It’s fine for the higher-ups to be furious, but in the end, it’s we lackeys who have to do the work!” Yan Bingxuan grumbled insincerely as he discreetly watched for their reactions.

Ye Chong was startled. As expected, they must be referring to him and Mu. However, to frame them for thievery was impudent. Ye Chong was extremely calm on the outside, and Shang immediately came out and spoke to him urgently, “Ye, don’t act so calmly, you gotta show some surprise!” Ye Chong immediately affected a slight surprise on his expression, fitting for his nature.

The old man was shocked. “Someone dared to steal something from the Sanctuary?”

Seeing that both of them had reacted normally, Yan Bingxuan finally relaxed and smiled wryly, “Right? Those two must have some b*lls to do this. The Sanctuary’s people had seen them as they escaped in their mechs, one of it is a badly beaten down mech with four arms and two heads. Old Ge, have you seen anything like this before?”

Ye Chong was startled on the inside, but kept his expression calm.

“Four arms and two heads? A strange mech like that? No! If I’ve seen a strange mech like that, I would have remembered it!” The old man shook his head. Ye Chong was quietly thankful that Hei Zi and little Nan Nan were not there. If they had seen Yu Di, they would have immediately exposed him then.

“Sigh, that’s right! To find two people in such a huge area is much like finding a needle in a haystack!” Yan Bingxuan vented his dissatisfaction.

The old man nodded. “It’s definitely not easy!”

Yan Bingxuan produced a metallic sphere, flashing green lights, and apologized to the old man, “Old man, my apologies, it’s merely a formality!”

The old man waved his hand and spoke lightly, “It’s alright, do what you have to!” He saw Ye Chong watching the metallic sphere curiously, and explained to him, “That’s a special accessory for the patrolmen, called Life Seeker. Nothing alive can evade its detection! It is used to check for any hidden humans or animals. Understood?”

Ye Chong realized then of its purpose. “Understood!”

A small aperture on the Life Seeker projected a holographic image, showing five green dots on it. Yan Bingxuan counted everyone present, including himself, and found it to be exactly five. He kept the Life Seeker and spoke with a smile. “All good! Pardon the intrusion, Old Ge!”

“It’s nothing!” The old man did not mind.

Yan Bingxuan continued, “Well, that’s all to it, I’ll be taking my leave!”

“Hei Zi!” The old man yelled, and Hei Zi rushed in as he instructed, “See Uncle Yan off! Yan, I’ll not be sending you off!”

Yan Bingxuan quickly replied, “No need to! Please continue your work, Old Ge!” He began to move towards the steps that he came in through.

Suddenly, Yan Bingxuan stopped in his tracks, and exclaimed, “Huh?”

Could there be something wrong? Ye Chong, freshly relieved, was jerked back into suspense!

Chapter 135: Conjecture

an Bingxuan stopped in his tracks, his face full of surprise!

“Where did I give myself away?” Ye Chong jolted inside, all his muscles tensed, and his naturally hanging arms shifted to an anticipatory posture. The moment Yan Bingxuan showed any signs of hostility, Ye Chong would kill him without hesitation! Even if the opponent’s physique suggested a difficult enemy, Ye Chong was still confident that he could take care of his enemy before he could send a warning signal to the others!

“Full-skeleton mechs?” Yan Bingxuan’s face betrayed his pleasant surprise as he turned to the old man, “Master Ge, have you finally made a full-skeleton mech? Are these three mechs your latest work? They’re absolutely amazing!”

Ye Chong’s whole body relaxed at that, and his arms discreetly returned to their natural hanging posture! He was, however, somewhat curious. Were full-skeletons mechs so out of the ordinary? Could there be something to them?

Ye Chong was not aware that the old man was the only person was skilled in using skeletons to make mech parts. However, the old man was a total stranger to mechs, and did not understand the design functionalities of mech parts. Hence, his products were often not as desired, and had a high probability of malfunctioning. Even though the old man had made every part of a mech with skeletons, putting all of them together and having the parts working in tandem would inevitably amplify the defects of each individual part, and the mech’s safety rating would be extremely low.

Full-skeleton mechs were but an ideology. Even though Hei Zi’s mech looked like a full-skeleton mech, there were still a considerable number of parts in it made of non-skeleton material, and so it did not qualify as a full-skeleton mech.

Ever since the Sanctuary knew of the old man’s skill in producing skeleton mech parts, the Sanctuary had offered him protection. Yan Bingxuan was responsible for the old man’s safety, besides making periodic reports about his working progress.

Now that there were three full-skeleton mechs right in front of him, how could he not be shocked? He knew from the grapevine that the Sanctuary was also trying to produce full-skeleton mechs. However, their progress was slow, and so the Sanctuary placed great importance on the old man.

Full-skeleton mechs would offer enviable features – better automotive control, longer flight distances, and most importantly, outstanding anti-detection capabilities. This would be a great advantage in battle.

The old man was pleased. “Hehehe, Yan, even you can guess wrong sometimes! These were not the handiwork of a miserable old man like me. This apprentice of mine had carelessly assembled them, but they’re not really full-skeleton mechs. Ah, but this young man here has real potential in making a real full-skeleton mech!” His words were regretful, but his tone suggested a certain pride in his apprentice.

“The young man certainly doesn’t seem like it!” Yan Bingxuan was now truly shocked! No matter how he looked at him, the young man had seemed unremarkable – he looked thin and frail, but was actually an expert in mech assembly. When did the old man accept this apprentice? Yan Bingxuan grew suspicious. “I’ve been too relaxed with my job here recently,” Yan Bingxuan thought pensively to himself. “I must look into this later. Hmm, better take good care of this young one to avoid any mishaps, if he can make a full-skeleton mech, it’ll be under my account, and I’ll definitely move up the power ladder!”

Yan Bingxuan was circumspect, and kept his emotions to himself as he smiled and said, “Master Ge, you’re truly blessed! With an able apprentice, you’ll finally have a successor!”

The old man’s half-lidded eyes were full of joy, but he said, “He’s not really a full apprentice yet, there’s much to learn! It’s too early to speak of these things!”

Yan Bingxuan noted to himself to visit the place more often and get familiar the future skeleton carver; it would be helpful for his career. However, he understood that this was an overnight task, and so, with his decision made, Yan Bingxuan bid farewell to everyone and continued on his job.

After Yan Bingxuan left, Ye Chong exhaled in relief. The old man turned to him and spoke seriously, “Ye, in future, be careful to this man, don’t trust him too much, understand? He might not be entirely sincere, but, if you met any difficult problems around here you can still ask for his help, he’s still quite influential in this area.”

“Yes!” Ye Chong nodded in understanding.

“Alright, let’s forget about him! From today onwards I’ll teach you how to recognize and differentiate between skeletons! This is also something basic! Now all skeletons are suitable to made into mech parts. Let’s start from the basics …”

Ye Chong was safe, and the Mentalist Sanctuary’s efforts were to no avail. The Sanctuary was infuriated, and blamed it on the incompetence of their patrolmen. The patrolmen received the blame indignantly, and vented their frustrations on any local organization that they set their eyes on. Thus, all organizations lost their presence and power almost overnight, and vanished without a trace.

The Sanctuary’s failure was actually largely due to their erroneous deductions. Based on Feng Su’s report, everyone had deduced that the mech pilot controlling the golden miniature mech must be physically strong. It would have otherwise been impossible for the pilot to bear the consequences of piloting the mech.

He also had a companion! That meant that there were two of them, and one of them should look physically strong. This was why Yan Bingxuan did not suspect Ye Chong to be the one he was looking for when he saw him!

Under the old man’s careful guidance, Ye Chong dealt with skeletons every day and grew experienced quickly. The old man was grateful for Ye Chong’s good memory and sharp mind.

The three mechs that Ye Chong assembled were taken by the Sanctuary’s men the next day, but of course, they had left many rare skeletons in return, and the incident was considered as a barter of goods. Ye Chong did not mind them, since the three mechs were obviously full of issues. The old man had made all those parts without understanding their use, but only based fully on the schematics and measurements provided by his clients. Ye Chong was certain that those three mechs must be prone to malfunctions!

The Sanctuary’s men felt otherwise. From their perspective, these were just about full-skeleton mechs. Besides, the parts assembled based on Mu’s suggestions resulted in excellent performance, and the Sanctuary’s mech pilots were all overjoyed! As for the one who brought the news to the Sanctuary, Yan Bingxuan was duly rewarded.

On the other hand, Hei Zi had approached Ye Chong discreetly later and asked Ye Chong, “Ye, were you the thief?”

Ye Chong replied calmly, “The one they’re looking for is me, but it’s they who want to steal my things!”

Hei Zi’s expression was one of realization, and he warned Ye Chong out of kindness, “I thought so, how could you have been stealing? Then you have to take care now, the Sanctuary’s always tyrannical! I’ll make sure little Nan Nan keeps your mech a secret, little Nan Nan is very sensible!”

“Okay!” Ye Chong replied lightly, and watched as Hei Zi left him, but he was moved inside. Shang, however, was laughing coldly in Ye Chong’s mind, “Ye, have you really never stolen anything? I think Harmony of the Winter Aria was the result of your thievery, tsk tsk, how could anyone think of you as a nice person? What a joke!”

He was undecided if he should laugh or cry at those words, but he also had no valid rebuttal for them.

Suddenly, Shang sighed dramatically, “Sigh, Ye, how long are we staying in this ragged place? What a bore! There’s not even a beauty in sight! Without beauties, how can we train your sense of beauty? Life is so dull!” He affected a yawned. “Ye, you should finish learning these things quickly, so we can finally leave this God forsaken place, and return to the wonders of life! I very much look forward to that!”

Ye Chong can imagine that Shang’s blue bionic eyes must now be flashing in deep longing. If Shang had any cleaning fluid left in his mouth, he would definitely leave if dripping from his mouth like saliva.

“I think the situation now is quite alright, it’s peaceful and fulfilling. More importantly, I’m getting stronger!” Of course, Ye Chong did not agree with Shang, or Shang would have egged him on to leave the place earlier.

“Sigh, how could I have forgotten that you and Mu are the same, lacking the same appreciation of life’s many joys? Heavens above! Why are you cruel to leave me between two dull, tasteless, lifeless creation of yours? Could I have sinned too much before?” Shang wailed.

“Before? Shang, did you find out anything about yourself from before?” Ye Chong grew attentive.

“Much of the information has been lost, and not recoverable. However, based on what we have, I and Mu have a conjecture.” Speaking of this topic, Shang’s tone became serious.

“What conjecture?” Ye Chong was encouraged. If it was Mu’s deductions, the probability of him getting it right was high. Mu and Shang’s past was always something Ye Chong was very interested in.

“Remember that time with the warship? Mu found that our database has information on the warship, and I was shocked. I guessed then that we’re probably related to the MPA. Besides, our information on this Twin Moon Corvette is quite detailed, almost as detailed as its original schematics. Later on, our information was proved to be entirely accurate! From this, you can see that we must be related to the MPA, and probably quite closely.”

“The MPA?” Ye Chong started. He had never expected Mu and Shang to be related to the MPA. Thinking of their current relationship with the MPA, Ye Chong could not help but shake his head and smile wryly.

Shang’s voice turned gentle, “Ye, don’t worry too much, we’re not too concerned over our past. The one who reactivated us is you. No one but you can ever communicate with us again, much less control us. Besides, we have various information on the MPA, that would be extremely helpful to you!”

“Yes, I know!” Ye Chong replied plainly. They were his most loyal and trustworthy companions, almost like his siblings. With the tacit understanding between them, there was no need for more words.

“Besides, it’s only a conjecture, its validity remains to be proven!” Shang replied in a rare moment of solemnity.

Chapter 136: Progressing

shiny mechanical arm gripped onto a half-disc. The disc was as thin as a leaf, it’s surface burnished into perfect smoothness, and the red skeleton grains sprawling on it were like an abstract art of lines. At its center were three holes that could each fit a finger, arranged to form a triangle.

Ye Chong examined the disc closely, his mind rapidly calculating as he recalled all the knowledge about skeletons passed down by the old man to him, trying to find the best approach based on what he knew. Unlike the old man and Hei Zi, Ye Chong had a solid theoretical foundation, all thanks to the unique teaching methods by the elders at Aurora.

In this fickle and materialistic society, foundational theories in all academic subjects were largely unappreciated. Moreover, since mech foundational theories were cross-disciplinary, they were more complicated and massive, such that there was no single unifying system for them. What Ye Chong had learned were the conclusions of the Aurora’s elderlies from their lifelong work. They had studied mechs all their lives, and found in their later years that those previously ignored foundational theories were the most fundamental of all. Hence, to prevent Ye Chong from repeating their mistakes, everything that they taught Ye Chong began from the most fundamental level.

Ye Chong had unwittingly been nurtured by them to become the most peculiar mech engineer across all fields.

Ye Chong had a rectangular metallic tank placed before him, filled with silver liquid. The calm surface of the liquid was like a flawless mirror, reflecting Ye Chong perfectly. Hei Zi watched anxiously from the side at the disc gripped by the mechanical arm. This was the most important step, immersing the disc into the strengthening chemical. The immersing duration, angle, proportion and so on, all contributed to the final quality of this part.

The disc’s early processing was all done by Ye Chong, and now he faced the final step – immersion. Immersion was the unique process of immersing a part into the strengthening chemical to enhance the skeleton’s various properties.

Ye Chong sat calmly in front of the controls dashboard, which directly manipulated the mechanical arm. The controls were more intricate and complicated than a mech’s controls. The holographic screen projected from the controls’ photon processor clearly reflected from Ye Chong’s pupils.

Ye Chong was feeling serious. After all, up until this step, Ye Chong had done everything perfectly. Once this step was successfully done, that part might be the most perfect skeleton part ever made.

Ye Chong had laboured through repeated considerations and calculations from the very first step of choosing the right materials. He had picked the sternum of a Moonblood bird; he even took this Moonblood’s skeleton to the old man for inspection. The next step was designing, and after carefully analysis of the Moonblood’s skeleton, he finally decided to make it into a mech engine’s padding. After that was crude processing and fine burnishing; Ye Chong partook every step after careful consideration, and his execution was also exact.

All this time, immersing was the most complicated step, and the effects were highly random. Even the old man had carried out immersions based on experience, without any logical theory behind them.

Unlike his sombre expression, Ye Chong was calm inside. No one knew that Ye Chong was actually quite confident with this last step. Ye Chong had discovered early on the randomness of the immersion process, and he had studied it closely, and through repeated experimentation, found a few ways to greatly increase the success rate of the method. He was now finally presented an opportunity to test his conclusions.

Ye Chong entered a series of commands into the photon processor of the controls dashboard. He then set the controls from manual to auto mode, and left the dashboard.

The mildly anxious Hei Zi abruptly noticed Ye Chong coming to his side, and could not help but be startled. “Ye, why are you here?”

“The settings are complete, no need for me to control it!” Ye Chong explained calmly. As he finished, the mechanical arm began to move slowly.

“Ah!” Hei Zi gasped in shock. “Ye, how can you use auto mode? Quick, shut it down!” He rushed towards the controls dashboard, but was held back by Ye Chong.

Seeing Ye Chong’s indifference, Hei Zi panicked. “Ye, quick! That thing’s going to be ruined! Master had never used auto mode for immersions! Ye, stop the machine, quick, or it’ll be too late!” Hei Zi’s hoarse voice was filled with urgency.

Ye Chong’s hands gripped onto Hei Zi tightly like shackles, and no matter how much Hei Zi struggled, he could not free himself. He immediately realized how much stronger his junior brother was compared to him.

Ye Chong understood his concern for himself, and while he was personally moved, he kept his expression flat as he replied, “Hmm, just wait and look!”

Between their exchanges, the mechanical arm had finished its job, and the disc was now lying quietly in the drying oven.

Ye Chong then let go of Hei Zi’s wrist, and Hei Zi rushed immediately to the drying oven. He opened the oven hastily and took out the disc, examining it closely.

“Ah! How is this possible?” Hei Zi gasped again in surprise, staring at the disc in his hand in disbelief.

In the underground workshop.

The old man studied the half-disc in his hands closely, his expression one of satisfaction. The padding was flawless no matter how he looked at it! What impressed him more was that Ye Chong could produce this masterpiece in such a short time. As the old man imagined the day that his apprentice could inherit and the spread this craftsmanship, how could he not feel thankful?

“Ye, Hei Zi said you used auto mode during immersion for this padding?” The old man asked with half-lidded eyes.

“Yes. I stumbled upon a few ways to increase the success rate of immersion, and I’ve recorded them in a chip and gave it to Senior Brother [1]!” Ye Chong did not show any signs of showing off, as he attributed his findings as a result of “stumbling upon” them.

Hei Zi nodded at the side, complimenting him, “Yes, Master, Junior Brother’s methods are effective, I’ve tried a few times and they all worked!” Hei Zi grinned widely.

The old man nodded in approval and said, “Hmm, not bad, not bad! Ye, your fundamentals are strong, and you’re a quick study, with excellent memory. While you may have begun later than your Senior Brother, you have understood more and at a deeper level. Your future is limitless. Your Senior Brother is an honest man, you must take care of him!”

“Yes!” Ye Chong’s reply was short and determined, and came sincerely from him.

“What you lack now is experience, and that is something I cannot teach you. Only through practice can you accumulate experience. Your task from now on is to practice every day. You may choose your own tasks, and the skeletons there are yours to use.” The old man pointed at a huge pile of skeletons.

“Yes!” Ye Chong nodded.

The old man pondered for a while before speaking again, “Ye, you’re smart, and have learnt just about everything there is here. If you’re willing, go learn alchemy from Guan Leng. After all, if you don’t know alchemy, you’ll have to depend on others for the strengthening chemical, that makes it easy for you to be dependent! However, your Aunt Guan is ill tempered, and you’ll be in for a hard time if you go. Hmm, I’ll leave this decision to you!”

Guan Leng was an alchemist living nearby, and all the strengthening chemicals here came from her. She behaved oddly, and was often mad as a hatter. However, her skills in chemical synthesis were extraordinary – she prepared almost all the strengthening chemicals based on the old man’s requirements.

For some reason, she always granted the old man’s wishes. For other people, it would depend on her mood.

Periodically, when the strengthening chemicals were running out, Ye Chong and Hei Zi would visit her to obtain more. Hei Zi disliked visiting, and upon noticing Ye Chong’s indifference to the crazy lady, he had assigned the drudging task to Ye Chong.

For such an excellent alchemist, she remained largely unknown in the entirety of the Orbits. That was a small surprise to Ye Chong.

Ye Chong already knew the formula for the strengthening chemical. After Mu and Shang did their scanning, all the components of the strengthening chemical were recorded. Ye Chong was afraid of running out of the strengthening chemical in the future, since he would ultimately leave this place.

“What a good idea! Ye, you should go learn from her! She’s definitely capable. All these types of strengthening chemicals were from her original formulae, that’s awesome! Ye, best if you can learn some ways to grow Do Kun stone! Wah, then we’ll be rich!” Shang could not help but come out, very much enthusiastic.

Ye Chong tried very hard to stop himself from rolling his eyes, as he did not want to appear disrespectful to the old man. However, Shang’s words had indeed made him feel helpless – what a money-grubber!

However, the mech had also reminded Ye Chong of his earlier days in Blue Ocean Academy. For some reason, he missed those times, although he cannot quite figure out why.

The old man’s words interrupted his reverie. “Hmm, Ye, I did not forget your strange illness! Don’t worry, once you’re skillful enough, you’ll definitely pass the Sanctuary’s tests. Then, you’ll be able to leave the Orbits and search for doctors elsewhere! Beside, with the Sanctuary’s powerful influence, gathering all sorts of talents, they might know what to do with you.”

Ye’s strange illness had resulted in two episodes in his time here, frightening both Hei Zi and Nan Nan. When the old man heard of it and came to him, Ye Chong had already recovered.

For Ye Chong, asking for help from the Sanctuary was one big joke! Ye Chong could barely hide from them; if he were to present himself to the Sanctuary, was that not asking for death? This solution was immediately rejected by Ye Chong!

“Hmm, alchemist … Do Kun stone … The Sanctuary’s tests …”

A flash of realization flickered in Ye Chong’s eyes.

Chapter 137: Lunatic Guan

unatic Guan’s home was rather messy, one could step into a pile of utilities or miscellaneousness right by the entrance. Ye Chong had to lift his every step in caution or he would actually initiate an avalanche from the mountain piles of items in the room and be engulfed by it. The scene reminded him of the trashes back on Trash Planet-12 though.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk,” Shang’s voice rang. He sounded impressed, “It looked like you had met quite an intriguing lady.” It was for the women again, of course, “Eh, it felt like an old spinster with mentality issues? Kekeke, Ye, take care and good luck!” Shang rejoiced the catastrophe coming to our hero soon.

Ye Chong did not seem to be interested in joining Shang’s chatter. However, as he understood deep in his heart that no matter what sort of reply he made, be it sarcasm or bland statement, it would only make the artificial intelligence more excited. So Ye Chong decided to give the artificial intelligence some silent treatment, let him have his slice of self-indulgence in relationship that Ye Chong could never convey.

“Kekekeke…” Shang teasingly laughed on, “Ay! Almost forgot! Ye your heart did not belong to the outside, it’s all belonged to that fist-fighting lass! … Kek… Ye, I feel your heartbeat racing~!” Shang’s pride was demonstrated through the mechanical ups-and-downs in his tone.

The garb of pure whiteness flashed in his mind as the veins on his forehead pumped uncontrollably, his nose sensed as hooked by the strange aroma again, and his tongue felt coated by the slipperiness of something before…

And Ye Chong actually zoned out for a moment.

He was pulled back to the ground of the Orbits after perceiving sounds of graceless footsteps by his ears.

He took a look at the hazy Lunatic Guan in her hangover.

Lunatic Guan was around 28 to 29 years old, she was rather demure, judging by how Shang exclaimed upon seeing her… although it would be a killing challenge to ask Ye Chong to judge from his view. Her mind was still on the other side of the Orbits, she was sort of unconscious, flushed and disheveled, with her shirt sliding to one side, exposing that fair left shoulder of hers. Her breasts were magically appearing back and fro through the loosened clothing of hers. She seemed to be unaware of her striptease… in spite of that, as the cup rested upside down in her slender hand like herself.

Gasp!

It was not Ye Chong. He heard it clearly from Shang. Nevertheless after attending loyally to Shang’s every motivational session, none of his outrageous behavior seemed to surprise Ye Chong anymore.

Ye Chong simply did not get it, the way of how one judged someone’s appearance. Fundamentally, everyone has the same number of eyes, ears, nose and mouth. Nothing strikingly different there was. Certainly Ye Chong could understand the fact that there are differences at some point. For instance, he was well-aware of the differences in his eyes and ears, as his sight and hearing were way more sensitive; for his smell and taste though, they were slightly inferior. However! Ye Chong could never be convinced the fact that one could justify such difference of strength at first sight, even for someone like Mu!

If that was the case, probably such difference in strength was not one of the factors contributing to the so-called “aesthetic judgment” by Shang.

Assuming it was based on the facial muscularity in actuality… Well, Ye Chong believed he lacked such knowledge as he could hardly imagine how the muscles on one’s face could do anything positive to combats. If these lumps could do no good in battle, how would one determine their quality? Presuming that Shang meant hair, that would do nearly nothing to battle too! In fact, it was on the contrary – having an overgrown hair would affect the progress of the battle negatively. So it would be most appropriate to stay bald provided that one was on Trash Planet.

Bald would be considered the beauty then…

But Ye Chong had never heard Shang complimenting a bald female!

Then how the heck do I even judge one’s beauty? Ye Chong was utterly dumbfounded. It was challenging indeed!

“Ahh…” A mechanical moan from Shang beeped by, “Oh my Fal… Oh heavens, how in the world? How in the world there would lie such an absolute beauty at such a shabby place? Ye, I’m done! Ye, I. Am. Done. For!”

“Shang, what’s wrong?” Ye Chong was startled.

“Umm, Ye.” His voice was shaking, “This is what we called ‘being shot by the arrow’. And I’m sure I had been shot.”

“Arrow?” Ye Chong panicked as he looked around quickly, but there was nothing… although Ye Chong still kept his guard high, “Could it be a new form of archery? Of using a projectile of invisibility? Wave-based arrows? No! It is a ray arrow?” Ye Chong got into his stance right away, awaiting the moment Shang confirmed the wounding strike. Then he would deploy the Guardian and blast off in the speed of light instantly. With the Guardian they would be in good hands, it had to be this female who assassinated Shang, then Ye Chong would kill this despicable feline at the quickest speed possible so he could spend more time to find this ballista of revolutionary in leisure!

ZZzt!

Shang almost crashed himself! “Ye, do you really have not the slightest humanity?”

“Humanity? But Shang, you said you got shot, I clearly heard it! Mhm, considering how weaponry this ancient could do you no harm, it has to be a new kind of weapon that involves ray beams or some sort of impulsive waves. That would be more likely.” Ye Chong’s tone was dead serious.

Zzt! It was super effective.

Shang fainted… nearly. “Ye, have you not heard of the arrow of Cupid?”

“Arrow of Cu- what?” Ye Chong did not understand it. “What company makes it? What’s the exact specs? The model? The brand? What does it do exactly? What are the capacities? I don’t think I have seen such a sophisticated product before…” Ye Chong was dead serious, pondering.

ZzZZzt!

Shang could not hold it any longer, he launched a full barrel of lecture, “Ye, you freaking beast! Could you be a little more normal sometimes? You don’t even know the arrow of Cupid? You and your bloody head filled with endless fighting, killing, massacre and your bloody mechs and your bloody modifications! When in the century would you learn the true meaning of life?” The very last sentence was uttered romantically in stark sentiments by Shang, which tickled Ye Chong from the soul, that his hair went standing.

“Does it have anything to do with this?” Ye Chong was bewildered. Well it seemed like Shang was not attacked, so it was a relief.

“Ay…” Shang was depressed, “I must admit it was my misconduct to have left you in such demise. Talking about the true meaning of life with you, is like talking to walls. Nothing productive comes back.”

“But Mu said walls do produce something. They produce echoes and the sound reflects back.” rebutted Ye Chong.

“Oh my Fal Galaxy. Holy matrimony! What kind of … thing! Are both of you? Heavens what have I done to stay with both of them?” Shang’s tone was filled with tears, he howled in grief.

“Hmmmmmmmmm?” a sweet tone going upwards pretentiously.

“Ye, my cute Ye boy, what is that stare? Missing me? Loving the good old me?” Lunatic Guan’s eyes were hazier than ever, tripping her steps, collapsing anytime it seemed. The tone was seductive.

“Magnefique! This is gorgeous!” Shang exclaimed. “Ye, do you know what it is? It’s known as the Twirling Tongue Tease! According to a research on women, ladies who spoke in such tease hold an alluring arousing appearance – a God’s gift! I never knew, never knew the slightest, that in a filthy place like this, a beauty, a beauty of such otherworldliness stood, just stood right there!” No one seemed to get what Shang was saying anymore… his tone was intensely passionate that it felt like some gibberish generated from dictionary.

No doubt, Ye Chong did not understand a single sentence uttered by this lunatic indulgence. He probably only got the part where Shang emphasized on how good Lunatic Guan was. She’s… good? His eyes were rolled into the realm of his head, wondering how Hei Zi would be jumping around and seeing the dinner he had last night returning if he heard what Shang had said.

Ye Chong took a careful look at Lunatic Guan, still, he did not identify anything good on her… other than her hands. They were a nice pair of hands, which they were fair, with great proportion. Ye Chong’s eyes could even discern the fine distribution of muscles on the arms. Slender yet agile hands! The downside though… Ye Chong was sighing, the skin was too fair. Fragile, feeble, torn upon touch, the defense would be poor.

But thinking of how she was actually a chemist who fought in a laboratory with chemicals, rather than a real hand-to-hand fighting, Ye Chong was confused of his judgment once again.

Lunatic Guan had gotten used to Ye Chong’s silence, just like how Ye Chong had gotten used to her drunk lunatic self. Most of his visits happened to spot her alcoholic self slurring and rolling around while twitching in some insanity sometimes, which were the reasons why Hei Zi showed reluctance of paying her a visit and also why her name being “Lunatic” Guan.

“Oh… Gulp. Don’t tell… Don’t tell me, you had finished your… your… strengthening liquid… che-chemical again…” She swung her cup, “Wait… no. You had taken tons before this… You-You can’t have used all up already…” Lunatic Guan was shocked and she giggled as she teased, “So… you did miss the good old me, eh? Ye my boy. Hahahaha, hmm? Why don’t, why don’t, I accompany our poor, poor, poor lonely Ye boy tonight? Only tonight!”

“Holy!” Shang sounded mesmerized, “Gorgeous!” He sounded impatient, “Ye, say yes to that statement, go green light! Please make sure you accept the world’s greatest offer!”

Of course Ye Chong directly showed ignorance towards the unwanted cheerleading counseling service.

“It’s not about the strengthening chemical, ma’am.” Ye Chong spoke on, “Master called me here to learn about alchemy from Aunt Guan.”

Lunatic Guan flinched… and then she began making glances over Ye Chong, “Well, I can’t tell at first sight. Looks like your master had some expectations on you… for he actually asked you here to learn alchemy from me. How could I miss such hint? Tsk, tsk, they say you shouldn’t judge a wine by its bottle and I guess it’s true. The good old me had seen it wrong!” She probably meant “judge a book by its cover”…

“Well,” Ye Chong asked abruptly. “What does Aunt Guan think about this?”

“Kekekekekekekeke… Jajajajajaja…” Lunatic Guan went lunatic for a moment, “Ay, Ye my little boy, how many times must I remind you? Call me Sister! ‘Aunt Guan, this.’ and ‘Aunt Guan, that’, you and your naming are making me old!” She might had gone lunatic, but Ye Chong saw her hand holding the cup, her fingers twirling the handle, justifying the fact that she was considering it.

So Ye Chong stayed quiet as he waited for a clear, conscious reply from her.

…

… …

It was a moment of silence between both of them.

The fingers stopped twirling. “So, what do you think?” Ye Chong quickly spoke, in his usual monotonous tone.

Lunatic Guan looked quite surprised. Apparently she did not expect Ye Chong to grasp the timing so accurately.

The cheeky smile on her face vaporized somehow. Her expression was stern out of sudden, which Ye Chong saw it the first time ever on her. Her bottomless pupils rolled over Ye Chong and rolled back to the center, as she looked into the cup, her words fell slow, “If it’s an order by your master, if you really wanted to come here and learn alchemy, I wouldn’t mind…” Her voice trailed off.

“Mhm. Conditions? What about the conditions?” asked Ye Chong with his still face.

“Well, conditions, there’s none…” Lunatic Guan’s eyes looked greatly impressed, “If you want to learn alchemy from me, there are indeed a few rules and regulations from me. If you could not obey them, I won’t be teaching you at all, even if your master came and tried convincing me,” the last sentence went grim.

“Ok,” Ye Chong was not horrified. “State it,” his tone fell flatly.

“First, what your master intended was probably for you to master the formula of a few kinds of strengthening liquid. But, since you came for me, I’ll decide what I want to teach and you can leave only after I admitted your expertise in this! You cannot simply leave on a whim anytime before this. Of course, you are allowed to get back to your master occasionally,” she spoke serenely.

“No problem,” Ye Chong replied after a moment of pondering,

“Second, you are my student and you will do as what I have instructed, no doubt, no bargain and most importantly, no slacking!”

“Okay.”

“Third, whatever place I forbid you to go and whatever item I disallow you to touch, do not, ever, go, and do not, ever, touch it! If I caught you, you better be able to face the consequences.” Though the regulation came nonchalantly, Ye Chong could smell the danger between the words for some reason.

“I am not a curious person to begin with,” Ye Chong was confident of this side of his personality.

“Think it through,” stated Lunatic Guan.

“Done it,” replied Ye Chong. “I agree.”

“Are you sure?”

“Sure.”

“Hm, alright. For starters, clean this room, organize everything.” The first instruction was tossed over Ye Chong as Lunatic Guan burped, turned and walked away in grace.

“Ye.”

“Regarding those words…”

“Ye, I’m taking every word that I’ve said!” No cure for regrets, Shang… Horrified Shang upon seeing the piling junks in the room. His mechanical heart ran colder than ever.

Chapter 138: Ye Chong’s Tutorial

he piles of utilities were not much of an issue for Ye Chong since cleaning rubbish was like the bread and butter for someone who grew up on Trash Planet like him. It was as easy as ABC.

Ye Chong was so efficient at it that even Shang got surprised, “Ye, I never knew you have such talent! You are such a skillful cleaner. Well, that means even if we got out one day, you could be a good maid and you could earn decently to pay for your living and our fuel! Mhm, apparently being a maid is not just for anyone and it certainly requires some standard of skills.”

Ye Chong ignored the artificial intelligence again as he took a glance at the room, which had become spotless and refreshing. Technically he just discarded whatever that looked useless to him and a majority of them turned out to be clothing. Like for Pete’s sake, who would buy these many clothes? Won’t she feel inconvenient of changing into different clothings constantly?

Without hesitation, these grimy clothing were all thrown.

Seeing how the room got all tidied up, spick and span, Ye Chong was satisfied, though he did accidentally “over-clean” a few pieces of floorings as they were too dirty… He wiped the specks to a bin.

The next few days passed under the Lunatic Guan’s signature giggling and mumbling. She did not regard Ye Chong in a bit.

Well Ye Chong was not in a rush as there were simply too many things he could do to kill time. Meditation alone could already consume a huge portion of his hours, since his talent to this was much more measly than most of the people. In spite of that, he kept it up, after working hard for so long, he made some breakthrough a few days back finally – he started to feel that wave of oddity faintly wafting around him.

This was more than encouraging to Ye Chong. After witnessing the unique battle style conducted by these pilots from the sanctuary, he had always believed in how mental training was the root of their existence.

His mindset was right after all. The starting point was correct but the path was rockier than he thought. The actuality of mental training was a more complicated concept. These so-called mentalists had been chosen way back when they were a child for their outstanding mental and physical conditions. They were trained in a group of 10 each. They grew up together as they trained together to build the rapport. And they would become the true elite of combats!

Nevertheless, Ye Chong did not expect to get fully immersed in the boundless world of mentalist, neither did he wish the expertise could provide him aid of any kind during battle. He only wished that it could at least help him to ease his pain whenever that symptom came raiding him. If it could do that, it would be godly helpful and Ye Chong would be thanking God.

Other than the daily meditation session, there were other things to do as well. Ye Chong was not the meddling kids who would go digging some graves, peeling some masks, he had much better things to do like getting familiar with the Guardian. He had been restlessly trying to get along with this miniature mech the past few days because he understood the fact well enough that only with the continuous bonding between the pilot and the mech itself would bring out the best in each other. The Guardian was just like the treasure of infinity, which never failed to give Ye Chong new surprises.

Dagger for No.2. It was a rather stupid item name for a great pair of daggers like itself. It did not even look like a proper noun of naming without the capitalization, even though this silly name represented a transcendent pair of daggers. Numerous discussions were conducted between Ye Chong and Mu yet they failed to determine the concept behind the production of such kind of dagger, which was mind-blowing enough for Ye Chong to praise how Gu Shaoze was a genius. The sharpness of Dagger for No.2 was much higher than the Blue Winter which the tip had been imbued with Do Kun stone. The one pity was… the fact that it was too small to do anything significant on a mech, unless the fatal spots were aimed at first or it would still be a mosquito’s bite on an elephant. The other catch was it was tricky to pilot the miniature under the unique monochromatic vision, and Ye Chong was attempting to get used to it.

In addition, Ye Chong also had to invest a few hours of his day on getting some hands-on practices on the bones he got from the grandfather, just to prevent regression in his skills.

Judging by the routine he had day by day, sometimes Ye Chong wondered if he could even squeeze a few minutes on alchemy, which justified the fact that he was acting so patiently despite Lunatic Guan’s consecutive absence, simply because he did not have the leisure to even figure it out! Out of the blue his life felt all fulfilling and meaningful. The biggest fortune of his life at the moment was probably Shang had switched places with Mu once again as his time was up. When Shang left and Mu came, it felt like a silent night, holy night – all was calm, all was bright.

This was exactly what Ye Chong thought especially being mentally tortured by Shang’s lecture. Ever since he had a glance at Lunatic Guan he was as if overdosed with aphrodisiac. “Aphrodisiac?” The alien term to Ye Chong was then defined by Shang, claiming that it was a kind of chemical which would induce simulation of a certain kind of hormones in human body within a short period of time.

The definition sounded horrifying to Ye Chong, wondering when Shang did his chemistry studies. What left Ye Chong such a deep impression was actually how Shang was “reacting” towards Lunatic Guan after that. He would be praising Lunatic Guan solemnly and endlessly like her best worshipper, lines and lines of classic cheesy, cringe-worthy expression of love he called them came rolling like inferno of his libido he said. It was impressive for he never repeat the said adjective or noun… but it was menacing at the same time. On top of that, regularly he would “advise”, “recommend” or “suggest” Ye Chong to approach Lunatic Guan whenever he could, though the tone sounded like how a person who would also “advise” the old lady during a robbery. It was fortunate that Ye Chong had such a calm personality, he almost snapped under the uninterrupted chain of agony. One could imagine his machine jamming!

It was absolutely a horror! If anyone who acted like Shang after consuming this namely “aphrodisiac”, then this said chemical would be the most fearsome drug in history of humankind!

The relieving fact was Shang had a strong accuracy of time as he gave away his space right at that moment, though with a heavy heart that made him sing some goosebumps-giving poems he said. Ye Chong gave a deep sigh of relief upon hearing Mu’s monotonous line again.

Shang might had left, but Lunatic Guan had just arrived.

“Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.”

The glass hung in her right hand as Lunatic Guan leaned against the door with her face reddened from the alcohol. Ye Chong immediately paused his routine as he set his glance of indifference upon her.

“Yi…Yi…Ye.” Her words were unclear, “Ye my boy you… you are so hiccup patient… so uncomplaining… I’m impressed… no wonder your master had such expe-expectation on you. Well… Very well… Let the good old sister grant your wish…” Her head swung uncontrollably as she fell upon the door and went all the way down to the ground she sat.

…? Ye Chong’s expression suggested otherwise.

“Little Ye! You!” Glared at Ye Chong upon seeing his doubtful eyes, Lunatic Guan mumbled, “Ye my boy, don’t tell me… you think I’m… I’m… hiccup drunk? Hmph… Let me tell you, Little Ye. I’m not… I’m not drunk! Let me give you a pro… proper lesson today!”

…

Settled down, Lunatic Guan pondered a little. Seriousness began surging through the drunken face of hers as her speech became clearer – a rare sight it was indeed. “The chemists, or some called the alchemists… they were not the one who played with the flasks right from the beginning, most of them happened to be botanist formerly. They researched on plants and had discovered a variety of attributes on these beautiful babies. Mhm, it’s a very intriguing study indeed! However, as the timeframe for a plant to complete its growth was too long, it brought up a lot of problems for them to conduct the research effectively. Thus, these researchers, driven by their curiosity and impatience, started trying various methodologies to condense the growth timeframe of a plant. And that was how the chemists showed up. Until today, botany is still the most widely used field of study in alchemy.”

Ye Chong was certainly all ears and surely he did not notice how the ever-drunk face of Lunatic Guan had turned all fair – her eyes were crystal-clear, lustered with wisdom as the features defined her shocking beauty with that gleaming face of hers.

“Then, people realized it was possible to reduce the growth timeframe through alchemy for living things other than the plants. As they ventured deeper into the unknown, their research was recognized. They started getting known by the people for being the explorer, the developer to new species. Then the field of alchemy was diversified, professionalized and began heading into the vision of humanity!”

Her tone was embedded with a hint of pride, which was surprising to Ye Chong for it was far-fetched to imagine a lunatic like Guan could have such emotion… Perhaps, Lunatic Guan was not as simple as she appeared currently before… Ye Chong laughed at the thought – “like tell me anyone who had a simple background and managed to enter the Orbits!”

“So…” Lunatic Guan carried on, “there are a number of branches of studies in the alchemy. Well, we are humans after all. We can’t simply involve ourselves in every field available. Other than the difference in branches of expertise, there are still many methods that are unknown to people to distinguish the grouping between chemists. Since you are technically my student, you should be aware of this. Mhm, everything regarding this is stored inside the processor at Room No.5 and the password would be 37254. Go check it out if you are interested. Being an occupation having rich history as dated long time ago, there are laws hidden within the field and rules which are unwritten to outsiders, which is something you need to work on. Or else… Heh! You could picture what would happen if you conduct the taboo, be it an accident or an incident. Hmph!” The tone fell coldly.

Ye Chong nodded, expressing his understanding.

“For starters, learn about botany. The research of botany is most fruitful and mature!” Lunatic Guan searched through her body for a moment, she found nothing as she stopped and pondered with her head tilted. “Oh, silly me!” she muttered as she withdrew a chip of size of a thumb right from her chest. “Grab!” She tossed it to Ye Chong.

Lunatic Guan “tossed” the chip too gently, the chip was too light to fly far enough to Ye Chong. It was falling and Ye Chong launched himself to grab it right before it hit the ground.

“Oh?” Lunatic Guan’s eyes flashed slight peculiarity as her eyes scanned through Ye Chong, “Eh, my Little Ye, you ain’t bad you know! I never knew you were quite capable of things despite that puny body of yours. Yes, yes, sister myself would be relieved even if you were to head out alone. Hehehehehehehehe! Little Ye, you know! You~could~always~come~to~me~ So I could have an actual test on your s-t-a-m-i-n-a! The exercises! If you know what I meant, hehehehehe!” sneered Lunatic Guan, covering her mouth which uttered a tone of ambiguous chemistry.

“Stamina?” Ye Chong shook his head as his reply came seriously, “My stamina is good enough. No test is required!”

…

Psh!

Lunatic Guan had lost control after trying very hard to inhibit her laughter, as she sat on the ground and burst out laughing. “Ahahahahahahahaha!” The chain of laughter rang throughout the room. “Hehehehehehehehe!” Ye Chong could not compute the rationale behind this long laughter… “Mu.” He knew it would be very inappropriate if he asked out loud, so he asked Mu in his mind instead, “Is my stamina that bad?”

“Hmm…” Hesitated Mu, “Probably the foe had better vitality, although the chances are less than 1%!”

“Hah…”

It took quite some time before Lunatic Guan lost her breath, as she tapped her chest, gasping for air. 3 minutes lapsed and she finally calmed down.

“Hah.”

“Okay, this chip contains the illustrations of common herbs. Although most schools do not demand their students to memorize all of this, you are my student and you should not be all cheap and secondary of course! Memorize the entries, every-single-of-them. I’ll be testing you in a few days. If you got it wrong, heh! No doubt, punishment awaits! And that would be very, very memorable to my Little Ye.”

Ye Chong shuddered for some reason.

“Also!” she spoke on, “this is only a side quest, but you better be doing it. You would be collecting the actual herbs as samples based on the listing in the illustrations. Yes, the plant searching device would be at Room No.2, fifth from the left on the third row. You would probably need that. The instruction is there. It is simple, just a glance and you’ll get it. So stop bothering me with that! Okay… that’s probably… it? I want to see actual samples for all entries on the illustrations after 5 days. Alright, save the nagging. That’s it.” Lunatic Guan waved as she seemed a little irritated somehow.

“Tata! Zzz…”

She ignored Ye Chong after that. Lunatic Guan leaned against the door and began sleeping soundly.

Chapter 139: Into the Woods

oom No.2, fifth… from the left… the third…row… There it is!

So this is the plant searching device Lunatic Guan had mentioned? Wondered Ye Chong as he took a careful look around. It was unexpectedly tiny in size, with an appearance of a cube of about 5 to 6 cm^3 with two levels where the upper part contained a piece of crystal spread in nets of pale yellow while the lower was a base of metallic dark blue which the texture had been glossing beautifully after the process of frosting. Both levels were connected by 2 composite straps at the endings with adjustable hinged pins on them, which looked like a futuristic watch from a glance.

Ye Chong took the pin and buckled himself by the wrist. Tick! Clipped the adjustable pin automatically on the wrist. The size was just right. No discomfort was felt on his wrist.

Zzzzt!

Almost immediately after, the device was activated as beams of various colors were diverged from the crystal and then converged upwards right above, which eventually formed a clear hologram on top.

Right inside the device there was a detailed manual that illustrated instructions required to operate the system. As Lunatic Guan had stated, it turned out to be indeed simple, easily understood. Technically, Ye Chong just had to insert the data of the designated plant into the chip to trigger a scanning system which would look for the inputted plant within the proximity of 10 meters. And the locations would be marked on the hologram. Thus, it would be justifiable to state that intellectualization had already occurred in all sorts of fields, including the study closest to the nature, the alchemy itself.

The chip given by Lunatic Guan had actually encompassed entries of a large variety of plants, which turned out to be an eye-opener to Ye Chong, since plants were the rarest species he would see back on Trash Planet-12. So instead of plants, the mutated lifeform took the place of the bottommost of the food chain. They would consume organic junks for a living and they possessed great survivability. There were plants on the planet, however those were mostly the kinds which could adapt to harsh conditions, which in return, they had bland colors and unsightly appearance. Thus his reaction as he could have never seen such beautiful bushes of flowers on the hologram with different kinds of shapes and colors before.

To even survive on Trash Planet, the first lesson one has to learn is to respect life. The kinds of species still living on Trash Planet are absolutely strong and lasting by nature. Throughout the days of getting in between life and death, Ye Chong learned this lesson by heart. He valued life, he would treat lives of any form equally, and that would be Ye Chong’s philosophy towards life.

Eventually these plants were like the masterpiece by the God to Ye Chong!

Ye Chong did not rush out of the room and began his plant sampling right away. Instead, he took a thorough reading on the description of the plants. Towards learning, he held sufficient patience, demand and curiosity, as he believed these were all parts of his strength while strength always had the ability to determine the outcome of his life, being the warranty to his survivability!

But then Ye Chong exited from the concentrated inquisitiveness of his pretty soon, simply because… “Man… memorizing is truly a tiring work…” In any event, Ye Chong had confidence in his memory being average at the very least before this. And today he stumbled upon this task that turned out unexpectedly tedious… where he barely remembered a thing on the list yet his brain felt all exhausted, getting dizzier.

Seems like… Mu would be more accustomed at tasks like this…

No.

Ye Chong still understood the difference of memorizing the listing by Mu or by himself, only the strength which was wholly his would be the most reliable source of guarantee!

It was a pretty comprehensive set of illustrations that it felt like a mini encyclopedia. There were extensive writings regarding the nature, the effect and even the actual application of the specified plant in the industry. Nonetheless, such vast amount of information remained a bit puzzling to a beginner like Ye Chong. Plainly the basic information of the plants alone was already a headache to him. He solely wished that Lunatic Guan’s examination would come on a later date, as 5 days were challenging.

…

Ye Chong strolled through the woods.

Ugh. I forgot. Why had I never thought of borrowing a mech from Nan Nan’s grandfather? I would have some sort of transportation at least! Ye Chong pitifully checked out the list of mechs he had with him… none of them were deployable, as either they were damaged beyond repair or they were too alarming to appear in the woods. Ye Chong could just imagine everyone on Haleyson hunting him down the moment the mech flipped out of the dimension.

Sigh… Ye Chong was in grief but what else could he do? He lifted his steps and began walking hurriedly, at least Ye Chong’s stamina was certified to do a bit of running in the greens.

The forest was serene.

The atmosphere slowed his steps gradually.

Sauntering through the forest, he inhaled the refreshing air coming right from Mother Nature. Ye Chong sure had fallen in love with this sensation of serenity. Beep! Beep! Beep! The plant searching device on his wrist pulled him back from the fantasy. The beeping of notification sounded extra ear-piercing in the silent woods. “Oh. Hah!” Ye Chong laughed uncontrollably, “My life has always been filled with danger and war. Such life of peace and harmony does not belong to me!”

He shifted his focus back onto the plant searching device on his wrist. Wow! He staggered upon seeing the countless red spots appeared in the interface!

“Ye.” Mu’s voice echoed, “You should try searching one item at a time. Currently you had inputted too many items!”

The device was unquestionably powerful, the overall efficiency of the sampling process was sharply increased after Ye Chong did as what Mu guided.

Okay, this is the Trifolium… What about this? Hm… Pairing Vine…? No… it should be Paired Whip…

Ye Chong began sampling the plants as instructed by the device while tasting the painful realization of his atrocious memory which hardly helped him recalling even the name of the plants he encountered.

He plucked a few plants and grabbed some others…

Soon, Ye Chong discovered a new issue – his hands were bare. He was unarmed. He did not bring any form of containers to keep the plants he had collected, which upset him… “Ah!” He also found out how fragile the plants were that they crumbled in his palms as Ye Chong carried them along. And he had to start from scratch again.

In the midst of his fret, a few clinking sounds of metal rang by his ears.

His pupils went focused as he perceived the incoming sound carefully. He might had an atrocious memory, but he still had a good pair of ears. “Was that…”

“Ye, there were two mechs warring…” Mu simply did not give him the opportunity to flaunt his sensitive hearing, habitually his voice sounded monotonously, “Somewhere 500 meters from your right hand side. Mhm, the mech model, judging by the clinking, it should be one of the mechs we encountered at the sanctuary before, while the others… unknown.”

“Sanctuary?” Ye Chong withdrew his hands from one sprout, he did not intend to join the party at first, but… he tilted his head pondering. The men from sanctuary, their intentions had been confirmed to be hostile. If that’s the case, it would be beneficial in the upcoming encounters if we could get more information on them.

“Ye…” Somehow Mu could see what Ye Chong was thinking, as he suggested, “If you really insist on joining the party, piloting the Guardian would be the best option! The Guardian is in-built with an anti-detection system which could counter the detection by the mechs from the Sanctuary at a success rate of 85% and above. The landscape is rather fitting to the nature of Guardian too.”

“Mhm, a great idea it is,” agreed Ye Chong.

Ye Chong started to get the hang of unique monochromatic vision in the Guardian. The ever refreshing roaring strings of information somehow were able to get him into a status of calmness quickly. The boundaries defined by dots and lines in black and white, the ever-moving data, they were mesmerizing to Ye Chong. He grew fond of the Guardian as he got familiar with the interface.

Leap. Leap. Run. Leap.

The miniature mech worked like a charm in the woods since its size was mini as it was called. It felt weaving through the trees with more dexterity than a standard mech which stood 10 meters and above.

The only downside Ye Chong felt about Gu Shaoze’s genius invention though… was the color itself. Well, certainly the color gold was classy and glossy, easy to the eyes, but it was too eye-catching in Ye Chong’s opinion. Ye Chong did not really fancy the all sparkling and dazzling color scheme on his mech when he was born being an assassin lurking in the dark. He did try repainting the surface of the Guardian with some darker colors like a grayish green, however contrary to his expectation, the material of the Guardian was more than peculiar as no paint seemed to be able to remain on the surface. Some types of the paint he tried would drip off in streams. There were paints that lasted on the surface with no question, till Ye Chong tried wiping them… and they got transferred to the cloth after that, like those washing powder advertisement he had seen before, the Guardian stayed clean as new in one wipe despite all sorts of paints and dirts.

Mu was pretty intrigued by the nature of the material on the surface yet sadly he could not perform any kind of effective analysis without the aid of professional apparatuses. So the material for the Guardian lingered as the biggest mystery till that moment.

Ye Chong who was piloti- nope, practically saying – Ye Chong who was wearing* the Guardian, moved like an agile beast in the forest as he went leaping and dashing freely at great speed!

The accuracy as well as the coverage of the detection system on most mechs would be negatively affected in the woods, except for a super mech like Mu Shang, which was extremely rare for mechs being able to perform accurate detecting and positioning even in the jungle. Back in the days where he was still performing NR Training and piloting a Raven, he always had a preference to fight people in the jungle as that would potentially reduce the differences in capacities of mechs with the foes.

The dense branches provided Ye Chong the best camouflage, as he made to the two mechs 30 meters away nearby without alerting them using the Guardian’s impeccable anti-detection system.

Right when he deployed the Guardian, the analysis function that ran automatically gave him a headache for a moment, countless networks of data flooded his eyes, the data ran and refreshed maniacally. He only realized the fact that the landscape was too complicated for Guardian to compute. He was jammed with the information and he could see silhouettes at the slightest. Nevertheless, the system seemed to have cleared up itself while he was puzzled by the issue. The imagery started simplifying itself as some lines faded away, the visual grew clearer, the data stream refreshed slower.

It was a shocker to Ye Chong to see the sudden changes all by the system itself but he did not have the time to figure it out just yet. Apparently there were still a lot of functions undiscovered… Speculated Ye Chong, who then calmed his excitement as he observed the images attentively.

As stated by Mu, the mech was indeed from the Sanctuary. Ye Chong could recognize that model at first glance, being similar to the one he knocked out with the Guardian back then, whereas the other mech… it was much smaller in size, had an emerald body, the designs were rather revitalizing, with slight innocence. Ye Chong suspected it being a mech for females.

The two mechs had apparently created an opening around them. Twigs were broken, trees collapsed in a circle of borderline. The earth was scooped out viciously. These had justified the fact that they must have fought before. The green mech had several scratches on the body too, while the Dawn mech, as expected from the Sanctuary, was bright anew. The status of both parties was blatant in this scenario.

Both parties stood still as they anticipated the next move of each other.

“Ey, kiddo!” The Dawn mech spoke, “Why don’t you just be a good girl and follow me back to our Sanctuary? You aren’t running away today. The Sanctuary had made a compulsory order to capture you alive. As long as you are still inside the Orbits, you can’t run. Just give up.”

“Capture me alive? Hmph! Not this easy! Guess what! I’d rather die right here than returning to that freaking place!” The slightly kiddish voice rang in Ye Chong’s ears with immense rebellion of anger along with desperation.

“You want to die? Providing that you do not spit your last breath here, the Sanctuary always has a way, even if you want to drop dead to hell, we would pull you all the way back from hell!” The words came harshly from the pilot on the Dawn mech. They sounded cold and inhumane.

“Heh! I understand I’m no match to your big and scary machine! But my life still lies in my own hand! Well, I’ll die right here and drop dead to hell at most, what else could happen? In fact, hell feels like a better place to stay than that freaky place!” Determination filled the words of the female pilot on the green mech.

“Keep your chariot just yet, miss! The officials had stated to forsake your previous sins if you return now with obedience. You have their words.” The pilot on the Dawn mech turned slow in his tone, seemed to be calming down the female pilot he had just enraged. Obviously he was worried, judging by the personality portrayed by the female pilot, it would not be weird to see his mission failed in the end. “Well, miss. You do know that you could never escape the Sanctuary. Just follow me, I’ll guide you and I promise you that you will be fine.” His words voiced gently like a peaceful elderly.

“Hmph!” Too bad it did not work on the girl as she ridiculed, “What a line, ‘I promise you that you will be fine’? Hmph! You are nothing but a watchdog being ordered by your master to fetch a bone. What bark can you even promise?”

“Why you little…” The senseless words had infuriated the pilot on the Dawn mech, “You are a stubborn kid, aren’t ya? Let’s see how I’m going to teach you something about manners! Don’t tell me about your pointless suicide! You could shoot yourself in the head now, I’ll just get a few ‘whips’ from my ‘master’ at most. But I’ll make sure you would suffer enough before that!”

The threatening tone resounded through the peaceful forest, which turned chilly and disturbed.

Chapter 140: The Greenbird in Liberty

So you are the kind who wouldn’t bulge till doom is slapped right in your face eh? You might be the talent from the elite group, but well, too bad, too bad…,” he spoke grimly, as the last sentence trailed off in shrills, of his firearm.

“You…” The girl was indeed a “kiddo” as labeled by the Dawn mech pilot. She apparently lacked experience in combats and reacted passively towards the sudden blow.

Ye Chong in the meantime decided to spectate the entire fight between the two parties at the side. He had once matched against the mechs from the Sanctuary before, but that was a team fight. It did not define the capabilities of the mech when alone, which was what Ye Chong strived to witness in the woods.

The dirty move pulled off by the pilot on the Dawn mech was fancied by Ye Chong. He would give an excellent score for the pilot was able to sneak an attack by distracting the foe with his words. An epitome of assassination to learn from! But Ye Chong knew his abilities well. With his personalities, it would be a little far-fetched to pull such trick off. He would be far more appropriate to sneak an attack in dark, without sound and without trace.

They exchanged moves rather quickly, since the space was limited and filled with numerous obstacles. Their distance of action was much shortened, thus the melee fights. Oh? Ye Chong was triggered by the word, “melee”, that sounded like his arsenal!

The fight before came too abruptly. Ye Chong barely had the opportunity to do a close-up on most of the mechs involved, except for that purple mech.

Seemingly the Dawn mech had a distinctive 3 feet design, which gave it an improved balancing on the land, whereas the green mech looked bland in contrast. An oval cabin sat right above the 3 feet of the Dawn mech, where it was connected to a red disk with 3 pliable metallic tubes. Plenty of white spots of various sizes sparkled on the surface of red disk.

It looked odd indeed.

If Ye Chong stayed much longer in the Orbits, he would have known that the Dawn mech took the form of a kind of species exclusive to the place, the Tripeslug*.

The girl’s green mech had obviously taken the form of a bird. The whole mech literally looked like a dainty green bird, which were much shorter than its opponent and it was hard to tell if it had anything outstanding about it. But then, Ye Chong was not foolish to judge the performance of a mech by its appearance. In fact, he had experienced the potency of the Dawn mech. Judging by the information obtained from the pilot, he seemed to be cautious with this “kiddo” he called.

The way the Dawn mech fought in close range was eccentric!

Snap! Two of the tubes connected to the disk were disengaged! Two red beams of light came out from the bottom and extended rapidly over the tubes in swirls!

Within twinkling of eyes, the pair of soft tubes had transformed into a pair of flaming electric whip. Buzz! Buzz! Electrical growl came from the whip occasionally along with a few arcs of light glaring in the eyes. And at the tip of both of the tubes a conical laser beam was installed.

Ye Chong was amazed by the ingenious design! The tubes clearly were made out of one-of-a-kind materials – highly pliable and durable, combining with the conical laser beams, they would have a certain level of penetrability. The choice of the tubes was great as they provided a more nimble action compared to most of the close-ranged weapons, due to the fact that it had the most intuitive changes of angle, hence becoming an unpredictable weapon to the foes. “Still, the downside… as usual…” Ye Chong could tell it at first glance, the whips were unpredictable alright, but it could not deal fatal damages to the foes.

The other tube was also covered with flames and electricity while the red disk had become a shield which its angle could be changed naturally.

That was smart. However, Ye Chong could tell – melee attacks should not be the strength of the mechs from Sanctuary. They could be supportive but not aggressive! The statement was apparent when the choice of close-ranged weapons installed on the mech was concerned. It lacked a killer! It did not have any vicious close-ranged weapon! Hence it would not allow the mech to gain the ultimate advantage in a melee attack and it would be nothing in front of the Black Covers’ mech which aced at melee attack on the other end of the scale.

The Dawn mech fought proactively, its speed caught Ye Chong’s attention.

The Black Coves, the FMPA, the Sanctuary… they might had an utterly different design of mechs with emphasis on a totally different aspect, but they had something strangely similar – all of them had superb speed. Consequently, speed remained as the core factor of mech combats, whether it did psychic attacks, a punch in the face or a missile launch with heat tracing.

Habitually the Guardian had activated its automatic analyzing system over the two mechs. The analysis ran like a whirlwind that a vast amount of information crashed the field like a wave of tsunami. Ye Chong’s eyes were not in the mood for those. They were all on the fighting between the mechs.

The weaponry of the Dawn mech behaved exactly as Ye Chong predicted – the whips slitted oddly like serpents in the head, ever-changing and magnificently swift; the shield hovered around the body of the mech, highly prepared for incoming attacks.

The green mech seemed to be rather familiar with the battle style of the Dawn mech as she dodged the hurricane attacks with grace. Yet, she did not manage to dodge everything. The mech was whipped a few times, charred linings remained on the surface. The machine was not broken however. Although the flaming electric whip might had a threatening appearance, it still had limited forces that it did not deliver any actual damage to her mech.

The girl wielded a parrying spear, an ordinary weapon which Ye Chong had once used before.

“Eh?” Ye Chong was so astonished that he could not help but to exclaim. Something was amiss! His eyes fixed on the green mech’s behavior. I knew it! At first glance, the girl was at a worse situation in the fight, holding up attacks from the foe; however, Ye Chong saw it through – the girl was fine the whole time, her attacks were actually delivered viciously that it drove the foe in panic.

These were not surprising enough to make our hero gasp at the spot. There was a silhouette of another person in the cabin. And that was… “The purple girl who nearly killed me that day!”

No wonder there was always a sense of acted-upon-prediction in the battle… Ye Chong still could feel that pain dealing with that purple physic girl the other day! The girl piloting the green mech also gave an identical sensation to Ye Chong. She seemed to never fail to foresee the movements of the foe and avoid them in the nick of time, though she did not feel as skillful as the purple girl.

If the purple psychic girl symbolized a matured fletching, the girl in the green mech would symbolize a nestling then.

Ye Chong was very much sure of his speculations by then. This had to be a technique unique to the mentalists in the Sanctuary, it could be learned! And from their conversation, he could tell that they were not measly of their kind.

Imagine a few tens of … no! They would only need a few mechs with pilots who had acquired the technique, imagine them with their rapports… how terrifying the potency would be! Ye Chong was getting cold sweat over his back. One-on-one was not even a confident fight to Ye Chong… let alone Two-on-one or more-than-two-on-one!

Ye Chong settled down as he collected his thoughts. He feared that the pilots who had mastered such technique would be the mastermind, the master strength of the Sanctuary! Well then! The girl in the green mech should not be a challenging opponent just yet! If he could obtain some top secrets of the Sanctuary from her, then it would be an immense help for him to identify the complicated factions in the Orbits. Moreover he would more likely to encounter her kind again in the near future. Assuming he could really dig some information beforehand, it could potentially save his life!

That tricycle mech was much worthless than the girl’s head in his eyes.

This was it!

After a SWOT analysis in his head, Ye Chong made up his mind!

The three-dimensional illustration of the tricycle mech traced 4 white lines and 3 dots. Evidently those were the best spots to make fatal strikes after analysis. Ye Chong who had gotten pretty much used to the Guardian understood it well.

The jaguar peeked at its prey in the bushes, ready to pounce anytime!

…

“No,” The girl in the green mech was holding the attacks laboriously. She knew that if she were to hold the attacks any longer, she would collapse before the damn watchdog. “But… But I…” She had lasted for this long yet she had hit her limit. The head was pounding as she overused her ability. “You should never overuse your physic ability! Never ever overuse your head! Preserve it more than any other parts of body!” The voice of her teacher echoed. The teacher had mentioned the precaution numerous times before. Overusing the ability would be dangerous.

“But!” What else could she do?

“No! I’m not giving up! I’m not accepting this!” She could not accept failure just like this. “I had done so much just to get out of that place! I had been running endlessly for these days. It was suffering, very suffering, but it would not stop me from loving the vibrant world outside! I am not going back for the monotonous, repetitive routine of training-learning-training! If I am going back for those, I’d rather die! Right here!”

… Stand still, stand still! Use your head to stand still!

Good girl, now, see through my moves.

If you can’t see it, you will just take every blow from me.

In her memory, her “home” had always been the base, a base illuminated by artificial lighting, no sun, no moon, only cold people freezing her surrounding, her soul.

She had been planning her grand escape in the dark 3 years ago and she realized how useful the knowledge she had learned in this. She started to work even harder in her studies, paying extra efforts to every teaching she received, soon she became outstanding in the group and caught the teacher’s attention and admiration.

Finally, half a month ago, I grabbed the opportunity and I made it out.

As expected, the Sanctuary took action extremely quickly. But what she did not expect in her prediction was that the Sanctuary actually sent a group of men to hunt her down. “Apparently I am indeed outstanding enough for the Sanctuary to send an army for me.” The irony ridiculed her as she laughed bitterly. The additional inclusion of army in her plan did not panic her, instead, she saw through the silver lining in the sky calmly, seized every lining she saw and escaped.

She cracked her head thinking every single moment of her life. And she did it. The army slowly became a team, a team gradually became few men. Under her tenacity, only one foe had remained right before her.

Nevertheless, this situation was not what she desired, as she knew herself well, in a one-on-one, straight up it would be her defeat. It was not because of her poor performance of course. She might had yet complete the whole training course in the Sanctuary, but she was in fact the best of the elites. She had exceptional talent in this, compared to most of the pilots in the Sanctuary. It was depressing because her failure was solely because of the incapabilities of her mech compared to the Dawn mech. The Greenbird was a mere training mech for the pilots in the Sanctuary, no doubt it would be feeble in front of the standard Dawn mech from the Sanctuary.

No… No!

Does that mean am I going to really die here? Today?

Depression filled her heart, desperation drowned her mind.

Her body stuck in a fight, her soul stuck in a contract.