76: Chapter 76 Thunder Strike and the Heart of Machinery

"Left side, lower path, sweeping leg."

Lin Qi muttered, his body leaping lightly to the right.

Whoosh!

A thick metal leg swept past where he had just been standing, smashing a brick on the ground to pieces.

Tie Zhu's attacks continued.

This metal monster, pieced together from scrap and powered by a chaotic source, had movements completely devoid of logic.

One second it was sweeping its leg, the next that aluminum bucket head was crashing over directly.

If it were three days ago, Lin Qi would have already been sent flying.

But now, he just tilted his body slightly, his shoulder catching perfectly in the blind spot of Tie Zhu's force.

"Stop."

Old Mo's voice rang out.

Lin Qi paused his feet, grabbed the mechanical arm Tie Zhu was swinging, and pushed its constantly wobbling head back into place.

"That's enough."

Old Mo closed the comic book in his hand, took a booklet even more tattered than the previous notebook from his bosom, and tossed it over.

Lin Qi caught it, and on the cover were three calligraphy characters: Thunder-Shock Slash.

"This name..." Lin Qi's mouth twitched. "Can you put some effort into naming things, old man? It sounds like a fake Secret Manual from a roadside stall, three for ten bucks."

"The name isn't important, as long as it works."

Old Mo pointed at Lin Qi's arm.

"Your strength is enough now, and your hardness is enough, but your attack methods are too single-minded."

"Besides head-on clashes, it's just joint locks. What will you do when you encounter those defensive warriors who are like turtles in a shell? Bite them with your teeth?"

Lin Qi opened the booklet.

The content inside was sparse, filled with diagrams of muscle fiber vibrations.

"This is a force-exertion technique."

Old Mo explained, "Mimic the frequency of lightning and control your muscles to tremble at high frequencies."

"The moment you make contact with the target, this vibration will conduct through the medium, generating double or even triple the penetrating power."

Lin Qi watched, mesmerized: "Striking across a mountain to hit an ox?"

"That's Jianghu charlatan talk. This is called physical resonance."

Old Mo corrected, "In a digitized world, shields have a defense threshold."

"If a single attack can't break the defense, then use high-frequency oscillation to disintegrate its structure. For a Body Cultivator like you without a mana bar, this is the best armor-breaking method."

Lin Qi closed the booklet and pondered with his eyes closed for a moment.

His Comprehension Ability for martial arts was extremely high; as a Martial Saint in his past life, he was no stranger to such micro-manipulation.

In this life, his Physical Body had undergone "Violent Bone Forging," and his control over his muscles had reached a freakish level.

Two minutes later, Lin Qi opened his eyes and looked at Tie Zhu, who was still spinning in place.

"Want to try?"

He walked up to Tie Zhu, opened the fingers of his right hand, and seemingly lightly pressed them against the five-centimeter-thick chest armor plate of Tie Zhu.

Just one second before his palm touched the metal plate.

The muscles in Lin Qi's forearm began to tremble crazily, the frequency so fast that the naked eye could only see afterimages.

Hum.

There was no deafening collision sound.

Only an extremely low hum, like a giant hornet flapping its wings by one's ear.

Tie Zhu's heavy body suddenly stiffened.

The armor plate on its chest was intact, not even leaving a dent.

But the next second.

Crack.

Snap.

A series of crisp sounds came from inside Tie Zhu.

The chest cavity that had been flashing blue light suddenly went dark, and immediately after, this machine weighing several hundred jin collapsed onto the ground like a pile of scattered building blocks.

A broken drive shaft fell out of its armpit, the break looking flocculent—that was the disintegration of metal after reaching its limit of fatigue.

"This power..."

Lin Qi looked at his own palm, somewhat surprised.

If this palm had struck a person, their ribs wouldn't just break; their internal organs would probably have turned into porridge.

"So-so, just barely entered the door."

Old Mo glanced at the wreckage on the ground, "Your force control is too poor; you hurt yourself as much as you hurt the enemy. Look at your hand."

Lin Qi looked down and realized his palm was red and swollen, and there was even a small crack in the web of his hand.

"Reaction force." Old Mo commented, "But it's enough to deal with those rookies in the freshman competition."

Lin Qi looked at the pile of scrap iron on the ground and sighed.

"Looks like I have to fix it. This Tie Zhu is too fragile."

He put on his gloves again and walked skillfully toward the scrap area in the corner of the warehouse.

This time he had to find a sturdier core component, otherwise, this sparring partner wouldn't work.

Lin Qi searched through a pile of scrapped precision instruments.

Suddenly, his hand touched a cold, spherical object.

This thing was mixed in a pile of rusty gears; if you didn't look carefully, you wouldn't notice its uniqueness.

It was a metal ball the size of a fist, its surface covered in complex patterns, the gaps filled with sludge.

Just as Lin Qi was about to throw it aside, his fingers suddenly felt an extremely faint pulse.

Thump.

Thump.

Very light, like the heartbeat of some hibernating creature.

Lin Qi immediately brought the ball to his eyes and probed it with his Martial Intent.

The System gave no prompt, only a line of garbled code.

[Item: ??? (Unable to parse)]

"Old Mo, there's a weird thing here."

Lin Qi walked to Old Mo holding the metal ball.

The originally nonchalant Old Mo's eyes froze the moment he saw the ball.

He sat up straight abruptly, snatched the metal ball, and wiped the sludge off it with his sleeve.

Those patterns were revealed, glowing with a dark golden luster.

"This is... a Mechanical Heart?"

Old Mo's voice was somewhat dry, "This is the highest-level Puppet core from the old era; the technology was lost fifty years ago."

"Even the current Advanced alchemists can't create a chip with this kind of autonomous learning logic."

He looked up at Lin Qi with a strange expression.

"Which trash pile did you dig this out of?"

"Just that box labeled 'Non-recyclable'." Lin Qi pointed to the corner.

"What a waste of heaven's gifts." Old Mo cursed, not knowing who he was scolding, "If this thing were taken to the black market, it could be traded for half of Longya Academy."

Lin Qi's eyes immediately turned into the shape of gold coins.

"Then sell it?"

"Sell my ass." Old Mo threw the ball back to Lin Qi, "The technology to activate this thing doesn't exist right now; it can only be used as a decoration."

"But this faint energy fluctuation shows it isn't completely dead. Keep it; if you can find a high-level energy source in the future, maybe you can make a big guy."

Lin Qi stuffed the ball into his backpack with some regret.

Although it couldn't be cashed out immediately, it sounded like a stock with potential.

"Alright, stop fixing that broken Tie Zhu."

Old Mo stood up and patted the dust off himself.

"Today is the last day of special training; if you keep practicing, your body will be overdrawn. Go sit on the roof for a while and adjust your breathing."

Lin Qi nodded and climbed onto the roof of the warehouse.

It was dusk, and the setting sun dyed the entire Longya Academy blood-red.

In the large plaza in the distance, a huge ring was already being set up, and a holographic projection was looping Li Shaobai's promotional video.

Lin Qi sat cross-legged and closed his eyes.

The Qi and blood in his body no longer surged violently as before, but became calm and deep, like the tranquility of a great river before it enters the sea.

In this half a month, he hadn't just forged a copper skin and iron bones.

More importantly, he had learned how to plunder resources and strengthen himself in this digitized world in the most primitive, most barbaric way.

Scrap is a Treasure Trove, poison is a tonic, pain is experience.

This is the survival way of a "Blank Slate."

The sky gradually darkened.

Old Mo climbed up at some point, carrying a black bag in his hand.

"Catch."

The bag landed in Lin Qi's arms.

Opening it, he saw a set of dark gray combat gear. No flashy decorations, the cut was clean, and it felt slightly cool to the touch.

"No added stats, no enchantments."

Old Mo said faintly, "But it's woven with 'Black Gold Spider Silk' mixed with cut-resistant fibers."

"Breathable, wear-resistant, and the key is that it's not easy to rot. Your sportswear is already sour; don't go out tomorrow and embarrass yourself."