149: Chapter 150 The old man behind the door cultivated godhood with his bare hands for twenty years

"Finally, a Repairman—"

"who is willing to throw away the tool given by God."

An old voice came from behind the mechanical door.

The calloused hand did not reach out any further, merely placing a worn-out wrench across the threshold, as if waiting for Lin Jin to make his own decision.

The roar of the golden God Head still shook the delivery room.

The Six Divine Seats pressed down from the dome, their black chair legs slamming into the ground, forcing the entire No. 9 Forbidden Zone to sink continuously.

[Rule Maintenance Seat Seventh Candidate association has been severed]

[Unauthorized maintenance passage detected]

[Sealing immediately]

The small mechanical door began to close.

Without hesitating, Lin Jin grabbed the hand behind the door.

The old man pulled with sudden force.

Lin Jin was dragged directly inside the door.

"Lin Jin!"

Shen Tingxue rushed forward, her Ice Key jamming the closing crack of the door.

Zhou Heng's Thunder Spear followed closely, thrusting inside.

Chen Ye held his shield sideways and slammed his entire body against the door.

"Old man, if you're opening your door for business, don't just pull one in!"

An impatient cough came from behind the door.

"Lift the door hinge upward!"

"What's the use of just pushing!"

Chen Ye was stunned for a moment.

Zhou Heng had already turned the tip of his spear, lifting the door hinge upward.

Shen Tingxue froze the gears below.

Crack!

The mechanical door was forced open.

Shisan, Yu Xing, and Teacher Xu Wenzhou slipped inside one after another, and finally, even Lin Shoushan's folding treatment pod was squeezed in by Chen Ye.

Once everyone was inside, the old man kicked the door latch shut.

Bang!

The golden divine light was shut outside.

The rumbling instantly grew distant.

There was no temple behind the door.

There were no rule texts.

It was just a narrow, low-ceilinged maintenance passage filled with the smell of engine oil.

A few old-fashioned light bulbs hung overhead.

Wrenches, pliers, screws, and hand-drawn blueprints were piled against the wall.

Every blueprint was blackened by grease stains.

The old man stood under the light, wearing an old jumpsuit of indistinguishable color.

His left leg was a metal brace, and his right eye was covered with a dirty cloth.

Half of his body had already grown together with the pipes behind him.

The moment Lin Jin saw him, he felt a sense of familiarity.

It wasn't because he had seen this face.

It was because he had heard his voice.

The 002 in Teacher Xu Wenzhou's hand suddenly vibrated.

Under the black cloth, the wrench let out a low hum.

"It's you."

Teacher Xu Wenzhou stared at the old man.

"The voice of the First Maintenance Worker in the training pod."

The old man sneered.

"Does that thing even deserve to be called a person?"

"The system took the training recordings I left behind and pieced together a talking manual."

"Learning three of my catchphrases and it dares to impersonate me."

He walked up to Lin Jin and reached out his hand.

"The wrench."

Lin Jin handed over the chipped rusty wrench.

The old man weighed it a couple of times, then threw it back.

"You're gripping it too tightly."

"Repairing things isn't about fighting for your life against it."

"The more you fear breaking it, the more likely you are to use brute force."

Lin Jin caught the wrench.

"Who are you?"

The old man did not answer.

He pointed to an iron door nearby that was constantly leaking golden light.

"Repair it first."

The doorknob was vibrating frantically.

The power of the Six Divine Seats was battering the latch from the outside.

The lock body had already cracked in three places.

Lin Jin subconsciously waited for the rule prompts.

There was nothing in his vision.

No faults.

No solutions.

Only an ordinary door lock that was about to be shattered by the vibrations.

The old man folded his arms and looked at him.

"What?"

"If God doesn't give you the answers, you don't know how to work anymore?"

Lin Jin squatted down and ran his hand over the lock body.

The left side was hot.

The right side was not deformed.

The latch rebounded slowly, but it wasn't completely jammed.

He removed the casing and found that a spring inside had been shaken out of its slot.

Lin Jin clamped the spring with pliers and pressed it back in.

The first time, the angle was wrong.

The spring snapped back and flew off, brushing past his face.

The old man did not warn him.

The second time, Lin Jin first relieved the pressure on the latch, then slowly guided the spring back into the slot.

Click.

The door lock closed again.

The golden light from outside slammed heavily against it.

The iron door only shook slightly but did not open.

Only then did the old man nod.

"Not bad."

"Without that eye, at least you haven't turned into a useless waste."

Outside the delivery room, the Six Divine Seats began to turn toward other entrances.

A series of explosions echoed throughout the entire maintenance passage.

The ease on the old man's face vanished instantly.

"Follow me."

He turned around, dragging his metal left leg as he walked deeper inside.

The half of his body connected to the pipes actually stretched continuously as he moved, like an old cable that had been used for twenty years.

Chen Ye's scalp went numb at the sight.

"You are..."

"The main console's manual circuit breaker."

The old man didn't look back.

"Twenty years ago, when the automatic shutdown failed, there had to be a living thing stuck here."

Lin Shoushan stared fixedly at his back.

"Cheng Du?"

The old man's steps paused.

"You still recognize me?"

Lin Shoushan propped himself up on the edge of the treatment pod, his voice tight.

"You died in the first God Head shutdown accident."

"That's what the Records said."

Cheng Du pulled open the iron gate ahead.

"The Records also said Lu Chengyuan had been dead for twenty years."

"Didn't he still sit in an office for twenty years anyway?"

Lin Shoushan fell silent.

Cheng Du turned his head to look at him.

"You aged faster than me, kid."

"Seems like things outside aren't any better."

"Why did you never contact me?"

"Contact you for what?"

Cheng Du pointed to the pipes connected to his body.

"To tell you I'm still alive, so you can come back to take over my shift?"

"A Repairman is already bound to this place."

"There's no need to trick another one in."

Hearing this, Shisan's eyes flickered slightly.

Cheng Du did not continue reminiscing.

He led everyone through the maintenance passage to a tiny control room.

Compared to the Golden Delivery Room outside, this place was laughably crude.

Six red valves formed a circle.

In the center was a rusty black lever.

Above the lever hung a handwritten wooden sign.

[Maintenance Complete, Personnel Evacuate]

But the words "Complete" were welded shut with metal.

"This is the earliest maintenance core of the God Head."

Cheng Du tapped the six valves.

"Record, Ruling, Replacement, Recovery, Correction, continuation."

"Initially, they were not the Divine Seats."

"They were just six maintenance permissions."

"Temporarily invoked when repairing equipment."

"And returned after the repairs were done."

Yu Xing looked at the welded lever in the center.

"What about The Seventh Seat?"

"There is no Seventh Seat."

Cheng Du replied.

"Maintenance is not a fixed permission."

"Whoever finds the problem takes the tool."

"Whoever has the ability goes in to handle it."

"The seventh position was originally just a passage."

Everyone looked back at the small door they had come through at the same time.

[Repairman Passage]

Cheng Du twitched the corner of his mouth.

"Later, some people felt that the maintenance permissions were too dangerous."

"They couldn't let just anyone touch them."

"They added candidacy qualifications to the passage, added titles to the Repairmans, and then packaged the temporary tools as god-given talents."

"In the end, even maintenance itself was turned into a chair."

Lin Jin clenched the rusty wrench.

The Hand of Rules was not a gift specially sent to him by God.

It was the God Head locking the observation methods that originally belonged to all repairers into The Seventh Seat.

Only candidates could use it.

Everyone else could only wait for the system to decide what counted as a fault.

Cheng Du pulled the first red valve.

It didn't budge.

Behind the valve, the golden pressure instantly surged back.

His right shoulder split open directly.

There was no blood.

Only bundles of aging wires were exposed from the wound.

"The Six Seats are reconnecting with the God Head."

"Once they all fall back into the mainframe, the God Head will no longer need Yu Xing."

"Nor will it need a name."

"All class holders will become functions within its body."

Zhou Heng grabbed the second valve.

"How do we cut it?"

"Shut all six valves together."

"Not a single one can be left open."

Cheng Du looked at everyone.

"But do not use your career instincts."

"The Six Seats can reverse-control you through your careers."

Chen Ye walked toward the [Recovery] valve.

"Then what do I rely on?"

"Your hands,"

Cheng Du said.

"If you're afraid, say you're afraid."

"If it hurts, scream."

"Don't act like a career instruction manual."

Shen Tingxue gripped [Correction].

Zhou Heng chose [Ruling].

Chen Ye stood before [Recovery].

Teacher Xu Wenzhou jammed [Record] with the 002.

Shisan walked toward [Replacement].

Yu Xing placed her hand on the [continuation] valve.

The six of them exerted force simultaneously.

The valves did not budge in the slightest.

The Divine Seats outside immediately sensed it.

Black text snaked along the pipes into the control room.

[The Protection Role should protect system integrity]

The valve in Chen Ye's hand suddenly reversed, nearly twisting his wrist off.

"I am not the Protection Role right now."

His face went pale with pain, yet he still held on tightly.

"I am Chen Ye!"

[The Lockdown Role should prevent illegal shutdown]

The frost on Shen Tingxue's arm began to spread toward the valve.

She voluntarily let go of the Ice Key, using only her freezing-red hands to turn the metal wheel.

"I can choose not to lock down."

[The Barrier Breaker Position should follow the optimal path]

Dozens of paths appeared in front of Zhou Heng.

Every single one showed that shutting the valve would lead to greater losses.

He didn't look.

"This time, I'll take responsibility if I choose wrong."

The lightning light went out.

Only the sound of palms rubbing against rust remained.

One.

Two.

The six valves began to turn slowly.

The golden face of the God Head squeezed out from the wall.

[Stop.]

[The six maintenance permissions must not leave the mainframe.]

Cheng Du kicked the central lever.

Sparks flew from the welded words "Complete".

"Do you see that?"

"What they truly fear is not being shut down."

"It is admitting that maintenance can have an end."

The reason The Six Seats exist forever is that the Career System never allows "already repaired" to occur.

After every stabilization, new risks are manufactured.

After every crisis is resolved, new regulatory positions are left behind.

There is no end.

The repairers can never leave.

And the permissions never have to be returned.

Lin Jin walked up to the central lever.

The weld points were very thick.

The rusty wrench couldn't cut through them at all.

Teacher Xu Wenzhou was about to pull out the 002, but Cheng Du raised his hand to stop him.

"This thing cannot be cut using class abilities."

"Whoever welded it on can take over again."

"It must be dismantled using the most ordinary method."

Lin Jin inspected the weld seams.

"We need a cutter."

Cheng Du dragged an old-fashioned blowtorch out from the bottom of the tool cabinet.

"There is no spiritual energy."

"Light it yourself."

Lin Jin twisted open the gas valve.

The first ignition failed.

The second time, the flame had just lit up when it was blown out by the pressure of the God Head.

Cheng Du blocked the draft with his body.

The golden divine light scorched through his back.

"Hurry up."

Lin Shoushan wanted to step forward, but Cheng Du barked at him.

"You stay lying down!"

"I've guarded this for twenty years for you, not so you could crawl over now to snatch death!"

Lin Jin ignited it for the third time.

The blue flame finally stabilized.

He aimed the blowtorch at the weld points.

Molten iron dripped down drop by drop.

The words [Maintenance Complete] gradually emerged from the sealed metal.

The six valves also turned to their limit at this moment.

Crack!

The main connection between The Six Seats and the God Head disconnected simultaneously.

The golden face outside suddenly shattered.

But before everyone could let go, a black box that had been covered in dust for twenty years suddenly popped out from the deepest part of the control room.

Cheng Du's face changed.

"The original shutdown Record?"

The lid of the box opened on its own.

There was no divine decree inside.

Only a piece of paper used by humans.

At the top of the paper was the maintenance report from the first run of the National Class Transfer System.

[Overall System Design Goal: Allow humans to borrow classes to cope with the Abyss]

[First Major Fault: Classes begin to reverse-define humans]

[Submitted by: Mother of All Things]

[Proposed Action: Immediately cease the National Class Change, retaining the right of individuals to voluntarily use tools]

At the very bottom, six rejection stamps were stamped.

Record.

Ruling.

Replacement.

Recovery.

Correction.

continuation.

Cheng Du stared at the report and said slowly:

"Twenty years ago, everyone thought humans dismantled God."

"But in fact, the first one who wanted to shut down the Career System—"

"was God Himself."

At the bottom of the black box, a second document was automatically unfolding.

The title was only one line.

[Mother of All Things Dismemberment Execution List]

When the first name emerged, Lin Shoushan sat up abruptly from the treatment pod.

It wasn't the Department of Education.

It wasn't the White Tower.

Nor was it the Six Divine Seats.

At the top of the list, it clearly read:

[First Blade Executor: Lin Shoushan]