14: Chapter 14: Firepower Frenzy! Unlock the Steam High-Pressure Spray Gun!

Outside the carriage, the Extreme Cold Ice Storm continued to pour its fury upon the Polaris.

Lu Chen sat in the driver's seat, his gaze locked firmly onto the holographic panel.

At the very bottom of the Armament and Weaponry Lv1 branch, the icon for the Black Powder Steam Repeating Crossbow was emitting a ghostly blue light.

Above it, a gray energy line connected to a second, as-yet-unlocked node.

As Lu Chen focused his thoughts, the gray icon rapidly expanded, popping up a detailed system description.

[Armament and Weaponry Lv1 (Node 2): Wrap-around Steam High-Pressure Spray Gun]

[Node Description: Generates hidden omnidirectional spray valves at the four corners and visual blind spots of the vehicle's outer armor. The pipelines connect directly to the pressurization chamber of the Primary Efficiency Boiler.]

[Upon activation, it can spray a mixture of superheated steam and boiling water at a temperature of up to 200 degrees Celsius, covering a three-meter radius around the vehicle with no blind spots. For creatures and raiders without heavy, fully enclosed armor, it inflicts devastating melee burns and causes loss of vision. Truly the supreme tool for self-defense, repelling enemies, and clearing attachments from the vehicle body!]

[Unlock Cost: 50 Truth Points.]

200-degree superheated steam mixed with boiling water? Spraying within a three-meter melee range with no blind spots?

Lu Chen silently recited the description.

This was practically a hedgehog defense tailor-made for him!

On the wasteland, those raiders who crept silently like hyenas to the side of the vehicle, attempting to pry open the iron doors or destroy the tracks, were far more terrifying than head-on artillery fire.

When those scumbags, who thought they had found a blind spot of the Polaris, prepared to swing their crowbars, they would be met with a waterfall of 200-degree boiling water...

Just the thought of that scene gave Lu Chen immense satisfaction.

"System, invest 50 Truth Points and light it up for me!"

Lu Chen did not hesitate in the slightest. The account balance was instantly deducted from 250 points, becoming 200 points.

[Ding! 50 Truth Points deducted. Armament and Weaponry Lv1 (Node 2): Wrap-around Steam High-Pressure Spray Gun, unlocked successfully!]

[Warning: Detected that this weapon requires direct extraction of boiler thermal energy and water tank reserves. Frequent use will lead to short-term temperature fluctuations inside the vehicle and water resource depletion. Please exercise caution in controlling the spray duration, Host.]

[Weapon reconstruction, starting.]

The instant the system prompt finished, a dense sound of metal friction and pipeline reorganization echoed throughout the interior of the Polaris.

Lin Wan, who was meticulously wiping an aluminum bowl with waste paper nearby, was so startled by the sudden commotion that she sat down hard on the floor.

She looked in terror at the Primary Efficiency Boiler in the center of the carriage.

She saw that on the side wall of the boiler, the originally smooth metal surface suddenly churned violently, bulging with irregular bumps.

Then, with a few crisp clicks, four thick brass pressurization interfaces generated out of thin air!

These interfaces rapidly extended four alloy pipelines, each the thickness of a forearm, with their surfaces wrapped in thick, heat-insulating asbestos.

The pipelines were like long snakes coming to life, spreading along the floor and inner walls of the carriage, crudely yet seamlessly.

They forcefully pierced through the Double-layer Asbestos Insulation Interlayer and plunged directly into the interior of the bulletproof iron plating at the four corners of the Polaris.

Outside the vehicle, if anyone were standing out in the minus 100-degree Extreme Cold Ice Storm at this moment, they would see a cyberpunk scene.

On the originally pitted four corners of the Polaris's armor, four fist-sized square openings suddenly folded outward.

Subsequently, four menacing-looking pure copper spray heads, covered in honeycomb-like nozzles, slowly poked out from the openings.

Each nozzle was polished symmetrically and evenly, radiating a chilling murderous intent.

The moment the four spray heads emerged, they automatically completed a 360-degree self-check rotation, bringing the entire body of the Polaris into a no-blind-spot firepower coverage network!

Click!

Inside the carriage, the pipeline reconstruction ended.

On the right panel of the driver's console, a brass toggle switch with a red safety cover had suddenly protruded from the previously empty space.

Below the switch, a precision circular gauge displaying the boiler's steam pressure had also appeared.

The entire upgrade process took less than ten seconds.

Gulp.

Lin Wan swallowed hard, looking at the suddenly appeared complex pipelines and the red switch, and asked stammeringly.

"City... City Lord, what... what is this now?"

She was now completely numb to Lu Chen's methods. In this man's hands, a piece of scrap metal that was originally just waiting for death was evolving at a speed that defied physical common sense, madly transforming into some kind of terrifying war weapon.

"At best, it's a shower head for giving people hot baths."

Lu Chen replied casually.

He reached out with his slender fingers and gently stroked the brass switch with the red safety cover. The metallic sensation coming from his fingertips calmed his constantly tense heart.

But just looking at the panel description was far from enough.

The obsessive-compulsive disorder of an infrastructure fanatic required him to conduct rigorous combat tests on every newly unlocked piece of technology. Only by witnessing the destructive power with his own eyes could he incorporate it into his tactical system.

Lu Chen glanced at the monitoring panel next to the driver's console. Outside, apart from the strong wind and ice and snow, there were no biological signals.

He would just use the ice outside to test the blade.

Lu Chen's gaze tightened. Without hesitation, his thumb flipped open the red safety cover, and his wrist suddenly exerted force, pushing that brass switch fiercely to the top!

Click!

The moment the switch was pushed to the top, the entire Polaris shook violently.

The Primary Efficiency Boiler in the center of the carriage emitted a terrifying roar like a dragon's bellow!

The pressurization chamber inside the boiler raised the temperature and pressure to a shocking critical value. A large amount of pure water was frantically pumped into the pressurization chamber by the high-pressure pump, churning and vaporizing under the 200-degree high temperature!

Hiss!

Four sharp hissing sounds, piercing enough to make one's eardrums ache, rang out simultaneously from the four corners outside the vehicle!

That sound was like the exhaust valves of thousands of pressure cookers being pulled off at the same time!

Through the bulletproof glass, which was already covered in thick frost, Lin Wan watched in sheer terror as four columns of white-hot steam mixed with boiling hot water swept frantically across the three-meter range outside the vehicle!

The Extreme Cold Ice Storm outside was minus 100 degrees, while what was sprayed out was 200-degree superheated steam.

The terrifying temperature difference of 300 degrees triggered a violent thermodynamic explosion the moment they made contact!

Bang!

Within three meters of the Polaris, that thick, rock-hard ice had the melting process skipped entirely.

The moment they touched the superheated steam, they made a cracking sound and were then shredded by the terrifying air pressure into white powder flying all over the sky!

Everywhere within sight was shrouded in thick, impenetrable white superheated mist.

If any raiders were standing outside the vehicle at this moment, they would not only have their skin and eyeballs scalded and cooked directly, but they would also completely lose their sense of direction in this vast, white, high-temperature mist, becoming lambs waiting to be slaughtered.

A defensive circle that combined lethality and blinding!

After spraying for only five seconds, Lu Chen quickly pulled the switch back down.

Not only because the test had achieved the expected results, but also because he keenly noticed that the thermometer needle on the wall had unusually jumped down by 0.5 degrees in these short five seconds.

At the same time, the stored water in the water tank had also visibly dropped by a shallow notch.

"Good stuff. The power is impeccable, it's just that the energy consumption isn't low."

Lu Chen evaluated it objectively.

This kind of weapon could not be used as a conventional attack method, but as a trump card to flip the table in a desperate situation, it could make any approaching enemy wish they were dead.

The melee blind spot had been covered.

Lu Chen's fingers left the switch, and his gaze turned back to the holographic screen.

In his dictionary, there was no such term as "know when to quit," only "firepower overflow."

Having solved those hyenas attempting to crawl under the vehicle, the next step was to consider how to deal with those thick-skinned behemoths.

Long-range. Heavy armor. One-hit kill.

Lu Chen's gaze locked onto the third node of the Armament and Weaponry Lv1 branch.

That was the very top of the current firepower branch, and also the potent medicine for him to end his megalophobia.