132: Chapter 132 New Skill Trial
The further he went inside, the more he felt that the security configuration of this warehouse was not simple.
Surveillance cameras were densely arranged on the outer walls, rails for automatic turrets were embedded in several hidden corners, and the scanning frequency of vibration sensors could be vaguely sensed beneath the ground.
But for Zhen Lu, the more high-tech, the more convenient it was.
His Mental Power and Electromagnetic Force spread out simultaneously, and the structural map of the entire warehouse clearly emerged in his consciousness; he could see clearly which door led to ordinary supplies and which area was the core storage room.
He bypassed several guard posts where personnel gathered and made his way directly toward the core storage room.
The door to the core storage room was a heavy alloy blast door with multiple layers of encryption, requiring dual iris and voiceprint verification.
Zhen Lu hovered his palm over the access panel, his Electromagnetic Force probing into the encryption chip to crack it layer by layer.
A moment later, the blast door emitted a low rumble and slowly slid open.
The moment the door opened, the alarm went off again.
Unlike the ear-piercing buzzing in the White Building, this alarm was deeper and lower in frequency, as if it were coming from deep beneath the floor.
Zhen Lu stood at the entrance of the storage room, spreading out his perception, and discovered that the trigger mechanism for this alarm was not purely an electronic signal.
They had set up hybrid trigger devices around the core storage room; electronic encryption was just the first layer, and physical vibration sensing was the second.
He had bypassed the electronic layer, but the physical movement of the blast door itself had triggered the vibration sensor.
With the alarm still blaring overhead, Zhen Lu strode into the storage room.
The shelves were piled high with items: crates of gray steel ingots, well-packaged experimental equipment, and boxes of labeled reagent raw materials—all local resources he had glanced over during his scan.
He bypassed the first few rows of shelves, scanned the storage room a third time with his Mental Power, searching every nook and cranny, and finally found two scrolls in a drawer of a sealed storage cabinet in the innermost row.
He took out the scrolls and checked the labels: Skill Scroll, not Ability Scroll.
Skill Scrolls preserved by NPC factions were already rare, and this was even more true for a faction like Tariman, which had built its foundation on biotechnology.
These scrolls could also be opened by NPCs; once opened, the contents were like a martial arts manual in the Wuxia World, allowing one to slowly practice the methods recorded within.
But in this Wasteland World of pure abilities, the content written in the scrolls was incomprehensible to NPCs, and they could not learn it instantly by simply tapping it on themselves like players could.
Therefore, once these factions obtained them, they merely collected them as rare items rather than actually studying them.
These two scrolls were likely found here because Tariman's people had killed players and looted them from the corpses; not knowing their specific purpose but sensing they were important items, they had locked them away in the storage room.
Zhen Lu tapped the two Skill Scrolls against his body, scanned the other shelves again to ensure nothing was missed, then turned and exited the storage room, returning along the maintenance passage the way he came.
He didn't touch the other supplies in the warehouse; Lao Tie's people would come to take over, and he only took what he needed.
As he emerged from the storage room, the edge of his Mental Power perceived someone at the end of the corridor.
It was a C-level Ice Ability User with a cold and sharp aura; the temperature of the surrounding air was noticeably half a degree lower in his perception than elsewhere.
The two locked eyes across the corridor and struck simultaneously.
Zhen Lu activated his telekinesis, and an invisible force bore down on his opponent like a wall.
The opponent raised his hands, and several ice arrows condensed in front of him, trailing a thin layer of white mist as they shot straight at him.
Simultaneously, several ice cones as thick as arms formed on the walls on both sides and above his head, plunging down from multiple angles to seal off all escape routes.
Zhen Lu spread his telekinesis around him, an invisible telekinetic shield catching all the ice arrows and ice cones.
The moment the ice cones struck the telekinetic shield, they shattered into ice shards, while the ice arrows crumbled section by section from tip to tail.
His telekinesis didn't pause for a second, piercing straight through the mist of shattered ice crystals and slamming solidly into the Ability User's chest.
The opponent couldn't see the telekinesis and relied on instinct to release an ice crystal defense, but those layers of ice were no match for this invisible force; he was sent flying by the direct impact of the telekinesis, his back smashing through the wall behind him.
Amidst the sound of shattering bricks and stone, his body continued to roll backward from the momentum.
Before his eyes could regain focus from the impact, Zhen Lu had already crossed the corridor and flashed before him.
He was as fast as if he were teleporting.
He delivered a blow with his right fist wrapped in invisible telekinesis; the physical impact of the fist and the secondary burst of telekinesis simultaneously penetrated the side of the opponent's neck, knocking him unconscious with a single strike.
He dragged the unconscious Ice Ability User out of the pile of rubble, squatted down to check his breathing—he was still alive, just knocked out.
With both skills in hand, it was the perfect opportunity to test them on a C-level Ability User, and they worked quite well.
The two scrolls he had obtained in the storage room were Psychokinetic Attachment and Psychokinesis at Will.
Psychokinetic Attachment: Allows the user to imbue physical strikes with telekinesis, dealing double damage from both the physical blow and the telekinetic force.
Psychokinesis at Will: Uses telekinesis to pre-mark a location; the body will move rapidly toward the marked point, guided by the pull of the telekinesis, with the speed increasing alongside the strength of the telekinesis.
He had used Psychokinesis at Will when he flashed before the Ice Ability User just moments ago, and the punch that knocked him out had utilized Psychokinetic Attachment.
He hoisted the unconscious Ice Ability User onto his shoulder and strode out of the warehouse.
He wasn't idle along the way; anyone who rushed at him was knocked unconscious by his telekinesis.
The off-road vehicle was still parked on the loading platform.
Seeing him approach with someone on his shoulder in the rearview mirror, Shen Yue pushed the door open and stood up.
Zhen Lu tossed the captive into the trunk and said to Shen Yue, "This is for Lao Tie."
He then started the engine, turned the steering wheel, and drove toward their stronghold in the town outside the city.
Not long after the car drove out of the warehouse area, Zhen Lu suddenly slammed on the brakes.
In the middle of the road ahead, two figures were standing in the night wind, waiting as if they had known all along that he would come out this way.
He had been keeping an eye on the pursuers behind him and hadn't paid attention to what was ahead.
There were no electronic signals coming from these two; only pure Ability User fluctuations.
He scanned them with his Mental Power—two C-levels with high energy density.
He tilted his head to scan the unconscious Ice Ability User in the back seat again, carefully checking him with his Mental Power, but found nothing unusual.
His thoughts shifted, and he switched to an Electromagnetic Force scan; a tiny tracker was embedded in the captive's clothes, emitting a weak but continuous signal.
When he had used his Mental Power earlier, the device had been indistinguishable amidst the electronic components and was only detectable using Electromagnetic Force.
It seemed that Tariman had installed such trackers on all their core personnel, and these two had followed the signal all the way here.
Zhen Lu pushed the car door open, said to Shen Yue and Shen Xi, "Stay in the car," and walked toward the two figures.
The two figures saw him, too.
There were no wasted words, no threats, and no demands to surrender; the hostility on both sides peaked the moment their eyes met.
The Fire Ability User suddenly thrust his hands forward, and three fireballs the size of basins formed a line, trailing scorching flames as they barreled toward Zhen Lu, sealing off any space for him to dodge left or right.
Almost at the same instant, the Wind Ability User crossed his arms and swept them through the air; the air beneath Zhen Lu's feet was instantly sucked away, and a semi-transparent net of vacuum blades silently rose from below to shred him.
High and low, bright and dark—their coordination was impeccable.