133: Chapter 134 You'll regret not buying the first edition.

Hark placed the rectangular metal ingot and the temperature-controlled box filled with gene seeds onto the scanning table in the temporary command room.

The ultra-high radiation at the bottom of the pit caused the alarm on Hark's heavy radiation-shielding armor to wail incessantly. He didn't remove the armor, stepping back from the scanning zone with his heavy lead-lined gloves still on.

Inside the Holographic Operations Cabin.

Li Cang took control of the scanning table through the system's physical mapping interface.

He directly selected the twenty-eight gene seeds and dragged them into the Primarch Gene Laboratory's cultivation queue.

The laboratory's automated docking system began to operate. Green life-support fluid refilled the empty cultivation tanks. These seeds, recovered at the cost of fourteen lives, would become the second batch of Astartes in one hundred and sixty-eight hours.

Li Cang shifted his gaze toward the metal ingot.

He pulled up a data isolation line on the system panel.

This was something from the simulated world; it couldn't be brought into reality.

However, the system's built-in [civilization forge] could perform a concept-level reverse disassembly on it.

Li Cang didn't throw it into the crucible immediately.

He looked at the embossed emblem on the screen—a three-layered gear interlocking with a skull.

The red crystals in the skull's eye sockets exuded an incredibly pure malice under the scanning table's cold light.

He called up the communication channel management interface.

The dedicated communication band for the Adeptus Mechanicus was lit green.

Li Cang pressed the disconnect button.

Physical disconnection, data blocking—he shielded all low-level signal probing from the Adeptus Mechanicus.

He couldn't let those Tech-Priests, who were helping build the shipyard on the base's perimeter, know he had dug this up.

Because the micro-engraved binary scriptures on this metal ingot belonged to a completely different system than the crudely painted coatings on those priests.

It was like one was a pirated instruction manual printed on an assembly line, while the other was a master key with the highest manufacturer privileges.

Li Cang dragged this "manufacturer key" into the [civilization forge].

A crimson warning box popped up on the system interface.

[High-level data lock detected. Forced dissolution will result in an 85% data collapse rate.]

Li Cang tapped the confirmation button.

A fifteen percent survival rate was better than sticking his neck out for his allies to inspect.

The crucible's virtual flames enveloped the metal ingot.

The progress bar representing the data cracking began to crawl forward with difficulty.

For every one percent it moved, the temperature in the Holographic Operations Cabin rose slightly. This wasn't a physical temperature change, but a secondary feedback from the massive data stream hitting the system processor.

Li Cang stared at the progress bar and took a sip of the protein drink next to him, which had already cooled.

The progress bar stuck at ninety percent.

Then it suddenly burst open.

[Dissolution complete. Obtained fragmented data snippet ×1.]

Li Cang dragged the solitary data snippet to the center of the main screen.

There were no schematics, no technological blueprints.

It was an extremely brief text log.

The log was not in any common tongue he recognized; the system automatically translated it into text humans could understand.

"Phase one test data recovered. Macro-cannon power lines showed 3% energy loss under absolute zero. Suggest adding living bone as a superconducting insulation layer in the next iteration."

As Li Cang read this sentence, the muscles in his back slowly tensed.

This wasn't an internal communication of the Sun Warriors.

The Sun Warriors were the laborers who built the Macro-cannons; they couldn't write such a condescending report that treated a strategic-grade weapon as a "test subject."

This was an acceptance slip from the boss behind the scenes.

Li Cang looked further down.

"The simplified design provided to this alien vassal has exposed material science bottlenecks. However, no intervention is necessary. Their destruction will gather sufficient parameters regarding the destructive power of that 'Gene Berserker' unit."

Gene Berserkers.

It was referring to his Thunder Warriors.

Li Cang placed the half-finished can of drink on the table.

The Sun Warriors hadn't conjured the Plasma Macro-cannon out of thin air.

Someone had given them a low-end blueprint and had them build a target under the Antarctic Ice Sheet.

The purpose of building the target was to test the limit of the Thunder Warriors' destructive power.

Li Cang had used the lives of fourteen Astartes to flatten that ice sheet.

He thought he had won.

In reality, he had only helped the person who issued this acceptance slip complete a stress test.

At the end of the log, there was a signature.

It wasn't a human name, but a string of hexadecimal identification codes.

When the system translated this identification code, a red related link automatically popped up beside it.

Li Cang was all too familiar with this red link.

It was the taboo he hadn't dared touch during the hundred days since the start.

[The Beyond and Dangerous Data: Noctis Labyrinth Related Dossier].

This string of hexadecimal identification codes was identical to a low-level signature within that sealed red-labeled data.

Li Cang leaned back in his chair, tilting his head to look at the metal ceiling of the operations cabin.

He finally understood how this trap had been set.

Deep within Mars, in the restricted zone known as the Noctis Labyrinth, there was a high-level branch of the Adeptus Mechanicus that possessed core manufacturer technology.

They had somehow bypassed civilization faction restrictions and fed the Macro-cannon technology to the Sun Warriors.

Then they sat aside, watching the Sun Warriors and Thunder Warriors tear at each other on this icy plain.

Li Cang cast his gaze toward the panoramic map of the base's perimeter.

Several Tech-Priests were busy at the [Orbital Shipyard] construction site.

They were Li Cang's allies, the people who helped him repair equipment and sold him medical pods.

Their emblem was a single-layered gear—crude and low-level.

They might truly know nothing.

They were merely peripheral consumables for their high-level kin hiding in the labyrinth.

But that didn't mean they were safe.

Li Cang looked at the nearly finished Orbital Shipyard and the energy lines being connected one by one by the Tech-Priests.

If those people in the labyrinth could use even the Sun Warriors as pawns...

Then how many backdoors were buried inside this shipyard built by low-level priests?

Li Cang's fingers tapped slowly on the console.

The rhythm was steady, without any panic.

He was calculating the accounts.

The high-level priests were in the shadows, while he was in the light.

The other side had manufacturer technology, while he only had the low-end version.

The other side was using him for test data, and his forces were currently depleted, leaving only the twenty-eight recruits soaking in the tanks.

This wasn't a situation that could be overcome by brute force alone.

He needed a new blade. A blade that wasn't in the opponent's test database.

He locked his gaze on a corner of the system's tech tree that he had always ignored.

There sat a blueprint fragment he had obtained during a PVP settlement but had set aside due to a lack of Adamantium.

[Basic Tactical AI Core (Unencrypted)].

A legacy of the Cyber Federation.

Li Cang clicked on this blueprint and glanced at the analysis permissions attached to it.

Since you, the Adeptus Mechanicus, like to play at data collection behind the scenes...

Then I'll mix a bit of cyber-era electronic virus into your sacred system of gears.