With the background noise of recording equipment, a soft and lively female voice was gently humming. The voice of T.E.R combined with the piano accompaniment was enough to make anyone feel relaxed. Wang Jixuan noticed that the headache he had earlier had eased quite a bit.
‘What magical music.’
She was hosting an underground broadcast—Fortress 76 promoted respect for labor and banned entertainment stars, so they could only use underground broadcasts and virtual singers.
After the humming ended, Wang Jixuan came back to his senses and realized he had been sitting by the bed for a few minutes. The virtual singer known as T.E.R took a gentle breath, as if calming herself, and said softly:
“Our Fortress 76 has withstood the test of the Blade Beasts and has become the first fortress to survive two waves of beast attacks and still remain stable. The Blade Beasts must be too scared to invade us now.
“I hope my music can help everyone relax. Let’s all work hard today and live our lives well!
“And also…
“I met a great hero wearing a black helmet and black protective gear. He saved me during the Blade Beast attack, and I don’t know how to express my gratitude to him.
“But everyone, I can say for sure that heroes really do exist! He was like a beam of light shining on my face, driving away all those terrifying Blade Beasts.
“The next song, ‘Black Hope,’ is something I created yesterday. It only has a simple melody, and I’ll play it lightly.”
The virtual singer picked up her wooden guitar, and cheerful notes floated out, accompanied by the sound of her fingers tapping on the strings.
Just as Wang Jixuan was getting into it, the recording suddenly stopped.
“Uh, the device ran out of battery while recording,” Wu Man quickly explained, sounding a bit weak. “I haven’t mastered the skill of generating power yet.”
Wang Jixuan leaned back, a sudden flash of inspiration hitting him.
The skill of generating power?
He raised his hand to touch his chin, deep in thought.
“When are we moving?”
“Very soon,” Wu Man replied immediately. “Sir, your furnaces have already been moved to the seventh floor. They’re building a new structure there to serve as a forging area.
“As for living arrangements, they can only temporarily set up some single rooms. The seventh floor is tight on space since it’s a nursery center, so it might be a bit inconvenient to live there, but the environment is the best in the fortress.”
Wang Jixuan clicked his tongue. “Alright, no problem. I just thought of something fun to try later.”
Wu Man pointed to a box by the bed. “This is a new communicator sent by Captain Zhou. It can exchange text messages across fortresses and can directly contact Commander Ling Tong.”
Wang Jixuan stood up and stretched a bit. “You need to get used to walking quickly too.”
“Okay, sir,” Wu Man smiled gently. “I’ve been taking in a lot of protein lately.”
Wang Jixuan wandered around the supply station, greeted Uncle Tai and Wan Xiaoqi, then sat down on the sofa to fiddle with the communicator.
The screen in the center of the communicator displayed some simple setup boxes, and he needed to set a name for himself first.
Wang Jixuan shamelessly wrote down the nickname ‘Light of Justice.’
‘Tsk, even if I’m practicing dark arts, I’m still a genius. Who can argue with that?’
…
[Wang Zheng (Light of Justice): Just woke up. How are you two?]
[Little Zhou (Turning Over a New Leaf): Wow! Awesome!]
[Ling Tong (Returning for Maintenance): You woke up just in time.]
[Wang Zheng: Yeah, I was suddenly bumped into while I was unconscious. I wanted to see where that person went, but Xiao Wu told me the swan had already flown away.]
[Ling Tong: I accidentally bumped your face with the box before I left.]
[Wang Zheng: Next time, I hope you can be a bit gentler or let me know in advance so I can prepare myself.]
[Ling Tong: There won’t be a next time; I’ll be careful.]
[Little Zhou: So, am I now part of your little play?]
[Ling Tong: (_?)]
Wang Jixuan smiled calmly and changed the subject.
[Wang Zheng: How’s everything over there?]
[Little Zhou: The pressure is huge; I can say it’s enormous. Many people are trying to defend the Thirteenth Institute. The psychics have indeed played a huge role on the front lines, but for confidentiality, we can’t introduce the birth of psychic weapons to them. All news must be suppressed as much as possible. The military in the D5 battle zone is doing everything they can to control information about you. Over a hundred people have undergone memory micro-surgery. However, because we’ve detained Wei Linzheng and Feng Bangjie, the Psychic City has already strongly protested.]
[Wang Zheng: I’ll sort out the production line for the Demon Breaking Dagger as soon as possible.]
[Little Zhou: How soon is ‘as soon as possible’? You don’t need to stress too much; I can handle it.]
[Wang Zheng: I can’t guarantee that. I need to become a senior mechanic first.]
[Ling Tong: I can help you with the exam questions and answers.]
[Wang Zheng: (ー△ー；) I meant I need to master the knowledge. I need to combine alien technology with the technology of this planet.]
[Little Zhou: Is it really alien technology?]
[Ling Tong: Why am I starting to believe your nonsense? Is it because this is the only explanation for the abnormalities in you?]
[Wang Zheng: At least I won’t betray humanity and I have a clear self-awareness of being human.]
[Wang Zheng: Commander, when will you be back?]
[Ling Tong: About a month. I’ll finish the maintenance as soon as possible. Fortress 76 has now become a blind spot on the global map of the Thirteenth Institute, which has an extraordinary negative significance for them. This means the Joint Defense Army has started to drive out psychics. If they can’t solve the problem of Fortress 76, many other fortresses and battle zones with suffering psychics will follow suit. So, Fortress 76 will become the center of the storm, and I will definitely come back to protect you.]
[Ling Tong: Typo, I meant to say guard.]
[Little Zhou: The main issue is that the psychics themselves are too much. They should be the strength to protect the fortress, yet they want to interfere in the internal affairs of the fortress and promote their greatness everywhere. What is this? Clearly, they still want to rule over humanity! These evil guys! They monopolize psychic technology but have no good intentions!]
Wang Jixuan thought carefully for a few minutes.
Meanwhile, Wan Xiaoqi put on his exoskeleton armor and started moving things. As a big man, he naturally had to help out.
[Wang Zheng: Keep it up, Little Zhou! Ling Tong and I will handle the fighting; you make our fight more meaningful.]
[Little Zhou: Wow, that sense of mission just hit me!]
[Ling Tong: Take care of your injuries on the seventh floor; the scenery there is indeed very nice.]
[Wang Zheng: Let’s leave it at that. If there are any issues, just let me know. Keep up the confidentiality work. I’ll go help with the moving.]
He put the communicator back in his pocket and helped move luggage and equipment while continuing to think about the question he had just come up with.
How to mass-produce the Demon Breaking Dagger?
Making it look similar was easy; engraving the prohibitions could also be solved. High-precision digital machines could easily handle that and could even make the dagger layered inside and out.
The hardest step was forging the final breath that activates the Demon Breaking Dagger.
This step couldn’t be replaced by machines and required the forger’s mana.
Just now, Wu Man’s words reminded him.
The skill of generating power.
Actually, he could think about this from a different angle, rather than just from the perspective of a pure cultivator. He couldn’t be stuck on so-called ‘orthodox’ forging methods; after all, what was needed now was mass production.
For example, the ancient forging secret technique recorded the method of using lightning to forge weapons;
And there was also the method of sacrificing living beings to forge weapons recorded in demonic cultivator texts.
Does the sacrificial method sound evil?
This brings up the fact that there are a lot of Blade Beast souls in the crystal cores… wouldn’t it be fine to use them for sacrifice? It doesn’t have to be human souls.
Using Blade Beast exoskeletons as ‘auxiliary materials’ and sacrificing Blade Beast souls to forge weapons to fight against the Blade Beasts!
Brilliant.
…
The seventh floor of the fortress is the only way from the middle city to the upper city.
Wang Jixuan always just hurried past, glancing at the scenery of the wheat fields before leaving.
The seventh floor is the fortress’s nursery center and also the main production area for natural starch. All natural starch produced here is prioritized for the young of humanity, doing everything possible to ensure a beautiful childhood for the children of the fortress and to provide a relatively healthy psychological foundation.
Additionally, the rehabilitation centers here are only open to injured warriors.
Wang Jixuan and his group moving here was like breaking the fortress’s rules, creating a small privilege.
But it wasn’t really a privilege.
Wang Jixuan was stationed here as a ‘frontline injured mechanic,’ and the assigned room was a single dormitory.
Zheng Shiduo and Wu Man were arranged in the dormitory building opposite him, sharing a larger two-person room.
Wan Xiaoqi and Uncle Tai lived in a nearby building that was temporarily halted in construction. That place would also serve as Wang Jixuan’s future ‘forging’ area, with thick blue tarpaulin wrapped around the building’s exterior.
‘Strange, why can’t I live with Uncle Tai? Isn’t there enough space over there?’
Wang Jixuan thought to himself as he opened the wooden door in front of him, quickly finding the answer to his question.
The dormitory was a narrow space of about thirteen to fourteen square meters. A single bed was placed against the wall, and there was a single sofa, folding chair, and writing desk, along with a separate bathroom in the corner.
The highlight of this room was that it was equipped with a small balcony.
The sliding door was open, and the wind from the wheat fields blew through the corridor and wooden door, lifting the white curtains onto the balcony.
“Not bad.”
Wang Jixuan raised an eyebrow, set down his suitcase, pushed aside the fluttering curtains, and walked out onto the balcony to look outside:
The sunlight coming from the ground was gathered together, forming a huge sun lamp hanging over forty meters high on the metal ceiling, warming the place.
In the distance, the wheat fields swayed in waves with the wind, showing no signs of the hundreds of Blade Beasts that had attacked before.
Inside the nursery center surrounded by wheat fields, a group of children was doing health exercises under the guidance of the caregivers.
Wang Jixuan’s mood suddenly brightened.
He leaned against the balcony railing, enjoying the view in front of him, then took out the new communicator to snap a pixelated photo and sent it to the only group chat.
A few minutes later, a reply popped up.
Zhou Zhengde sent a photo of a dark single room in a military prison, accompanied by a sad face emoji.
Wang Jixuan almost laughed out loud.
Wait, this guy can still use the communicator in prison?
He truly is a favored son of the officials!
—Little Zhou going to prison was also to continue detaining those two B-class psychics, which involved a clash between the D5 Joint Defense Army and the Psychic City.
Wang Jixuan felt clear-headed about this.
As long as the ‘Demon Breaking Dagger’ could be popularized, the Defense Army would have the confidence to confront the Thirteenth Institute.
This also posed a huge risk for him… if the Demon Breaking Dagger and Ling Tong’s great sword fell into the hands of the Thirteenth Institute, they would likely go crazy, definitely sending a bunch of experts to search for him.
This was a direct provocation against the Thirteenth Institute’s ‘exclusive development rights’ for psychic abilities.
Risks and opportunities often coexist.
What really made Wang Jixuan feel pressure wasn’t the Thirteenth Institute, but rather…
Those powerful Blade Beasts’ light pillars.
Twelve golden light pillars could almost illuminate the deep starry sky;
And those light pillars of various colors and sizes densely covered the ground;
The young king bug they had just painstakingly taken down could only be considered below average among these light pillars…
This was the real enemy.
Ding—
Suddenly, a buzzing sound appeared in Wang Jixuan’s ears.
He groaned in pain, feeling as if his forehead was about to explode again, his soul trembling, and his energy rapidly spinning.
Wow, the backlash from the demonic powers is so strong?
A wave of dizziness hit him, and Wang Jixuan leaned against the balcony railing, quickly pressing on the acupoints on his body.
At that moment, a young girl in a pleated skirt passed by outside the door. After she walked past, she blinked and stealthily approached the open door, hands behind her back, slowly peeking in, her short hair swaying slightly as she stared at the figure standing on the balcony.
Is she a new neighbor?
Should I say hello?
‘This is a great opportunity for exercise. The new neighbor seems to be a young male…’
‘Hmm! Gao Huating, you must try to communicate with the opposite sex! In a few months, gene matching will begin. If you marry through gene matching instead of free love, you’ll be looked down upon for life!’
‘Go for it!’
The girl pursed her lips, stood up straight, took a deep breath.
She bravely stepped forward, crossing her hands over her stomach, her flower-like face showing a gentle professional smile as a caregiver, greeting him in a voice as thin as a mosquito’s:
“Hello, I’m your neighbor on the right. Can we get to know each other? My name is Gao…”
On the balcony, Wang Jixuan suddenly spat out a mouthful of clotted blood, pointing his sword at his throat.
Phew! Much better!
Huh? Someone at the door? A neighbor on the right?
Wang Jixuan turned around cautiously and saw a slim but curvy young girl with refreshing short hair and a cute face, her cherry-like lips seeming to have a jelly-like quality.
He felt like he had seen this girl somewhere before.
Then it hit him; she was from the nursery center, one of the two female teachers who took care of the children.
But… she looked a bit dazed, staring blankly at the blood on the ground.
“Cough,” Wang Jixuan said, “I’m injured. Sorry, did I scare you?”
“I faint at the sight of blood… don’t mind me…”
The girl forced a smile, rolled her eyes, and slowly collapsed outside the door frame.
“Hey!”
(End of Chapter)