IRCDM Chapter 26

Chapter 26: Morning Light, Are You Alright?

The mecha stood silently within the protective shield. Liang Huan said, “It’s beautiful.”

Li Yao smiled, “It used to be even more beautiful. I found it in a scrap factory after I came back, but unfortunately, I could only repair it to this extent.”

“Can it still be operated?” Liang Huan asked.

“It can.” Li Yao kicked the repair box beside him, “I’ve updated all the replaceable parts inside, but the Kunwu only has an S-grade interface, so it might not be so easy to control.”

Liang Huan turned to look at him.

“What are you looking at me for? I haven’t operated it since I repaired it, and I have to spend money to maintain it.” Li Yao squatted down to check the wires on the ground, “In the mecha’s activated state, a C-grade mental power will be forcibly ejected. Later, after you enter the operating room, establish a mental link with me. After I log in, you will perform the main operations, and then we’ll try if I can take over the operations.”

Liang Huan was strangely silent for a moment, “Li Yao, perhaps we can change to another mecha.”

Li Yao removed the protective shield, clapped his hands, and stood up. A rare look of excitement appeared on his face, “Change what? This is the only mecha I have left. I wouldn’t let anyone else operate it.”

Liang Huan had previously watched basic mecha operation tutorials on the chip. Although they were a bit complicated, he had memorized most of them… It wouldn’t hurt to try.

Li Yao handed him the combat suit. Seeing him slowly unbuttoning it, he couldn’t help but take it back and put it on him neatly, reminding him, “Our mental link is only at seven percent right now, and I may not be able to log in. It doesn’t matter. If I can’t log in, just help me test the Kunwu’s basic performance first, see if there are any areas that need improvement, and also lower the α interface frequency by 0.5 percent, enlarge the tolerance point of the Cain chassis to 19, I’ll tell you the other things you need to change after you get inside.”

He patted Liang Huan’s chest, “Go ahead, darling.”

Liang Huan said seriously, “What if I adjust it wrong?”

“No big deal.” Li Yao pushed him towards the mecha’s entrance, “Even if you ruin it into a pile of parts, I can still piece it together, hurry up.”

Liang Huan only felt a moment of weightlessness, and after a few seconds, he entered the Kunwu’s operating room. His field of vision suddenly widened. He recalled the tutorial operation and found the combat pod in a pile of messy wires and equipment and walked in.

The strange feeling of dizziness made him feel a little overwhelmed, and his mental power began to fluctuate violently, but it was different from the unbearable pain of being attacked by a heteromorph, and more like a kind of frequency resonance. Hundreds of interfaces were attached to the combat suit. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, his vision suddenly magnified, and his body became heavy and stiff. He tried to move his fingers, and the Kunwu’s fingers moved accordingly, but there was a one- or two-second delay. He also turned his neck and lowered his head, and saw Li Yao standing alone in the messy ground, looking at him solemnly.

“Li Yao?” He called out to the other party.

Li Yao looked up and met the gaze of the Kunwu’s illuminated eyes, “Adapt first, then perform the mental link. If you feel uncomfortable, stop immediately. It would be a greater loss if your functional disease is triggered.”

The massive mecha suddenly bent down and stretched out a hand towards him.

“It’s fine.” Liang Huan’s voice slowly sounded from the headset.

Li Yao raised his hand, and his fingertip touched the huge mechanical finger. The cold and familiar touch made him feel a little dazed. The effects of excessive medication in his body were constantly accumulating, and his temple accompanied by a stabbing pain. The countless failures before made him hesitate for a moment. He was even a little glad that he had gotten used to failure, so he wouldn’t collapse and be helpless like he was at the beginning, losing his composure in front of Liang Huan…

“Li Yao, let’s try.” Liang Huan’s voice carried a kind of reassuring power.

He was lifted up by the cold, huge mechanical palm. The red numbers representing the mental link rate between the two people were rapidly climbing. In just a few minutes, the value on it rose from 0.03 all the way to 7.39 percent, and after a moment of pause, it directly soared to 15.6 percent – this was the minimum standard value for a two-person operated mecha.

Li Yao lay in the combat pod, feeling the familiar and unfamiliar mental fluctuations, his expression a little dazed.

He successfully entered.

He actually succeeded.

He turned his head, and through the transparent pod, met the gaze of the person next to him.

Liang Huan smiled, imitating the appearance of the instructor in the teaching video, and gave him a thumbs up.

Li Yao twitched the corner of his mouth, closed his eyes and carefully felt the Kunwu’s mental frequency, gradually taking over the Kunwu’s control from Liang Huan. The familiar sense of stagnation was transmitted to his body, and he only felt the blood in his whole body was boiling, every nerve was burning. The excitement of his long-cherished wish coming true made his whole body tremble. He habitually shook his right hand, cut off the Kunwu’s external wire, and together with Liang Huan, took a step forward with the Kunwu.

Although his cooperation with Liang Huan was not very tacit, and the Kunwu’s movements were stiff and slow, he had waited for many years for this step.

“Liang Huan, can you see it?” he asked in a low voice.

“I can see it.” Liang Huan looked at the wide-open doorway in front, “Can we go out?”

“Of course.” Li Yao raised his hand and directly pulled open the α interface next to him. The combat pods of the two people, separated by two layers of transparent covers, were connected to a passage. The connecting wires on the arms of the two people’s combat suits were bound together. As long as they raised their hands, they could touch each other.

Liang Huan clearly felt Li Yao’s heartbeat, and the other party’s riddled mental power, even if it was dry and scarce, it was particularly tenacious and powerful, like a tree that had been uprooted after being ravaged by a rainstorm, even if it was dying, it had to live towards death, struggling and unwilling to give in.

The Kunwu, which had been silent for many years, was finally reactivated. It slowly moved its steps, accurately crossed the obstacles on the ground, and walked more and more steadily, and faster with each step. They walked forward together, the tightly closed door slowly opened, the darkness gradually faded away, and the golden light of the bright morning sun penetrated the dense branches and leaves of the primeval forest and fell on the dusty ground. Li Yao stretched out his arm and caught the first ray of morning light with his mottled palm –

“Warning, abnormal mental power fluctuations detected. The dual-person combat pod will be forcibly logged out in ten seconds. Ten, nine, eight…”

“What’s going on?” Liang Huan looked at their mental link rate, which still remained at a value of 15.6, and even had a tendency to continue climbing. In theory, it should not be forcibly logged out at all.

“It’s too late, retreat first!” Li Yao reacted faster, tearing off Liang Huan’s combat suit before the countdown ended, severing the link between the two.

Liang Huan followed closely behind. In the piercing alarm sound, the two retreated from the emergency pod one after the other. The moment they landed, the Kunwu made a noisy electrical sound. Liang Huan was about to turn his head to look, when suddenly his head went blank, and a tyrannical and terrifying mental wave swept in like a tide. He was immediately left with only a dazzling white light in front of him.

“It’s that transparent…heteromorph…It…has been…following us…Damn it—” Li Yao’s voice vaguely sounded in his ears, and then he felt Li Yao rushing towards the Kunwu.

“Li Yao!” He turned around to grab, but grabbed empty air. The mental attack made his legs weak, and he almost fell to the ground. He had to use his internal force again, and saw Li Yao desperately climbing onto the Kunwu’s mechanical arm, and behind the Kunwu, the transparent heteromorph finally revealed its true face.

“It” was larger than the Kunwu in size, its gray-white body was covered with black mechanical pipes, and the original head had three pairs of eyes on the front and back. The moment it lowered its head, its body cracked densely, revealing countless mouthparts in its body, and he could even see its wriggling “stomach” inside – let’s call it a stomach for now, because it looked more like a mass grave that contained corpses. There were the wreckage of vehicles, human limbs, zombie crystals, and heteromorph bladders, and even some buildings… The translucent stomach mucus rapidly devoured everything, and the mouthparts opened and closed with its breathing. Its limbs were entangled in those black mechanical pipes, but even so, its movements were very agile. It had already twisted off the Kunwu’s mechanical arm. When Liang Huan looked up, it had already circled around from behind, its gaze fixed on Li Yao who was smashing the Kunwu’s operating room.

The transparent heteromorph made a high-frequency cry. It lowered its head and opened its mouthparts towards Li Yao.

However, in the next second, a devastating laser swept across its eyes, and the severe pain made it roar. It suddenly raised its head and saw the culprit.

Liang Huan was holding a laser pulse gun, aiming at its head, and mercilessly fired another shot. Then, in the next second, he was smashed against the wall by the other party’s tyrannical mental wave, shattering the wall. The black mechanical pipe smashed down on his head. He rolled to the side neatly, turned his head to look at the gun in the distance, and then looked at Li Yao who had climbed into the operating room, cursed inwardly, stepped on the mechanical pipe that the heteromorph threw again, threw out a grenade in the smoke of the explosion, shuttled through the heteromorph’s messy body and gaping mouthparts, and re-grabbed the gun: “Li Yao!!”

However, Li Yao did not respond. He clenched the gun, and taking advantage of the transparent heteromorph’s lack of reaction, he flew up to the Kunwu’s operating room, and ran straight into Li Yao, who was climbing out with the operating box on his back. Liang Huan reached out and pulled the person out. They didn’t even have time to exchange any words, and fell from a height of more than ten meters in the mental wave attack of the heteromorph. In the chaos, Liang Huan switched the gun body to an ice axe and forcefully chiseled it into the Kunwu’s body. In the piercing metal friction sound and the exploding sparks, the two people struggled to stay in mid-air.

Liang Huan tightly grabbed Li Yao’s arm and gritted his teeth, “What are you carrying on your back?”

He felt like he was dragging a thousand pounds.

“Energy box…” Li Yao looked up at him, “Inside is the Kunwu’s energy core and data chip. As long as this thing is still there, it’s fine… My arm is about to break, or should you fly?”

“I—” Liang Huan was so angry that he wanted to curse. His pupils suddenly shrank, “Be careful!”

The heteromorph’s body suddenly expanded, and the split mouthparts bit towards Li Yao. Li Yao exerted force suddenly, bending his body and hooking his legs around Liang Huan’s calves. The wriggling flesh brushed past the box behind him, emitting a terrifying stench.

Li Yao cursed angrily and grabbed Liang Huan’s belt, “Hold on tight!”

Before Liang Huan could react, his arm suddenly sank. Li Yao’s legs were wrapped around his waist like this. Li Yao hooked his neck with one hand, almost face to face with him.

The two people leaned their heads back at the same time.

“Damn.” Li Yao cursed in a low voice. He didn’t expect this posture to be so weird, but he couldn’t care too much. He hung the box on Liang Huan’s waist, let go of his neck, took out a black chip from the box and put it in his pocket, and then looked down to find a weapon.

Liang Huan’s forehead veins were bulging, and the tiger’s mouth holding the ice axe was oozing blood because of excessive force. The overdraft of mental power made him unable to mobilize any internal force, and he could only rely on brute force to hold on. He gritted his teeth and looked at Li Yao, “What are you doing? I can’t hold on any longer.”

“Trying to get you a special-grade brain core.” Li Yao quickly assembled the weapon and patted his waist, “How can a man say he can’t hold on, Your Majesty, work harder, remember to grab me later.”

Before he finished speaking, his whole body suddenly leaned back. He was almost hanging upside down on Liang Huan. Before the heteromorph’s next wave of mental power attacks came, he aimed at the bladder in the heteromorph’s body.

Boom—

The huge explosion made the entire laboratory vibrate at any time, and most of the walls collapsed.

Among the entangled mechanical pipes and damaged mecha, Liang Huan grabbed Li Yao, who had been stunned by the explosion. The two people fell down again. He held the ice axe tightly, and in the end, he couldn’t tell whether it was hitting the mecha or the heteromorph, and then he was pounced forward by the sober Li Yao, and the two rolled to the ground.

“Cough cough cough.” Li Yao spat out a mouthful of blood and grinned at the dusty Liang Huan, “Your Majesty, are you still alive?”

Liang Huan raised his hand to wipe the blood flowing from his ears and said in a hoarse voice, “…I can’t hear what you’re saying.”

“I said—you’re really amazing—” Li Yao tilted his head and shouted in his ear.

Liang Huan tilted his head and only felt pain in all the bones of his body. He looked at the destroyed Kunwu and frowned, “Where’s the transparent heteromorph?”

“Ran away.” Li Yao struggled to get up from the ground, clicked on the chip on his wrist, and stared fiercely at the leaping light spot on it, “But I implanted a special tracker in its body. The heavy nuclear mine injured it badly. We’ll go after it.”

“Do you really want to kill it?” Liang Huan asked.

Li Yao raised his hand and wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, and stretched out a hand towards Liang Huan: “Get you some special-grade brain marrow, are you going?”

Liang Huan grabbed the bloody hand: “Just because of the brain marrow?”

Li Yao met his gaze and said in a deep voice: “It took away a part of the black box. I won’t let it walk out of this forest alive. You can choose to stay, and the people from Shenfeng should be able to find you.”

Liang Huan smiled and smeared the blood on his neck: “Let’s go, I really want to taste what special-grade brain marrow tastes like.”

Li Yao wiped his sticky neck and muttered, “Smearing it randomly, what a bad habit.”

“I can hear you now.” Liang Huan said without looking back.

Li Yao took two quick steps to catch up and patted him on the waist: “Not broken, right?”

“Broken.” Liang Huan said quietly, “Compensate me.”

“Okay, see if there’s anything valuable, I’ll compensate you.” Li Yao opened the off-road vehicle parked next to the laboratory and got into the driver’s seat, “Get in the car.”

Liang Huan sat beside him and said slowly: “I think you’re very good.”

Li Yao was concentrating on scanning the map and said when he heard the words: “Well, it’s good.”

“Then it’s settled.” Liang Huan was very satisfied, “In the future, stay by my side, and I will definitely not mistreat you.”

He had already planned to let Li Yao be his right-hand man in the future.

“Let’s go!” Li Yao hid the laboratory, confirmed the heteromorph’s location, and then took the time to continue the previous words, “Stealing things from my head, if I don’t kill it, what did you just say about mistreating me?”

“…” Liang Huan closed his eyes to rest, “I’ll remember it, drive carefully.”

Li Yao grabbed a handful of blue pills from the side and swallowed them into his stomach, stomping the accelerator to the bottom.

Liang Huan opened his eyes, his gaze falling on the bottle of medicine next to him that was already bottoming out – he remembered that before entering the Kunwu, Li Yao’s bottle of medicine was still full.

His mental power was S-grade, and he also had internal force suppression. He was injured badly even facing this special-grade transparent heteromorph. Now he was mentally exhausted and his whole body was injured. If it was not necessary, he didn’t even want to move his fingers, but Li Yao only had C-grade mental power. First, he operated the mecha and then fought the special-grade heteromorph. Now he actually looked mentally excited, as if he didn’t feel tired or pain at all… This was not normal.

“Li Yao, are you alright?” He looked at Li Yao.

“Can’t be better.” Li Yao chuckled, handing him a chip.

Liang Huan didn’t know why.

“New.” Li Yao said, “If we accidentally get separated, you can contact the nearby exploration team for help.”

Liang Huan embedded the chip directly into his skin, carelessly wiping off the blood on it, leaned back and closed his eyes.

“Don’t worry, I will watch you carefully.”