Chapter 196: Engineer Type
Bright flames instantly illuminated the fan-shaped area directly ahead.
The Iron-eating Tree, flailing its claws, fled in panic, but its speed was too slow. Fuel oil had already drenched its body, and surging flames climbed up the branches within a breath.
As the branches swung, they ignited the surrounding companions as well.
From the drone’s perspective overhead, violent flames bloomed simultaneously on the massive Mobile Fortress, igniting fire tree silver flowers one by one, illuminating the area for several kilometers around like a splendid fireworks display.
The clanging of the Armored Train was like drumbeats, accompanied by the Iron-eating Tree’s vibrations spreading rumblingly in all directions.
Like a festival celebration.
Lin Jin paced back and forth in the Carriage, adjusting the flame temperature to prevent insufficient power from allowing the enraged Iron-eating Tree to get close.
The Armored Train was waterproof and shock-resistant, but its high temperature tolerance was average.
He Jie on the roof picked up a large flamethrower, aiming at the Iron-eating Tree below.
Like an arsonist, trimming their branches for them.
The orange-red firelight illuminated his ferocious face in flickering shadows.
“Crackle…”
Yu Yue meticulously trimmed Su Huan’s hair, strands of shiny black long hair falling to the ground.
Reflecting the firelight outside the window.
The Carriage was extremely soundproof, only faint crackling sounds filtering in, barely audible over the cracking sound of trimming hair.
Violent flames and gentle life intertwined here into a scroll painting of the New World.
Restless yet tranquil.
……
Scorching sunlight had just pierced through the thick Italian velvet curtains when the smart home system quietly activated. Constant-temperature underfloor heating kept the teak floor at 26°C, stepping barefoot on it felt like treading on sun-warmed beach, warm and comfortable.
A vintage phonograph by the bedside played nostalgic and gentle cello music.
The woman on the bed fluttered her eyelashes and got out of bed.
She pulled back the curtains, and blazing sunlight flooded the room, illuminating every detail indoors.
Wang Yi frowned.
The Storm Zone’s climate was completely opposite to the Acid Rain Area.
Though she disliked the pungent smell of acid rain, she enjoyed the humid, continuous climate there, which wouldn’t irritate her skin.
In her earlier years, to maintain her beauty, she had undergone too many medical beauty treatments, making her skin sensitive and photosensitive.
After becoming an Evolver, it improved somewhat, but the habit lingered.
Instinctively repelled by overly abundant sunlight.
Outside the window was a glass-domed sunroom, crystalline glass refracting light into pale golden veils, enveloping the room full of blooming champagne roses.
Fine water droplets still condensed on the petals, evidently from the automatic irrigation system’s recent mist spray.
Under the Storm Zone’s scorching sun, dew simply didn’t exist.
To be precise, without someone tending and nurturing them daily, such delicate, unmutated flower buds wouldn’t exist at all.
About three minutes later, her personal secretary knocked on the room door on time.
While assisting Wang Yi with washing up, she said, “Mister Shu invites you to breakfast.”
“Seeing him makes me nauseous and unable to eat. To save my appetite, tell him to get lost.”
Wang Yi said with a trace of disgust.
Even without this former husband from the Board of Directors, she was still a senior executive at Black Kite, so naturally she didn’t need to give him face.
The secretary was already used to Wang Yi’s vicious words.
Calmly, she said, “Mister Shu said that Miss Shu Wei is in the squad sent out on the task…”
Before the secretary could finish, a violent noise interrupted her.
Looking up, the floor-to-ceiling window in front of her shattered into a spiderweb pattern centered on Wang Yi’s fist, bright red blood seeping through the cracks.
The woman’s figure had already vanished from the bedroom, echoes of gritted-teeth angry curses resounding outside.
“Where is that old bastard?! Today I’m going to strangle him alive!”
The secretary calmly picked up the walkie-talkie, “Come replace this glass.”
……
Sunlight gleamed white on the plate, the steak topped with tomato juice tender and delicious.
Mister Shu unhurriedly held chopsticks in one hand and a knife in the other, cutting the steak on the plate into small pieces, then pushing it in front of Wang Yi, whose face was iron gray.
Though the other was furious, years of habit made her restrain her temper in public.
But the waiters’ positions revealed that the atmosphere between the two wasn’t pleasant.
“Shu Wei is only Tier 1 now, why did you send her on a task to such a dangerous place?!”
Looking at his enraged ex-wife, Mister Shu sneered, “This is the result of you badmouthing me in her ear all these years. I don’t even dare see her; she explodes the moment we meet, and she won’t listen to me.”
“So you didn’t notify me either, right?”
Wang Yi’s gaze was icy, pressing step by step.
Mister Shu frowned, “She’s already thirty years old, a CEO worth over a billion before the Apocalypse, not your pet!”
“Besides, I instructed the Tier 2s to prioritize her safety. If the task fails, so be it. Worst case, report it to the company; it’s still better training than holing up in the base.”
Wang Yi curled her lips mockingly, “You stay safe in the Safe Zone at headquarters, eating unmutated steak and drinking red wine, sending my daughter out for training. Why don’t you go?”
Mister Shu let out a long sigh. No matter the personality, once a woman disliked you, she always had endless tricky moves.
“I’m almost sixty. I’ve been through all the storms I needed to…”
“Bang!”
Wang Yi swept the plate, flipping the steak, and spat with hatred, “Don’t lecture me with your grand principles. If anything happens to Shu Wei, I’ll cut you into a thousand pieces!”
Without giving him a chance to continue, she stood and left.
Mister Shu looked at the steak on the ground, his brows furrowing.
He wasn’t distressed about the steak; his annoyance was because he had personally cut it.
Even though it was extremely precious food in the outside world now.
But to his power, it was mere scraps.
Not even part of resources, but a complimentary gift from the power he wielded in his position.
At this moment, a waiter approached hesitantly, bending low to whisper, “Deep Blue Data’s Vice President of Business Development wants to see you.”
Mister Shu’s face remained calm, but a trace of doubt flashed in his mind.
What did Deep Blue Data want with him?
But the other’s status meant he couldn’t ignore it.
He took the hot towel from the waiter to wipe his hands. The slight helplessness toward Wang Yi vanished completely, replaced by the deep, sinister expression unique to old men. He stood and walked out.
“Don’t waste grain.”
Several waiters behind him slightly bowed, expressionlessly picking up the steak from the ground and eating it.
……
Two days had passed since the Armored Train left Shun’an Station.
That night’s rain was light, but the wind was strong.
The Iron-eating Trees called it the most beautiful bonfire they’d ever seen. They danced wildly around it all night before dispersing contentedly.
As for Black Kite and Deep Blue Data’s people, they never appeared even after departure.
Perhaps held up entertaining that enthusiastic group of Iron-eating Trees.
Or encountered something else.
Su Huan didn’t know.
The Armored Train maintained a top speed of 75 km/h heading north.
Most travel was on railway tracks; tracks were only used when rails were broken. Besides being faster on rails, fuel consumption was also an issue.
At the same speed, tracks consumed nearly eight times the fuel of rails!
Even after refueling substantially at Shun’an Station, it couldn’t withstand such usage.
On the Train, energy was needed everywhere.
So the Logistics Group selected some Energizers to inject electricity into the train engine in batches daily, easing some energy pressure.
Though it couldn’t fully cover fuel consumption, the remaining fuel was enough for this batch of Energizers to grow.
On the way to Guangren City, the Armored Train encountered many survivors.
But the Armored Train no longer needed many outsiders, so it only took in a very few exceptional talents.
After sending out small teams for transactions and exploration, it hurried away.
Two months of endless acid rain, communication blackout, and infinite zombies and Mutated Beasts made even the most optimistic survivors lose hope. Emotions progressed from fear, despair, breakdown… finally turning into numb survival.
The Apocalypse didn’t actually arrive all at once.
It came in batches.
The first Apocalypse was during the Heat Outbreak, when all things mutated.
This was the environmental Apocalypse.
The sudden Apocalypse crisis enveloped human civilization.
At that time, people’s hearts were gripped by fear, desperately fleeing, seeking survival, struggling by any means.
There was always a bit of expectation.
Perhaps rescue that appeared out of nowhere, or resources unreachable in the past, or sudden liberation from dull, repetitive work.
Two months later, survivors had somewhat stabilized.
They suddenly realized they could never return to that prosperous, peaceful era.
No convenient water and electricity, no social network, no delicious food delivered with a finger tap…
The old rules humanity formed over millennia were shattered.
Some didn’t even know what they relied on to live, how they lived, why they lived…
Only then did the second Apocalypse truly descend.
This was the Apocalypse of the human heart.
So whenever the massive Armored Train passed a place, countless survivors cheered excitedly, for that roar brought the afterglow of old civilization.
But after the afterglow faded, only endless cold darkness remained.
Fear and hesitation were the norm.
But Su Huan didn’t care about that.
As Train Conductor, he only needed to be responsible for his own train.
Under his high pressure, everyone on the Armored Train operated like parts in precision machinery, efficient and orderly.
No one had shown psychological issues yet.
Because Su Huan gave them a goal, a distant but visible “plum” on the mountain.
“The train heads north to escape the disaster.”
This wasn’t what Su Huan said, of course.
It was a phrase that gradually mutated when he first explained the train’s goal to Wan Xing and others.
Plus the heavy daily work, even Evolvers had no time for random thoughts.
Since the entire train crew were Evolvers with no energy shortages, the train schedule changed from 24-hour to 36-hour system.
A 36-hour cycle.
24 hours of work daily, the remaining 12 hours all for rest.
Everyone was indifferent to the time change, with no resistance.
If the train was a company, they all lived in the company—what else could they do besides work?
The Armored Train’s production efficiency rose another 20-30%.
……
On the Armory Hall between the two trains, an interesting test was underway.
Soldiers from the Armed Corps stood on both sides; He Jie, Yu Yue, Xiao Ba, and others were there.
Crowding around the two in the center.
One was Yu Jing wearing a large exoskeleton.
This was the latest research and development result from her Mechanical Laboratory.
Custom exoskeleton: [Engineer-I], weighing 110kg.
Based on that Enhanced Function Exoskeleton, all metal skeletons were replaced with Tier 1 titanium steel.
A new material crafted from titanium alloy combined with Tier 1 Spine Hound spinal bones and Ironwood.
Compared to Qing Steel, titanium steel had over 20% higher hardness, even 20% lighter than Qing Steel, but inferior in ductility and tensile strength.
Plus difficult to produce and not as easy to synthesize as Qing Steel, previous batches were only stored as new material, not used extensively on the train.
Now used by Yu Jing for the exoskeleton, it complemented perfectly.
Compared to [Scavenger], [Engineer] was completely different.
Exposed hydraulic lines wrapped in carbon fiber insulation sheaths, joints using bionic tendon structures, surface covered in cold-resistant composite armor plates, overall in matte iron gray with fluorescent orange special marking stripes.
Back with standard engineering mounts for quick attachment of scientific instruments, welding arms, or light weapons.
Extra pair of five-joint high-degree-of-freedom mechanical arms on left and right.
Two joints at shoulders, one at elbow, two at wrists; through these nodes, the mechanical arms could flexibly turn.
Mechanical arms had hydraulic clamp and precision operation modes; the former with over two tons of grip force, the latter for laser ranging, 3D emergency printing, etc.
Focused on engineering manufacturing, the [Engineer] series was taller, bulkier, with a rough, cold mechanical texture.
Yu Jing, at just over 1.6 meters, reached two meters in this exoskeleton.
Taller than the tallest Liang Kuan on the Train by a head.
At this moment, Yu Jing held two handguns, her left and right mechanical arms each holding an Iron Curtain Assault Rifle.
Her back carried a light machine gun, all aimed at the target hundred meters ahead.
Beside her stood the Armed Corps’ Mongoose.
In front was a table with the same two assault rifles and light machine gun.
He Jie in the middle looked toward the Train Conductor nearby.
Su Huan nodded.
He Jie held a timer, raising his single hand high.
Accompanied by a beep.
Fire tongues bloomed simultaneously from both their muzzles.
But Yu Jing’s side had three: one from the back light machine gun, two from the handguns in hand.
The 15 bullets from the [Enforcer-S1] Tactical Handgun and the ammunition belt from the back light machine gun finished almost simultaneously.
Meanwhile, Mongoose had emptied his handgun and was reloading.
This competition required one reload for assault rifles and light machine gun, three for handguns.
Yu Jing calmly manipulated the exoskeleton; with a few clicks, spare ammunition belts were loaded, aiming at the forward target for shooting.
Meanwhile, she unhurriedly reloaded the two handguns in her hands.
