Chapter 240: Planet Rainbow
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
On Planet Rainbow, a dark red spaceship was laying alongside the docking zone. The spaceship, of its 3km length, was not attracting that much of attention among the other spaceships.
Although galaxies other than Csebesini were in hot water, the 4 forces had been performing all sorts of reorganization to restore the security of their territories. The pirates plundering everything had been knocked into oblivion, and soon intergalactic trades started once again. As affected by this incident, the figures of both incoming and outgoing spaceships at Rainbow had been increasing these days.
The docking zone, isolated by war, had regained its activity.
The dark red spaceship laid at one quiet corner.
Well, if anyone noticed the ship they would have been wondering why no one had left the spaceship for so long it had been parked. But who would really notice a normal spaceship at the pier anyway?
The spaceship was the Coxcomb, by the way.
Well, the process starting from the time the crew spotted two Dawn mechs chasing the powership, then suicidally heading towards the Coxcomb and being shot down by Ye Chong was merely a matter of few minutes. The Beauty’s Secretion had always been the best assassin in the dark, with its corrosiveness melting the armors of the mechs and soon penetrating them, leakage happened and they were history before they knew it.
Under Shang’s kindest "invitation" Little Rock boarded the Coxcomb. Of course, within the few brief exchanges of Shang and him, Shang’s cunningly experienced talking style had gotten all the information he needed from Little Rock.
First off, Luo Wei had died, which matched what Zhu Ling had stated. And the potency of Feng Su had once again be reinforced in Ye Chong’s mind. And Little Rock managed to escape when Luo Wei gave a final struggle before his death.
Little Rock was a non-combat members in the Black Coves, so never once he was dipped in the silver liquid. Judging by Little Rock’s description, one could determine that the silver liquid was something rather precious among the Black Covers. It was known scientifically as the "Muscular Texturizing Solution" and only the selected combat squad members would be dipped in the liquid.
Non-combat members, being the entities in a fighting organization, were of a rather low position, so Little Rock had always been the bullies’ target back then. But ever since Commander Qiu Lie recognized his capabilities, he was shifted to the strategy department, which since then his life improved. Nevertheless, he still received discriminative behaviors from the pilots of the frontline from time to time, even under a commander’s protection, which led to his shrinking personality. And Luo Wei was one of the only few pilots who treated the non-combat members with friendliness.
Shang, the psychological expert had millions of ways to win over Little Rock’s heart in his mind. And they had formed a decent relationship from the beginning, which soon Little Rock grew fonder on Shang.
Towards Shang’s superior performance, Ye Chong did not say a word, even though he was showing high respect towards his capabilities. He knew he was not an expert on this, even though he was confident to assume he would not worse than Shang when it came to talking appropriately.
Luckily I’m not the leader of the team, I’m seriously weak at this man… Laughed Ye Chong at himself in his mind.
Lian Yue, who only had his eyes on the pretties and the handsomes, was directly scorning at that mere average boy who in fact was certainly underwhelming compared to Lian Yue himself. His body was short, he was underweight, one could say he was a puny coal coming out of nowhere, although his lustrous eyes were rather intelligibly expressive.
"Meh," snorted the vain man.
The happening after that was astonishing to him however, as the artificial indulgence and the little boy started playing tremendously complicated games, with tremendously overwhelming amount of calculations in a tremendously ingenious manner. Lian Yue had already been stunned to the alternate dimension as the game progressed, upon realizing the fact that he could not understand anything on the screen.
"I have to admit… he is a genius! No doubt!" he muttered as he failed miserably associating this easily overlooked puny underweight boy with the word "genius" gloriously shining in his mind. Aren’t geniuses supposed to be worldly gorgeous like me? But the happening before him was irrefutable.
Zhu Ling on the other hand remained silent upon Little Rock’s arrival, as she was well-aware of her position in the ship. She was rather surprised of this little boy with a similar age as hers, however. With his professional calculations, the boy would have been greatly regarded by the authority in the Sanctuary. She could not imagine how the Black Covers could ill-treat such a contributing genius.
After a wave of shock and amazement, the peace on the Coxcomb was restored, since everyone had their own tasks to do. Ye Chong had to perform his alchemy experiments, while having the responsibility to produce Beauty’s Secretion; Zhu Ling needed those time to carry out her meditation trainings; Lian Yue had always been running between the metallurgy lab and Zhu Ling, while Little Rock had been competing Shang on some extremely complicated mathematics.
Little Rock, as easily overlooked as the pebbles at the roadside, had somehow made tremendous development under Shang’s training, as his standard skyrocketed to a whole new level, which he got to switch opponent by then. Yes he was facing Mu instead. And Mu, with his godlike ability, was actually feeling a little troubled in defeating Little Rock, since unlike the artificial intelligence, Little Rock had the creativity to make some interesting detours.
Creativity of humanity would be something that a PSI like Mu could never imitate.
Everyday Mu Shang would report Ye Chong the progress of everybody else, although Ye Chong did not see the need in doing so, Mu Shang showed persistence in it.
And that oversized illustration of the gorgeous, under Ye Chong’s continuous demand, Shang eventually took it down, with a heavy heart. Well, Ye Chong would not want to be suddenly bombarded by someone just because of the unnecessary attention the illustration had attracted.
"Done," Mu’s voice remained flat as usual. The word signified Ye Chong’s ability to get off the ship and wander at free will.
The Coxcomb - as it was parked at the docking zone - had completed scouting and mapping the landscape of the entire area. It would be rather essential to have planned a few sets of escape paths beforehand, especially when they were in the land of the Freedom Alliance, which none of them had any idea how the organization operated. Be cautious, that was what they thought.
The unknown always holds the greatest danger.
The monitoring was successful under the assistance of Little Rock, who had drastically improved the calculation the processor of the Coxcomb had to perform. This was also the very first collaboration between Little Rock and Mu. The outcome, as far as one concerned, could be considered satisfactory for Mu was able to hack into the Virtual Connection Central Point at the docking zone effortlessly with the help of Little Rock.
Virtual Connection Central Point, as the name had defined itself, was a point where all the transmitting signals conglomerated in an area, which connected all users in the area at once.
After hacking into the central point, Mu and Little Rock began sneaking upon the other central points nearby. It did not take long before they successfully hacked into up to 13 points of virtual connection access.
Very quickly after, both of them started to create a new connection between these 13 central points, in a way the points would be connected in a completed crossing structure, which expanded the useable virtual resources as well as promoted its stability. The idea was brought up by Little Rock and was formed into a final plan after Mu’s verification.
They reinforced the crossing structure afterwards. Mu first extracted all sorts of trapping program from the databank and laid them across the structure afterwards. Ye Chong was seeing Mu being so intense the first time near the control panel.
Well, Ye Chong could understand the artificial intelligence’s intensive expression, he was being alert over someone, someone who was able to wipe a celeb completely from the Virtual World 20 years ago. How horribly strong that person could be! And Ye Chong had Mu’s words, where he stated that he was not confident to carry out the same task as flawless as the person now. And that was the person’s standard twenty years ago. Assuming the person was still living, within 20 years, the person could have become a sky-walking hacker, no, sky-flipping hacker perhaps.
One could not imagine the potency such person could have demonstrated using the Virtual world. Ye Chong also knew the whole point of Mu being so participative in the preparation was to ensure their safety, since this would be a duel across sections, where two persons from two different worlds hacking into each other.
Preparation had been completed. And Ye Chong got off the Coxcomb, alone. Mu needed to watch over the entire warship while trying his best to handle that super Maverick from the Freedom Alliance. Zhu Ling, well she could be helpful in battles but Ye Chong had not grown comfortable enough to bring her out as working partner. His sole partner would be none other than Mu Shang.
Ye Chong brought a modified communicator with him, which he would use to keep in touch with the Coxcomb. As he was walking around, Mu and Little Rock had began engulfing the Virtual World of Rainbow gradually.
He walked down the stairs and realized he was actually at lost, having zero idea on where to start, as people were walking on the street tranquilly. It felt like he had got out of a fictional world and had returned to the humanity.
He made a new ID card, more precisely, "recover" his ID card on a little "help" from Mu. Ye Chong had already gotten use to this "recovery" process since this had been like the thousandth time he had done it. And this time, his pseudonym was Takano.
He went to one of the self-serving hotels, got himself a room.
Prometheus Group seemed to be rather well-known among the residents on Rainbow. The group was the leading financial group on the planet. They had numerous branches beneath them and every zone of Rainbow was occupied by companies of their subsidiaries, which was puzzling to Ye Chong as he had no idea which department that Gao Shichang, who happened to have the same name as his papa, was belonged to.
And it was a fruitless outcome when Mu carried out his research on Gao Shichang back then.
At least they saw a consistency within the fragmented information, which pointed towards Prometheus Group. It could have been a search of a needle in a haystack, which could take years, but Ye Chong did not bother. He had plenty of time to find out what had actually happened behind the scene. He would not mind spending the next one or two years staying on Rainbow to be a detective. And for those on the Coxcomb, he believed they would not care where they actually were.
Nevertheless, it felt a little strange for Ye Chong, since he could not tell if this was the first time he was on a mission alone. It was foreign to head out without Mu Shang by his side, even though he could have made contacts via the communicator. Mu had once advised him to avoid contact as much as possible unless on an emergency, too. It would be risky if Ye Chong contacted Mu, since it would be a piece of cake for that super Maverick to monitor the streaming over the communication process. Mu would in fact encrypt the entire chain of signal but he could not guarantee if it would be impossible for the foe to decode it.
Everyone was fearing that super Maverick from the Freedom Alliance.
As he wandered on the streets, Ye Chong saw the scattered pedestrians moving, with a depressing frown on their faces, under the tall buildings which part of them had turned into debris at some corners. The damage caused by war to the people, was not something that could be simply undone by time. The place was once a developed and lively place and now, it was devastating and lifeless.
Sometimes there would be flocks of mechs zooming by in the sky, which the piercing sound the air friction caused was still alarming to the residents. Something was clogging their heart, some sort of gloominess had clouded their mind. The residents never could imagine the days in devastation and now here they were, walking on the street as if it was a norm. Human was one kind with great adaptability to their surrounding after all.
Ye Chong stopped. It was the arrival, Prometheus Group : Mech Research Center 76.
The center was a tall building, about 500 floors height, with a particular modern design. The walking staff seemed to be extremely engaged in their ongoing works, unlike the other places. The name of the company stood blatantly on top of the sign, which one could not miss.
Ye Chong lifted his head as he set his eyes upon the hologram projection at the outer wall of the building rolling all sorts of information about the center.
That was one notice which caught Ye Chong’s attention. It was written in a rather desperate tone, where they were looking for all kinds of mech experts in the industry and they would pay handsomely for the expertise. And a large page of introduction on their facilities and hardwares followed. Ye Chong felt the urge to compliment the designer of this notice, it was too tempting! Even an indifferent person like him could not resist but to have slight fond over working here for the rest of his life.
He took a look at the date, it was published 10 days ago, with a duration of a year.
People were walking in and out of the building while he was reading the notice, where most of them were expressing deeper depression with their sighs and whines. There are hardly any person leaving the building with a smile.
Ye Chong, with his eyes, could tell the information those little gestures had suggested. These people must be the candidates for this job of the fantasy. The sorrow faced must have failed their selection while the smiley one must have been employed.
30 : 1. Okay that was a slight shocker to Ye Chong, never would he expected the rate of employment to be this low.
He stayed in one corner at the outside for a moment and to his surprise, the number of candidates grew over the time, and he could feel the lobby exploding. He frowned upon the phenomena, I know it is a really amazing job but I seriously do not see the need of this craze.
Oh wait, could there be something unknown to the outsiders?
And for some reason, Ye Chong uncontrollably headed towards the crowded gate.