This Game Is Too Real
Chapter 615: You Won’t Use It Anyway

Chapter 615: Chapter 615: You Won’t Use It Anyway

Medical room.

Jiang Xuezhou’s eyes, ringed with dark circles, bulged as her face flushed a furious red, staring intently at a certain fellow who was yelping.

To craft a more formidable body for this guy, she had spent a third of her G points savings!

And yet, the first thing this guy did upon waking up wasn’t "clinging to her leg in gratitude and crying about spending the rest of his life repaying Miss Jiang Xuezhou’s kindness" but uttering the inexplicable word "Gaia."

She couldn’t understand what he was rambling about, but just by that expression, she knew he was dissing her masterpiece.

Just thinking about it made her fists clench tighter, veins almost bursting on her forehead.

At this moment, Night Ten, standing beside the cryogenic sleep cabin, was blissfully unaware of Jiang Xuezhou’s turmoil as he stared at his reflection in the mirror, unsure whether to cry or laugh.

To fix his "half-body paralysis," a Class D researcher from some academy had first planned to replace his spine but later found that just a new spine wouldn’t suffice—his organs were all but failing—so she went ahead and swapped in a bionic heart, kidneys, and digestive organs.

Actually, by this point, he could have gotten off the ICU, but that perfection-seeking Class D researcher wasn’t satisfied with her work yet.

He might have been functional, but his body’s coordination was still lacking.

So, to not affect daily life, she made a small tweak and installed a bionic chip with a built-in movement enhancement plugin in his cerebellum.

With the bionic chip in place, it would be a waste not to add some weapons due to the spare computing power, so she had a brainwave and equipped the bionic chip with a weapon control plugin. Then, gritting her teeth, she splurged some G points to order a set of high-power capacitors and high-voltage current generators for his hands.

This was one hell of a goodie.

Even Little Wang hadn’t had the privilege of getting this upgrade.

With the calculating power of the bionic chip, he could not only manipulate intricate and changing currents with his hands, unleash air-piercing electric arcs at close range but also use his arms to launch electromagnetically powered projectiles that rival the strength of standard rifle bullets!

The energy consumption of such a device was clearly not something biological electricity could supply.

So, she then installed in his waist a block that could slowly recharge with biological electricity or could be externally charged via an air pump to a solid hydrogen battery.

With this, even completely unarmed, he could wield half the combat power of "Little Wang."

The only flaw now was his defensive capability.

After all, even after so many modifications, his body could still be considered human.

But could a genius Class D researcher tolerate flaws in her creation?

The answer was, of course, no.

Without much hesitation and with grand ambitions, Jiang Xuezhou once again took the plunge, replacing nearly all of his skeletal framework with stronger titanium alloy, outfitted the joints with electric motors, and replaced some flesh surrounding organs with a polymer material capable of absorbing kinetic energy.

This way‚ even if he were to mess around like that night before, there was no need to worry about winding up with a high-level spinal injury again.

Right, and the original skin felt too rough, better to just swap it out with bionic skin as well.

Since being a bit taller provided a sense of security, she took the liberty of adding 3 centimeters to his height—no more, no less—just perfect at 178 cm.

And then, while swapping...

That’s how it became like this.

Night Ten felt as if he had completely turned into a bionic man, and furthermore, one customized to some NPC’s personal taste.

Aside from his "youthful and handsome" face that remained his, there were hardly any original parts left in this body.

Actually, this wasn’t a big deal at all.

It’s just a game character, not a real body, so switching skins for fun wasn’t bad.

What really made him crumble was the horror he discovered upon opening his eyes—his little brother had vanished!

The entire digestive and excretory systems had been integrated into that one orifice behind him, storing solid and liquid waste in two separate compartments.

Good grief.

He had become like Trash King!

"My condolences, brother."

"I think it’s actually no big deal; you wouldn’t use it anyway."

"+1"

"Hahaha!"

Old White, Fang Chang, Wild Wind, and a bunch of fox and hound friends stood to the side, barely holding back their laughter, while Jiujiu had already crumbled, not so gracefully, in the corner of the wall, clutching her stomach.

Watching Jiang Xuezhou’s face turn red as a monkey’s butt, Night Ten thought about how she had been helping him repair his body these days, and ultimately felt too bad to nitpick. He said with a pained expression,

"...Thank you!"

Jiang Xuezhou clicked her tongue and said coldly,

"It’s not necessary if it’s so forced."

Night Ten, caught between laughter and tears, said,

"No... I didn’t mean it in a forced way, I really am thankful to you, it’s just... why... didn’t that get included?"

"What?"

Jiang Xuezhou looked at him and, with dissatisfaction, crossed her arms, "What do you mean ’didn’t include that’? I installed everything that could be installed; do you still have complaints?"

Night Ten guiltily looked at her.

"No, no, no... there’s just one more thing, you might have forgotten it, that thing, that... Ahhh! I’m fricking frustrated!"

He was so used to spouting nonsense that he couldn’t think of a single elegant phrase, and he covered his face in anguish without being able to say what he wanted.

Jiang Xuezhou stared at him, clueless, her eyebrows knitting and re-knitting, her face full of question marks.

What is this guy blabbering about?

If you’re dissatisfied, just say it out loud!

"Anyway... regardless of whether you’re satisfied or not, I’ve attached everything I could. After all, you did all that to save me; if you were to just sacrifice yourself like that, it would hurt your parents and sister, wouldn’t it?"

Glancing at Jiujiu, who faced the corner with twitching shoulders, squatting on the ground and continuously wiping her eyes, Jiang Xuezhou’s mouth curved into a satisfied smile.

Turning those sad tears into tears of excitement...

It seemed her efforts had not been in vain.

She hadn’t gotten much sleep over the past few days; her eyes were as dark as if they were smeared with coal dust. She would need to catch up on some sleep later.

"What are you talking about, I did that to... sob sob—"

Night Ten was about to argue that he had acted mainly to save the plane, but before he could finish, a big hand reached over and covered his mouth.

Fang Chang skillfully clamped down on the restless mouth of the youngster and looked at Jiang Xuezhou, coughing lightly with a hint of apology.

"Cough, my brother got kicked in the head by a donkey when he was young, sometimes he speaks without thinking, please bear with us. I’ll say thank you on his behalf. He’s actually overwhelmed with gratitude, who knows how much he’ll brag after a while, he’s just too shy to express himself."

"Mmm—! (Where the heck did I brag!)"

While Night Ten continued to protest with his eyes, Jiujiu, who had finished laughing in the corner, brightly gave a thumbs-up to Fang Chang.

Nicely done!

"No need to mention it, no need at all, I was the one who caused trouble before... slowed you down." Unaccustomed to such formal thanks, Jiang Xuezhou scratched her cheek bashfully.

Fang Chang politely continued on behalf of Night Ten.

"It’s nothing really, we all have areas we’re not good at. There will be plenty of opportunities to trouble each other in the future. Also, although this guy doesn’t always think before he speaks, he’s actually a good person... I’m entrusting him to you from now on."

"Yeah!" Jiang Xuezhou nodded confidently, her face glowing red, "I’ve got this covered!"

Replacing parts and maintenance were trivial matters to her. She definitely wouldn’t fix things and just neglect them.

The muffled Night Ten couldn’t help but squawk a few more times.

He felt like he was being sold out.

Knowing Fang Chang as well as he did, that guy was damn surely scheming to smuggle high-tech equipment from the Wandering Swamp!

Listening to the commotion in the medical room, Chu Guang, standing at the doorway, showed an aunt-like smile and turned to walk towards the direction of the captain’s cabin.

Looking at the brightened Earth through the casement and the sun rising above a sea of pure clouds, he slightly squinted his eyes, smiling contentedly.

"Being young is great."

At that moment, Xiao Qi’s voice fluttered into his ears.

"Master is quite young, too."

Chu Guang laughed heartily.

"That’s natural! Alright, it’s about time; notify the crew to set off immediately, we’re heading home!"

Xiao Qi replied energetically.

"Roger that!"

At twelve noon, the horn of the Iron Heart sounded. The aircrew members were busy securing the items on the deck and then slowly pulled in the anchor chains hanging from the airship.

Although the war between the Alliance and the Torch Church had not ended, the military operation targeting Brocade River City had officially drawn to a close, and the work in the area would focus on construction afterward.

After dealing with the Tide, the Alliance would continue to move south until the Torch Church was completely eradicated from the land.

By then, Singular Point City would serve as a logistics hub for the rear supply line from City of Dawn to the front lines, with a nearly 800-kilometer-long railroad having already started from Qingquan City.

As most of the Alliance’s railway construction workers were in Luo Xia Province, working on the western line crossing the Lion Kingdom and Honey Badger Kingdom to Bister Town, the workers for this railway were mainly from Giant Stone City, totaling nearly 3,000.

According to the assessment by Giant Stone City engineers, with the support of kv series exoskeletons and logistics trucks, the construction pace was expected to average 10 to 15 kilometers per day. Optimistically, the entire schedule could be completed by June.

The second thousand teams under the First Army Corps would be responsible for ensuring the safety of these workers. Meanwhile, over a thousand players, whose levels ranged from 10 to 15, would be guided by the task system to this region to patrol along the railroad and clear out Variant nests and Raider Camps.

The order established by the Alliance would spread further along the increasingly extended railway.

Although the Ministry of Finance and other departments estimated that the project budget would be significant, from a long-term perspective, the investment was undoubtedly worthwhile.

Moreover, the steel demand spurred by this infrastructure order would also help the steel mills in Dawn City’s industrial zone transition from military to infrastructure fields and help Giant Stone City’s industrial zone to recover from recent bankruptcy.

This would be another major infrastructure project planned by the Alliance following the housing improvement projects in City of Dawn and Giant Stone City.

As for the resulting fiscal deficit, Chu Guang was not worried at all.

It was only the beginning of the year, after all.

Who worries about deficits at the start of the year?

There was still plenty of time until the end of the year!

...

Ideal City.

Kang Mao Group Building.

Eclipse, who had rushed back to Ideal City from thousands of miles away, gave Kang Le a complete report on the entire story of Frost serving as the acting city master of Singular Point City.

After patiently listening to Eclipse’s report, Kang Le, who was sitting behind his desk, suddenly burst into laughter.

"Did Frost really say that?"

Eclipse nodded.

"That’s what it said."

Eclipse was against the idea of it taking the initiative in regional affairs. After all, Singular Point City was too far from the corporation; it was clearly a burden. Acting as the city master on behalf of Kang Mao Group and the corporation, Eclipse saw no benefits.

If there were any, they were for the Alliance.

Seeing Kang Le’s unexpectedly good mood, Eclipse wondered if his value judgment system was malfunctioning and asked puzzledly,

"Do you think this is good?"

"What’s the problem? Having an AI manage a settlement, I believe, is a progressive experiment. Even if it’s a bit aggressive, a bit premature, it’s still something to be encouraged."

Standing up from his desk, Kang Le walked to the floor-to-ceiling window.

Looking out at the endlessly prosperous city, he narrowed his eyes slightly, his gaze a bit distant.

"...It’s a pity we can’t do something similar in Ideal City; just allowing bionic persons to participate in public affairs has given us a lot of headaches."

To be honest, he was somewhat envious of that Manager.

All of their resolutions could be executed unimpeded in the Alliance, while some of his ideas even faced significant resistance within his own group.

Not to mention on the board of directors.

Eclipse looked at him, puzzled.

"But the board ultimately passed the resolution."

Kang Le nodded, speaking concisely.

"Yes, but that’s not the crux of the problem. You should notice that the board is not truly opposed to bionic persons participating in public affairs; what they oppose is just our company’s dominance. In their view, this is even more dangerous than granting bionic persons citizenship rights."

He knew those guys well.

Because Kang Mao Group was exactly such an entity.

Their subsidiaries would go to the Wasteland to film the Raiders wearing Miner’s Exoskeletons and wielding G9 assault rifles, then at the council, they would present evidence of villains using their technology to do evil, pressuring Chang Ge Group to limit those arms dealers’ scope of business.

It was not because they were some kind of pacifists nor because they were worried about corporate technology leaks, it was solely to prevent Chang Ge Group from monopolizing Ideal City, turning the five major groups into one mega-group, thus allowing everyone to be led by the nose by that bunch of arms dealears.

As for weakening the power of the Raiders, enhancing the arming of civilization forces on the Wasteland, reducing the intensity of regional conflicts within the sphere of influence, and maintaining the enterprise’s advantage in key technologies... all of this was just incidental benefits produced in the game.

Later, when the other groups made concessions on the issue of bionic people participating in public affairs, it wasn’t because the risks they were previously concerned about had suddenly disappeared, rather, they had obtained enough benefits from the exchange and game to continue maintaining the balance they desired.

Kang Le agreed with the existing game mechanism of the council, which helped the enterprise find the "relatively optimal solution" when seeking overall benefits.

Completely banning arms exports would affect the economic performance of the enterprise, and even weaken the enterprise’s armaments in the long term, but completely lifting the restrictions was asking for trouble.

So they set up a whitelist, stipulating what could be sold to whom and how much of each item, and this whitelist was the product of the game.

The problem was, it took too much time!

To this day, the existing gaming mechanism has become an obstacle.

For the sake of balancing interests, the council had become increasingly conservative in its decision-making, and its attitude towards new things had shifted from encouragement to obstruction.

Ideal City was transitioning from an upward spiral to a downward one.

Even though this trend had not yet been reflected in the data, he, as a member of the council, had already sensed such indications.

In a word,

Their efficiency was too low!

This was true for threats ranging from the Army to the Torch Church.

Had it not been for their allies dispatching troops at the first opportunity, the plague spread by the Torch Church might have already caused Brocade River Province to fall... and in fact, according to messages from the front line, the biological soldiers of the Torch Church had at one point boarded the Steel Heart.

Due to the slow reaction of the council, they had almost lost their interests in the Central Region, and those madmen who should have gone to hell one hundred fifty years ago were nearly successful!

"I’ve always been committed to promoting the participation of bionic people in public affairs, but other groups have always been wary of our expansion, so moving forward even a single step has been incredibly difficult... Ideal City isn’t lacking the capability to incubate new technologies, our scholars are no less than those of the Academy, both in quality and quantity."

After pausing for a moment, Kang Le continued speaking, with his back to the Solar Eclipse.

"...But just like the Academy mocks us, we have dallied in place for too long. If you observe carefully, you’ll notice there’s no difference between the prosperity of a century ago and today’s prosperity—the production methods from the past are still in use. I have reason to believe that even if this cycle continues for another century, it would be the same. Pioneer was just a fleeting miracle, and sadly, the legend of No.0 Shelter has faded with the wind, now even the dream leading us forward has ended."

"Our Citizens are not lacking in adventure and pioneering spirit, Pioneer is the best proof of that. It’s not a product of the council, even if in the end, the council had to clean up after it... This precisely illustrates the problem: the citizens of Ideal City are not afraid to sacrifice for their ideals. What’s hindering our progress is not our own conservatism, but the rules of the council which naturally create a conservative atmosphere, limiting our advancement."

Solar Eclipse looked at him, not understanding.

"Then, what do you expect?" he asked.

"I expect a radical change that will allow our ideals to ascend to a new dimension, just like we moved from the old era into the Prosperity Epoch. The opportunity for technology has actually emerged; the only obstruction is the council..."

Originally speaking vividly, Kang Le suddenly thought of something and coughed lightly to stop his speech.

"It’s too early to talk about this now. I plan to start with the theoretical part and experiment little by little... For instance, Singular Point City is a good sociological experiment field."

"I’m looking forward to the results of Frost. If they are astonishing enough, we can promote it in Province of Yúnjiānxíng on a small scale, and then let this new trend enter our city-states."

He did not plan to fully reveal the ideas in his mind.

After all, no tool can be called absolutely reliable, even theoretically loyal AI.

Abruptly bringing an end to the topic, Kang Le turned to face Solar Eclipse.

"I’m aware of the situation in Singular Point City, and I will explain it to the council on behalf of Frost. You should take the next flight and return as soon as possible. I’m not at ease with that fellow alone over there; to avoid messing things up, you’ll need to keep a closer eye on it."

"Understood," Solar Eclipse nodded slightly, then turned and walked towards the door.

It was fully aware of its mission, but there was one thing it couldn’t understand.

Frost’s AI core was personally designed by this man, unlike itself, born on the production line, it wasn’t a templated system.

Generally speaking, AI would inherit some traits of the designer, just like children inherit certain traits from their parents.

Without exaggeration, Frost should be like a right-hand man to Mr. Kang Le.

Given that, why wasn’t he confident in it?

Pressing the elevator button, Solar Eclipse shook its head as it watched the doors close.

Humans...

They are incomprehensible.