Not even the Ten Squadrons dared to defy Admiral Lin's orders. He didn't expect a mech core with a depleted battery to talk back. Jingheng Lin was a little shocked. He said after a pause, "Did you download some weird dataset and got yourself a vir-"

Before he could finish the word "virus", the powerful relaxant rushed through his body.

The name "relaxant" sounded fresh and cosy, but it had nothing to do with anti-acne relaxing masks. It penetrated the body incredibly quickly. Once the relaxant entered the body, it would spread through the entire system within minutes. It felt as if every nerve in your body went through an electric shock. Lin's words died in his throat. His breath was interrupted. There was so much tension in his neck that he felt as if it was going to snap. His fingers tightened, the veins on his bare arms became protruding, nearly bursting through his skin.

However, at the same time, his compatibility level with the mech rose to its maximum from the previous 80%, which dropped due to fatigue.

The strong stimulation caused by the relaxant lasted for about a minute, before a severe muscular spasm occurred.

Jingheng Lin skillfully stretched out his twisted limbs when his breath was in between shallow pants. The dark underground route then laid bare before him. The objects occasionally floating by looked like they'd slow down. A light tremble went down the crawling mech. It subtly corrected its angle, and accelerated on the route almost perfectly using one side of the propulsion system.

Zhanlu waited by his side, motionless, "Sir, according to the Laws of Artificial Intelligence, an AI can defy its orders to a certain extent once it decides its owner's life is being threatened after a.s.sessment. I am defying the order "shut up" now, because I must remind you that you have severe relaxant abuse issues even back in the Silver Fortress. In the past five years, I have been considering that your symptoms have eased a little, but just now-"

Jingheng Lin rubbed his cramping lower legs, rolled his ankles, arranged his collar and stood up. He got himself a cup of salt water before interrupting Zhanlu, "I wasn't aware that relaxants have been cla.s.sified as drugs now."

"Relaxants are for raising compatibility level under extreme circ.u.mstances," the mechanical hand closed its four fingers together, making a gesture for taking an oath, as if to emphasize his seriousness. "No one uses it when the compatibility level is at 80%."

Lin sneered, "Yes, but some useless b.u.ms will never reach 80% in their entire life."

Zhanlu kept his gesture, "We're talking about your problem. Why do you have to commit racism speech on irrelevant people?"

"The number deviated from my average score by more than 10%. Does that not count as an extreme circ.u.mstance? What's the issue?"

"It could only show that you were extremely tired. You had exhausted your mental power." Zhanlu said so solemnly. "Once the route is stabilized, the mech would be on automatic driving mode just so the pilot can break off the mental network and take a rest. However, you never break off from the net when you're in a mech even if more than one person can take turns. You're breaking the mech operation laws here...Sir, wait! That's also against the rules! "

Jingheng Lin put on his headphones to shut out Zhanlu' s nagging. He played a s.e.xy country tune, disentangled Zhanlu' s mental network from Beijing's, blocking Zhanlu both physically and mentally. Hastening their way back, he went back to surveying and mapping in peace and quiet.

They had less than 24 hours before the high energy particle flow reaches the base. 284 so-called "mech pilots" had a.s.sembled at the station, every single one of them was carrying a sticker which had a number identical to their mech on it, scratching their heads in different expressions. It looked like a set of doc.u.mentary about wild animals.

The four students were handing out the take-off instructions according to the mech numbers - the instruction was in the form of recording. Holiday explained the ignition and take-off sequence, parking position, timing for the s.h.i.+eld-opening, s.h.i.+eld docking...and how to correctly use adult diapers in that deep and sonorous voice of his.

Sat.u.r.day and his squad of tag-alongs worked through the night to record these after they'd listened to Bixing Lu's explanations alongside the four students. By the end of around two hundred recordings, broadcaster Holiday had already lost his voice.

Bixing Lu still had a drop of hope for mankind's intelligence. He even projected construction principles of the mech s.h.i.+eld on the 3D screen, trying to explain to the pilot what they were about to do. He would have worn out his tongue and he would have gotten nothing but confused looks.

He gulped down half a bottle of mineral water, brus.h.i.+ng them aside, "Never mind, just go - Dad, the rest of the pilotless mechs, should we split them in half? 8 mechs per mental network, would that be a bit too much?"

Monoeye Hawk got irritated at the sight of him. He let out a huff and turned to walk away.

"Eight pilotless mechs?" Sat.u.r.day whispered. "How could one do that? Didn't you say you were a lecturer? You're not some sort of Green Beret, are you?"

"Of course not. It's just experience. Even the piano will need ten fingers." Bixing Lu said. "Do you even know what the special forces are like?"

Sat.u.r.day gave him a sincere shake of his head.

Bixing Lu chuckled, didn't say anymore - a soldier from the special forces could break into 36 parked mechs and blow up the s.h.i.+eld of an entire base from the faraway admin building with nothing more than a single mech core. And that soldier was just in the administration building.

Just now, Monoeye Hawk had already mounted the tracks with his mech. A gasp rose from the crowd - there were eight equidistant, pilotless mechs following him obediently. When the mechs flitted past the accelerating tracks, he was like an arrogant corpse leading his legion of zombies. With a thundering noise, the thermoelectric system outside the cooling tower let out a brilliant light, and all the nine mechs rose at the same time, with such cut-gla.s.s precision it was as though they were a same body.

Sat.u.r.day held his hand above his eyes and stared unblinkingly at where the mechs had disappeared, disregarding the dazzling light. Just as Bixing Lu thought he was about to sigh in admiration alongside the others, Sat.u.r.day abruptly turned his head. His soft baby face set in conviction, he said word by word, "If what you said was true, then one day, I can be like that, too."

At that, he gave a curt wave, "Self Defense Force! All official members, follow me!"

The official members of Self Defense Force were more like soldiers. At least they dared to sail out for more than two sailing days and launch the missile from there. Once they got the order, they went on the track one by one in good order.

After twenty minutes, all the decent pilots were on course, but there were only fifty-four mechs outside of the atmosphere, which was only one sixth of them. All the rest were the shabby mechs. Now those were the tricky ones.

Bixing Lu swept his eyes over the crowd, slowed down his explanation, "Once on the mech, you may turn on your portable audio. Those who can still listen to others speak while they're connecting to the mental network stand on my left side, those who can't, stand on my right side. Alright, comrades on the left side, please raise your numbers and guiding audio, and depart in order... What?"

"Mr. Lu, may I ask how could we avoid b.u.mping into the mechs right next to us? If the mech in front is too slow and I crash into it, how could I pull the brake on the accelerating track?"