In the time it took Feng Xue to brush past a scavenger, a slightly warped silver metal plate entered his field of vision. Judging from the exquisite patterns on it, it was probably the casing of some civilian device.
“Aluminum alloy. Its strength should be around D15. It’s worth some money, but it’s a bit too bulky…” Feng Xue made a rough assessment in his mind, then glanced at the other scavengers who were clearly eyeing it as well and decisively gave up on it. This thing wasn’t particularly rare; he could make the same thing using metal ingots from the shop. There was no need to let it take up his carrying capacity.
His gaze continued to move, but his legs bent slightly. In a somewhat awkward posture, he scooped up a cracked little box the size of a palm from beside his foot.
“The main control box of a sixth-generation cooking machine. Alumac composite material. A pity the stuff inside is already shattered.”
Feng Xue shook it twice, pulled out the shattered chip residue inside along with a few wires, set them underfoot and stomped on them twice before tossing the flat little box into his bag. In terms of strength, this thing was just roadside junk, but its thermal conductivity could reach H17 level. It was enough to make a heat-dissipation ring for an energy weapon…
As he proceeded along the way, Feng Xue suddenly felt the same sensation he had in his previous life when playing games like Fallout as a junk collector. Every valuable item he picked up gave him a considerable sense of satisfaction, and when he encountered something that was clearly valuable but had to be abandoned because of limited backpack space, that feeling became even stronger.
“So in a certain sense, is Diablo also a search-fight-extract game?” Feng Xue cracked a joke in his mind and kicked away the half-remains of an intelligent pet beside his foot. This thing had obviously already been picked over; the most valuable chip and head sensors had both been taken, leaving only a furry plastic shell that wasn’t even worth melting down…
[Unrecorded entry detected. Record it? Note: Recording an entry will cause irreversible damage to the entry carrier. You may also obtain this entry by installing the cybernetic prosthesis.]
“Holy shit?!”
The instant his toe made contact, the golden finger suddenly popped up a notification. Feng Xue’s reflexes, which surpassed the limits of the flesh, instantly kicked in, and his whole body lunged toward the half mechanical cat he had kicked away. By a hair’s breadth, he caught it in his hand.
“Record it!”
With the command issued by thought, the half mechanical cat instantly disintegrated into useless debris, and an entry appeared before his eyes—
Entry: Spinosaurus Form
Type: Skill
Quality: Blue Excellent
Effect: Can only be granted to torso-type cybernetic prostheses. Upon activation, at the cost of temporarily deforming the body’s posture, grants a massive agility bonus. Duration: 1 minute/star. Cooldown: 10 minutes. Identical skills share cooldown.
Remark: Ha!
……
“Good grief! So it was a Hakimi after all. My apologies, my apologies.”
Feng Xue looked at his first blue entry, and for a moment, he felt as though he had a mouthful of complaints with nowhere to spit them out. But after glancing at the entry’s effect, he frowned again. Compared with [Great Strength], which explicitly stated a threefold amplification (increasing by two times), this entry’s bonus was only described as “massive.” Moreover, the word “agility” sounded more like a game attribute and was not as intuitive as “output force.”
“Forget it. I’ll just make one later and test it, won’t I?”
Feng Xue shook his head and decisively gave up on continuing to think about it. Time on garbage day was extremely precious; it couldn’t be wasted pondering such questions.
However, with the precedent of “Hakimi,” Feng Xue’s strategy for moving forward changed once again. As long as it was a mechanical construct with a certain degree of completeness, regardless of whether it had value or not, he had to check it. Fortunately, the golden finger’s judgment was very lenient; a casual kick was enough to know whether it had an entry, so it didn’t delay him too much.
It was just that after that, he did not encounter any more devices with entries. He did, however, pick up a cybernetic eye with an intact crystal structure. The already damaged eyeball itself was not worth much, but the crystal inside was a hot commodity whose sale was restricted by the Ge Union. Many high-end optical components needed this thing. Although Dayan had substitutes, they were basically incompatible with the Ge Union’s platforms. Either one smuggled an entire set over from Dayan, or one could only spend a high price to buy it in the Ge Union.
Now that he had obtained such a piece, using it to make a laser scalpel or a precision lithography pen would both be good choices. But considering that the golden finger could directly engrave chips, making it into a scalpel was probably better after all.
Worried about scratching the crystal, Feng Xue simply tossed the entire eyeball into his bag, and his steps grew even lighter.
As he drew closer and closer to the extraction point, the number of scavengers around him also increased, and small-scale conflicts gradually began breaking out along the roadside.
And this made Feng Xue realize that it was about time he left!
Feeling the still rather flat backpack behind him, Feng Xue was already quite satisfied with his gains this time. He dispelled the lucky thought of “maybe I can find another entry to record,” and following the directions on the minimap, began moving toward the extraction point less than one kilometer away from him.
Having learned from his previous lesson, he still maintained the posture of searching. His steps were not fast, his gaze still swept over the garbage heaps, and on that face adjusted with his flesh-and-blood ability, a somewhat disappointed expression remained at all times.
As he approached the extraction point, the pedestrians on the road gradually merged into a group. Feng Xue immediately quickened his pace and joined a small cluster of a dozen or so people.
The others had nothing to say about Feng Xue’s arrival. The reason for forming groups when leaving the garbage dump was precisely to use the sardine tactic—by increasing the number of companions, they reduced the chance of being targeted themselves. Naturally, the more people there were, the safer it was.
But when the group had only walked two hundred meters or so, Feng Xue sensed a gaze.
At first, Feng Xue thought it was merely a casual sweep from some gang members by the roadside. But as that gaze focused, he finally realized that he had been targeted again!
Feng Xue himself did not understand the reason, but in the eyes of seasoned cleaners and gang thugs, the difference between Feng Xue and the other scavengers was simply too obvious.
Putting aside the fact that there were no obvious traces of cybernetic modification on his entire body, compared with the faces around him that had been carved all over by the hardships of life, his complexion and bearing were far too presentable. So much so that even his hunched back carried a few degrees of deliberateness.
If he had been walking alone on the road, Feng Xue might not have attracted attention. But precisely because there were so many scavengers around him as contrast, he became especially conspicuous!
Feng Xue never would have imagined that he had drawn attention because he had taken the initiative to join the crowd, but the fact that he had been targeted was already established. Cautiously, he glanced from the corner of his eye in the direction of the gaze and saw several gang members who looked fierce and vicious.
Their clothing varied wildly, but the same tattoos and emblems declared their affiliation.
At this moment, they were whispering something among themselves, and as the group continued forward, those few people simply began closing in.
However, the scavengers in the group clearly did not know that those people already had a target. Seeing gang members approach, they were immediately triggered. No one knew who suddenly spoke, but along with the word “Run” entering their ears, the dozen or so scavengers carrying large and small packs almost all bolted at the same time!