Feng Xue was very satisfied with the results of his face-sculpting. He controlled the body to sit down in a corner, and only then opened his golden finger’s warehouse—
[Materials obtained from this exploration: Destiny Type-II Pulse Emitter, Rhine KN-4 Basic Model Cybernetic Eyes *8, Neural Transcoders *14, Loken Third-Generation Neural Plexuses *13...]
[Estimated value: 6,837 vouchers. Extract/Sell. (If no choice is made within three days, they will be sold automatically.)]
[Your reward: Portable Operating Table has been issued. This package will be retained for 72 hours. Please claim it before the time limit expires.]
Feng Xue estimated the price. All he could say was that it was about what he had expected. The cyberware installed by scavengers and gangs was mostly high-end two-star or low-end three-star stuff. Even if it were removed whole, with its who-knew-how-many-hands-old condition, each piece would top out at two hundred credits. If he stripped out the core components and paired them with a metal casing, the profit would basically be cut in half, but the quantity he could take away was six or seven times greater.
Considering that even if he kept these things and assembled them into cyberware himself, each piece would only earn him a dozen or so points more, and he would have to factor in the time cost as well—and given that he had no idea when he would be able to reopen the shop—it was better to exchange them for cash.
Since the price offered by the golden finger was decent, he did not hesitate. Apart from the Destiny Type-II Pulse Emitter, he sold the rest as a bundle to the golden finger, receiving a total of over five thousand vouchers. Just from that price difference, one could tell how valuable that thing was.
He really had not been wrong when he said earlier that Brother Fist had wasted it. It was not that it could not be used as a weapon, but a secondhand recycled component worth over sixteen hundred on its own had actually been turned into a hand-cannon cyberware with a cost-performance value of probably just over five hundred. How was that any different from using a rocket launcher as a mace?
Still, this sort of component needed to be paired with a high-output energy source to display its power. Feng Xue did not possess an energy-type Source Ability, so for the time being he could only put it away. If he could obtain an energy-output-type entry, that would naturally be perfect. Even if he could not, making a fixed turret and installing it in the shop would also be fine.
After dealing with these gains, Feng Xue finally turned his attention to the golden finger’s reward. With the extraction confirmed, a case about the size of the black briefcases used in gangster deals in movies appeared before his eyes—
Name: Portable Operating Table
Type: Medical Equipment
Quality: Blue, Excellent
Description: Portable surgical equipment produced by Rhine Life. Simple to operate, stable in performance, comprehensive in function, and outstanding in precision. It is sufficient to meet the needs of the vast majority of cyberware surgeries. However, before this product was sold as far as Great Yan, it once became a symbol of scavengers—no, even now, it still is.
Note: Clearly, the people who developed this equipment did not realize that in the Columbian Union, patients who could get a cyberware doctor to make a house call would never possibly use such “crude” equipment.
“Good grief. No wonder it’s the reward for killing scavengers. But for me, it’s just right.” Feng Xue was quite satisfied with this reward. Although the old man had left behind quite a few surgical instruments, they were inevitably old and backward in a way that suited the garbage heaps of the slums. Although Feng Xue himself had gotten off that operating table, if he had a choice, he would still prefer to use more advanced equipment on himself.
Feng Xue opened the briefcase and began feeling out how to use this new toy. At the same time, he split off part of his consciousness and began controlling the Demon Sword’s body to move. The fist techniques within the Heavenly Martial Killing Dao were practiced one move at a time—not involving their true essence, merely to stretch the muscles and bones, while also letting Feng Xue adapt to this method of control with only a small amount of consciousness invested.
Half an hour passed like this. Only after Feng Xue had become very smooth at controlling the Demon Sword did he close the product manual, then control the Demon Sword to pick up the case containing five pairs of arm cyberware and leave the clinic through the back door...
...
Looking at the dark, oppressive sky overhead, Feng Xue strolled along this unfamiliar street. Not counting the golden finger’s battlefield deployments, this was only his second time going out. But compared to the unease he had felt when going to find Xie Miao before, Feng Xue, now controlling the Demon Sword, felt unexpectedly relaxed.
While continuously breaking down and summarizing the information from the Sword of Hell and the Heavenly Martial Killing Dao in his mind and transferring it into his brain disk, his feet followed the AI’s guidance and brought him to a location far from the garbage dump.
The entire garbage district had been built around the dump, and being far from the dump meant that this place was already close to the “city’s edge.”
Although this world had the concept of nations, the Columbian Union’s system was more like that of city-states. Large cities with populations exceeding ten million were like isolated islands upon the earth. There was no civilian intercity transportation here at all. Apart from traveling on business as company employees aboard private aircraft, ordinary people had almost no safe way to leave the city.
The reason for this was the vast number of mutated creatures in the wilderness.
Feng Xue could not find the origin of these mutated creatures online, nor were there any related records in Old Jiang’s materials. He only knew that these things were so powerful they almost did not seem like carbon-based lifeforms. Even the cannon fodder that often moved in swarms of hundreds or thousands could charge while withstanding machine-gun fire, while high-level monsters could even contend in strength against six-star mechs.
Fortunately, however, mutated creatures did not harbor any special hatred toward humans. They also had a stable food chain among themselves and would not, like in games or novels, randomly launch monster sieges for no reason. Moreover, probably due to their bodily density, very few species were capable of flight. This was also why most cities in this world were built atop support pillars over fifty meters tall.
Yes, that was right. The garbage district was actually the space beneath the city’s pillars.
However, even though the city authorities would, in order to protect the pillars from damage, dispatch mercenaries and troops over the long term to exterminate beast herds that approached the city, they would only target individuals or groups that might pose a threat to the pillars. As a result, mutated beasts still frequently charged into the garbage district.
The closer one got to the city’s edge, the more dangerous it became. But according to Feng Xue’s senses, the farther he was from the garbage dump, the cleaner and tidier the buildings he saw became.
This was not an illusion, but a matter of clientele.
Unlike the impoverished who could not afford street-block rent and had no choice but to live in the garbage district, the locations near the city’s edge were mostly occupied by resting mercenaries, military personnel, or desperadoes hoping to make some extra money out in the wilderness.
They had strength and were willing to spend money. What followed naturally needed no further explanation.
However, Feng Xue had obviously not come here to try his luck in the wilderness. He simply followed the navigation and arrived before a tailor shop that looked perfectly ordinary, yet whose price tags made one’s scalp prickle at a glance. After confirming the arrangement of the secret signal shown in the photo, he pushed the door open and entered.
“Taking measurements, or altering clothes?”
The boss behind the counter looked up and glanced at him, asking in a casual tone. Recalling the jargon from Old Jiang’s notes, Feng Xue immediately replied:
“Altering clothes. The trouser legs are too baggy, so I want them taken in. The material’s good material—I can’t bear to throw it away.”
Hearing Feng Xue’s response, the boss stopped what he was doing. Only then did he speak with a slightly more serious air:
“Good material? What kind?”
“Bought in silk floss and wove it at home.”
Hearing this, the boss knew that the person before him had not walked into the wrong place, and immediately said, “Five hundred deposit.”
“...” Feng Xue felt a slight twinge in his heart, but he still bought an anonymous chip worth 500 credits from the system shop and handed it over.
The boss took the chip and swept it with the card reader built into his thumb. Knowing the amount was correct, he turned and took from the shelf a neatly folded hooded cloak, placing it on the table—
“Altering clothes takes time. The customer can wear this first. If you’re not in a hurry, you can also wait in the lounge at the back...”
As for why the AI in this book is about the same as in reality, it is not that this world lacks advanced AI, nor is there some taboo like in cyberpunk. As for why it has not appeared, the answer is quite simple: because it is expensive.
Advanced AI in the Columbian Union is very expensive, and as a high-level production tool, it is heavily taxed.
In addition, running AI requires high-computing-power equipment or a network. The former cannot be hidden from the gendarmerie, while the latter is even less secure. Old Jiang himself was highly capable and had a five-star military access pod, so he did not particularly need AI assistance. Therefore, even if Old Jiang could write one, he would not use it. The same was true for the other people in the garbage district: they either could not afford it, or feared leaks.
Of course, there are also digital lifeforms transformed from soul Source Energy, but that is not something the garbage district could come into contact with.