The chanical limbs behind the golden-haired Elf chanic curled up, even his ears drooped slightly, making him look quite dejected.
Yu Sheng watched him from the side and after a mont said, "Well, it’s just about dropping a couple of nukes, right? And they don’t seem that big. If it really won’t work, I’ll open the door and send them back for you. You just give the cost price later..."
But before he could finish, Luo shook his head gloomily, "No, the key isn’t the nuclear weapons themselves, it’s their installation spots and the chain chanism—a complex layer of force field devices protect the core parts of the lab, enough to withstand considerable destructive force. And the safety system is ant to trigger a chain reaction at key protection points of the force field to shut down the operation of Zolda Black Stone from the inside out...
"Do you understand? Those two fusion bombs are rely triggers; simply sending them back is useless. They need to be reinstalled in the correct spots within the chain chanism, but the safety system was never designed to anticipate the triggers disappearing into thin air... Reinstalling the bombs without damaging the chain chanism is nearly impossible."
The people in the office exchanged confused glances, and Erin finally couldn’t resist speaking, "I don’t understand a thing—why is blowing up a lab so complicated? I an, haven’t you guys got loads of high-tech stuff? Can’t you find sothing more powerful than a nuke to just blow up the whole space station? What’s with all the chain reactions and internal shutdowns?"
"Of course not!" Luo hastily interrupted Erin before she could finish. Luo clearly had so psychological shadow from the 66.6 cm tall little person, avoiding direct eye contact while speaking, "You don’t understand, that lab... even the entire Black Stone Space Station, they’re not just protecting the ’Black Stone’, they also function as Black Stone’s limiter."
Yu Sheng imdiately furrowed his brow, "Limiter?"
"Yes, or to put it another way, the entire Black Stone Space Station is essentially a cage, with eighty percent of the structure designed to prevent Black Stone from escaping," Luo quickly explained, "Do you rember what I just said? Black Stone responds to external stimuli in various ways—it’s like so kind of living being, and while in the ’awakened’ state, it’s quite active and has a very strong tendency to escape. So we need the chain reaction triggered by the ’triggers’ to ensure it can instantly shift Black Stone’s operating mode, sending it back to its dormant state.
"If we don’t do this, and simply destroy the space station in a crude manner, the Zolda Black Stone, currently in operation, will be directly exposed to the outside world. I... don’t know what would happen then, but it’s certainly not going to be good."
After listening for a while, Yu Sheng finally caught up with the explanation but looked utterly puzzled, "What the heck, a nuclear bomb explosion can put it back to sleep?"
Luo’s eyelids visibly twitched, and he looked at Yu Sheng with helplessness and a sigh in his eyes.
"Don’t look at like that," Yu Sheng quickly waved his hand upon seeing the response, "I didn’t score that well in the college entrance exams."
Baili Qing, on the other hand, appeared thoughtful, "But as far as I know, before you guys obtained that ’stone’, it was circulating among scavenger settlents for a long ti and even sparked several warlord conflicts. During those tis, its state was..."
"Dormant," Luo sighed, "The Zolda Black Stone had been in a sleeping state for ages, which is why those primitive scavengers could survive passing it around. In fact, it wasn’t until three years ago that we first awakened it in a lab environnt and realized then its tendency to escape—but at the ti, it was still quite controllable and didn’t cause any trouble. Until about a year ago, its level of activity suddenly increased several tis over, as if it fully awakened... Thinking back, the ’loss of control’ probably started unknowingly back then."
Yu Sheng was suddenly stirred by the words, instinctively lowering his head.
Erin also raised her head, her scarlet eyes eting his.
"Carrying a painting fra is heavy enough," the little puppet began to mumble, "now I’ve to carry a hot potato too..."
Luo heard Erin’s mumbling and turned around in confusion, "What do you an by that?"
Yu Sheng waved his hand, given their lack of familiarity, he did not explain much and instead changed the subject abruptly, "I don’t think you should worry about those two ’safety systems’ anymore, they’re of no use now, even if the ’triggers’ are fixed."
Luo frowned, "Why do you say that?"
"Because Black Stone’s current active state has nothing to do with the activation you perford three years ago," Yu Sheng sighed, "It’s now agitated for other reasons—the ’shutdown’ process you set for it three years ago has already failed."
Luo turned around, still puzzled, directing her gaze at Baili Qing.
"I suggest you trust what he’s saying," Baili Qing stated emotionlessly, "He’s an expert."
"Isn’t this hunter gentleman an expert in combating the Dark Angel?" Luo’s expression was sowhat bewildered.
But the next mont, she suddenly realized, her bewildered expression turning to shock.
"You understand now?" Baili Qing calmly stared into Luo’s eyes, her tone carrying a hint of helplessness and annoyance, "Will you still casually pick up things to study in the future?"
"I..."
Luo opened her mouth a few tis, but in the end, she didn’t say a word.
After a few seconds of silence, she finally turned her head to Yu Sheng and asked, "Alright, Mr. Hunter, so what’s your suggestion?"
"I need to get close to that ’stone,’ and I’ll need your cooperation for that," Yu Sheng said seriously. "Maybe I can find another way to calm it down—or figure out what it’s ’thinking.’ But let be clear, I can’t guarantee success. I have to try first."
"No problem," Luo nodded almost imdiately. "As long as you can get back to the space station, I’ll imdiately order the lab to open its doors for you... As for my ’disappearance’ during this ti, I’ll co up with a reasonable explanation to dispel my subordinates’ doubts."
"No, it might not be that simple," Yu Sheng shook his hand right away. Images of the mind entities caught in webs and trapped in dreams on the ’Mirror Space Station’ eroded by ominous forces flashed through his mind. "Are you really sure that those researchers and security forces around the ’Black Stone’... are still your subordinates?"
Luo was stunned for a mont upon hearing this, and her expression changed: "What do you an by that?"
"Recall your state just now," Yu Sheng shook his head. "When soone questioned the loss of control over the Black Stone and demanded you shut down the research facility, what was your first reaction?"
Two seconds later, Luo’s face visibly changed.
"That ’stone’... it can perceive external threats to itself," Yu Sheng said slowly, deep in thought. "It will contaminate and assimilate the surrounding minds, turning you into its protectors without you even noticing, and it doesn’t stop there—those two nuclear bombs transmitted to the Boundary Land were clearly no coincidence."
Luo reacted instantly: "So you’re saying... it’s already trying to dismantle the restraints around itself!?"
"We’re not facing just a ’stone,’ but a ’brain’ that’s occupied the space station, capable of perceiving threats and malice—its criteria for threat assessnt and perception are a total mystery," Yu Sheng said, pacing slowly around the office. "The researchers and security forces around the Black Stone, even the space station itself, will go to any lengths to protect it, not to ntion that the Black Stone itself might have all sorts of bizarre ’abilities’..."
Luo listened attentively, took a deep breath after so reflection, but just as she was about to speak, a piercing alarm interrupted her actions.
The alarm resounded throughout the Special Service Bureau Building!
Red light suddenly flooded the corridor outside the door, and several warning notifications popped up on the screens on a nearby desk. Baili Qing’s eyes sharpened as she swiftly moved to one of the screens and connected an incessantly flashing call request: "What’s going on?"
"Director!" an urgent voice ca from the speaker, "Space detectors have sensed several anomalous mass focal points forming on the second customs floor. Sothing is tearing through our spatial barrier!"
"Evacuate customs, everyone fall back to the buffer zone and stand by, security forces are on their way," Baili Qing said quickly, then looked over at Song Cheng not far away. "Song, take a team over imdiately—bring heavy firepower!"
"Yes, Director!"
Song Cheng quickly left, while Baili Qing connected several other ergency communications, rapidly grasping the ’intrusion’ situation occurring within the building and completing deploynts for all affected floors and departnts. Only then did Yu Sheng chi in: "Where is that customs floor exactly? I’ll head over to help."
"You haven’t been there, I’ll take you," Baili Qing said bluntly, stepping out from behind the desk, turning her head to glance at Luo, "You co too."
"Assuming you don’t mind a Black Spot scientist wandering around your Special Service Bureau Building," Luo said nonchalantly, as her legs beneath the long skirt remodeled into nimble wheel-like forms.
Erin glanced up at her, the small puppet’s face full of doubt: "What can you do there, you can’t even beat ."
Luo was montarily choked by the words, but fortunately, Baili Qing spoke up: "If Black Spot Soldiers do rush in, at least she can negotiate on our behalf."
"Alright then—if those intruding Black Spot soldiers are even willing to listen to reason," Erin shook her little head, then waved her hand, and a dozen mass-produced puppets imdiately ran over to line up behind her.
Admittedly, they looked quite imposing—if you overlooked the fact that each of these little things was only 66.6 centiters tall.
"I still trust my ’troops’ more,"
Erin said smugly.
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