Chapter 1069: Chapter 78: Take Action

Protector Shi lay in a cave. This “cave” should have been created when a kinetic energy projectile pierced through the battleship’s outer armor. Perhaps it might have bounced inside the ship, causing this. The cave passed through a tiny compartment—it might originally have been a place for low-ranking officers to store personal belongings. Even now, there are piles of trash here, seemingly scorched by high temperatures, stuck to the walls.

At this moment, Protector Shi wrapped himself in a dust-proof cloth, lay on the ground, and disguised himself as a pile of garbage.

He had just taken a distant glance at the cave’s exit and saw a group of patrolling Chaldea City defense forces. Leading the group unmistakably was a First Heavenly Layer Sky Warrior. It seemed that Chaldea had started sealing off various small paths.

The probing capabilities of a First Heavenly Layer prosthetic body were indeed astonishing. Protector Shi didn’t want to gamble on the sensitivity of the opponent’s probing equipment, so he turned off most of his own equipment and silenced his radio waves, leaving only passive probing equipment active, waiting silently.

Only after the other party walked far away did he move slowly using his toes and elbows against the wall. The magnetism generated between his fingers fixed him to the wall, allowing him to move like a bug.

He forcibly squeezed through the decaying door of this utility room and entered a severely deformed passage.

This passage was almost twisted like a fried dough twist. The kinetic energy projectile likely caused the penetrating “cave” after the passage had deformed. The final battle of this warship was probably very intense. The deformed passage looked like some kind of abstract painting, with rust marks even appearing on the walls.

The remnants of the warship aren’t ideal building materials. Warship remnants that have lost their surface protective layer are likely to react with air, ultimately losing valuable recyclable resources. Fortunately, the Benchmark Man’s demand for oxygen is very low, so such situations are within acceptable limits.

However, back then, the people of the Neutral City-State truly didn’t have many paths to take.

This passage wasn’t very spacious, to begin with. After severe deformation, Protector Shi had to squeeze through it himself. There were marks on the ground. Members of the Six Dragons Sect occasionally explored this route years ago. Just follow the scratches left on the rust marks back then; there’s no need to worry about unexploded bombs from a century ago.

Although a hundred-year-old bomb might not be lethal anymore, the noise would certainly be significant. Mechanical waves would quickly transmit along the steel structure. With just a few detection points, it’s possible to quickly locate the explosion site. Mechanical waves travel faster in metal structures, which is an alarm measure that all Space Cities possess. After an explosion occurs, control systems can quickly lower partition walls and gates to seal off points of fire or leakage.

That would be quite troublesome.

After circling a considerable distance, Protector Shi finally crawled out and fell into another wide but rarely trafficked space.

In the city of Chaldea, no matter how good the sense of space is, it’s never enough. Protector Shi merely pushed open a servic door but seemingly arrived next to the sewage system. And above his head, an inverted residential area with windows was suspending.

This place is the city’s entire circulation system, purifying the air and also recovering lubricants, coolants, and combustion products of propellants volatilized in the air.

Protector Shi immediately used his fingers to fix himself to a pipeline, utilizing the pipeline to cover himself, blocking possible lines of sight from the residential area.

This place won’t do. Those residential areas above constitute the “Middle Class District,” and there are even light bulbs between the pipes to illuminate the surroundings. It’s a rare area in Chaldea that could be described as having “scenery.” At least the view here is fairly open. Besides a wealthy area where one can view the cosmos, this place is quite popular.

Occasionally, people would also come here to the exhaust reclamation pipelines to take a stroll.

He needed to move to a more remote place…

Protector Shi listened carefully, then cursed, “Damn it…”

His body wriggled along the pipeline like a goldfish swimming.

A buzzing sound emerged in the air. A group of drones approached slowly, bearing the official insignia of Chaldea.

Protector Shi used only passive hearing to grasp the drones’ positions. He utilized the pipeline to block the drones’ sight, simultaneously leaving quietly.

Minutes later, he gradually couldn’t hear the buzzing sound any longer.

Protector Shi let out a slight sigh of relief. He slid his hand, and a plasma beam shot from his palm to cut the pipe’s surface. The fingers of his other hand generated electromagnetic force, gripping the pipe’s surface. The “whizzing” wind sound issued from within.

Protector Shi cautiously cut open a large circle, then flipped his body and sank in. Subsequently, he kicked with both feet, fixing himself. He seemed to fall into a typhoon… no, the man-made gale roaring through the tunnel was even faster than natural storms. A Homo sapiens falling into it would be instantly swept away.

Protector Shi took out quick-drying glue. He needed to seal the cut he made.

Only then would abnormal pressure fluctuations not alert Chaldea.

Okay, it’s almost there.

Protector Shi sighed.

He couldn’t avoid destroying several pressurization devices and several monitoring devices within the pipes next.

However, no one would obstruct this stretch anymore. Hopefully, he could reach the factory area just like this.

Protector Shi pushed with his feet, sprinting with the gale.

Like Superman.

…………

“Excluding point F… Excluding point H…”

Jeanne closed her eyes, compressed her visual processing, and let her brain’s spatial awareness and graphical imagination be used by Tumor Xiang Shan to plan the next route.

Finally, she rebooted her prosthetic eye, waved her hand, and led her team to the next suspicious point.

It looked like an electricity equipment room. Tumor Xiang Shan said, “According to the public city master plan and the production licenses of factories available online, there’s no need to equip this area with dedicated electricity equipment, and no enterprises have set up any large-scale equipment here in the past decade. This electricity equipment is much larger than what the plan shows.”

Jeanne glanced around and whispered, “But it seems like this is simply… saving materials by directly using the walls of other functional facilities as walls for the electrical equipment room, hurriedly enclosing it. I find this quite natural.”

“Yes, so that’s probably why they might have hidden things here, isn’t it? I also find it quite natural.”

At this time, Jue Jue had already kicked open the door to the electricity equipment room. Subsequently, her face changed, she said, “There’s a problem here. The equipment is too packed, here…”

Jeanne tilted her head and glanced inside.

Xiang Shan also saw it. At that moment, Jeanne instinctively reached for her lower back. A cylindrical object jumped into her palm.

It was an EMP generator.

Tumor Xiang Shan said, “Make your move.”