Chapter 504 A Huge Loan! The Best Opportunity To Join The Demon Race!
The principle behind the old TV’s detection function was still a mystery even until now.
Based on the displayed effect, even electromagnetism imaging and infrared reaction imaging could not achieve such a smooth and perfect video feed.
Furthermore, this was merely a low-end instrument that even the ordinary people of the former Blazeland could use.
Regardless, Su Mo was occupied with inspecting the camp. His hands were toggling the controls and his mind did not dwell upon how much truth there was there to uncover regarding the fall of Blazeland. On the TV screen, the video image distance to the camp was narrowing. Finally, Su Mo could clearly see, for the first time, the device that was creating the fog and its true appearance. Strictly speaking, it was not a device per se. Rather, it was a… A glass container that contained a mass of wriggling flesh! Unlike the brains of Lu Kuan and the others in the glass brain box, this mass of flesh was like a meat putty pureed from a grinder, and did not exhibit even the slightest semblance of structure or form.
With the container acting as a constraint, the meat putty wriggled up and down as it continuously squirmed about inside the container.
With each violent wriggle, tiny fog clouds gushed out from the meat putty and scattered into the air through a hole in the containerforming the thick fog column. “Sure enough, they are also using the mysterious Old Era Technology.” “These things, no matter what their effects are, on the basis of their appearances alone, cannot be classified as being anywhere close to normal at all.”
Muttering under his breath about his discovery, Su Mo zoomed into the image as close as possible in order to observe the meat putty’s working principle in detail, as well as the personnel that came out every now and then to maintain it. However, he promptly gave up after a brief period of observation.
Without actually touching and testing the meat putty, there was nothing he could learn from an observation like this.
The entire working procedure was rather straightforward. From the base underneath the glass box, a current of faint yellow electrical current stimulated and struck the meat putty.
The meat putty would then attempt to escape the glass container in response to the electrical stimuli.
However, due to the constraints of the glass box, the putty could not escape, but instead had to adapt, much like a gecko, and slowly expel tiny bits of its body through the specially made holes in the glass box. It was a pity that whenever the meat putty reached the final 30%, the maintenance personnel would come over and supply it with highly nutritious substances through the device.
Lacking any other option, the meat putty was forced to absorb it as it would once again grow rapidly. The other 70% that was expelled out of the container would all then have been done in vain. Then, the electrical current would stimulate it again and the process would repeat itself. This entire process ultimately formed the fog column. This method of operation was simple and any villager could have mastered its operation easily, let alone these “professionals” that the demon race had sent. Su Mo continued to toggle the controls. This time, however, he was cautious. When observing the largest tent on the left, he did not rashly zoom the camera in and enter. Instead, he turned his sights to the insides of the smallest tent on the right.
“Two dwarves are maintaining the device. This is interesting!”
Su Mo panned the camera so that the video feed now displayed the interior of the tent, which was furnished rather normally. Within a single glance, Su Mo saw a capacitor battery that was similar to the ones he had around him.
Even though the enemy’s capacitor battery was significantly larger than his, there was no difference with regard to their working principles. The old TV did not have an option to receive audio input, hence, Su Mo could not tell what the two dwarves, who were sitting on the battery, were talking about, even if he tried to lip-read.
However, judging from their outfits, and by repeatedly zooming in and out on details, Su Mo was keen enough to pick up on something unusual.
On their necks, Su Mo noticed a mark about the size of a fingerprint. When the dwarves spoke, the skin would stretch and deform in line with their vocal movements.
Yet somehow, no matter how the dwarves spoke, this mark maintained its shape and did not deform in the slightest despite the skin it was on doing so. It almost seemed as if the mark and the skin were not on the same plane of existence. Perhaps… the mark was like a living being and possessed the ability to adjust its position based on the movement of the skin.
Naturally, this observation was only possible thanks to the old TV’s ability tozoom in and magnify details. Otherwise, it would have been difficult to spot the mark, even if Su Mo were standing right in front of them. He zoomed in and out repeatedly to test the limits of the old TV. He made sure that he would not trigger any reaction even if he zoomed straight into the dwarves’ faces. Only then did Su Mo feel relieved.
Next, Su Mo toggled the controls once again and the scene shifted back to the tent at the front.
“These look like the Light Empire’s cyborgs. Modifying their left hand into an electric drill is pretty sexy.” As soon as he entered the interior of the tent, he immediately spotted the Ent that had been searching for him earlier. Currently, the Ent was comfortably rooted to the ground, as light green roots endlessly fed the Ent with energy from the earth below. On his left side, however, were three cyborgs that seemed rather peculiar. Two of them had their lower halves modified into caterpillar tracks. Their function was most likely to transport and carry things. The other had his left arm modified into a multifunctional “electric screwdriver” and seemed like a proper utility handyman.
Similarly, Su Mo found marks on them, just like the ones on the dwarves. The three had theirs on the exposed skin of their necks, while the Ent had it on the inside of one of its roots.
However, the marks on the dwarves were a faint blue and seemingly pulsated at a regular rhythm.
The cyborgs and the Ent’s marks were faint yellow instead, and seemed to be of a lower grade.
After observing for a while and not noticing anything else unusual, he turned his sights to the remaining two tents and inspected them one by one. After a while, he zoomed the camera back to the top of the fog column, where he could have an overview of the entire camp. Rubbing his temples, he leaned against the soil wall. “Everyone possesses the marks. It seems that the most common ones are the white marks, followed by the yellow marks. The highest-grade marks should be the blue ones.”
“In all likelihood, these things are the source of their energy. Or perhaps these things are to help them differentiate between the enemy and themselves.”
“If I could think of a way to get my hands on the marks…No, it would suffice to just capture one of them.” “I’ll kill one and the mark would naturally lose its owner. At that point, the system’s appraisal function will reveal its true properties and usage.” “Perhaps I can even make it mine by using the system to upgrade and modify it!”
In his heart, Su Mo was already certain of the source of their peculiar power to assume the identity of others.
In all likelihood, this mark was the source of that curious power.
However, he could not inspect the marks as the requirements for the system’s appraisal function were not met. He needed to capture a lone enemy in order to conduct a proper investigation.
He meticulously deliberated on the situation.
Upon realizing that he only needed to capture one lone enemy to solve the problem, his thoughts immediately cleared up. Earlier, he had attempted to lure the enemy out of their camp.
However, the enemy probably would not move alone. Rather, they would move in groups and cover one another as needed.
In this scenario, it was extremely difficult to silently take one of them out. Once he failed, his position would immediately be exposed. Hence, if he had to commit the perfect crime…
He shifted the camera view back to the writhing mass of meat. His eyes narrowed as an idea was immediately conceived in his head.
“D*mn, it’s really tiring to transform into this stupid dwarf. Walking in his form feels as if someone cast a slow spell onto me. Quickly, help me get the awl.”
“D*mn it, this won’t do. When I return to the clan, I’ll sell off this rubbish dwarf template. I’ll spend a bit more money to get a more comfortable one.”
The battery supplying the equipment seemed to have malfunctioned as a yellow fault indicator was lit up.
The dwarf sitting on the battery noticed this and jumped off while muttering as he adeptly walked to the rear of the battery However, the other dwarf did not respond affirmatively in response to his muttering. Instead, there was a somewhat complaining voice that replied. “Em? Harl? You’ve finally realized?”
“How many times have I told you back then, but you just wouldn’t listen. Wouldn’t it be sweet if we had bought a higher-level cyborg instead and just ran errands for the people in the clan? Instead, we ended up coming here while fearing for our lives just to collect information in exchange for contribution points.”
“Ha, Turner, I didn’t intend for things to end up this way. They told us that the dwarven population was massive and that they possessed numerous territories. If we managed to blend in, we would definitely have plenty to eat and could easily acquire plenty of good things to exchange for contribution points.”
“However, I never imagined that the food given to lower rank dwarves was like pig feed, and they had barely any benefits either. It’s completely inhumane!” Taking the awl handed to him by Turner the dwarf, he gave the rear cover of the battery a few knocks, after which the yellow indicator light went out.
Watching the green indicator light once again turning on, the dwarf named Harl cackled.
“We could not collect information on the king of the humans, Su Mo, because of his identity as a territory lord. Even so, once we complete this job…” “The templates of the humans under his command will surely sell out like hotcakes. By then, the data from just a few of them should net us enough profit to purchase a new set of templates. Furthermore, if this king of humans develops fast enough, we might even be able to trade the information for top-grade templates. It’s truly something worth looking forward to!”
“That’s right. However, this dwarf identity is still somewhat useful. Luckily, we learned a lot during our stay at the black stone base camp. Our presence there allowed us to get a headstart on the situation before the rest of the older folks in the clan could discover it. Otherwise, we wouldn’t even be left with scraps if they had discovered the presence of the humans first. Wait…”
“Why is it yellow again?”
Longing for a better future, the two “dwarves” were just about to climb on the battery and sit down again. However, before they could start climbing, the indicator light that Harl had previously repaired once again turned yellow, indicating that something was faulty. This time, the two dwarves were both agitated.
“I didn’t buy a second-hand item… why is it faulty?”
Harl walked to the rear again and found the spot where he hammered on earlier. Once again, he hammered on it a few times—the sound of the hammering echoed throughout the tent.
The yellow fault indicator light once again disappeared. However, unlike before, before Harl could even turn his head around, the green fault indicator instantaneously changed to yellow.
Compared to before, this change had happened even quicker!
“This is not good, this is not good. The collector is out of control.”
“The rate of disintegration is too fast. Quickly adjust the battery power rate, don’t charge it anymore!”
Before the two dwarves could step outside to yell for someone, a noise erupted outside the tent.
Rushing out of the tent where the battery was, Harl the dwarf immediately turned his sights to the collector that was right in the center of the camp.
What he saw instantly sent him into a state of unease.
If the frequency electrical shocks previously had been one shock every ten seconds, then the resulting rate of disintegration was approximately 0.05%! However, now the frequency of the electric shocks had increased to once every four seconds, and the rate of disintegration had in turn increased to 0.2%! Moreover, this rate was increasing non-stop. At this rate, either the meat putty would escape first, or perhaps either the battery power supply or the highly nutritious substance that was fed to it would be first to be completely exhausted! “What do we do? The collection progress is down to the final 20%.” “Without this 20%, we can’t even afford one-tenth of the template’s price. The contribution points we invested into this will all be lost!”
It would seem that the tall bear person was the strongest among them.
However, as they spoke, all eyes turned toward the two dwarves. Evidently, they were the real decision-makers of the entire team.
“Do we go?”
“Only in your dreams. We were only able to buy all this equipment by taking on a loan. If we leave empty-handed, we’ll need to deal with the high-interest payments for our loans.”
“At that point, we won’t be able to pay it off even if we sell ourselves off and become lowly mercenaries, working off our lives for the benefit of others. You might as well just kill me now!” Turner, the cautious one, was interrupted immediately by Harl whose eyes were now brimming with madness.
Turner shuddered immediately when the words ‘loan’ and ‘interest’ were mentioned. His eyes displayed a hint of reckless madness because they were already in such a disastrous predicament.
“How many portions of the nutrients do we have left?”
The handyman immediately raised his hand. “We still have six. Based on our current situation, it will only last us less than half an hour. We need at least… at least forty portions!”
“Forty portions? Do you f*cking know what forty portions even means?” Like a beast driven to madness, Harl immediately jumped from where he was standing and hit the handyman on the knee. His strike was not strong. However, as both their marks flickered, the handyman immediately lost all motor control of his body and fell to the ground.
“I hired you all and paid for it. Your lives are now mine.”
“Before all the information is collected, everyone shall immediately go over to your respective positions and assist in stabilizing the collector and reducing its energy consumption!” “Without my orders, no one is allowed to return. You must remain in your position even if you die!” He pointed at the fog in the air that had intensified, which had almost taken on solid form.
He took out a dozen or so cube-shaped devices and laid them on the ground.
After being bellowed at by Harl, the remaining eighteen foreign races picked up the devices and scattered like birds-running in the direction of the fog column. While disguised, these foreign races did not seem to feel the pressure exerted by the territory’s restrictions.
They arranged themselves in an orderly manner, standing three kilometers apart from one another. In the blink of an eye, the campsite, where twenty people had once stood, was now suddenly empty. “Go and repair the power source. See if you can control the power output. I’ll be here modulating the energy block.” “There’s only 18% left. It has to hang on!”
Listening to Harl’s heavy’s breathing, the honest Turner nodded his head, entered the tent, and took out his tools to begin repairing. Currently, Harl was the only one left standing outside in the middle of the camp. Their seemingly perfect defensive arrangements earlier had instantaneously crumbled. “D*mn it! There are indeed still secrets here in the territory of the king of humans, Su Mo. Secrets that we are unaware of.”
“After I get the template this time, I’ll personally enter their territory and see for myself. I’ll find out what mystery this Su Mo is actually hiding.”
He tossed in another portion of the nutrients. However, the mass of flesh was still speeding up its disintegration process. The sight of this immediately agitated Harl the dwarf as he cursed incessantly.
However, this time, like a ghost, a voice rang in his ears nonchalantly.
“Eh, so you want to know my secrets?”
“Do you need to take some medicine?”
Wah!
This voice was likened to a sudden pat on the back while one was walking at midnight, or even a strange growl by the ear when one was sleeping Immediately, Harl became dazed and subconsciously turned to where the voice had come from.
However, the very next second, he nearly jumped in fright. His mouth was trembling uncontrollably as he was about to yell.
Unfortunately, the human figure he saw was well-prepared. With a stretch of his arm, the dwarf’s neck was tightly grasped in his hand.
The words that were coming out were seemingly choked to death by the force of this human figure’s grip. “Harl, what’s wrong? Is there something wrong with the collector?” The slight noise caught the attention of Turner, who was inside the tent. However, the noise was not too loud. Turner, who was flat on the ground repairing the battery, did not pay much attention to it and merely asked aloud.
“Be quiet. If you wish to die now, then go ahead and shout for help”.
“Tell him that everything is alright!”
Like a devil, Su Mo watched the dwarf’s face starting to swell and turn red. An iconic grin was etched on his face as he lowered his arm and spoke into the dwarf’s ears. After seeing the latter nod his head, Su Mo loosened his grip. “Cough, I’m fine. You just handle the battery. Cough, cough. I’ll handle things outside here.”
“Okay!”
Harl, the leader among them two, evidently valued his life greatly. His willingness to cooperate further widened the grin on Su Mo’s face. “I’ll give you a chance. You have five minutes to explain to me why you infiltrated my territory.”
“Be warned that you only have one chance. Once you’re done, I’ll interrogate the other dwarf to cross-check the information. Whoever is lying will…die!”
This was a classic and timeless interrogation tactic.
The first half of Su Mo’s words made Harl the dwarf immediately want to answer. However, he immediately turned silent after listening to the second half.
After ten seconds of consideration, Harl’s facial expression shifted over and over again. Finally, he put on a solemn expression and looked at the tent where the lights were brightly shining; he nodded his head firmly. “I’ll tell you, but don’t kill me. I’ll be your… dog, no, I’ll be your slave.” “Okay!”
Six minutes later, when Harl the dwarf had finished his last sentence, Su Mo immediately snapped his neck.
He drew the dagger that was strapped to the dwarf’s thigh, pointed at the dwarf’s neck, and gently carved out the blue mark. The strip of blood-red flesh was now in Su Mo’s hands. “This is interesting. I acquired a huge debt even before I did anything.” “However, with this identity, my entry into the demon race is assured. This is… the perfect opportunity!” His eyes narrowed as he observed the properties of the carved out flesh that the system had scanned. He thought of the confessions that Harl had uttered and broke out into a silent laugh.
