Infinite Train Project

Jiang City, afternoon, a gentle breeze.

A faint glimmer flashed on the balcony of a high-rise apartment. The man looked up at the sun, checked the time on his watch, and then closed the lens cover of his telescope.

In the distance, beyond the clouds, the city was deathly still. Above, the massive, cloud-like mass hung motionless like a mountain.

Beep, beep, his watch chimed.

5:00 PM, one and a half hours until dark.

The man pulled a chain, and a specially made alloy gate rose outside the original floor-to-ceiling window, gradually swallowing the light in the room.

Sunlight streamed through the gaps in the alloy plates, casting linear rays across the living room filled with supplies.

Buzz...buzz...buzz...

A strange sound arose. The man paused, listening intently.

Instantly, his expression changed.

He grabbed his self-defense dagger, strapped it to his waist, and carefully exited the apartment, climbing the stairs to the rooftop terrace.

A helicopter approached from the distance, flying low, the deafening roar of its rotors growing louder.

Whoosh!

The man produced a long water pipe from somewhere, with a tattered orange cloth tied to the end, and began waving it rapidly at the helicopter.

Inside the helicopter, the girl wearing headphones saw the orange flash and wordlessly traced the window with her finger.

"Mr. Wen?"

The pilot in the front also saw the orange on the rooftop and tentatively asked, looking back.

The man called Mr. Wen, a middle-aged man in a suit, glanced out the window, closed his eyes indifferently, and said, "Wishful thinking. Who cares about the lives of these poor wretches!"

The pilot fell silent.

The middle-aged man noticed the girl's gaze and said loudly, "What, overflowing with sympathy?"

"Remember, they are not like us. If tomorrow is the apocalypse, we will be the last ones to die, understand?!"

"Tch~"

The girl's expression was cold as she looked out the window, dismissive of the middle-aged man's words.

Whoosh~

The helicopter roared past in the sky.

The man on the distant rooftop watched this scene, casually lowering the long pole, his gaze relaxed.

"Damn it, what a nice helicopter, what a pity..."

Wee-ooh! Wee-ooh! Wee-ooh!

A few minutes later, a rapid alarm sounded in the helicopter.

"Stall warning - stall warning!"

"What's wrong!!"

"Lift suddenly lost, possibly encountering an unknown vortex!" The young co-pilot's expression changed drastically as he struggled to maintain flight.

The sudden situation threw everyone into a panic.

"We're in the air, in broad daylight, are we running into some kind of ghost?" The middle-aged man in the back, who had been calm, shouted first.

The pilot looked at the airborne radar but found nothing unusual. At that moment, the light in the cockpit suddenly changed, as if covered by shadow. Realizing something, he quickly craned his neck to look up at the sky.

The sight made his pupils shrink, and his face turned ashen.

A bizarre black shadow was faintly visible in the massive cloud above, blotting out the sky!

The clouds churned, and a violent wind suddenly rose!

The helicopter was caught by a huge suction force and was uncontrollably gaining altitude.

"Warning! Warning!"

"Damn it! Captain! What do we do!"

The co-pilot, still unsure of what was happening, looked at the captain in a panic, only to find that he was now fixated on something. He followed his gaze.

The thin clouds were constantly dissipating. As the altitude continued to increase, the two in the cockpit finally saw the black shadow in the clouds clearly.

The black shadow in the clouds was actually... a giant human-shaped dried corpse!

The human-shaped dried corpse floated face down in the clouds, blotting out the sky. Only a large portion of its torso was visible, and its length was at least 10 kilometers under visual observation!

The Floating Sky Giant Corpse was motionless, looking at first glance like a floating continent, gray-black all over. One could even clearly see the dry, cracked folds of its skin like valleys and deep ravines. Its dark, empty eyes held no life, and it floated above the city with an eerie sense of oppression.

"Aaaaaaah~!"

At that moment, screams erupted in the out-of-control helicopter!

The girl in the back turned pale, her pupils gradually being consumed by darkness.

The hurricane tore at the helicopter's fuselage, turning the multi-ton industrial product into a speck of dust in the sky.

An invisible suction instantly devoured it upwards, quickly disappearing into the clouds.

On a distant rooftop, Lin Xian watched this scene, his face slightly darkened.

Buzz~

Just then, a flash of mysterious light appeared on the horizon. Lin Xian reacted, cursed "fuck," and immediately returned to his residence.

He pulled down the window shutters, sprayed deodorant in the hallway, and closed the iron door.

Waiting quietly for the night to arrive.

Drip, drip.

At precisely 18:45, the second flash of mysterious light appeared outside the window shutters. The sun set, and the entire city was swallowed by darkness.

In the city under the black curtain, eerie whispers echoed in the dark alleys, piercing roars reverberated in the darkness, terror was approaching, and the bizarre was descending!

Inside the house.

A record player played soft jazz music. Lin Xian, wearing an apron, leisurely opened a can of beans in the kitchen. On the electric stove, tomato and beef brisket soup emitted an enticing aroma.

A sprig of vibrant coriander on the cutting board was a reward from today's rooftop botanical garden. On days like these, green always brought joy.

He sprinkled the chopped coriander into the pot, not even letting go of the small piece that stuck to the knife.

Outside the window was a desolate, empty night. A pacing sound came from below the floorboards, and something strange seemed to be breathing in the depths of the dark corridor...

As if accustomed to it, Lin Xian calmly set out his dinner and ate quietly by candlelight.

"Sunrise time has been extended to 12 o'clock. There should be less than 5 days left until the next polar night."

At the table, Lin Xian ate while recording something in a diary.

The main function of the storage room's batteries and generator was to keep the refrigerator running and the alarm system active.

And lighting was a nuisance. After all, lights in a pitch-black city would undoubtedly turn his shelter into a beacon.

After finishing dinner, Lin Xian began to sort out today's harvest.

"Two cans, two bottles of water, oh, and a bag of expired potato chips..."

Strangely, food and water did not take up too much space in the large backpack. The rest was filled with strange odds and ends.

Several broken mobile phones, a stereo, a broken razor, and a hair dryer.

These scraps were treasures in Lin Xian's eyes.

He smirked and placed his hand on the stereo. Instantly, a faint fluorescent light appeared on his hand and in his pupils. His hair moved without wind, as if a strange power was emerging. Before long, the fluorescent light disappeared, and the stereo he had touched suddenly decayed into a small pile of brown ashes, falling to the ground.

[Devour successful, Mechanical Origin Points +1, Mechanical Devour skill proficiency +1, Extra reward: Your Strength increased by 1]

[Current Mechanical Heart Level LV.1 176/500]

[Hint: Upgrading Mechanical Heart grants special skill rewards. When Mechanical Heart reaches LV3 LV6 LV9, a mysterious awakening can be obtained]

[base attributes]

[Strength: LV1 22/50]

[Speed: LV0 28/30]

[Defense: LV0 15/30]

[Current basic skills]

[Mechanical Devour LV.1 265/300]

[Mechanical Manufacturing LV.1 112/300]

[Mechanical Scan (Passive)]

[Mechanical Repair (Passive)]

[Mechanical Operation (Passive)]

The familiar light screen lit up before his eyes, and Lin Xian was overjoyed. He didn't expect a broken stereo to grant a 1 point Strength increase.

Don't underestimate this 1 point Strength attribute.

Since Strength upgraded from LV.0 to LV.1, his whole person had undergone earth-shattering changes.

He used to be nothing more than a skinny college otaku who struggled to carry a bucket of water, but now, he could almost do a hundred one-handed push-ups in one breath. The change was astonishing.

At first, Lin Xian thought his ability was useless, but now he increasingly felt that his ability had great potential. If Strength and Speed could continue to upgrade, then he might not be inferior to those physically mutated ability users relying solely on his own combat power.

[Devour successful, Mechanical Origin Points +1]

[Devour successful, Mechanical Origin Points +1]

The following broken mobile phones did not trigger attribute values again.

"It seems that higher-powered stuff has a better effect..."

He sighed. He had tried to devour car engines before, but only succeeded once. That time, it directly increased 20 Mechanical Origin Points and granted 5 attribute points.

But the reason he chose to start with these small things now, and why he had to retrieve them from the apartment, was simple.

The larger the mechanical structure, the longer it would take him to devour, and the more energy it would consume.

That time, devouring the car engine was like encountering a terrifying maze; it not only took him over an hour, but also almost completely exhausted him. Lin Xian was truly grateful that he hadn't been bitten to death by zombies or ghouls in that situation. He considered it a stroke of incredible luck.

Since then, Lin Xian had deeply understood the principle that haste makes waste, and he adhered to the belief of safety first and surviving by playing it safe.

However, to his surprise, when he devoured the hair dryer, the light screen in front of him suddenly flashed with golden light.

[Devour successful, Mechanical Origin Points +1, Mechanical Devour skill proficiency +1, additional reward: You have obtained the Wind Cannon skill!]

[Wind Cannon LV.1, condenses air at your fingertips, instantly releasing it to cause a certain amount of damage.]

"A skill?!"

Lin Xian's pupils constricted. This was the first time he had obtained a skill from Mechanical Devour.

"I didn't expect to get a skill from devouring ordinary things?"

A hair dryer... Wind Cannon??

What kind of logic is that?

Lin Xian suppressed his excitement, focused his thoughts, raised his fingertip, aimed it at the sofa in the distance, and gently flicked!

Thwip!

A very faint sound of air being torn apart rang out. The pillow on the sofa seemed to have been hit by something invisible, and it suddenly exploded, sending the cotton filling inside scattering like snowflakes!

"Holy crap!"

Lin Xian's heart raced. He had deliberately not used too much force or air just now, because he was worried about causing too much noise. Now, after a simple test, he thought that if he used his full strength, it would definitely still be lethal to some extent.

In the year 2069 AD, Apocalypse Day arrived. Thirteen 'devouring zones', each with a diameter of several hundred kilometers, appeared successively around the world. These were officially called "Star Abyss."

From that day on, "Star Abyss" spread a radiation-like black curtain around it, like some unknown life form. This was vividly called the [Dark Tide] by the world. Every other day, the area swallowed by the Dark Tide would expand by several hundred kilometers, and the daytime would begin to shorten. After reaching a certain cycle, the covered area would enter a polar night!

Under the polar night, the climate suffered natural disasters and abnormalities, creatures were infected, zombie tides erupted, and unknown horrors descended from the Abyss!

Humans were forced to begin a mass exodus to escape the Dark Tide!

After the apocalypse, a small number of people were affected by the radiation from the Star Abyss annihilation zone, and various abilities mutated within them. This gave these people a great advantage in the survival test. Lin Xian was one of them.

Soon, survival groups mainly composed of ability users began to emerge like sparks.

"Jiang City announcement: All six monitoring teams in the northwest and southwest directions have gone missing. Announcing to all survivors: flee to the east!"

"The [Oasis] convoy, founded by ability user brother Liu Wei, will depart at 4 PM tomorrow. Location: Walmart in White City. Only accepting those aged 16-50 with good physical fitness. No elderly, young children, or women. However, if you carry firearms or have a large amount of supplies, you can bring one additional family member..."

"[Jiang City Bunker] welcomes all ability users and beauties. We are rooted in the Jiang City military nuclear facility bunker, with a population of over three hundred, with a clear division of labor, and can withstand the polar night..."

"I am in Building A, 1304 of Mingwang Residential Area, with sufficient supplies and a specially modified house. Only accepting beauties aged 16-30. No ugly ones..."

"Ananda is an envoy sent by the Creator God to cleanse the evil thoughts and minds of the world. As long as you have a heart of repentance, you can join our Paradise of Ultimate Bliss Cult and be spared from disaster. Sincerely offer water, food, and pure maidens, and the Savior God will not harm the innocent. Contact 139 for seeking salvation from suffering..."

"I am Professor Wang of the Jiang City Research Institute. According to calculations, Jiang City will be swallowed by the polar night again in 5 days. This time, there will be no sunrise... Hahahaha, it's over, physics... so ridiculous, there is no escape, no one can escape... hahahaha!"

In the darkness, Lin Xian slowly adjusted the radio. The extreme content was increasing. It seemed that after experiencing the first polar night, the vast majority of Jiang City's survivors had already fled.

The twenty-one-day polar night had already turned Jiang City, which originally had a population of millions, into a living hell. And who knew how long the next polar night would last, or whether his supplies would last until dawn?

"Infinite Train Recruitment Project--Build a fully armed heavy train, rushing along the 320,000-kilometer Orbital Ring!"

Lin Xian opened his phone and looked at the post he had posted on the local forum before the last polar night. The few replies inside were mostly sarcastic.

"Watched too much Snowpiercer, huh..."

"Brother, the global power grid has basically collapsed. How can you run without electricity?"

"Even a gas turbine locomotive consumes at least 50 liters of fuel per hour. With that much fuel, wouldn't it be better for me to drive an off-road vehicle?"

"Doomsday joker, you'll be honest as soon as you hit a broken rail..."

"The ideal is full, a mobile iron fortress, not afraid of zombie tides. It's a pity that fantasy is just fantasy, there are too many unrealistic things."

"Idiot."

The post stated that he was building a fortress train that included living carriages, supplies carriages, medical, planting, energy, and production carriages, and was gradually recruiting members. The requirements for members were extremely high: either they possessed abilities, or they possessed the professional skills to match these carriages.

A fully armed, unstoppable heavy train, fleeing east along the 320,000-kilometer Orbital Ring to escape the polar night. Even if it stopped midway, with its fortress-like body armor, it could withstand zombie tides and strange attacks in the dark!

This was romantic enough, and crazy enough!

However, after the polar night, most of the network and power facilities had collapsed, and this post had not been responded to for a long time.

Apart from the radio, where he could still hear some survivors holding on in shelters, The entire Jiang City was desolate.

New book, please pay attention and follow the reading!