The Little Woman

A flicker of surprise crossed Gao Gong's eyes. The stalker before him reminded him of an old saying.

She was so cute that if he punched her, she would probably cry for a long time.

This stalker was a leather-clad loli with one eye swollen from a beating.

Of course, Gao Gong quickly realized that it had not actually been beaten swollen. The radiation-filled environment had caused the native to be born deformed, and a pair of tumors had grown right around her eyes.

It only looked as though someone had beaten them swollen.

It was kind of cute, too.

The leather-clad loli was not actually as delicate and defenseless as she looked. Facing Gao Gong, she immediately pulled the steel rod from her waist and pointed its sharpened end at him.

"Little girl, you've been following me for several days, haven't you?"

On the very first day, Gao Gong had discovered that someone besides him was probably in the Cement Forest. He simply hadn't been sure whether it was a scavenger or a mechanical hunter.

With farming monsters as his priority, Gao Gong hadn't paid much attention. But over the following days, he realized that someone seemed to be following him.

The stalker had no intention of competing with him for monsters. Instead, she merely picked up the beast remains Gao Gong didn't want.

That allowed Gao Gong to determine that the other party was most likely not a fellow hunter, but a scavenger.

Ordinary scavengers, however, would not venture deep into the urban zone.

Gao Gong was also somewhat interested in how she had managed to follow him.

Hearing him call her "little girl," the loli opposite him inexplicably flew into a rage. "Who are you calling a little girl? Are you blind? I'm thirty this year!"

"Uh—"

Gao Gong blinked and carefully examined her again. A trace of embarrassment flashed through his eyes.

Damn, even an old lecher like me could misjudge someone. So her mutation wasn't just 'swollen eyes'—it also had an effect similar to dwarfism.

"Let's get straight to the point. How did you follow me?"

"Who was following you? This city is so big, you—"

The small woman with swollen eyes was just about to argue when her pupils suddenly contracted. A strand of hair slid down from her forehead.

She had not even seen how the other party had drawn his blade.

If that slash had reached her throat—she would not even have known how she died!

Gao Gong said calmly, "I said, let's get straight to the point. It would be best if you did. This isn't for my sake, but for yours."

Seeing the terror on her face and the beads of sweat sliding down her forehead, Gao Gong secretly nodded.

Actually, he had intended to chop the steel rod just now. After hesitating, he decided he probably couldn't cut through it. To avoid showing off and ending up looking like an idiot, he had switched to cutting her hair instead.

The reason he had managed to bluff her was that he had leveled up again and added a point to Perception.

With eleven points of Perception—more than twice that of an ordinary adult—bluffing a little loli, no, a little woman, was not a problem.

So far, the effect was excellent.

Who would have thought it would work too well? Huang Yuanli simply threw down the steel rod and wore the tragic, heroic expression of someone going to her death. "If you're going to kill me, then go ahead. I won't say a thing."

Gao Gong was caught somewhere between laughter and tears. "Why would I kill you? You don't have anything valuable on you. I mean, if you really are a local scavenger, perhaps we can cooperate."

"You've followed me for so many days. You should know that apart from certain valuable materials, most things on radiation beasts are trash to me."

"Really?"

Huang Yuanli looked incredulous. After all, Gao Gong's current outfit made him look exactly like Blade from Marvel—the only difference was that his face looked like a celebrity's. In short, he looked intimidating at first glance.

Seeing that she still didn't believe him, Gao Gong planted the Red Unicorn in the ground, sat down heavily, pulled out a nutrition paste, and stuck it in his mouth. He casually handed another one over.

"Want one?"

Now that he had money, Gao Gong bought the five-mechanical-coin-per-stick deluxe nutrition paste. This one was barbecue-flavored, with a taste like meat jelly.

Huang Yuanli instinctively swallowed. In her memory, the last time she had eaten meat had been when she was very young. It had been canned meat provided by the factory, and the taste had been unforgettable.

Perhaps the food had done the trick, or perhaps she knew her life was in someone else's hands. Either way, she simply gave up resisting, sat down on the ground, grabbed the nutrition paste, and squeezed it into her mouth.

"Don't rush, don't rush. I have plenty of this stuff."

Gao Gong immediately pulled out more than a dozen sticks and scattered them on the ground. There were vegetable and fruit flavors, and even roast-duck flavor. Huang Yuanli stared at them, completely transfixed.

After eating and drinking her fill, Huang Yuanli rubbed her stomach. Much of her wariness had faded, and she said lazily, "Compared with the other mechanical hunters, you're not too bad. Those hunters look at us like we're primitives. Hah, they might not even know as much as we do."

Gao Gong asked with interest, "You are indeed different from the scavengers I've met."

"Of course. In the terms of the Old Civilization era, I'm an intellectual."

According to Huang Yuanli, scavengers came in two types. The first had lost their parents and relatives in the mechanical wars when they were young. They grew up in a daze with, at most, some rudimentary survival experience, eking out an existence in this fringe region like sewer rats.

The second type had been raised by refugees from childhood. They had received a relatively complete education from the Old Civilization era and could use their knowledge to struggle for survival in the city.

She was the second type.

"Aren't you curious how I managed to track you?" Huang Yuanli waved her hand smugly. A small black dot flew over from the stairwell and landed on her finger.

It was an electronic bee.

"This is my agent bee."

Name: Electronic Bee

Type: Mechanical Bio-Beast—Metal-Wing Subclass—Electronic Species

Radiation Level: F-

Health: 5/5

Stamina: 8/8

Bioenergy: 11

Biological Attributes: Strength 1 Agility 2 Endurance 2 Intelligence 2 Perception 2

Skills: Flight Lv5; Signal Perception Lv6

Note: This is a moving electronic signal

"You can train mechanical bio-beasts!"

Seeing the surprise on Gao Gong's face, Huang Yuanli became even prouder. With a thought, the electronic bee flew down and landed in Gao Gong's palm.

Gao Gong had seen mechanical bio-beasts before, but this was the first time he had seen one this small. It was obvious that the bee's wings were made of metal, while its stinger was a size thicker, resembling a 2.5-millimeter earphone plug. The rest of its body was no different from that of a normal bee.

"It can emit radio waves and determine whether there's danger nearby by measuring the strength of recovered electronic signals. It can also locate and track targets by adjusting its frequency..."

The more Gao Gong listened, the more familiar it sounded. Wasn't this just a pocket-sized radar?

"How did you train it?"

Huang Yuanli rolled her eyes. "How could I possibly tell you? It's what we depend on to make a living!"

The small woman with swollen eyes stood up and dusted off her backside. "If you're not going to kill me, I'm leaving. As for whether we'll cooperate, I'll have to ask the elder when I get back. Don't think you can fool me!"

A strange light flashed through Gao Gong's eyes, and he smiled. "Of course. I never force anyone to do something against their will."

He returned early that day.

Generally speaking, Gao Gong clocked out at four or five o'clock sharp. It wasn't that he lacked the desire to work himself to the bone; rather, once night fell, the beasts in the urban zone became far less calm than they were during the day and entered a state of chaotic slaughter. Some high-level monsters would even leave their territories.

Moreover, at night, the radiation in the city reached extremely high levels. Even if he injected a radiation shot beforehand, remaining in such an environment for a long time would still cause irreversible injuries to the human body.

As for why this happened, the principle was simple. Electricity consumption was certainly higher at night than during the day, and the same was true of radiation-based creatures.

But Gao Gong left especially early that day, finishing work before three.

"Looks like I've hooked a big fish." Gao Gong opened the car window. The hot wind blew against his face, keeping his mind clear.

"Anyone capable of training a mobile radar definitely isn't from an ordinary tribe, and it's even less likely to be a simple beast-taming method." Gao Gong paused. "The scientific knowledge they possess would be at the absolute pinnacle even in the Old Civilization era."

"If they've trained more than just electronic bees, and have other mechanical bio-beasts as well, then it isn't merely professional knowledge."

Gao Gong's eyes lit up. "It might even be an entire professional knowledge chain!"

In the game Cyber World, there were two ways to obtain professional knowledge. The first was to unlock a secondary profession. As the secondary profession leveled up, new professional knowledge would naturally be unlocked.

The second was to complete scientific research missions for special factions. The professional knowledge obtained from these missions was mostly related to crafting specialized equipment.

But above professional knowledge, there was actually another existence—the professional knowledge chain, also known by players as the profession's bottomless pit!

It was called a bottomless pit because the amount of experience poured into it was astronomical, making it virtually impossible for anyone to complete.

Generally speaking, when a secondary profession reached the maximum level of twenty, it would unlock around ten types of professional knowledge.

To obtain a complete professional knowledge chain, one had to first max out the secondary profession, then raise all ten types of professional knowledge to Lv9, and complete a professional fusion quest. Only after completing the fusion quest could a professional knowledge chain be born.

The tribe Huang Yuanli belonged to might very well possess such a professional knowledge chain.

A professional knowledge chain had two functions. One was to craft advanced equipment above the rare level—strategic-grade weapons—and construct civilization-level megastructures.

The other, more important function was to carry out a civilization ascension.

Only by gathering enough professional knowledge chains, unlocking the civilization knowledge system, and completing the ascension quest could one achieve civilization ascension.

Generally speaking, a planetary civilization could master at most a first-level professional knowledge chain, while civilization ascension required at least a third-level civilization.

But this was the Cyber Test Site. Gao Gong suspected that what the other party possessed was a second-level professional knowledge chain related to neuroscience.