Old Zhao spent some time getting ready.
Fortunately, he had already completed most of the mission report he needed to submit while he was in the game. Now he only had to polish it a little. By the time he and Brother Loyal arrived at the base's conference room, Master Qin and several project leads from the Explorers' Guild were already waiting there.
The meeting would begin in a few minutes. Staff were testing the equipment, while the old men chatted among themselves from their seats. But Colonel Zhao keenly noticed Master Qin fiddling with a "little thing" in his hand.
It looked awfully familiar.
He went over and took a quick look. The moment he saw something resembling a combat knife, his heart skipped a beat.
The blade wasn't made of ground steel. It was a "crystal blade" shaped from some kind of crystal. A cable was attached to the butt of the unusual knife, running to a battery pack nearby that supplied its power.
"Is that a thermal knife?"
Old Zhao blurted out, making Master Qin glance at him.
The old man snorted, tossed the thing to Old Zhao, and took a sip of tea before replying:
"What? Why are you so surprised? Haven't you used one of these over there?"
"That's exactly why I'm surprised!"
Colonel Zhao scratched his head.
"You actually made one of these? I thought that even if we could build one at this stage, it'd only be a lab prototype."
"It is a lab prototype."
Master Ma sighed from beside them.
"You used thermal weapons over there, but they didn't need an external power supply, did they? Look at ours. It needs a special battery, so it's completely impractical for combat.
"We can scale up the thermal guns and mount them on some