The Missing Condition
"Seventeen seconds! The entire battle lasted only seventeen seconds, and the orca has once again achieved an overwhelming victory!"
Inside the venue of the advanced competition, the host led the audience in cheers, while the Orca, which had easily defeated its opponent, calmly returned to the maintenance room. With a whoosh of Degassing, the canopy opened, and Feng Xue spun around, using the aircraft's knees for leverage, and landed steadily on the ground.
"Looks like the new equipment is breaking in well? Any problems?" Mang Ke, who had rushed back from the Coach platform, immediately asked. Feng Xue shook her head and said:
"There are no major problems with handling, the weight doesn't change much, and the feel is okay. However, it requires a high angle of entry. It's fine in one-on-one situations, but in many-on-many or one-on-many situations, it might get stuck. Also, the weakness of the lanyard control is still too obvious. It's fine for ring matches, but we still need to find a way to optimize it for actual combat."
"I understand. It's a matter of material quantity. After all, we only got that much. However, Palin has already made progress on laboratory preparation methods, so I believe we can try mass production soon. Then we won't have to be so stingy."
Mang Ke recorded the questions raised by Feng Xue in his notebook, while also thinking about ways to further lower the operational threshold.
Having been in Bailin Country for over three months and having played nearly ten matches in the higher-level competition, Mang Ke witnessed a wealth of technical ideas that would have been impossible to encounter in the Parlin Kingdom, amidst the accumulation of techniques from all over the world. Although most of these techniques are not widely applicable, the inspiration they contain is still admirable.
Meanwhile, Parlin Kingdom's mecha technology also received considerable feedback. Based on the power core from the Sea Monster, the new model - the Wasp series - which retains the shape of an orca with ape arms and a wasp waist, has passed various tests. Although it has not yet been put into mass production, that is only to avoid the monitoring of the Ideal Country.
However, once Parlin Kingdom begins hosting the Iron Armor Steel Fist competition, these experimental machines will be added to the competition in various ways, even if they are "shortchanged," and will then rightfully become Palin's technological reserves.
Of course, Palin wasn't the only one "leeching" profits from the Bailin Country Mech Competition; in fact, long before that, many small countries had tried this kind of "overtaking on a curve."
The reason why only Palin achieved success was threefold: first, they possessed the leading technology of "Sea Monster Heart"; second, they had Feng Xue, a top-notch pilot, as the tester; and third, they had Mang Ke, an outstanding and talented engineer.
The above three points, along with Parin's relatively complete industrial system as a vassal state of the Ideal Country, have led to the current achievements.
Mang Ke hurriedly left with the experimental data and Feng Xue's feedback from the actual machine. It's unclear whether he wanted to share the information with Palin immediately or if he planned to optimize the orca design drafts again first.
Feng Xue didn't seem to care much. She casually pulled out a glass of Happy Water, chugging it down while waving to Old Li was slowly making his way over.
"You felt it too, didn't you?" Old Li suddenly said something inexplicable. Feng Xue's First Turn, and she retorted in an air of certainty:
What do you mean?
"Trait." Old Li didn't keep him in suspense. He casually found a seat, rubbed his temples, and said:
"Seven Tag related to ghoul brokers have already been added, and there are quite a few ghouls in this world. Based on past experience, this should be enough to generate enough Trait, but there's still no movement."
"If that's the case, then mine is about the same," Feng Xue said in a rather flat tone.
"Whether it's the accumulation from the Heavenly Court, my current persona as a Genius Pilot, or the excuse of 'studying at Bailin Country Academy,' all of these have met the requirements for condensing the Trait, but nothing has happened."
"Everything else is fine, but the thing about 'studying in Bailin Country's is completely my original creation, at least in this world. Moreover, it only circulates in the Parlin Kingdom. The Tag '[working while underage]' is niche enough that there is no possibility of it being 'taken over'."
"I now strongly suspect that the difficulty in creating Trait in this world is not simply due to 'occupied spaces'."
Upon hearing Feng Xue's words, Old Li's face revealed an expression of "great minds think alike":
"That's what I think too. If we think about it carefully, if the reason we can't condense the Trait is simply because we don't have a divine position, then for us, there shouldn't be any difference between condensing the Trait in another world and condensing it in this world. But the Infinite City, or rather the Tower of Tower of Babel, clearly stipulates that the Trait must be condensed on the 121st floor. Either the Trait condensed in this world is problematic, or the Infinite City needs something from this world."
Thinking about Old Li's hypothesis, Feng Xue nodded. The fact that he created the Trait for the Great Sage, Equal to Heaven Sun Wukong in the Journey to the West world, but still failed to fulfill the requirements of the Tower of Babel, was enough to illustrate a lot of issues.
However, figuring this out wasn't difficult, and Feng Xue believed that other level masters had probably thought about this issue as well. But even so, until now, no level master had completed the Trait in this world.
The two looked at each other in bewilderment. The maintenance room fell silent for a moment, with only the sounds of staff from the Yuelai Tavern moving the machine away.
After a moment, Feng Xue tentatively spoke:
Do you know how the gods of this world became gods?
Upon hearing this, Old Li pondered for a long while before seemingly waking from a dream and saying:
"I don't know, or rather, there are relevant settings, but no corresponding proof!"
At this point, he suddenly pressed his fingers to his temples, striking a somewhat silly pose as if he were practicing martial arts. After a long while, he opened his eyes wearily and said solemnly:
"According to records, the most recent case of an independent godhood should be the God of Live Broadcast thirty years ago. In the three years that followed, dozens of various branches of the Live Streaming system emerged Subordinate God. Since then, no new gods have been born, and the God of Live Broadcast's own resume cannot be found. At least in the memories of ordinary people in this world, there are no relevant clues."
"What about the other gods?" Feng Xue seemed to have grasped something and quickly asked. Old Li shook his head and said:
"Similarly, basically all gods first become gods from a Main Body god (not necessarily the main god, but similar to the relationship between the God of Games and the god of chess or board games), and then a batch of Subordinate God are generated in a short period of time. The way subordinate gods become gods is by following the path opened up Subordinate God the Main Body god. The process is no different from the normal formation of Tag, but the way all main gods become gods is 'unknown'."
"So, in this world, to establish Tag, it's more likely to follow existing deities and become 'Subordinate God' than to forge a new path? Come to think of it, the current rumors circulating about God Selection Arena and the technological deification of the Ideal Country are, in a sense, also considered 'Subordinate God'?"