Act.8: Gong

Foreword:

Everyone knows that turning words into actions is far more difficult than turning actions into words.

[--Maxim Gorky]

[Part 1: The Heartbeat of Steel]

Located 1,500 kilometers from the Antarctic coastline, more than 4,000 meters below the ice surface, lies the world's largest subglacial lake.

It is called Lake Vostok, also known as the Eastern Lake.

Peter Sergei was originally a member of the Antarctic expedition team appointed by the United Nations Philosopher Foundation. In 1992, he came into contact with five ancient viruses in Eastern Lake, and later suffered a mental breakdown, claiming to be a descendant of giants.

Among these five types of viruses, there are also early versions of the Vita Imprint. To be precise, based on the decay period of carbon isotopes, it should be a version from 640,000 years ago.

The other four types of hybrid viruses almost transformed Sergei into another kind of creature. His human lifespan was originally going to end at the age of 71 when he came to explore Antarctica. In just eight short weeks, these viruses turned him into an infant, a huge baby about 71 centimeters long.

From then on, Sergei always referred to himself as the child of the "Man of Fire".

If the frogman troops are the vanguard sentinels of the Heaven's Ladder, then the Birch Tree Armored Forces, led by Sergei, are the heavy infantry who help the Lord of Cinder overcome all obstacles.

There are sixteen heavy units like Sergei, whose genes have been modified by an ancient virus, in the Heaven's Ladder.

They call themselves the Birch Tree Corps, excellent firewood and fuel, analogous to the World Tree in Norse mythology that supports all things and the incredible Tree of Life that holds up the sun.

This information can be found on the identification card found on Sergei's body.

After cleaning up the battlefield, Teacher A Ling recorded the enemy's battle plan and personnel composition in the new details page of [Phoenix].

Xue Ming felt terrible; facing such a gigantic enemy, he found it difficult to maintain his fighting spirit.

--The feeling is like facing a lion or tiger, or a huge grizzly bear or rhinoceros. No matter how strong your spirit or how brave you are, you can't resist the trembling and fear brought on by the instincts of the Homo sapiens body.

This is not something he can control; on the contrary, the more lucid he is and the clearer he sees things, the harder it is to control the Madness Index in his brain.

"Teacher A Ling, how did you do that? That huge half-giant, I hadn't even finished my military rations, and he just killed it like that!?"

He was very curious and eager to know how to deal with such a huge target.

The Great Rift of All Things records the Gate of Death of such giant creatures. Giants are very rare, and their hybrid descendants are all kinds of strange creatures. Their direct bloodline includes mountain trolls - which often appear in the mountains and snowy fields. Hunters have fought and killed such monsters, but the battle records they left behind are so pale.

When Xue Ming saw these creatures with his own eyes, even though he had several ways to fight them in mind, when it came to actually putting them into practice, he found that these bodies had betrayed him and they had lost their will to fight.

"Just now, I felt like my head was about to split open, and my body was stiff; I couldn't move at all."

He helped Ms. A Ling pack her backpack and handed her the new BUR drill rocket launcher.

As if by magic, Ms. A Ling stuffed new "firepower" into her neckline, tucking two small tubes into the Velcro straps under her armpits, transforming her once-decreased breasts into a 36D.

"That's normal." Su Ling tore off a tattered red flag and tossed it to Xue Ming: "Want to learn? I'll teach you! Make me some winter clothes as tuition."

Without saying a word, Xue Ming began to practice her needlework skills.

Using spirits as measuring tapes and needles, he sewed a coat from bright red velvet and cut Kevlar from the corpses of his enemies to use as insoles.

In just a few minutes, the thick woolen coat and cloth boots to keep out the cold were ready.

Su Ling took two candies from the waiter's pocket and tossed them to Xue Ming.

"This is a secret elixir that can increase courage."

Xue Ming tore open the candy wrapper and put it in his mouth. His mouth was filled with a slightly poisonous lily fragrance, which was cloyingly sweet.

He crouched before Sergei's corpse, feeling the oppressive aura emanating from it.

"Really? Ms. A Ling, you're not kidding me, are you?"

"Of course not!" Su Ling and Xue Ming squatted down together, gently patting the corpse's cheeks and fiddling with the hybrid giant's chin. "Is this candy hard to eat?"

Xue Ming: "Yes. It's too sweet. I feel like my brain is starting to rust while I'm holding it in my mouth. The smell of lilies is poisonous. What kind of culinary horror is this?"

Su Ling: "It is my courage."

Xue Ming: "Is there any scientific principle behind this? Can this weak toxicity accelerate my metabolism? Can it trigger a stress response in my body? Can it stimulate the secretion of adrenaline?"

Su Ling shook her head. "No, no, no, it was made by my employer."

Upon hearing this, Xue Ming was momentarily stunned and speechless.

"It's awful, so incredibly sweet. This little idiot goes into the kitchen to make explosives, and it took her so long to make this plate of candy. She doesn't know lilies are poisonous; she just thinks the name sounds nice." Su Ling propped up the corner of her mouth with two fingers, her smile radiant. "When I was fighting these monsters, I was always in a state of guaranteed victory—I couldn't accept the fact that I was defeated, and I couldn't imagine how heartbroken and tearful my employer would be after losing me."

Xue Ming looked at the Steel Heart in his hand; it was the bridge between his heart and Xiao Qi's.

In the unusual spiritual pressure environment near Niflheim, the effectiveness of this mental connection became intermittent.

"The BOSS is only giving you a pair of wedding rings. You need to build more connections with my apprentice, perform more rituals, things that are more tangible and stimulating to the five senses than rings, such as candy, perfume, or photographs. Words are so pale. We talk a lot, but it's actually to cover up the lack in our hearts. It's easy to put actions into words, but difficult to put words into actions. You may be able to maintain your rationality and your mental shield in other environments, but when you come to this deadly place, to this dangerous situation beyond your comprehension, your physical body begins to become fragile and vulnerable."

"I believe David Victor also taught you how to overcome fear. Unlike his shameless, sexy dance moves, eating candy is my unique secret. It's about the people and things I must protect, and it keeps me clear-headed under this Inspiration Pressure." Su Ling took Xue Ming's hand and gently patted the back of it. "Don't let my apprentice shed tears. Whenever you think of her helplessly crying, I believe courage and anger will ignite within you in an instant. This is your destiny with her, your talent. It's just that because of your cold, aloof lifestyle, never doing anything unnecessary, you think this ritual is superfluous—building more connections with the people you care about, entrusting your obsession to specific material objects. As long as you take out these objects, you can immediately recall the corresponding people and things. At that moment, nothing can destroy your fighting spirit."

Xue Ming was still shaken; under the terrifying pressure of his powerful enemy, he was almost unable to think.

Su Ling continued, "During the Soul Power attack we encountered halfway, there was also a flute melody. That was the ritual of the Lord of Cinder. I'm afraid this Lord of Cinder has been able to stay conscious and fight against madness by relying on this ritual."

At the start of the journey, at the Nine Realms Station, people embark on this inevitable path for a certain purpose, a goal that must be achieved, or someone they must protect. These rituals, which may seem insignificant to outsiders, are like prominent signposts on the journey of life.

To strangers, A Ling's candy is just a slightly poisonous treat, a culinary disaster. But it is the source of courage that sustains this VIP's spirit and keeps her clear-headed.

Without the boost from the Steel Heart, Xue Ming's keen Inspiration brought him a fear that overwhelmed him.

At this moment, he felt as if his spiritual essence was awakening from a quagmire. His eyes were clear, and he thought to himself—so Jason Megan was in such a terrifying environment, having a life-or-death farewell with the waiter.

The bitterness of failure could destroy Jason's mental world.

That shameful sadness could shatter Jason's spiritual beacon.

Over a thousand days and nights, both long and short, how was this Dacian man able to emerge from such terrible psychological trauma and return here?

Without a doubt, he is a strong man, a reliable partner with a heart of steel.

As if possessed, Xue Ming opened her phone and logbook, searching through records of her companions' words and actions, as well as photos and recordings, trying to find familiar people and things in unfamiliar surroundings.

He saw A Xing's selfie and the childish love letter Xiao Qi wrote when she had a crush on him.

His twelve rounds with Jason in the ring --

--And [Your blood is like my blood, your heart is like my heart]

Xue Ming rarely looked back; his thought process seemed to always lead him forward, peering into the distant future. He tried to bear the mental pressure brought by all sorts of terrifying speculations and conjectures because Xue Ming's birth environment influenced his way of thinking. He subconsciously believed that the past was all painful and unnecessary to mention again.

But now, despite having so many wonderful memories, he rarely takes out these precious things to look at them again because of this ingrained way of thinking.

In A Ling's eyes, the spiritual shield on the boy's head was gradually recovering, and under the abnormal spiritual pressure of Niflheim and the erosion of a black mist, it turned back into a brilliant gold.

Su Ling: "Well done!"

Xue Ming gripped the logbook tightly, his expression unusually solemn, his heart heavy with frost, his eyes burning with fire.

He finally understood why Teacher Su Ling could manipulate so many radiant stones and use so many different kinds of life-protecting charms.

This VIP seems to possess many personalities, using emotions as a tool to confront Sergei head-on. In the struggle, he simultaneously uses ten blood-red hibiscus stones to strengthen his nerves, stimulate his organs to secrete hormones, and manipulate the energy of the calamity beast absorbed in his muscles and abdomen. This is something only a burning heart can do; his courage and determination erupt like a volcano.

Xue Ming had always envied A Xing.

This guy seems to be full of enthusiasm and curiosity for everything. He's not afraid of getting hurt and will shed tears for strangers. He's like the protagonist in an adventure story, with eyes that are always clear and bright.

For this RSH trip, Xue Ming's initial thought was simply for everyone to survive. Helping Jason complete the exploration mission was an unexpected bonus. If they could also find Wendy Mills, it would be an incredibly lucky stroke of luck.

But these things were not trivial to Jason.

It's not some routine matter of "it's okay if you can't do it".

It's not a job, not a performance indicator that a company sends to its employees.

It's not just a few bland sentences in a log.

It's impossible to go to the Pavlov substation, take a few mediocre photos of the windmills, and then go back to fob off the job.

--It is a giant, not a windmill.

Xue Ming: "Yes, I understand."

Su Ling snapped her fingers, without asking what the young man her disciple had taken a liking to actually knew.

"Walk!"

This VIP was efficient and decisive, leaping and bounding like a nimble ape as he climbed the iron frame, bringing the old man from Workshop No. 2 back to the first floor in just a few breaths.

"Grandpa, what do we do now? What use are the two of us to you?" Su Ling asked.

The old engineer was startled when the distinguished guest led him down, and he muttered something under his breath.

"Can't you be a little gentler on my old arms and legs?"

Su Ling: "I don't like to talk nonsense. There's still a lot going on outside."

She paused for a moment, then opened the UI panel to search for the troop structure left by Sergei.

"There are still about 170 enemies. They started their deployment from the Elephant Trunk Hill outpost on the north side of the sea, and their patrols cover half of the outpost. They are searching for usable resources. I have no interest in building graves for those cannibalistic sentries at the Monument to the People's Heroes. If their mission included a shift change, those bodies should have already been found."

At this point, Xue Ming followed up to explain, "We can't use radios here, so these enemies probably don't know that Sergei is dead yet. This straggler who escaped from the Birch Tree assault team followed us to the power workshop. He's an ambitious guy who wants to monopolize your spiritual essence, so he probably didn't call on his comrades for support."

Su Ling: "But the next time we fight, it won't be so simple."

Xue Ming: "These giant hybrid soldiers are equipped with more than just their light weapons. If it were a full-scale, life-or-death battle with them in a defensive formation, the combat power of these dozen or so giant hybrid units would be terrifying."

After the two passengers explained the basic situation, the old man rubbed his arms, explaining that he had caught a chill in Workshop No. 2, and ran all the way to the workshop's foundation frame.

"Come with me, come with me, come with me! Young man! You're a mechanic, right?"

Xue Ming: "I know a little bit."

The veteran engineer tore down the red flag and pulled back the dust cover from the engineering framework.

How much do you know about diesel engines?

Xue Ming: "I know a little bit."

[Part ②: The War Gong]

As the red flag faded, Xue Ming saw the robotic arm hovering in front of the shaft tube of the main frame. It resembled an eight-axis cutting machining center from the last era, without a computer. Engineers skilled in ironwork simultaneously operated eight cutting heads and a universal joint, processing and modifying the target in the frame according to the industrial design drawings.

Su Ling's eyes lit up when she saw this thing.

"My darling!"

The main processing unit inside the base frame is almost six meters high; that is the true appearance of the weapon platform.

Its steel body still bears the marks of blades, and its two thick and sturdy steel bones seem to have been designed based on the lower limbs of ancient dragons. The steel wires twisting between the skeletons are its muscles. The powertrain consists of two V46 twelve-cylinder turbo diesel engines, with a total output of about 1,500 horsepower.

Corresponding to the design of the saurus-like lower limbs, it was always in a crouching posture with its knees tucked in.

This all-terrain weapon platform has almost no artistic or aesthetic appeal; its lower body resembles a robust frog, constantly maintaining a semi-crouching posture to cope with muddy environments.

There were two simple and crude mounting bases at the waist. Without saying a word, Xue Ming climbed onto the steel skeleton and measured the dimensions with a spirit measuring tape.

The veteran engineer said, "It can mount a 12.7mm coaxial machine gun."

Xue Ming continued to explore upwards, arriving at the main compartment and turret of the weapons platform.

He climbed into the driver's seat and found it very cramped and confined. Fortunately, the instrument panel of this equipment was labeled in both Chinese and Russian.

The upper part of the weapon platform still lacks armor plating protection, resembling an unfinished, half-finished product.

Its pressure relief valve, oil pipeline, oil circuit, and steel winch are all exposed.

Over the years, apart from some rubber parts aging and deforming, the blued anti-oxidation layer of the steel frame remains as smooth as new.

"What kind of steel is this, master craftsman?" Xue Ming leaned out of the cockpit.

The veteran engineer shook his head. "No more."

Xue Ming: "That's all?"

The veteran engineer said, "The Soviet steel grade no longer exists. According to your country's standards, its yield strength is slightly better than Q345E, and it is more cold-resistant—it's a legacy left by our motherland."

Xue Ming leaned forward and patted the main weapon of this steel beast, which was an 88mm cannonball.

"Why is the main weapon of this thing an 88mm cannon?"

The veteran engineer, adjusting the circuitry in the machining center, replied without turning his head, "At the time, we didn't have the capability to transport 88mm anti-aircraft guns. These are Germany Flak 18 guns, spoils of war captured from the battlefield. They were transported here by train. We used whatever we had."

"Is this [materialism]?" Xue Ming adjusted the cannon muzzle in the main cockpit, and heard the buzzing sound of the electronic fire control system starting up. Two sections of the cannon barrel protruded from the steel frame, symmetrically designed on the left and right sides. Two shots at a time, and the loading efficiency was also doubled.

"This is just a part of [Materialism]. Its name is [The Big Frog]—it's an engineering prototype. Multi-axis machining centers are too inefficient. We originally planned to use it as an engineering robot for machining armor. As you can see, its cabin is compact and cramped." The Master of Ceremonies told Su Ling to go to the warehouse to move equipment and armor, then turned to Xue Ming and shouted, "This is for the newborns of RSH. If there are any unfortunate deformed children, dwarfs, or wounded soldiers who have had limbs amputated, they can sit in the [Big Frog] and contribute their steel strength to the ideals of the motherland."

After saying that, the senior engineer pointed to the other base frame machining centers.

Those were bare steel frames of different styles, made from steel of different grades.

They are made of aerospace-grade aluminum alloy with anodizing treatment, resulting in an ultra-lightweight [Forest Ape].

It is a high-strength, titanium-plated alloy steel [Black Vein Butterfly] that has overcome many challenges.

It is an engineering machine [Nikola Tesla] that is entirely orange-red and made of copper-silver conductive material.

There were a total of twenty-one platforms, completely naked, without armor or weapons, standing quietly in the power workshop; they were the products of [materialism].

The old engineer, carrying two large boxes of diesel fuel, asked Xue Ming to bring down the main fuel tank of the [Big Frog] truck.

--The weapon platform was positioned low to the ground, with an oil pipeline leading into the steel monster's spine.

Within seconds, a signal indicating a fuel system malfunction appeared on the dashboard.

Xue Ming rolled off the machine, half of his body crawling under the belly of this steel behemoth, sorting out all the pipelines, and replacing the conduit sleeves and rubber parts.

The veteran engineer grinned from ear to ear when he heard the beep indicating that the oil circuit had returned to normal.

--It can do it! It definitely can do it!

Xue Ming, his face covered in grease, shouted to the Master of Ceremonies, "Simple fault, simple repair. Don't be too happy yet. This thing hasn't been touched in decades; who knows how many hidden problems it still has?"

It took Xue Ming over an hour and forty minutes, going up and down more than twenty times, to completely refurbish this lump of iron. In the critical powertrain assembly, there were ultra-high strength load-bearing carbon steel parts that were very prone to rust. Xue Ming had to use his spirit body in conjunction with a punch to open the mold, select new steel from the warehouse, and use a multi-axis cutter head to cut and shape the parts by comparing their dimensions with the original parts, repairing any burrs. There could be no error in the tolerance, not even a millimeter.

Brother Xingchen is right. Only Jiang Xueming can do this. Only his spirit can handle these complex, non-standard parts. It would be an almost impossible task for a few humans to assemble this huge and sophisticated armor with their bare hands.

After resolving the visible fault signals on the dashboard, its self-diagnostic system can detect more than twenty problems. For those it can't detect, you have to start the powertrain and let it run a few steps to find out if there's a problem.

There is also a special voice password recognition when starting [Big Frog].

The old engineer immediately brought a large gong from the main stage of the cultural performance. The gong was originally supposed to be made of copper, but there were very few copper mines in this area, and it was a scarce metal for wiring the power system.

"This is our battle gong. We strike it during mobilization meetings when we're about to go into battle. It's made of steel and has a very distinctive sound—we use it as our activation code."

After saying that, the Master of Ceremonies found a hammer on the tool rack and started banging on the gong.

The crisp, piercing notes echoed through the power plant.

--In Xue Ming's eyes, the pitch marks on the control panel, which had been jumping up and down, finally returned to normal.

When the two diesel engines start, it's like two hearts beginning to beat. Black smoke billows out of the exhaust pipes with a rumbling sound, only to be sucked into the vents within seconds.

The weapon platform's fan-shaped webbed feet took their first step forward, landing on a solid platform. These webbed feet allow the platform to move swiftly through mud.

The old engineer shouted, "It's alive! It's alive!"

A bright red Soviet flag was printed on the armored plates on the legs. This heavy armor, twenty millimeters thick, was hung from Su Ling's hands by the steel cable of the crane and passed to the Master of Ceremonies on the ladder.

The veteran Red Army soldier swung his hammer—

--Knock off the rivets, apply threadlocker, and tighten the fist-sized nut at the armor joint.

On the green-gray salt bath coating of the steel armor, the flag of the sickle and hammer remained bright red.

Xue Ming carefully manipulated the armor's torso, aligning its steel frame with the various armor plates of the crane, and asked Su Ling and the Master of Ceremonies.

"I need an instruction manual! Don't these weapon platforms have any combat records? Haven't you used them before?"

"Used on the surface! In Afghanistan!" The roar of the diesel engine almost drowned out the Grandfather's voice as he added more armor to the [Big Frog], shouting, "The KGB destroyed all the data! Our understanding of these behemoths, our level of processing these precision steel components, has regressed to the Tsarist era! Without you! It wouldn't even be able to move!"

Su Ling raised her head and Xue Ming.

"Now I finally understand why my apprentice is so clingy to you—your hands are even more efficient at making money than Buffett is at trading stocks."