A Great Harvest of Shock Value! Is This the Cured Meat You Mentioned?

"Ding! Congratulations to the host for completing the novice tutorial mission and performing a 'dimensional strike' in front of the entire school's faculty and students."

"Ding! Accumulated 3200 Shock Points!"

"Ding! In view of the host's outstanding performance, an additional reward of one 'Primary Industrial Mother Machine' exchange permit has been granted."

On the way back to the work-study student dormitory, Qin Feng looked at the jumping numbers on the system panel, his mouth curling up in a grin harder to suppress than an AK47.

Three thousand two hundred!

This was a massive fortune.

One had to know, just yesterday, he had to painstakingly calculate and pinch pennies just to exchange for a single screw.

Now, he could finally leap straight from the Stone Age into the steampunk... oh wait, the Electrical Age.

"Brother Wolf, we've struck it rich."

Qin Feng patted the clanking Scrap King No. 1 beneath him, his mood excellent.

Grey Wolf hummed without looking back while operating the mecha.

"Struck it rich? What's the use of being rich?"

"Can it buy sheep? Can it buy an automatic sheep-catching machine?"

"That maneuver I just pulled off consumed at least two high-energy springs and a whole canister of pepper!"

"These are costs! Do you understand what costs are?"

Grey Wolf pushed his tattered top hat down, his penny-pinching demeanor exactly like Red Wolf when she demanded household expenses.

Qin Feng shook his head with a smile.

"Don't worry, you'll get your share."

"Once we get back to the laboratory, I'll get you a new device."

"I guarantee it'll be a hundred times better than that hand-cranked generator of yours."

The two of them and the one mecha swaggered back to the basement entrance in the backyard of Dorm Seven.

The students who had originally wanted to follow along to watch the excitement were intimidated by the deafening roar of Scrap King No. 1 and the sight of Director Su fleeing in such a sorry state; they only dared to point and whisper from afar, not daring to get close.

Returning to the dark and damp basement, Qin Feng immediately opened the system store.

A dazzling array of product blueprints flashed before his eyes.

[AK47 Automatic Rifle Blueprint: 500 Shock Points]

[T-800 Terminator Skeleton (Incomplete Version): 2000 Shock Points]

[Iron Man Mark I Reactor Theory: 5000 Shock Points]

Qin Feng's gaze lingered for a long time on those mouth-watering pieces of black technology, but in the end, he forced himself to look away.

One shouldn't take too large a step, or one might tear a muscle.

At this stage, what he lacked most wasn't weapon blueprints, but the basic tools to manufacture weapons.

Without high-precision machine tools, even if you were given the blueprints for a Star Destroyer, you could only stare at them helplessly.

"System, exchange for 'Primary Industrial Mother Machine'!"

"Exchange for 'High-Precision Lathe Blueprint'!"

"Exchange for 'Smokeless Powder Formula'!"

"Exchange for 'Barrett M82A1 Anti-Materiel Sniper Rifle (Magic-Modified Version) Blueprint'!"

The series of operations was smooth and fluid.

Over three thousand Shock Points instantly shrank by more than half, leaving only a few hundred as pocket change.

But Qin Feng didn't feel the slightest bit of heartache.

As a white light visible only to him flashed, a machine with a rustic design and a cold, metallic luster appeared out of thin air in the previously empty corner of the basement.

That was the cornerstone of industry.

It was a machine capable of manufacturing other machines—a mother machine.

Although it was only the primary version and the precision could only reach the 0.01-millimeter level, in this Douluo Continent, which was still in the blacksmithing era, this was a divine artifact!

Grey Wolf had been lying flat on the broken sofa like a corpse, but the moment he saw this machine, his dead-fish eyes instantly turned into lightbulbs.

"Awooo—!"

He let out a strange cry and lunged directly at the lathe, rubbing his face against the cold metal.

"This texture! This precision! These perfect chamfers!"

"Qin Feng! Where did you steal this treasure from?"

"With this, I can polish that pile of scrap metal into real parts!"

"I'm going to build a sheep-catching radar! I'm going to build a supersonic sheep-catching spaceship!"

Grey Wolf was so excited he looked as if he had just caught Lazy Sheep; he was practically drooling.

Qin Feng pulled him off the machine.

"Don't rush to build a spaceship, build this thing for me first."

He slapped the Bullet blueprint he had just redeemed onto the table.

Grey Wolf glanced at the blueprint, his brows arching.

"A sniper rifle? The structure is simple enough."

"But the material requirements here are a bit high."

"The barrel needs high-temperature and high-pressure resistant alloy steel, the firing pin needs high-hardness tungsten gold..."

"We've only got a pile of scrap metal here, you want me to build it with my head?"

Qin Feng pointed to the corner of the basement.

Piled there were various ore scraps bought at a low price from the blacksmith shop, along with a few pieces of refined iron paperweights swiped from Director Su's office.

"Make do with these for now."

"I have the system authorization for Material Reorganization. Although I can only use a little bit each day, refining a few kilograms of alloy steel won't be a problem."

"As for the gunpowder..."

Qin Feng pulled the recipe from his pocket, a cold glint flashing in his eyes.

"The black powder in this Douluo Continent is too weak; we need to give them something with a real kick."

"Nitroglycerin, ever heard of it?"

Just as the two were heatedly discussing how to manufacture the first thermal weapon.

"Knock, knock, knock."

The already dilapidated wooden door was knocked upon.

It was very polite, neither hurried nor slow.

Qin Feng and Grey Wolf exchanged a look.

Grey Wolf immediately shoved the blueprint under his backside, staring vigilantly at the door.

"Who is it?"

A voice came from outside the door, slightly reserved yet tinged with a hint of urgency.

"Student Qin Feng, it's me."

"Yu Xiaogang."

Qin Feng smiled.

So, the Grandmaster really came?

"The door isn't locked, come in."

The door creaked open.

Yu Xiaogang was still wearing that slightly worn robe, but his expression at this moment completely lacked the arrogance he usually displayed, the "I know everything, you are all trash" attitude.

On the contrary, the way he looked at Qin Feng was like an elementary student thirsty for knowledge meeting a doctoral advisor.

Even more absurdly.

His left hand carried an oil-paper parcel, and his right hand clutched a thick notebook.

A rich, smoky aroma drifted in as he entered.

"According to your request."

Yu Xiaogang placed the oil-paper parcel on the table, his movements cautious, as if it contained not cured meat, but some rare treasure.

"Two jin of high-quality cured meat, I specifically went to the best deli in the city to buy it."

"And..."

He scratched his neck, looking a bit embarrassed.

"I brought the notebook too."

"Now, can we start the lecture?"

Grey Wolf's nose twitched, and he instantly teleported to the side of the table.

"Meat! It's meat!"

He tore open the oil-paper parcel, grabbed a piece of glistening cured meat, and shoved it into his mouth, chewing until his mouth was covered in grease.

"Mmm... although it's a bit hard and a bit salty, it barely counts as meat."

"Qin Feng, this old guy is actually quite sensible."

Yu Xiaogang watched the bipedal wolf gorging himself, his mouth twitching twice.

Is this really a spirit beast?

It looks more like a starving ghost reincarnated.

Qin Feng ignored Grey Wolf, simply pulling over a broken chair to sit down, crossing his legs, and looking at Yu Xiaogang.

"Master, since you are so sincere, I won't hold anything back."

"However, before I start the lecture, I must first correct a deeply ingrained misconception of yours."

Yu Xiaogang immediately opened his notebook, his hand holding the pen trembling slightly.

"Please, go ahead."

Qin Feng pointed at himself, then pointed at Yu Xiaogang.

"This so-called spirit power of yours, in your eyes, is a mysterious force that only spirit masters can control, right?"

Yu Xiaogang nodded.

"Of course. Spirit power is a gift from the heavens, a byproduct of the awakening of a martial soul..."

"Wrong!"

Qin Feng interrupted him unceremoniously.

"Dead wrong!"

"Spirit power, in essence, is just a type of energy."

"Just like light energy, thermal energy, or electrical energy, it is a form of energy that exists within this universe."

"It's just that it possesses biological affinity, allowing it to be captured and stored by specific genetic sequences—what you call martial souls."

"Your cultivation is actually just treating yourselves as batteries, constantly charging up."

"And releasing spirit skills is simply the process of the battery discharging."

Yu Xiaogang listened, dumbfounded.

Batteries? Charging?

These were terms he had never heard before.

But for some reason, combined with the electric shock device Qin Feng had demonstrated earlier, he actually felt this theory was... logically consistent!

"Then... what about spirit rings?"

Yu Xiaogang asked eagerly.

"If one doesn't absorb a spirit ring, a spirit master cannot break through their bottleneck. How do you explain that?"

Qin Feng picked up a screw from the table and spun it in his hand.

"That is the second point I want to make."

"Spirit rings are not some god-given law."

"They are merely the key to a 'limiter'."

"Or rather, they are a specific segment of genetic code."

"Your bodies are like locked machines; every time you reach a certain level, you need a new password to unlock higher power."

"Hunting spirit beasts and absorbing spirit rings is, in essence, plundering this password from the spirit beast's genes and forcibly writing it into your own body."

Qin Feng's voice echoed in the empty basement.

"Therefore, theoretically."

"As long as one can crack this genetic code, or create an artificial device capable of simulating this energy frequency."

"Humans wouldn't need to hunt spirit beasts at all to become stronger."

"In fact..."

Qin Feng leaned closer to Yu Xiaogang, his voice dropping, carrying a hint of demonic temptation.

"We could mass-produce artificial spirit masters who possess the power of ten-thousand-year spirit rings!"

"Clatter."

The pen in Yu Xiaogang's hand fell to the floor.

He felt as if he had been struck by lightning, his mind a complete blank.

Artificial spirit rings?

No need to hunt spirit beasts?

This... this was challenging the ironclad laws of the entire Douluo Continent that had stood for millions of years!

This was simply... a miracle!

Just as Yu Xiaogang's worldview was undergoing a shattering reconstruction.

Suddenly.

A terrifying pressure, to the extreme, descended from the sky without any warning!

"Boom!"

The ground above the basement seemed to be pressed down hard by an invisible giant hand.

The chandelier overhead swayed violently, and the parts on the table rattled with a clanging sound.

Grey Wolf, who had been gnawing on cured meat, suddenly tossed the meat aside, his fur standing on end as he bared his teeth at the ceiling.

"There's killing intent!"

Qin Feng's expression darkened instantly.

He could feel it.

That was no ordinary fluctuation of spirit power.

It was an aura filled with tyranny, destruction, and monstrous rage.

He was all too familiar with this aura from the descriptions in the original work.

In all of Nuoding City, only one person possessed such a presence.

That blacksmith who hid in the gutters to drink himself into a stupor.

That ruthless man who could smash a Title Douluo to death with a single hammer.

Tang San's own father.

The Clear Sky Douluo, Tang Hao!

"So, after beating the son, the father finally couldn't sit still?"

Qin Feng let out a cold laugh and stood up from his chair.

Yu Xiaogang was gasping for air under the weight of this pressure, his face pale as he gripped the table to steady himself.

"This... this is the aura of a Title Douluo!"

"How could a Title Douluo possibly be here?"

Qin Feng ignored the panicked master.

He walked over to the Industrial Mother Machine he had just exchanged for and pressed the start button.

At the same time, he issued a command to the system in his mind.

"System, initiate Level One combat readiness!"

"Brother Wolf, stop eating."

"Drag out those 'Fully Automatic Anti-Wolf Turrets' of yours."

"Tonight, we are going to slaughter a god!"