Chapter 25

Zhang Yuan opened his seafood noodles, planning to fill his stomach before doing anything else.

To his surprise, the man sitting across from him caught the smell of the food, and his Adam's apple bobbed involuntarily.

"Want some? I can share half with you."

"Oh, thanks! I've been trying to decide which of my treasures to bring along, and I completely forgot to eat."

Having shared a meal, the two quickly grew more familiar with each other.

The man was named Ye Kaifu. He had the same level of education as Zhang Yuan—just an undergraduate degree.

But most importantly, he was an "eighth-grade fitter," skilled in all kinds of manufacturing and handicrafts.

Zhang Yuan grew curious. "You mean the kind of job where you can file a piece of iron into a ball with a file?"

I wonder how much an eighth-grade fitter earns.

Needless to say, it had to be more than he did!

"Not just filing a ball, but using basic tools—files, cutting machines, polishing machines—to grind a cube of iron into a sphere. The margin of error can't be more than one si, which is about the thickness of a strand of hair. Then you pass, and you're considered an eighth-grade fitter."

"The thickness of a strand of hair? That sounds pretty difficult. You'd have to measure it by feel."

"If you're skilled enough, it's manageable. But for greater precision, you need advanced tools."

"Impressive!"

"Not really. There are plenty of people better than me... There are ninth- and tenth-grade fitters, too."

Zhang Yuan sighed to himself. Everyone aboard the Earth Era had a skill of their own. He might be the most ordinary one of all...

Of course, that was the old him.

Advanced fitters like this had been trained to help restart civilization quickly. The spacecraft had limited cargo capacity; they couldn't bring every kind of industrial machine tool aboard. Some parts could only be made entirely by hand.

Never underestimate the power of human beings themselves.

After wolfing down his noodles in a few bites, Zhang Yuan turned his attention to the collection of metal contraptions.

He was a mechanical engineering enthusiast, too, and had once taken part in a robotics competition in college.

He was pretty good at programming. But his practical skills were so poor that he'd wound up falling flat on his face—not in the most glamorous fashion.

Ye Kaifu's face lit up, his eyes shining.

Talking about his treasures seemed to scratch an itch. "This is my entry in the ESL Robotics Competition. This one's from the national competition, and this one... this one..."

"Did you make all of these yourself with a file?"

"Of course not. I bought the sensors and other components. But most of the parts really were handmade."

"What about the robot programs?"

"Uh, I wrote most of those myself, too..." Ye Kaifu's expression turned a little awkward.

Because...

Back in college, he'd accidentally become a simp.

Whenever he entered a competition, he brought along his "girlfriend" and her "male best friend," basically carrying two passengers on his back.

But no matter how capable one person was, there was only so much he could do.

So he'd never won first prize.

In the end, the simp had been left with nothing.

In a fit of anger, he'd decided to leave this heartbreaking world behind.

Zhang Yuan laughed. "Don't feel bad. First prize is hard to win... I entered competitions, too, and didn't win a damn thing!"

As they chatted, Zhang Yuan picked up something that looked like a mechanical hand and examined it curiously.

It looked pretty good, with a solid, metallic feel to it. It would've made a great movie prop.

He hefted it carefully. Good grief, it weighed nearly twenty kilograms!

Designing this mechanical arm must have taken a lot of time. And getting it to actually move was no easy task.

This guy was a real top student!

Ye Kaifu wore a hint of pride. "...I spent four months making this powered armor. It won second prize in the Galaxy Awards, and someone even borrowed it for the movie Terminator 100!"

"Powered armor?"

"Well, I only made one arm. You make a movement, and it copies you. Want to try it out?"

"Sure!"

Zhang Yuan eagerly put on a very tight leather glove that covered his hand all the way to his wrist.

A wire connected the glove to the metal arm.

When he switched it on, the sound of machinery whirring filled the air, like a motor starting up.

Ye Kaifu adjusted it. "All set. You can move now."

Zhang Yuan tried curling his five fingers into a fist.

With a whir of machinery, the metal hand likewise closed its five fingers into a fist.

He opened his hand, and the metal hand opened, too.

Curious, he asked, "This leather glove is a pressure sensor, right? Is it that famous MIA Pressure Sensing System?"

"Exactly!" Delighted to be talking with someone who knew his stuff, Ye Kaifu launched into an enthusiastic rundown of all kinds of specifications.

"Try crushing this." He picked up a soda can and held it in front of the mechanical arm.

Zhang Yuan carefully moved his arm. The metal arm followed his movements, extending and shifting in turn. It gingerly grasped the can, then tightened its fingers.

Crack—

The can let out a tortured shriek as it was crushed into a flat disk.

"Its maximum grip strength is 320 kilograms. An ordinary person's grip strength is only around fifty or sixty kilograms."

Ye Kaifu wiped the sweat from his face and asked, "So, how was the experience?"

"Don't tell me what's good about it. Just tell me the flaws, or I won't be able to bring myself to scrap it. There's no way I can take it into space."

"You really want me to list the flaws?" Zhang Yuan scratched his head. "I'm not sure how to put it..."

"Go on, go on. Don't hold back!"

"Uh, using it feels a little like operating an excavator..."

"First, it doesn't give me any feedback. If I don't look, I can't tell whether the metal hand has grabbed anything or how much force it's using. Compared with a real hand, it lacks a sense of touch, which makes it very inconvenient."

Ye Kaifu nodded. "True. There's no human-machine interaction. You can only estimate where to grab by looking."

Zhang Yuan continued, "Second, I don't seem to have any control over its grip strength. It crushed the can right away... I only wanted to pick it up gently."

"That's true."

"Third, there seems to be a slight delay, and the movements aren't very smooth. The mechanical hand doesn't seem to move the same distance as I do... How should I put it? It's not very precise."

Ye Kaifu wasn't happy about it, but he had to admit Zhang Yuan had a point.

Besides, he'd asked for an honest critique himself. He couldn't blame anyone else.

His shoulders slumped. "Sigh, you're right. That's why it only won second prize. I should give up on it."

"Goodbye, my precious. Maybe we'll meet again in the next life..."

He lifted the mechanical arm and placed it in a box.

Zhang Yuan felt a little bad. Had he been too blunt? He'd made the thing sound completely worthless.

He hurriedly said, "The model itself is pretty well made. The gears have backlash when they move, and friction varies at different angles. It must've been very difficult to design. Getting it to this point is already impressive."

"What good is a nice model? It's not that technical. It just takes a lot of time." Ye Kaifu shook his head and sighed, sinking into an irrepressible sadness over losing his harem...

Seeing this, Zhang Yuan said no more and put the matter out of his mind.

There was nothing else to do, so he might as well study. Studying always made him feel better.

"What should I study..."

Knowledge he'd learned in the past flickered through his mind.

Suddenly, inspiration struck. He remembered that there seemed to be a promising idea on his father's tablet.

Research on Full-Body Motion Mapping for Robotic Movement!