Hope flaring in their hearts, the two brothers summoned the last of their strength and paddled the raft toward the island with all their might.
Half an hour later, utterly exhausted, they finally brought the raft alongside a rocky shore.
Perhaps fortune had finally turned in their favor. As soon as they set foot on the island, they spotted a puddle nearby, filled with precious fresh water!
After drinking their fill, the two finally recovered some strength and began searching the island for food.
"Lao Da, something about this place just doesn't feel right to me!" Lao San had come up fighting in underground boxing rings and possessed an animal-like instinct for danger. Now he stood hesitantly at the edge of a forest on the island.
"Don't be ridiculous! Even if there are wild animals, do you think we're herbivores? Even if a Tyrannosaurus jumped out, I'd eat it raw!" Lao Da drew his pistol with a ferocious air, his eyes gleaming.
With that, he strode into the forest. Lao San scratched his head and followed.
The two passed through a dense forest, and the surroundings gradually changed. Even Lao Da, who had been so hungry he'd claimed he would eat a Tyrannosaurus raw, began to feel that something was wrong.
The trees grew sparser, and solar panels covered in green camouflage came into view, stretching across the landscape as far as the eye could see.
They were hard to make out from a distance, but up close, the oddities were easy to spot.
"Someone's on this island! It's been developed!"
The increasingly obvious signs of human handiwork made the two realize it at once.
"Lao Da, there are people here! We're saved!" Lao San exclaimed delightedly.
"Idiot, let's see what's going on first. Would a normal person need to camouflage things like this?"
"Uh... maybe it belongs to an environmentally conscious person?"
Lao Da: "..."
Resisting the urge to smack the idiot, Lao Da moved even more cautiously. But all around them, there were nothing but solar panels—no sign of anyone at all.
Suddenly, the grass nearby rustled. It sounded as if something was moving inside.
The two stared nervously in that direction, and Lao Da immediately aimed his only pistol at it.
"Plop!" To their utter astonishment, a toy robot about twenty centimeters tall hopped out of the grass. It wore a little vest and jeans, and had an adorable oversized head with two pointed antennae like ears. A damaged solar panel was strapped to its back as it trudged along with a huff and a puff.
To free up the Mechanical Insects for other work, this entire solar collection system had now been converted to use ordinary, non-Mechanical Insect materials.
Naturally, these man-made devices couldn't compare in quality to the Mechanical Insects. So if any equipment was damaged, perhaps by a wild animal, a little Xiaolang Robot like this would collect it and replace it with a new part.
Under Nie Yun's design, the entire process had become fully automated. Nie Yun no longer needed to intervene at all; the Xiaolang Robots could handle everything perfectly well on their own.
The little robot ignored the two completely and headed straight off in one direction with the damaged component.
The two exchanged bewildered looks.
"Lao Da, do you think... we've wandered into Lilliput? Like in the fairy tale?"
Lao Da: "..."
He shot Lao San a strange sideways glance.
Who knew that beneath your wild exterior, you were hiding the heart of a cute little girl?
"Come on, let's follow it and see!" Lao Da finally steeled himself and made up his mind.
The two followed the little robot for about ten minutes.
After they passed through another stretch of dense forest, the view suddenly opened up. The sight before them left them standing stock-still in shock.
A silver-white warship, nearly a hundred meters long, stood abruptly in the distance.
The oddly shaped warship was a gleaming silver metal, brimming with futuristic technology. Yet its layout and the rows of gun ports along its sides looked like something from a medieval warship in a movie, creating an indescribably bizarre impression.
It sat quietly at a simple dock. Though it wasn't particularly large, it exerted an invisible pressure that weighed on the two.
Several warehouse-like buildings stood around the dock. Countless little robots like the one they'd just seen were rushing in and out, keeping busy. The sight made the two's scalps prickle.
The little robot they'd followed tossed the damaged solar panel onto a scrap pile, then took a new one from a nearby warehouse. It cheerfully passed by the two and headed back the way it had come.
"L-Lao Da, we really have wandered into Lilliput!" Lao San said excitedly, his voice a little too loud.
"Shut up!" Lao Da hissed, his face dark.
He was starting to panic. If he wasn't mistaken, they'd accidentally stumbled into a mysterious place they were never supposed to find!
If they were discovered, who could guarantee these eerie little robots would really be as friendly as the ones in the story about Lilliput?
What if they were aliens preparing to invade Earth?
Would they be killed to keep them quiet? Or captured and cut open for experiments? That was how it always went in the movies, wasn't it?
But he was already too late. Their commotion had attracted attention.
Several silver female robots, clearly different from the others, suddenly turned to look at them. The bustling scene seemed to fall silent for a moment. All the robots froze, then stopped what they were doing and looked toward the two in unison.
At the same time, Nie Yun slowly opened his eyes in his sleep...
At the sight, the two felt their scalps practically explode.
They now knew exactly how it felt to be stared at by several thousand robots, some adorable, others cold and emotionless.
"L-Lao Da! I-I have trypophobia!" Lao San swallowed hard and stammered.
What the hell? Why hadn't you said so earlier!
"Come on, back away slowly!" Lao Da said cautiously. He kept an eye on the robots as he quietly edged backward.
Before the two could retreat into the forest, a lazy voice suddenly rang out with a yawn.
"Yaaawn... Who disturbed the King's slumber?"
As the voice sounded, a human figure appeared on the deck of the silver-white warship, peering down at the two with narrowed eyes.
He wore a silver cloak. He looked quite young and had darkish skin, and now he was gazing down at the two with ill intent.
The brothers exchanged bewildered looks. The King? That was a lot to take in!
"Oh, it's old acquaintances after all! Sorry, I just woke up and haven't changed scenes yet. Ahem! Let's do that again. So, you're the ones who disturbed my afternoon nap?"
After Nie Yun finished speaking, he looked at the two with a distinctly unfriendly expression.
"Run!" Lao Da didn't know why the other man had called them old acquaintances, but he'd keenly sensed Nie Yun's hostility. He shouted and immediately turned to flee.
But they had barely taken a few steps before they came back of their own accord.
Behind them, a great many little robots were watching them with ill intent. More importantly, each one had a shell strapped to its back.
As the saying went, bullies feared the reckless, and the reckless feared those who didn't care if they lived or died. When Pinming Sanlang fought, he truly didn't care whether he lived or died—he had already reached the absolute pinnacle of recklessness.
Unfortunately, his opponents were just as reckless and just as indifferent to death, and there were hundreds of them!
Two men who didn't care if they lived or died, fighting hundreds more just like them? Were they trying to get themselves killed?
Before you continue