The Width of Flattery Determines the Width of the Railway

Huang and FrostNova each held an experimental weapon and walked in the front row.

The big cat naturally struck up a conversation with FrostNova, saying, "The weapon I used before was actually quite similar to the Thermal-Driven Axe we're testing today."

Test? Experiment!

Huang's words gave Kal'tsit a flash of inspiration.

The fish-man undoubtedly refers to Seaborn, while the "smuggler" signifies a technological path that was abandoned by Oute... no, by the previous civilization!

Kal'tsit re-analyzes the game.

"Living off the mountain... relying on the Cove," this refers to natural endowment! Seaborn's natural endowment! And this route, and its research director, are subconsciously regarded by Oute as... smugglers.

Why is that?

"Is it an axe too?" FrostNova asked.

"No, it's that they are similar in principle," the big cat replied.

Are they similar in principle?

Smuggling... The existence of smuggling implies the existence of "prohibition." If there is no strong constraint to prohibit trade, then there is no point in talking about smuggling.

Therefore, the image of the smuggler does not lie in the smuggler himself... but in "prohibition" and "breaking the prohibition".

Research ethics?

No, while pushing the boundaries of research ethics to accelerate research certainly constitutes a form of smuggling, the act of "selling a girl who was devoted to him to a fish-man" further underscores the ethical transgressions within the Seaborn Project...

Etc!

The story of the Cove may be related to Seaborn, but it's entirely possible that other factors are involved as well!

Does "The Ancestor" necessarily refer to the entire pre-civilization?

Kal'tsit looked up.

He... she can also be a specific person.

Fishmen are people with fish-like qualities; Aegir is a person with animalistic characteristics; they are... modern Terra.

So, a girl isn't necessarily a girl...

Kal'tsit suddenly sighed.

This story can be completely rearranged:

The pre-civilization possessed abundant material resources, yet they were stretched thin in the face of the problems they encountered. To address this, they made many attempts, some of which were abandoned because they were too unconventional.

However, some aspects were continued by the previous civilization.

One of them... the second is Seaborn and Originium.

Seaborn Si... the "girl who fell in love with him" was "sold to the fishmen" by a certain member of a former civilization. She obtained the treasure but abandoned the "girl" in this the Cove full of fishmen.

The imagery here is not a one-to-one correspondence!

I should have realized this sooner!

Kal'tsit's line of thinking went too far off course, to the point of being quite surprising.

Following her line of reasoning, there seems to be no causal connection between Priestess "obtaining the treasure" and "giving Oute to the beast-eared girl," right?

This makes Priestess seem like a "scumbag" who abandoned Oute. Perhaps Kal'tsit is hypnotizing herself to remove the psychological barrier of stealing someone else's "wife".

Kal'tsit, are you planning to brush this off with "It's a matter of the subconscious, you humans don't need to understand it so clearly"?

"Why did you suddenly sigh?" Oute asked, interrupting Kal'tsit's thoughts with a question he already knew the answer to.

In Kal'tsit's line of thinking, Oute is practically a self-pitying "little girl" character.

"It's nothing." Kal'tsit didn't answer.

But a commotion came from the front of the group.

"Guwawawawawawa!"

It looks like a fish-man is talking.

Four fishmen, with their rather ugly-cute big heads, holding steel forks, lay crouching at the corner.

This group of enemies is a common combination found along the way in the Cove region: Murloc F4.

Although its simple skill set lacks pressure damage, its potential critical strike ability can often send squishy heroes to their deaths in one blow.

Then, when it's the hero's turn to act again, if he hasn't stopped the bleeding or healed, players might even start praying for the death gate bell to ring—after all, you can only hear the bell if you survive the death gate, otherwise you're dead.

"Heating the air here will only make the fishy smell more pungent..." Huang muttered to himself, but still resolutely swung the Thermal-Driven Axe.

The liquefied air was captured by the Originium Circuit at the axe blade, and Huang's Originium Arts effectively amplified it. The explosive airflow generated a heat wave, which in turn propelled the axe blade to deliver a powerful slash.

The fish-man, targeted by the big cat, frantically tried to raise its harpoon to defend itself.

But it was simply cut in two.

FrostNova also tentatively wielded the Cryo-Driven Halberd.

The heating system on the Cryo-Driven Halberd is not as complex as that on the Heat-Driven Halberd, and for any sorcerer, it's no different from turning on a microwave oven timer. Therefore, when this function is integrated into the small end of the Cold Drive weapon, competing for space with the Arts Unit, it can only be considered mediocre.

If it weren't for Huang's explosive Thermal-Driven Axe strikes, FrostNova might have been pleasantly surprised. But now, she only felt that the Cryo-Driven Halberd moved slowly and sluggishly, far less crisp and clean than Huang's.

"Yes, yes, one, two, three." W, looking utterly bored, faced the charging fishmen and activated the Originium Detonator.

Amid the explosion, she leaned back, turned to look at Kal'tsit who had been slacking off, and asked with practiced ease, "You stinky otter, don't you have any new toys suitable for me?"

Chapter 111 The Width of Flattery Determines the Width of the Rails

After entering the instance, in order to better record the map of the Cove, Oute shifted his attention from W to Kal'tsit. Just now, when he was acting as a narrator, introducing the background story of the Cove to the ladies, it was through Kal'tsit's body that he narrated.

It's likely that W deduced from this that Oute is still with Kal'tsit. But unlike the Bloodfiend, she doesn't possess superhuman senses; surely she wouldn't have relied on her familiarity with Oute or her intuition?

Wouldn't that mean it's all for nothing?

Kal'tsit simply said in her usual tone, with a slight reproach, "W! Don't be ridiculous!"

The Sarkaz girl turned around and glanced at the battle.

After confirming several times that all the fishmen had been killed, she shouted in dissatisfaction, "Old woman! Get Oute on board! I'm asking him!"

"... He said he was working."

Oute is indeed working.

"Doctor, are you planning to use this as an explosive device?"

Weedy pointed to the square, where a blast barrel stood in the square area cordoned off by Huang. Inside the blast barrel was the Cryo-Driven Axe that FrostNova had broken earlier.

In fact, similar weapons do exist in Terra.

In the early days of Arknights, there was a bombing drone that would occasionally bring small surprises to players during the early stages of the game – the Buling (yes, not the pigeon) drone.

It has a variant called the "Illusory Drone," which, unlike the Buling that throws regular warheads to cause area-of-effect physical damage and accelerates while unloaded, throws special warheads that deal area -Illusory Drone- effect magic damage and have a freezing effect.

"Yes, with a large number of ice mages, the production cost of liquid nitrogen will be quite low."

Besides temperature, pressure is also a crucial factor affecting gas liquefaction. If the pressure is sufficient, the temperature requirement can be less critical. However, in the 21st century, it is impossible to produce liquid nitrogen using personal handheld devices.

It relies on proper industrial equipment.

Soviet astronomer Kardashev once roughly divided cosmic civilizations into three levels by measuring their energy utilization. These are civilizations that fully utilize the energy of an entire planet/star/galaxy, namely K1, K2, and K3 civilizations.

Earth in the 21st century is generally considered to be a K0.7 level civilization.

But Originium is the ultimate creation of a K2 or even K3 level civilization.

With the help of Originium and Originium Arts, many things that seem to be cost-effective or simply impossible on Earth suddenly become useful in Terra.

Weedy was tempted to ask, where did all these ice sorcerers come from? But she wisely restrained her curiosity.

"Liquid nitrogen?" Weedy asked. "Don't we need to liquefy air?"

Oute stated, "In frontline weapons like the cordless power axe, sacrificing some performance ceiling for stability and versatility is well worth it."

Weedy countered, "If we're considering the upper limit, why not use liquefied hydrogen?"

Oute readily agreed, saying, "It's not impossible."

But he quickly pointed out. "However, it is cheaper to produce liquid nitrogen using air—we cannot afford liquefied hydrogen at the moment."

There are many things in this world that have endless uses and don't require spending money to buy right now.

Just like sunlight, just like air.

The air is mostly nitrogen. For sophisticated industrial production on Earth, directly liquefying air might be quite challenging. But with Originium as a foundation and Originium Arts readily available, the Terra have never had a problem with it.

Moreover, liquefied hydrogen has other uses...

On the other side, in the Cove.

Kal'tsit closed her eyes, listening intently. After a short while, she said to W, "Oute does have something new for you to test, it's explosives—but we'll have to wait until we get back."

The Sarkaz girl instantly became full of energy. She raised her fists high, her fists rippling slightly, and shouted, "Yay!"

Long live the otter!

Meanwhile, in the blacksmith's shop, a former Rhine Lab member who was engrossed in drawing a diagram sneezed.

Achoo!

Simply referring to "otter" is somewhat ambiguous.

"..." Weedy hesitated, wanting to say something.

"Just say it," Oute said, glancing at her.

"I'm just a bioengineer, I don't know much about what's happening on the front lines, and I haven't passed the physical fitness test yet..." Weedy first stacked her armor, then said, "But isn't the ammunition load of the Winter Soldier series a bit too much?"

Oute's eyes lit up, and he said, "Explain in detail."

Although Kal'tsit and the operators always tend to regard Oute as an omnipotent and omniscient genius, Oute is very self-aware: apart from micro-management which is guaranteed by cheats and only results in small or big wins, his other decisions are open to improvement.