Arsenal

The train was gradually slowing down.

As the roar of its engine faded, Ye Qiyan arrived at his first stop.

Standing before the door, he took a deep breath, tightened his grip on his ascended dagger, and pressed the button to open it.

The world outside was silent.

Everything around him was pitch-black, with only a huge, matchbox-shaped building directly ahead.

He looked up. There was no sun here, yet he could clearly see both the road beneath his feet and the building.

"Traveling through space. What an incredible power. No wonder all the trains have the same arrival time."

He left the train and reached the entrance in fewer than ten steps. The door was shut tight. He pried open a gap with his dagger, and the door swung open, immediately releasing a blast of decay into his face.

He stepped inside and looked around. Wooden crates stood in neat rows, and the rotten smell came from them.

Ye Qiyan pried the corroded iron lock off a crate with his dagger. Inside, two bolt-action rifles lay half-buried in wood shavings.

[Low-level Marksman Rifle]: supplied with 20 low-level rounds

Two guns, forty rounds.

That was what one crate contained.

And there were many more crates like it in this arsenal.

"Good stuff."

After opening several crates in succession, Ye Qiyan carried all his finds back to the train.

After several trips back and forth, even the strength fueled by his excitement was finally close to running out.

[Current stamina: 15]

Repeated use of Ascension had long since pushed Ye Qiyan's physical endurance to its limit, but, perhaps because of his excitement, his spirit had actually recovered to 70.

Without replenishing his energy during the train's three-hour stop, he reckoned he would have little strength left to move these supplies.

After resting for a while, Ye Qiyan stopped hauling supplies and explored the arsenal instead. On the shelves in one room, he found several sealed iron containers.

Back in his former world, he had watched some videos introducing military supplies, and quite a few had featured similar iron containers.

Curious, he walked over to them. Their embossed markings were blurred, and he could only vaguely make out something square-shaped.

"Could these be..."

Ye Qiyan swallowed. He pried up a corner of an iron container and saw compressed biscuits neatly arranged inside like gold bars, giving off a faint milky aroma with a slightly sour, fermented smell!

"They really are!"

Without worrying about whether the biscuits might have expired, he grabbed one and stuffed it into his mouth.

"If only there were some water, too."

Although he now had food for the immediate future, he still wasn't satisfied.

He ate only one compressed biscuit. After all, besides filling his stomach, these things would make him thirsty.

He found four containers of this kind of military ration, holding eighty compressed biscuits in total.

That was enough to feed an average adult man for roughly half a month.

He also found some sealed barrels of water nearby. Unfortunately, their smell clearly suggested they weren't drinkable.

Still, Ye Qiyan hauled them all onto the train.

The arsenal was a semi-enclosed, matchbox-shaped space. Collapsed shelves, rotten material piled on the floor, and the stench of decay hanging in the air made exploring particularly troublesome. The farther inside he went, the stronger the smell became.

In a little over two hours, Ye Qiyan found only forty-two intact rifles. Most of the others had deteriorated and rusted from improper storage, leaving them useful only for recycling at the workbench.

He also loaded some iron objects and wood that were easy to pick up and carry onto the train.

He could upgrade the train directly through Ascension, but crafting items still required resources. Even if he didn't use them himself, he could trade them to others.

Returning to the carriage with another armful of supplies, he glanced at the countdown on the operating system.

Thirty minutes remained before departure, enough for another one or two trips.

"One more trip. There should still be enough time."

Looking at the increasingly crowded train, Ye Qiyan felt that what he most needed to build now was his first standard carriage. The crates and the discarded firearms recycled at the workbench had provided enough wood and mechanical parts, but he was still well short on metal, so he couldn't build it yet.

"I don't think I've been into these rooms yet."

Back in the arsenal, he passed the mess strewn across the floor and headed straight toward the back. He pushed open the few remaining unexplored rooms one by one. Their interiors offered faint signs that these spaces had once been living and resting quarters.

The first few rooms yielded nothing special. Only in the last room did he finally find something unexpected.

Crack.

It was the sound of bone being crushed underfoot.

Ye Qiyan slowly lowered his head. Beneath his foot, a skeleton's shinbone had been crushed to pieces.

"Sorry, buddy. Didn't mean to do that."

He wasn't afraid. Ever since he was little, even the scariest horror films had only seemed entertaining to him. Even the swollen, bluish faces of the dead he occasionally saw at funerals left him feeling nothing.

Ye Qiyan pulled his foot back and was about to turn away when he suddenly noticed a dust-covered paper document envelope beneath the skeleton.

There was nothing strange about finding a document envelope in an arsenal. What was strange was how well it had survived. Even iron and wood had deteriorated so badly, so how could a paper envelope remain completely intact?

Puzzled, Ye Qiyan pulled the envelope out from beneath the skeleton.

He didn't open it immediately. Instead, he jogged back to the train. The operating system inside the carriage had an item appraisal function. If there was a trap inside, it should be able to detect it.

[Level 1 Treasure Chest] (Openable)

"This is actually a treasure chest?!"

He examined the document envelope, as thin as a cracker, with surprise and delight written across his face.

"Heh, thanks, bony buddy. I'll come back and give you a proper burial."

Smiling, he was just about to open it when his hands suddenly stopped.

"Right, I should be able to use Ascension on this treasure chest too, shouldn't I?"

Just like when he had used Ascension on the train, once the idea appeared, there was no getting it out of his head.

He glanced at his current personal information.

[Stamina: 30] [Spirit: 80]

"An envelope this small shouldn't take much spirit, even if it uses any. Besides, I've got compressed biscuits. Eating another one will restore some stamina. It'll be fine."

Perhaps it was something special about this world.

The recovery in stamina after eating was very noticeable.

Besides, when someone began persuading himself, it meant he had already made his decision.

And so, Ye Qiyan silently recited the word.

Ascension.

His stamina and spirit numbers kept dropping.

[Spirit has fallen below 50. Entering a state of self-doubt]

He lay motionless on the carriage floor like a fish out of water, watching the hanging light sway slightly overhead. Only after a long while did he sit up.

[Stamina: 30 → 20] [Spirit: 80 → 50]

"Doesn't really feel like anything."

Ye Qiyan scratched his head.

Apart from physical exhaustion, he didn't feel any discomfort from this supposed state of self-doubt.

Shaking his head, Ye Qiyan carefully examined the document envelope in his hand, which seemed unchanged.

Upgrading the treasure chest from level 1 to level 2 had cost forty points of stamina and spirit combined, somewhat more than he had imagined.

[Level 2 Treasure Chest] (Openable)

"Looks like I can't use Ascension on it again. Does this kind of thing only have the potential for one Ascension? Or is there some special rule?"

"Whatever. I'll open it first."

Rubbing his hands together, Ye Qiyan opened the document envelope.

[Opening Level 2 Treasure Chest]

[Received Train Coins: 4]

[Received: Colt M1911 Pistol]

[Received: Level 2 Blueprint: External Garbage Collector]