Genius Mechanic: Chapter 203

Slared Contaminated Zone(Star Alliance Mission)

203. Energy Freeze

Proofread by Cloud Chip Cake and An Zheee 

Ying Chenlin glanced sideways at the mecha beside him, catching a clearer view in Zhao Lejie’s spotlight just now. The outer shell of You Su’s mecha was undamaged. He noticed that their mechas were positioned quite close, with You Su’s unrestrained mental power right next to him.

He subconsciously took a step back, but it seemed like the mental power still lingered.

“Chenlin.” Yuan’s voice timely reminded him. It hadn’t detected any abnormalities in Ying Chenlin’s physical condition, but there were subtle irregularities in his mental power and heart rate.

Ying Chenlin snapped back to reality and pulled out an injector from his portable medical kit.

He hadn’t done his routine injection yet today, and as the syringe pressed against the skin on the side of his mechanical arm, he hesitated for half a second. In the past, every time they entered a Contaminated Zone, You Su would always remind him to take his injection, but today, there was no reminder.

Beside him, You Su’s gaze fell on the adjacent mecha, with Theo’s incessant chatter in his mind. He soon closed his eyes.

“Why is your body temperature high again?” Theo’s puzzled voice continued, “Your surface temperature is high too. You’re in ice, You Su.”

The silence between the two quickly caught the attention of the two mechas behind them. As Huo Yan dragged the Shadow Fox out of the crevice it was stuck in, Ying Chenlin in front of him had barely moved. That was unusual, as Ying Chenlin would normally watch closely when they were handling pollutants, pointing out which areas worked well and which needed special treatment.

“Lao Zhao, the path ahead is up to you,” Huo Yan called out.

Zhao Lejie: “…I’m digging.”

You KID folks outnumber me; I don’t want any trouble.

The sound of the ice breaking echoed through the dim tunnel as Zhao Lejie turned to dig a path. Huo Yan and Lin Yao were at the very back, dealing with the Shadow Fox. This pollutant, dragged along as a cushion until now, wasn’t totally dead yet. Fortunately, the pollutant tendrils had it tightly bound, especially the few that were wrapped around its neck, nearly strangling it.

Lin Yao gave it a final blow, skillfully extracting the anomalous crystal from its brain and placing it into his storage compartment.

Their storage compartments were filled to the brim, nearly packed with the pollutants they had dealt with in the large pit earlier. Huo Yan thought that once they found a spacious area, they would need to transfer everything from the storage compartments to the storage devices, or they wouldn’t have room for anything else.

The Star Alliance’s mission had a time limit, but this time limit wouldn’t be disclosed in advance. It was generally determined based on the speed at which the participating teams cleared the Contaminated Zone. From what Dawn had gathered, it typically wouldn’t exceed a week. They had lost track of time underground, where there was no distinction between day and night. By their calculations, they had been inside for about two days.

“You mentioned something SLY is interested in?” Huo Yan asked, looking at Ying Chenlin. “What do you think it could be?”

Ying Chenlin paused when questioned, then quickly responded, “I don’t think it’s a pollutant.”

“Not a pollutant? Then what could it be?” Lin Yao racked his brains, “Plants? Minerals? Materials? Are they in need of those?”

Before being attacked by the special pollutant, they already had suspicions about the Snowy Mountains’s environment. The abnormal growth rate of the pollutants was definitely related to the uniqueness of the Slared Contaminated Zone. Now, because part of their team’s coordinates disappeared, all the elite teams were like hunters drawn by the scent, their eager expressions plainly visible.

If they were only interested in the pollutants, they wouldn’t spend time probing and scouting KID’s position.

Clearly, to them, the Shadow Fox—and even the pollutant behind this special white fog magnetic field—didn’t surpass their rational boundaries in value. They were after something more important than a pollutant’s anomalous crystal.

The Star Alliance’s system had lost connection and was unusable. Ying Chenlin could only see the previously buffered data when he opened the Star Alliance’s system.

Digging a path was a long process, and in that time, he reviewed all the data, identifying several anomalies.

“The special mission from earlier exists in other zones as well.” Ying Chenlin shared the information and continued, “If the anomalies correspond, then the affected zones are likely not limited to these.”

“There’s another point.” You Su slightly raised his gaze, “These pollutants are cooperating.”

Normally, pollutants, especially S-Level ones with intelligence, rarely share prey with other pollutants.

Yet, when Ying Chenlin and You Su were besieging the Shadow Fox, the tendrils underground only attacked the mechas and not the pollutants.

“Pollutants cooperating?” Lin Yao was a bit surprised. “That’s some really high intelligence.”

“There are precedents for pollutant cooperation. This anomaly aligns with our earlier judgment about abnormal growth rates,” You Su’s gaze fell on the ice layer reflecting the dim light. 

“It’s if their intelligence is high enough, and they have common interests. The Management Bureaus have long monitored that pollutants like this can’t normally propagate in the ordinary Contaminated Zones of the Third Star Domain. These situations are mostly seen at the Third Star Domain’s Frontier.”

Zhao Lejie asked, “You’ve been to the Frontier Contaminated Zones?”

You Su replied, “I’ve been there.”

When You Su mentioned the frontier, Ying Chenlin glanced in his direction slightly. You Su had been to the Third Star Domain’s frontier…?

“You Ge used to be a Frontier Mercenary; he’s been to many places,” Lin Yao explained.

Zhao Lejie: “…”

This man is terrifying.

Lin Yao didn’t quite understand and asked, “But what does this have to do with the frontier? It’s normal for frontier pollutants to come here if this place was previously turbulent, right?”

“It’s not about the frontier,” Huo Yan summarized the information. “Simply put, this place has enough interest to draw cooperation among pollutants.” He suddenly realized a problem. “Wait a minute, haven’t we encountered other pollutants without any symbiotic relationship along the way?”

These anomalies appeared after they had been dealing with the pollutants for a while. The fact that pollutants were drawn to the bodies of other pollutants was their first consideration.

But if multiple S-Level pollutants showed up at once, could there be another possibility? They might be in a location where the interests of these pollutants intersect, which is why they were cooperating.

“Wait a minute, are you suggesting…” Zhao Lejie turned around, “Is there something here that pollutants are competing for? Could it be that this thing is similar to what SLY wants?”

At that moment, Zhao Lejie’s weapon seemed to strike something, a hard object, and rebounded, causing his entire mecha to be pushed back two steps and directly collide with Ying Chenlin behind him.

Ying Chenlin staggered back a step, leaning against You Su, who quickly supported him.

Lin Yao asked, “Old Zhao, haven’t you eaten?”

“I didn’t eat anything. It seems like I can’t….” Before Zhao Lejie could finish his sentence, the ice wall he couldn’t break through suddenly cracked open. Something burst out from the crack, fast and fierce, and in the next second, it wrapped around Zhao Lejie’s weapon-holding hand and violently dragged his entire mecha toward the ice wall.

With a loud crash—

Ying Chenlin reacted immediately and put a hand on Zhao Lejie’s shoulder, trying to pull him back. However, the pulling force was so great that he couldn’t hold on the first time. Meanwhile, the sound of ice cracking filled the surroundings.

“Damn it!” Zhao Lejie’s exclamation abruptly stopped as his entire body was pinned against the wall, and all the pressure was exerted on his mecha.

From the left side, thick tendrils shot out from the ice wall, seemingly with a will of their own, binding Ying Chenlin’s hand and dragging him to the side as he tried to assist Zhao Lejie. You Su noticed the situation and grabbed the tendrils from behind, “This isn’t right!”

Huo Yan’s mecha’s searchlight swept forward, and everyone’s pupils suddenly contracted when they saw the ice wall.

The silent, pitch-black ice wall was now covered in cracks, with numerous tendrils emerging from the ruptured ice, spreading out around the five mechas. Huo Yan reacted quickly, deploying the shield, but he was positioned at the back and could only barely protect Lin Yao, leaving the front unprotected. “Old Zhao, switch weapons!”

Zhao Lejie’s mecha was pressed against the ice wall, struggling to switch the Light Blade in his right-hand to a shield. He used his left hand to brace the shield against the ice wall. The Defensive Shield’s range was limited in the narrow space, and with the cracking sounds of ice, more and more things slammed into the shield.

“Not good! My shield can’t hold!” Zhao Lejie said.

You Su coldly ordered, “Is the shield more important, or your life? Open it to the maximum!”

Zhao Lejie was swearing in his mind and reluctantly opened the shield. “The range is too small. How the hell can this hold?”

Lin Yao used his staff to prop up the space, but couldn’t hold it for long. He switched to a basic attack blade, jamming it into the gaps to cut through the tendrils entangled around the mechas and to help block the surrounding attacks. “Damn, this stuff is hard to cut through.”

Ying Chenlin quickly scanned the surroundings. It was too cramped; they couldn’t even fight properly, let alone use Zhao Lejie’s shield. He switched to the Energy Cannon. “You Ge, blow the ice layer open!”

You Su swiftly switched to the Energy Cannon, locking onto the area near his feet. The cannon fired with a minimized blast, breaking up some of the ice layer and expanding their narrow combat space slightly.

Two Energy Cannon shots carved a path, one on each side. They couldn’t care less about the stability of the ice layer. Fortunately, the tendrils had already damaged a significant portion of the ice, and after the barrage, a large amount of ice fragments fell. Lin Yao quickly collected these fragments into his storage compartment to clear out as much space as possible.

The sensation of the shells exploding near their feet was terrifying, especially when firing the Energy Cannon shots inside the shield; it felt like shooting at themselves.

Zhao Lejie couldn’t care less about the tendrils he was holding. The goosebumps from the explosions were rising: “Can’t the explosions be aimed somewhere else? Don’t hit my shield!”

“Quiet,” You Su said, listening to the sounds around him and noticing the tendrils emerging from below, which he then pushed back. “Watch your feet.”

Ying Chenlin looked at the ice layer that was gradually cracking. He aimed the Energy Cannon at the ice layer beneath his feet and fired, quickly saying, “Clear the path below; we need to move down!”

The tendrils emerging from the ice wall were more aggressive and numerous than before, and their pulling force had increased several fold.

Previously, Ying Chenlin could still resist these pollutants, but now they were being dragged along completely. His brows furrowed. There was no other option now. He took out an energy tube from the storage compartment, and the scent of energy fluid spread. “Zhao Lejie, set the energy threshold to the maximum! Huo Yan, you too.”

Both Tank mechas activated their shields simultaneously. Seeing that the tendrils couldn’t break through the shield, they crazily wrapped around the outermost layer of Zhao Lejie’s Defensive Shield.

Zhao Lejie: “What the hell? What’s going on?!”

“Let it bind us,” Ying Chenlin said, waiting for this moment. “Wait until it pulls us down.”

Zhao Lejie heard muffled sounds on the shield, “This is my shield! Didn’t you bring any ore?”

“You noticed?” Ying Chenlin paused and explained seriously, “I only brought two pieces of ore. There are too many of us and not enough to use as footholds. Luckily, I ran into you.”

Zhao Lejie’s eyes widened. With twelve mechas, you brought only a few pieces of ore as backup? Who are you trying to fool?

Two pieces are less helpful than none at all.

Huo Yan: “It’s okay, we’ll repair it when we get out.”

Lin Yao: “Chairman Li is covering the costs this time. Don’t worry, it won’t cost you anything.”

The tendrils wrapped around the entire shield. When the shield struck the ice wall, it made a crisp sound as it collided with the shattered ice. The sound of the shield compressing against the ice layer was like the sound of Zhao Lejie’s heart breaking. Before he could even start cursing, the strong pulling force from the tendrils had already rapidly dragged them downwards.

Ying Chenlin braced himself firmly against the shield, stabilizing his position through the turbulence. Just as he was about to make the next judgment, Yuan’s voice suddenly rang out.

Yuan said, “Chenlin, the surrounding temperature is dropping.”

Ying Chenlin stopped and looked up to see ice crystals forming on Zhao Lejie’s shield.

…?! Energy freeze?! 

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