Translator: AnubisTL
The factory gates slowly creaked open.
Before them lay the heart of the city, the most heavily guarded place in the entire metropolis. The scene within unfolded like a blooming maiden lifting her skirt, irresistibly drawing the eye.
"..."
Having completed his task, Xiao Ai turned back to Li Shiji with a blank expression. The rapid stream of code scrolling across the screen behind him had, of course, nothing to do with cracking the iris lock.
He had needed to infiltrate the network and locate all iris passwords capable of unlocking the door within the iris lock database. Then, he had used the miniature projector on his Mechanical Eye to replicate them one-to-one.
The entire process was incredibly complex.
But...
As an employee, the complexity of the work itself didn't matter. What truly mattered was making the boss realize how complex the task was and that you had successfully completed it.
The screen behind him had been purely to win Lord Mang's favor.
Nothing more.
We need to make the difficulty of his work tangible, or Lord Mang will never realize how impressive he is. He'll just see him as another chatterbox who exposed all his little schemes.
"Very good."
Chen Mang didn't say much, just nodded with satisfaction. Then he turned to the machine guns and anti-aircraft guns mounted on the factory wall. "When we enter this factory, will those weapons attack us?"
"No," Xiao Ai replied, shaking his head. "This city uses an Inner Network. The original firewall should have been extremely stable, beyond my computing power to crack. Even if I found a vulnerability, they would have detected it immediately and launched a counterattack. But it seems the system has been neglected for a long time, and numerous loopholes have emerged. It won't take much effort to infiltrate successfully."
"This factory is the heart of the city," Xiao Ai continued. "The city's network core is located within it. I've only infiltrated the factory's external network so far. But there's also an Inner Network inside the factory, and that network isn't connected to the iris lock."
"The core should be in room 1008 on the first floor."
"Once you've infiltrated and taken control of the network core within the Inner Network of the factory in room 1008, Train Conductor, you'll have absolute control over this city."
"Including..."
"Setting the rules and rewriting them."
Chen Mang chuckled, a genuine smile spreading across his face.
His initial expectation had been to use Xiao Ai to access areas he couldn't reach last time. Instead, his expectations had been far exceeded—he now had absolute control over the entire city. "Let's go!"
The heavily guarded plaza was enclosed by high walls, but the interior was surprisingly simple.
The only structure was a three-story low-rise building at the center.
Inside room 1008, everyone stood watching Xiao Ai, who was busy at a massive server mainframe. Colorful cables snaked from his body, plugging into the machine, while countless lines of code flashed across the screen on his back.
"This time it's not 'Hello World.' It's gibberish," Li Shiji murmured.
This time, the process took longer.
Nearly three full hours passed.
Xiao Ai stopped what he was doing, retracted the cable into his body, and turned to Chen Mang with a proud expression. The screens on his cheeks displayed the words "Mission" "Accomplished."
"Train Conductor, I've completed my mission. This city is now completely under your control."
"The city's service host contained a Tier 5 Smart Chip that served as its control center."
"But I killed it."
"Now, the entire city's control rests in my hands—which means it's in your hands, Train Conductor."
"Excellent," Chen Mang nodded in satisfaction, then asked curiously, "How do AI battles work?"
"Oh, that," Xiao Ai replied thoughtfully. "Actually, killing an AI is quite simple. You just need to destroy its physical form. For example, if you smashed my Train Auxiliary AI, I would die. Or, if you formatted and wiped my database, that would be essentially the same as killing me."
"However, the Tier 5 Smart Chip AI's database contained a lot of crucial information that couldn't be easily formatted. Since I couldn't locate its physical form, I flooded its database with a massive amount of waste information that needed to be prioritized."
"This Tier 5 Smart Chip AI is currently dormant and unactivated. Normally, without someone manually activating it, it wouldn't wake up. But if it does awaken, it will take a very long time to process all that waste data. If it lacks sufficient computing power, it might even freeze completely. That should give me enough time to deal with it."
"I think I understand. If hundreds of millions of residents in the train all made purchases at the Resident Store simultaneously, my main body would probably start smoking."
"Can we modify some basic rules? For example..." Chen Mang shook his watch. "Can I add a few zeros to my current balance of 5,000?"
He seemed to grasp the situation.
But that wasn't the most important thing. He just wanted to know what he could do right now. The 5,000 points were left over from his last visit.
"Of course, my train conductor," Xiao Ai chuckled, snapping his fingers. "How about 50,000? Too little?"
"500,000 still wouldn't be enough."
"5 million? 50 million? Or even 500 million? 500 million should be enough."
"..."
Chen Mang stared expressionlessly at the silent Xiao Ai, his gaze fixed on the rapidly changing numbers on his wrist-mounted display. Finally, they reached—
"500,000,000."
In that instant, he felt as if he had just entered a cheat code in Grand Theft Auto.
"Huh?"
Behind him, Biaozi and the others were equally stunned by the string of numbers on Lord Mang's wrist. They still remembered how difficult it had been to earn money when they first arrived in Neon City!
They had struggled for days in the Casino, barely scraping together a few hundred thousand.
It was only thanks to Zhang Yi's black boxing matches that they had finally earned a million.
That million had been enough to buy a mountain of supplies from the Mechanical Train Parts Store. But now... five hundred million?
Pure cheating!
This was only possible because it was the apocalypse. In the pre-apocalypse era, such blatant manipulation would have resulted in an immediate account ban!
"Can we actually use this money?" Chen Mang asked Xiao Ai, his expression equally strange. "Is it just for show, or can we spend it in other shops? Can we actually buy things with it?"
"Of course you can," Xiao Ai replied proudly, tilting her head. "This city's monetary system is based on the Mechanical Civilization's currency system. It's valid not only here but also in any other city belonging to the Mechanical Civilization."
"But..."
"Cough, because this city has been abandoned for a long time and its firewall has been completely breached, there's no verification during transactions. That's why it works normally here. But outside Neon City, in other cities of the Mechanical Civilization, every transaction undergoes multiple verifications and will be flagged."
"Using it here is enough."
Chen Mang suddenly chuckled and immediately turned to walk out the door. "500 million isn't enough. Increase it to 500 billion."
"Your only mission for the next 48 hours is to spend all 500 billion!"
Next, he headed to the Mechanical Train Parts Store. This shop wasn't just one story; it had a second floor that he hadn't been allowed to access before, as it was restricted to Tier 10 mechanical trains and above.
Now, he was driving a Tier 12 Train. He could definitely go up.
Whatever was on the second floor, he had only one thing to say: "I'll take it all!"
He didn't need to worry about money!
This time, he truly, absolutely didn't need to worry about money.
The Mechanical Train Parts Store.
A familiar place.
Chen Mang pushed open the door. The girl standing at the entrance greeted him with a cheerful smile. "Welcome!"
"You can choose freely from the First Floor and Second Floor zones, sir. The third floor zone is restricted to train conductors of Tier 20 and above, and your current Tier doesn't meet the requirement."
Chen Mang glanced around.
Nothing had changed since his last visit. It seemed no one else had entered the city during his absence. He had already bought most of the good items on the first floor last time, leaving only the more ordinary ones.
For example, the murphy stones, priced at 100,000 points each, with a purchase limit of 18.
He hadn't bought any last time. They weren't particularly useful to him. The rest of the items were equally unremarkable.
But—
Who cares!!!
"Package everything on the First Floor," Chen Mang said, leaning on his cane as he strode toward the Second Floor. "Don't bother haggling. I'll pay ten times the price. Just be quick about it. I'm not short on money."
"Ten times the price! Did you hear that! Pack yourself in too!" Biaozi, following behind, grinned excitedly at the saleswoman and shouted. He then hurried after Lord Mang to the Second Floor. He loved this feeling of swaggering around on someone else's power. No wonder so many people enjoyed cheating in games—nothing could beat the thrill of cheating.
The 2nd floor's layout was almost identical to the First Floor.
Several screens displayed different items in glass cabinets.
Murphy Stone: Special item, price: 100,000 points, stock: 14
Rare Train Token: Special item, price: 500,000 points, stock: 1
Random White-Grade Blueprint: Price: 15,000 points, stock: 12
Random Green-Grade Blueprint: Price: 50,000 points, stock: 8
Time Rift Detector: Red-grade train component, price: 10,000,000 points, stock: 1
Ultimate Challenge: Special item, Rare Map chip, requires use with Tier 5 Combat Training Virtual Space, price: 500,000 points, stock: 2
A scattered pile of items lay before him.
Chen Mang glanced at them casually before turning back to the unfamiliar salesperson standing at the entrance to the Second Floor. He grinned. "I'll take everything on the Second Floor. I'll pay you ten times the price!"
"Money's no object!"
"Make it snappy."
With that, he strode toward the Third Floor. But—he slammed into an invisible barrier.
The salesperson who had been packing items nearby called out, "Sir, the third floor is off-limits. Only train conductors with a Mechanical Train Level exceeding Tier 20 are allowed up there."
"..."
Chen Mang said nothing, simply turning his head to look at Xiao Ai.
"Just a moment," Xiao Ai said after pausing for three seconds. "Alright, it's done."
The next instant—
The salesperson who had just spoken hastily apologized. "Esteemed customer, I apologize. The system data hadn't updated in real-time. It's been updated now. Your train is actually Tier 1024. You're authorized to enter the third floor."
Chen Mang touched the spot where the invisible barrier had been. It was gone. He turned to Xiao Ai. "Isn't Tier 1024 a bit excessive?"
"It's mostly because the number is auspicious."
"True."
The Mechanical Train Parts Store had only three floors, with the third floor being the highest.
On the third floor, the selection of goods was significantly smaller.
Only three items had any stock remaining, while all other items showed zero inventory.
However...
The prices of these three items were utterly outrageous, including a Gold-grade accessory blueprint!
Gold-grade accessories were a tier above even Red-grade accessories.
Chen Mang's rough estimate of the total cost was around 80 million credits.
"Whew..."
Chen Mang exhaled deeply. "Damn, that's expensive! Who could possibly afford this stuff?" Fortunately, he had his cheat. With a decisive wave of his hand, he turned to the store clerk standing nearby.
"Pack everything up. I'll take it all. I'll pay ten times the price!"
Soon after, Chen Mang and his group left the Mechanical Train Parts Store, riding their off-road motorcycles down the street at high speed.
Whenever they passed a convenience store, they would stop.
The moment they pushed open the door, Chen Mang would declare, "Pack everything up. I'll take it all. I'll pay ten times the price!"
Then came the payment.
He placed his wristwatch on the counter, and the credits were deducted with a satisfying ka-ching. The sales clerks were honest—when he said he'd pay ten times the price, they actually deducted ten times the amount.
As soon as the credits were deducted, Xiao Ai immediately replenished his account.
So, making money is really just a scam, isn't it? Just set the rules, and who can match that kind of income speed?
Zhang Yi and Zhang Er were ecstatic.
This time, they were completely satisfied.
Thank goodness they had taken enough refrigerators. Otherwise, they wouldn't have been able to fit all this stuff. They crammed everything into the refrigerators one by one, leaving them utterly thrilled!
Biaozi was equally excited.
He was now eagerly anticipating the return trip. On the third floor of the mechanical shop, he had seen an item: the Ultimate Edition Virtual Map Chip, priced at 20 million!
This thing was sure to boost his comprehensive physical fitness even further. Once he cleared the map back on the train, he could finally pilot the "Pope" mech!
Xiao Ai was thrilled as well.
He had clearly made a major contribution this time. He was already imagining how the train conductor would praise him when they returned.
Chen Mang was also excited.
This was a golden opportunity to elevate the train's overall Foundation in every aspect. Whether it was useful or not, if it could be bought with money, he was buying it!
The store clerk was equally thrilled.
This was a huge deal!
After thousands of years without a sale, someone had just cleared out their entire stock. They had found a sugar daddy!
It was a win-win situation for everyone involved.
There were no losers.
The only possible loser would be the original owner of these Neon Cities, but that guy had long since vanished—what's the point of talking about winners and losers when someone's already dead? So, in this case, there were no losers at all, only winners!
(End of the Chapter)
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