Chen Yuan's voice was stern and low. But after he called out, the door remained silent.
"Who's out there?!" he shouted again.
He got up, moved to the side of the door, and pressed the button on his dagger. With a soft hiss, the magma-like blade began to radiate heat.
The knocking stopped. The hallway fell into a heavy silence.
Chen Yuan frowned, his breathing quickening. A normal person would have given some kind of response after being questioned. Had he been too fierce and scared them away?
Just as he was about to go to the window to look, the knocking started again.
THUD! THUD! THUD!
This time, it was even louder than before.
Chen Yuan's brow furrowed into a knot. In a deep, commanding voice, he yelled, "Who is out there?! Speak!!!"
The palm holding the dagger was now slick with sweat. His entire body was tense, stretched to its limit.
But still, there was no response from beyond the door.
In that moment, the events of last night flashed through his mind. Instantly, goosebumps erupted all over his skin. He glanced towards the warehouse. Tiedan was still upgrading.
Hurry up, you damn thing, hurry up!!! he screamed internally.
But this time, the outside world truly fell silent. The knocking did not return, not even as the Apocalypse Store's robotic arm began to fabricate the upgraded Tiedan.
Chen Yuan swallowed hard and hurried into the warehouse. Seeing the electrical arcs flashing on the platform and Tiedan's form taking shape, he let out a small sigh of relief. Thankfully, the process wasn't too long. When Tiedan once again appeared before him, fully formed, its appearance had changed.
He lifted the robot dog from the platform, loaded it with combustion pellets, and pressed the power button.
「Master, Tiedan has returned.」
This time, the voice was less mechanical. Tiedan stretched its legs, and then a three-sectioned, foldable mechanical arm extended from its back. The offensive arm, over two meters long, moved with fluid grace in the air, like a scorpion's tail. At its very tip was a spindle-shaped metal drill, the point of which glinted with a cold light.
He gently touched the sharp tip. With just the slightest pressure, it pricked his finger, drawing a drop of blood. He put his finger in his mouth to suck on it, the metallic taste of blood shooting straight to his head.
Chen Yuan nodded fiercely. This thing was the real deal. With this offensive arm, he could at least guarantee his safety within a two-meter radius.
He hurried to the living room and gave Tiedan an order. "Scan the outside. See if there's anything out there."
「Roger.」
Tiedan retracted its offensive arm and activated its thermal sensors.
「Report to Master: there are no moving objects outside.」
"None... Then watch the door. Without my permission, if anything comes in, you are to attack."
「Roger.」
Tiedan responded and began to stand silently behind the front door, its offensive arm extended, ready for battle at a moment's notice.
Chen Yuan himself returned to the warehouse. He swiped through the blueprints on the store's screen and, in the production tab, found the materials needed for another robot dog.
One Tiedan was not enough to put his mind at ease. He needed at least three. One for reconnaissance, one for security, and one for hauling materials.
「Fuel-Driven Load-Bearing Robot Dog: One main computer unit, 10kg iron, 1.5kg copper, 0.5kg steel, 0.25kg rubber, 0.25kg glass.」
Chen Yuan looked at the neatly sorted materials in his warehouse and frowned slightly. He had everything else, but he was missing a main computer unit.
"It seems the main unit is a critical material."
He glanced at the time. It was already approaching four in the afternoon, and the sky was beginning to darken.
Wait until tomorrow?
No. Chen Yuan felt he couldn't wait until tomorrow.
He slung his backpack on and, only after having Tiedan confirm three times that there was nothing outside, did he open the door.
The temperature outside had now dropped to over thirty degrees below zero. The entire stairwell was like a winding, frozen tunnel. As he locked the door behind him, he thought that he really ought to reinforce it.
Out on the street, the snow was already past his thighs. A biting, frigid wind howled, and goose-feather-like snow began to fall from the sky. The plummeting temperature, combined with the wind, made Chen Yuan feel as if he were walking through some ethereal, otherworldly realm.
Tiedan took the lead, its offensive arm raised high, ready to respond to any sudden situations. The thermal and graphical scanners on its head swept back and forth rapidly. Chen Yuan followed closely behind, his own nerves on edge.
The six-hundred-meter distance wasn't long. Man and dog took only about ten minutes to clear a path. Chen Yuan's gaze swept across the road. He found a snow-covered mound and quickly walked over. With a few loud clangs of his axe, he smashed the car window and tore out the trip computer from beside the dashboard.
He had just stuffed it into his backpack when he heard a scream from the distance.
Chen Yuan whipped his head around, his pupils contracting. Due to the dim environment, he could only vaguely make out two dark figures.
"Tiedan, how many people are over there?"
「Report to Master: there are two moving objects.」
Before Chen Yuan could ask anything else, Tiedan spoke again.
「One moving object has a temperature of 36.8 degrees. The other is at 0 degrees.」
Hearing this, Chen Yuan felt his breath catch in his throat.
A moving object… with no body temperature…
His mind went on high alert. Gritting his teeth, he gave a direct order. "Go! Get back, now!!!"
He didn't care what was happening with the other person. All he knew was that if he didn't leave now, he would be in grave danger. He abandoned all thoughts of other materials and sprinted for home. Tiedan followed close behind, its mechanical arm pointed backward to guard against anything that might give chase.
A distance of nearly eight hundred meters. Chen Yuan, in a daze, ran the entire way home in just five minutes.
He slammed the door shut with a bang, his hair already soaked with sweat.
Phew...
"What the hell was that thing…"
Tiedan swayed from side to side, indicating it didn't know.
Without resting, Chen Yuan took the main computer unit directly to the Apocalypse Store. He swiped quickly, found the robot dog in the production tab, and selected "Produce." He threw the required items into the insertion port one by one, then slapped the red button.
「Ding-a-ling~ Material insertion successful. Product in production. Please wait...」
Seeing the prompt on the screen, Chen Yuan simply sat on the floor, panting while he waited.
Ten minutes later, a robot dog identical to Tiedan appeared. Chen Yuan didn't take it off the platform, instead going directly to the upgrade menu and selecting the "Remote Image Transmission" function. He tossed in the materials from his warehouse as if they were free. This upgrade would take an hour.
Having done all this, Chen Yuan dragged his heavy feet back to the sofa. He took off his thermostatic suit and chugged a mouthful of Mineral Life Water.
Leaning back on the sofa, he began to plan. At first, he had just thought about going out to scavenge materials every day, trying his best to avoid contact with others. But after yesterday's events, he felt he had to speed things up.
First, scavenging materials was a must. But before scavenging, he needed a very powerful robot dog to guarantee his safety. That moving object with no temperature had planted a thorn of fear in his heart. If he didn't figure out what that thing was, he wouldn't be able to eat or sleep in peace.
Besides scavenging, he felt it was necessary to properly fortify his front door. A standard security door was, in the end, not enough.
As he was contemplating his next move, Tiedan suddenly entered combat mode. Its offensive mechanical arm shot out with a whir, its tip pressed against the center of the door.
「Report to Master. A moving object is approaching.」
THUD, THUD, THUD...
THUD, THUD, THUD...
THUD, THUD, THUD...
"Who is it?!"