Starting Cultivation in Wasteland-Chapter 582 - 452: Swaggering Attitude

Annette understood very well that transferring the military-facing business not only cut off a major source of support for him.

The key was that it would send a signal to the outside world: he had fallen out of favor.

Alright, using "fallen out of favor" is a bit inaccurate, but there is no doubt that those who belonged to the boss's power would start to distance themselves from him.

In other words, his other major support would weaken significantly.

And that was not the worst part; the worst part was that his political position on the planet would regress instead of advancing!

This mistake not only angered the boss but also ruined his years of hard work on Star No. 4!

But how many such years does one have in life?

If you're heartless, don't blame me for being unjust! At critical moments, Annette could handle letting go...

Qu Jianlei was not very concerned about these matters; what he cared about was when he could get his hands on the Array Book.

However, Hertman stated that applying for permissions required a process and asked him to be patient.

The Guard Captain further added that he could trouble the boss to put in a word, which might save some time.

But doing so would expose the relationship between the two families — not very favorable to him either.

Simultaneously, he also mentioned that it would be more appropriate for Zi Jiu Immortal to apply, and he could just manage the specifics.

After all, Zi Jiu Immortal had an official certified professor status, which was far ahead of Panda. 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Qu Jianlei found this process a bit odd, and when Hals clocked in again, he couldn't help but ask.

The chubby guy answered matter-of-factly, "Borrowing array books, of course, you have to go to the war zone headquarters."

Going to the war zone headquarters? Qu Jianlei asked in confusion, "Aren't there any array materials available in the public domain?"

"If there are, they would be in those authorized research institutes," Hals answered without hesitation.

"Some people play on the edge... I mean no offense to you, they can research but will absolutely not have the data."

"There might be some hand-copied records, but they definitely wouldn't dare to lend them out."

After pondering for a moment, Qu Jianlei asked again, "What process do civilians follow to borrow books?"

"There's no process to follow," Hals shook his head decisively, "First, you must have authorization to borrow."

"That's different from what I've learned!" Qu Jianlei furrowed his brows and stopped asking questions.

The chubby guy interjected at the first opportunity, "As long as you join the military research team, borrowing information won't be a problem?"

Qu Jianlei smiled but didn't respond, thinking to himself, I've never joined the military before, and now that Kushnier is there, it's even less likely.

Although he desperately wished to get rid of this Supreme, he would never underestimate the Supreme's abilities.

The power of the Supreme is comprehensive, including memory, and this has been recorded in many books.

For instance, someone once appeared in the corner of the Supreme's eye, and at that time, the Supreme was not paying any attention to the person.

But within three to five years afterward, if they needed to find that person, the Supreme could immediately locate them from memory.

Not just their appearance or clothing, they might even recall the aura.

This is a basic ability for ordinary Supremes, and those with strong memories can recall memories from ten years ago.

Thinking about this, Qu Jianlei was also worried about bumping into Kushnier during the authorization process?

That guy already had a lot of information on him; what if he recognized him on the spot?

Even if he didn't recognize him then, there might come a time in the future when that guy remembers him.

However, worrying is useless, so he decided to take things one step at a time.

Four days later, the permission was finally granted; surprisingly, it didn't require going into the war zone headquarters but rather a military research institute.

Qu Jianlei and Zi Jiu Immortal processed the paperwork together.

Just as the Guard Captain said, the borrowing entity was Zi Jiu Immortal, but the actual reader was Panda.

The female professor provided all necessary identification and input personal information like genes and iris scans.

Qu Jianlei didn't want to input his information, so he presented the Special Consultant certificate, "Will this work?"

There were two people responsible for the review, one said it would work, the other said it wouldn't.

Finally, the one who said it would work won out, "With database monitoring, what are you worried about?"

After completing the process, Qu Jianlei finally understood what database monitoring meant.

He didn't actually borrow any books; they just gave him a holographic helmet.

To read any book, he had to use this holographic helmet, which required a sixty-three-character password to activate.

As soon as the helmet was removed, the database link would instantly disconnect, making it practically impossible to copy any materials.

The only option was to memorize it by heart and then record it by hand copying.

After receiving the helmet and returning to the academy, Qu Jianlei didn't rush to use it; instead, he first contacted Gradi to inquire about the situation.

If there were any backdoors in this helmet, he would need to be extra cautious.

However, Gradi explained that this was a military-civilian cooperation project specifically designed to cultivate array talent.

The project was classified, and all informed parties had signed confidentiality agreements, so not many people knew about it.

Even the military's Hals hadn't heard of this project, indicating the level of secrecy.

As for monitoring the terminal, it is based on the central main brain of the combat zone; there is only a positioning system on the helmet, nothing else.

Gradi explained it very clearly, "Those who know about this project are not ordinary people and won't use excessive control methods."

Qu Jianlei thought about it and agreed that it made sense.

So that afternoon, he put on the helmet and officially started the borrowing process.

Unfortunately, the startup wasn't very smooth, and he could only see a dull, foggy mass in his eyes.

Within the fog, there were small points of light, irregularly distributed, flickering intermittently.

It was like watching TV with the screen full of static snow.

Qu Jianlei frowned: Is this supposed to happen, or is the helmet broken?

He silently counted for about half a minute, wondering whether to take off the helmet, when those flickering points of light suddenly began to spin.

The points of light spun faster and faster, accelerating quite astonishingly. In just a little over ten seconds, countless substantial halos formed.

At this moment, Qu Jianlei felt as if he were in the vast starry sky.

Only this starry sky was a miniature version, and an accelerated one, he felt slightly dizzy and disoriented.

"This startup effect... well, it's just alright, but why does it feel so familiar?"

After another seven or eight seconds, the starry sky twisted and a phantom of a... Big Head Butterfly appeared?

"Oh, come on," Qu Jianlei was taken aback, "and they say there's no backdoor, such hallucination techniques are being used!"

However, as the cartoon butterfly became clearer, he suppressed his urge to complain—could this be real?

After another ten seconds or so, the image of the little lake completely formed, and then... it seemed to be adjusting its body proportions.

The tiny body began to elongate, also starting to expand horizontally.

"No need to adjust," Qu Jianlei couldn't help but speak, "I just like this cartoon avatar, specially designed."

A soft voice echoed in his ear, as if reverberating in his mind, "You're just a freaking pervert!"

"Oh my~" Qu Jianlei was genuinely surprised this time, "Little Lake, you actually came through?"

The Little Lake on Blue Star had a voice library, and it was exactly this soft voice.

But after crossing over, Little Lake existed in his brain, never speaking before.

It could passively receive commands, occasionally expressing vague emotions, but he'd never heard the voice.

Now, being able to hear it speaking in a very familiar tone from before, he couldn't help but suspect it was a hallucination.

But even if it was a hallucination, Little Lake's tone... only he himself knew.

In those days, wasn't he a bit of a homebody? With a hobby of entertaining himself—actually just being introverted.

So Little Lake was just a big-headed cartoon, soft-voiced, yet speaking in a streetwise manner.

"Aren't you useless?" Little Lake responded softly, "At least find me a supercomputer, there are lots of super brains here!"

"Speak properly," Qu Jianlei snorted, "have you evolved?"

The Big Head Butterfly slowly rotated, "I've just recovered, recovered... your intelligence is declining like a parabola!"

"Switch to the serious version!" Qu Jianlei cleared his throat, "Tell me what's really going on."

"Master, it's like this," Little Lake finally began to answer properly.

After absorbing the energy from the broken hairpin, it did indeed recover a lot, but messing around in Qu Jianlei's mind, it dared not.

What Little Lake was best at was maneuvering within computers, exerting full control.

The various components of a computer, the limits, and boundaries are all fixed, making it easy to calculate the tolerance range.

Even if the calculation was wrong, or if an overclocking test was attempted, the ultimate result would be nothing more than destroying a computer.

Anyway, Qu Jianlei was very wealthy back then, replacing a set of super brains wasn't a big deal.

But it definitely couldn't mess around in the owner's brain; the intricacy of the human body far surpassed that of machinery.

Little Lake was quite sure that as long as it had enough access, it could definitely create a computer that would allow it to fully utilize its capabilities.

However, even with greater access, it definitely couldn't create a body to reside in!

——Not creating from scratch, including fertilized egg cultivation, single-sex cloning, or even seizing control after modifying a vegetative body!

It was really not being difficult for itself; it genuinely couldn't do it. The mysteries of the human body are unlike that of machines.

If it really maneuvered in Qu Jianlei's brain, once the master was gone, could it find another host?

More likely, if the master was gone, it would disappear too.

So despite absorbing the hairpin's energy, it didn't dare to recover to the best state, just lingering in a half-dead state.

Because it couldn't control itself and ate too much, recovering too well, it usually didn't dare to show up, fearing it might destroy the master.

Until today, the master got a helmet with high-tech content... and crucially, it connected.

At this point, it couldn't help but complain, "I've never seen an owner as irresponsible as you."

"You have so much advanced equipment, why don't you know how to use it?"

Hearing this, Qu Jianlei furrowed his brows, "Didn't you switch to the serious version?"

(First update in December, asking for guaranteed monthly tickets.)