161 Chapter 160: At the Range (1/2)

Over the next few days, I resumed my usual routine of attending the battle-automata lessons conducted by Elder Hai, then went to assist Tang Qi Hong in forging the six Spirit Artifacts requested by Dark Asura Sect. After that, I would practice my martial arts in the training facilities provided by Nine-Tailed Fox Sect, often sparring with Elder Zhao. Normally I would be posted as sentry to guard over Gray Shadow after the battle-automata lessons, but because Tang Qi Hong had requested that I be her assistant, Elder Zhao assigned me to be her bodyguard instead.

So no sentry duty for me. Yay. As an aside, I only needed to guard Tang Qi Hong during the smithing process because she would return to her home where Sect Lady resided in after that. And obviously Sect Lady Zi Da Ji would be a much more powerful and capable bodyguard than someone like me could ever be.

About three days passed, and we made a bit of progress with the six Spirit Artifacts. Tang Qi Hong wiped the perspiration from her forehead as she used her qi to control the temperature of the furnace. The Earth Magnets that we had brought back from Cloud Sky Mountain had finally been melded to the other Spirit Materials that Tang Qi Hong took from the sect.

”Okay, we're done for the day,” she reported as she switched off the furnace. I nodded and began to help her pack up.

I was about to escort her home, as duty demanded, when Tang Qi Hong suddenly turned to me after putting away her stuff.

”That reminds me. How goes your progress with your own Spirit Weapon? That shield, right?” she frowned. ”Even though you used it the other day, you told me it's far from complete. How far have you gotten so far?”

”Uh, I didn't have time to work on it these couple of days,” I admitted, turning a little pale. Tang Qi Hong scowled.

”All right. Let's head to your workshop. Show me what you have!”

”Um…I don't think that's a good idea…”

”Oh, stop complaining! Let's go!”

Tang Qi Hong hopped out of her workshop and proceeded toward the direction of the Blood Blades dormitory. Knowing that I wouldn't be able to convince her when she made her decision, I could only helplessly follow her and ensure she stayed out of trouble.

Stopping in front of my apartment, she turned to look at me expectantly. Obviously she was waiting for me to unlock the door for her. I gave her a droll stare.

”My workshop is that way.”

”Eh…?”

Tang Qi Hong looked extremely embarrassed when she realized that she had gone the wrong way. Coughing as she lowered her head, she gestured impatiently.

”Well, what are you waiting for? Lead the way!”

”You were the one who so confidently brought me here,” I muttered under my breath, trying not to laugh.

It didn't take more than five minutes for us to reach my workshop, which was located in the old outer sect disciple area. It wasn't my old one, to be honest – the moment I was promoted into the Blood Blades, I was allocated an unused shed closest to the Blood Blades dormitory. As most (actually, almost all) Blood Blades kind of abandoned smithing and Spirit Engraving after they got into the combat division, there was no real need for them to be assigned workshops.

I was kind of a special case, because I requested for it. Unfortunately, because I sucked terribly at smithing, they didn't take my request seriously and just assigned me an unused shed. If I had displayed overwhelming talent at smithing and Spirit Engraving, I bet the Sect Leader and Elders would personally order a custom workshop built next to the Blood Blades dormitory. With my lack of skills, I was just not worth the investment.

Well, at least I had a place to smith and engrave Spirit Diagrams, so I couldn't complain. It was much better than them telling me to give up totally just because I lacked the ”talent” or ”results.” That was how the real world worked, unfortunately. Without results, no one was going to spend too much money on nurturing you.

Unlocking the door to my run-down workshop with the key they gave me, I pushed the door open and politely signaled for Tang Qi Hong to step inside.

”Hmm, so this is your new workshop. I don't think I've ever been here before.”

Tang Qi Hong had not visited my workshop ever since I joined the Blood Blades. She had only visited my apartment once in a while, usually to hang out or ask for favors. Since we were not officially in a relationship, such visits were far and few in between.

”Yeah, Elder Zhao was kind enough to secure it for me when I asked him,” I told her, withholding all the problems and complaints I might have regarding the almost casual manner in which they assigned me this particular workshop.

”This looks more like one of those workshops assigned to the outer sect disciples,” Tang Qi Hong remarked, clearly not liking what she saw. I sighed.

”We are in the outer sect disciple residence right now,” I reminded her. ”We might be close to the Blood Blades border, but this is officially within the outer sect disciple zone.”

”Oh.” Tang QI Hong scratched her head, but didn't say anything else. She glanced at the ramshackle shelves and other stuff lying around. Like most guys, I wasn't very neat, but I wasn't very untidy either. There was still a bit of clutter, but there were a lot of avenues for her to walk around without stepping on any of my belongings.

She headed toward my bench, all the while glancing around at my shelves and looking a little disappointed.

Well, sorry for not maintaining an environment expected of an inner sect disciple. While, as one of the Blood Blades, I had the status equivalent to an inner sect disciple, my smithing and Spirit Engraving skills were not on par with one, and thus I didn't receive the resources usually allocated for inner sect disciples with regard to forging. It sucked, but there you had it. On the other hand, I did have access to all the resources made available to the Blood Blades, but I just didn't make full use of it.

I was getting my priorities wrong.

”Where are the colossal beasts?” Tang Qi Hong suddenly asked.

”Huh?” I stared at her in shock. ”What the hell are you talking about?”

Tang Qi Hong placed her hands on her hips. ”You know what I'm talking about. You should have frozen ancient and enormous beasts inside your chamber, sealed from a forgotten era. You should even have one colossal python as big as a mountain that wold make the Ice Soul Python as small as an earthworm in comparison!”

”Ugh…” I held my head as I tried not to shout. ”Aren't you mistaking me for Qin Lie? Why the fuck would I have Colossal Beasts in my workshop? It's not as if I ran away from Nine-Tailed Fox Sect and hid in the Arctic Mountain Rage so that I could escape Liang Shao Yang's attempts to murder me. Aren't you in the wrong story?”

”…oh. Whoops. Sorry.”

Apparently, Tang Qi Hong's mind had been stuck in the Spirit Realm for quite a while now. She grinned sheepishly.

”Sorry. Been reading too much xianxia novels lately.”

”Shouldn't you be reading all those reincarnation novels about how a Marine-super-doctor-assassin-genius thief-super-soldier woman got killed in the real world and reincarnated as a twelve-year-old 'trash' princess who is being bullied by her family and abused by her sisters for some reason? And then goes around slapping their faces after the original 'trash' princess was killed, and goes on to be a genius martial artist/spirit doctor?”

Tang Qi Hong brightened up. ”Oh, I read those too.”

I tried not to sigh in exasperation. ”At least you aren't reading all those stories about a girl having a CEO lover and getting into toxic relationships where the guy is basically abusive, but they somehow end up together regardless.”

”What makes you think I don't?” Tang Qi Hong demanded, annoyed. She had thought my question a slight toward her taste in books…but then again, I read stupid xianxia stories with Mary Sue protagonists, so I couldn't very well criticize other people about their tastes in stories either. I calmed down and smiled.

”We're getting sidetracked. You wanted to see my personal project?”

Taking out my Snow Aegis, I activated it. While the original spatial device was fairly small, it grew rapidly, seeming to draw mass from nowhere. That was exactly the reason while I needed the Void Whale part and made it double as a Spatial Device. When not in combat, the unnecessary components were sealed away in the alternative space, remaining dormant until I activated it. Then they would leave the spatial device and combine with the spatial device.

”Hmm…” Tang Qi Hong studied the snowflake-shaped shield for a few moments, nodded in approval. ”This actually looks good. Considering your usual products, I'm actually impressed with how you forged this.”

”I spent months forging just this one thing,” I muttered dryly. ”I would be pretty sad if it didn't turn out the way I wanted it.”

Tang Qi Hong frowned. ”Well, you said it was incomplete?” she turned my Snow Aegis over, taking out a hi-tech single eye-lense from her spatial ring, put it on and analyzed it. ”It seems complete as a shield.”

”Oh…I don't want it to just be a shield,” I confessed. Heading over, I took out the doomed Castellax-class battle-automata's components. The undamaged ones, anyway. ”I was trying to combine it with these parts.”

”Battle-automata components?” Tang Qi Hong frowned as she lifted them to look at them. ”Even a cerebral cortex and power battery. Why would you add these to a shield?”

”Because they are capable of complex calculations and autonomous fire responses,” I replied. Reaching into my Snow Aegis again, I took out a bunch of stuff. Tang Qi Hong's eyes widened when she saw the unfamiliar (for her) weapons.

”What are those? I have never seen anything like them before.”

”They are guns,” I explained as I raised one of them for her to look. ”They absorb the qi from the shooter and focus it into a high concentrated qi beam, amplifying the firepower several times over. Even a normal guy should be able to punch through concrete with a single beam from one of these guns.”

Even though I called them guns, they were very different from modern guns back in my original timeline. The barrels were sleek and smooth instead of cylindrical, and they were silver. They looked more like wings, or the petals on my Snow Aegis. Each barrel terminated in a single small hole where the beam would be fired from, and at the other end, the guns thickened and widened, including propulsion and anti-gravity systems.

”Wow…I've never seen anything like this before,” Tang Qi Hong marveled as she analyzed it through that hi-tech eyeglass. She could see the qi crystal at the core of the gun, the main conduit that would amplify the wielder's qi and turn it into a beam, which reflected off several crystalized mirrors inside the hovering weapon before being unleashed from the barrel. She also noted the mini-cerebral cortexes inside each gun, which served as its ”brain” or a crude form of artificial intelligence, and linked to each other through a wireless network that was supported by the main cerebral cortex inside the core Snow Aegis.

”I've tried to use Spirit Diagrams to finish it up, but it doesn't seem to work. I still can't get the artificial intelligence to run the way I want it to. Right now I can control it remotely, but with up to nine guns, I can't direct all of them at once. I need the artificial intelligence to assist me with manipulating them. That's where I'm stuck at right now.”

”Yeah, of course you would.” Tang Qi Hong turned to stare at me sternly. ”You're attempting a weapon no one has built before! An advanced, hi-tech weapon that never mind me, even Elder Hai mo hasn't heard of before! Can you imagine the waves you would make if this gets out? You'll cause a storm in the blacksmithing and Spirit Engraving world!”

”That is assuming I succeed, of course,” I reminded her. Tang Qi Hong's beautiful expression softened and she nodded.

”Yeah, I can see why you're having so much trouble. It's very difficult to invent a new Spirit Engraving for a weapon that has never been built before. To be honest, I'm not even sure how this weapon works…”

”Should I demonstrate it to you?” I asked. Tang Qi Hong's eyes brightened up.

”Of course! Can you?”

”Um…we'll need to go to the training facility first.” I glanced outside. ”If you don't mind visiting the Blood Blades' training facility.”