336: Chapter 336 Preparing for Battle Again, Ready for Duty

The mobilization order from the previous chapter had not yet been issued, but a new situation had already emerged impatiently.

Chen Wuwang's hand still rested on the control console, his fingertips rubbing against the freshly printed intelligence brief; the paper's surface was rough, like grit grinding against his fingertips.

He did not move or speak, only his Mechanical Prosthetic Eye pulsed with rings of blue light, and data streams flashed rapidly across his field of vision.

Three seconds later, the communication array emitted a "beep," and the door was pushed open.

Chen Xiaodao rushed in first, not even having time to unfasten his cloak, his voice exploding instantly: "Have you found out? Who is planning to make a move?"

Chen Tiezhu followed closely behind, walking with a gust of wind, his Mechanical prosthetic limb clanging against the floor with a "thud, thud" sound, cursing as he walked: "I had just fallen asleep when I was called up. If this is another false alarm, I will throw the intelligence officer into the furnace to roast for three days!"

Bai Ling entered last, her footsteps light, but her expression was not good: "I can sense it... The flow of Spiritual Qi in the southeast direction has changed; it is as if someone is secretly setting up a formation."

Chen Wuwang finally moved.

He threw the brief in his hand onto the tactical table, and with a "clang," he drove a dagger into it, landing right on the sentence: "Synchronized pressure in seven days."

"Chuanyun Sect, Leiyin Pavilion, West Desert Sand Clan, Chiji Ridge, Northern Plains Sun Clan, Cangling Clan, Nangu Lin Family." His voice was not loud, but it sounded like a knife scraping across an iron plate: "Seven old foxes, they have agreed to strangle me together in seven days."

Chen Xiaodao stood up abruptly: "Seven days? By the time they are at the gates, it will be too late! Let me lead the Sword Cultivator Team to raid the southern foothills of the Chuanyun Sect at night! Let me tear down their communication towers first!"

"To go and die?" Chen Wuwang glanced at him, his Mechanical Prosthetic Eye flashing with blue light, "Or do you want to present a letter of surrender to the enemy?"

"I am not—"

"Shut up." He interrupted, "What you need to practice most right now is not Killing Intent, but patience. The ultimate state of a Sword Cultivator is to be more dangerous when the sword is sheathed than when it is drawn."

Chen Xiaodao gritted his teeth, his fists clenching until they creaked, but he ultimately said nothing more.

Chen Tiezhu walked to the table, lowered his head to glance at the brief, and his brows knit into a knot: "How do you plan to fight? The seven clans are joining forces; even if each clan sends only three thousand people, that is over twenty thousand. We have less than fifteen thousand combat-ready troops, and only three hundred mechs. Can we hold out?"

"Can't hold out?" Chen Wuwang sneered, "Then make it hold out. If your pile of scrap metal really can't hold up, I will weld you into it to serve as the core furnace."

Chen Tiezhu rolled his eyes: "Easy for you to say. The 'Pojun' series currently uses single-core engines; they have to shut down for cooling after taking one large-scale Spiritual Qi impact. You want me to replace them all with dual-cores within forty-eight hours? Do you think I'm a god?"

"I give you forty-eight hours." Chen Wuwang stared at him, "If you are even one second late, I will hold you accountable."

"Fine!" Chen Tiezhu slapped the table, "I will pull up the 'Grey Whale' assembly line, use laser etching plus nano-filling, raise the precision to the micron level, and have all main force mechs upgraded within three days! But you have to promise me—the Materials must be sufficient; don't you dare try to fool me with some scrap metal again!"

"The composite Spiritual Steel piles have already been cast and will be put into storage tonight." Chen Wuwang nodded, "Take as much as you need."

Bai Ling spoke softly at this moment: "Can I... try to compile the Moon Shadow Barrier into data runes? To let the mechs trigger teleportation as well?"

Chen Wuwang finally revealed a hint of a smile: "If you had thought of this earlier, wouldn't it have saved us trouble? Go do it; I need it to be able to complete a folding jump within 0.3 seconds."

"But the Tree of Life sap and the Spiritual Qi chips have always been repellent... The previous three injections caused the System to crash." She frowned, "Unless... we can find a stable biological resonance source."

"Then find it." Chen Wuwang's tone was unquestionable, "If you want authority, I will grant it; if you want resources, I will approve them. As long as you can turn magic into a weapon we can use, you can mess with it however you want."

Bai Ling nodded, turned, and walked away, her footsteps a few paces faster than when she arrived.

Chen Xiaodao watched her back disappear at the doorway and asked in a low voice: "What about me? You can't really expect me to just wait, right?"

"You?" Chen Wuwang glanced at him, "Go to the Martial Arts Arena. Practice the new 'Starfall Style' sword formation until you can strike into the same hole even with your eyes closed. What I want is precise coverage, not blind hacking."

"Understood." Chen Xiaodao grinned, a cold glint flashing in his eyes, "I will go and let them know what it means to rather break than deviate by an inch."

Once the two left, the hall became quiet again.

Chen Wuwang stood in place, his fingers tapping the table unconsciously, the rhythm steady, as if counting down.

Ten minutes later, the first alarm sounded from the Artifact Refining Workshop.

"Warning: Abnormal Spiritual Qi fluctuations; unstable resonance detected."

Chen Tiezhu's roar came back through the communication array: "Who the hell used a non-standard rune board?! The number three circuit burned out again! Switch to the backup core, lower the 'Thunder Array' parameters by 15%! Don't be greedy for that little bit of output power; if you want to die, jump into the furnace yourself!"

The apprentice's panicked voice: "Elder Chen, the automatic calibration System has malfunctioned, and we can't adjust it manually now!"

"Get lost!" Chen Tiezhu cursed, "This thing understands my mind better than my son now!"

A robotic arm handed him tools, and without looking up, he dove into the belly of a half-dismantled mech, dismantling circuits with his bare hands, welding and cursing as he worked: "Putting fire-attribute runes into a water-System drive cabin? Which Genius did this? Find them and make them clean the toilets for three months!"

Meanwhile, at the Martial Arts Arena.

A ten-meter deep crater exploded in the center of the shooting range, the dust yet to settle.

The young Sword Cultivators were drenched in sweat, panting heavily: "Young Lord, this new formation is too hard to control. The energy convergence deviation exceeds 30%; even a slight deviation leads to self-detonation!"

Chen Xiaodao removed his Mechanical prosthetic limb, jumped onto the high platform empty-handed, and swept a cold gaze across the field: "You are staring at the formation diagram while fighting? Is Sword Intent dead?!"

He drew his sword, his mechanical arm activated in sync, and the laser sword "hummed" as it left the sheath, slicing through the air and leaving an arc precise to the centimeter, hitting the center of the target exactly.

"Watch closely—the first move is not a hack; it is 'calculation'!"

"Next time, I want you to be able to strike into the same hole even with your eyes closed!"

The crowd was silent for a moment, then responded in unison: "Yes!"

On the other side, in the Spiritual Energy Laboratory.

The data screen flashed red: "Fusion failed; biological brainwaves are not synchronized with digital signals."

Bai Ling stood in front of the terminal, her fingertips gently brushing over the interface slot, and whispered: "Perhaps... it needs a bit of 'living things'."

She cut her finger, blood droplets fell, and at the same time, she chanted an ancient incantation in a low voice.

The screen suddenly flickered, and a line of text appeared: "Identification successful, access granted: S-rank Secret Technique—Moon's Sigh."

She smiled: "Now, it listens to me."

Time passed.

Late at night, the Artifact Refining Workshop was brightly lit.

The last "Pojun-III" mech completed its dual-core engine installation; Chen Tiezhu leaned against the mech's leg, his face covered in grease, but his eyes were as sharp as knives. He looked up at the countdown screen: 47:58:12.

"Two hours left," he muttered, "I do what I say."

At the Martial Arts Arena, the Sword Cultivator ranks were neatly aligned, sweat soaking through their clothes, but no one complained of fatigue. Chen Xiaodao sheathed his sword and stood at the very front of the formation, his Battle Intent boiling.

In the laboratory, Bai Ling sat before the terminal; magic code kept jumping on the screen, and the folding model of the Moon Shadow Barrier had completed its preliminary verification.

The main control hall.

Three green lights lit up on the communication array one after another.

"Artifact Refining Workshop, mission accomplished."

"Martial Arts Arena, joint training of the sword formation has reached the expected goal."

"Spiritual Energy Laboratory, Breakthrough in digitizing the Moon Shadow Barrier; it can now be connected to the mech neural network."

He nodded but did not speak.

Then, he slowly exhaled.

The next second, he pressed a button on the console, and seven tiny light dots on the star map lit up again, distributed around the various major forces like a silently spreading spider web.

He stared at the countdown screen and muttered to himself: "Six days and twelve hours left... enough time for you all to regret this."