Wow! The item-dropping rate is really high!

"Okay."

Bai E hesitated for a moment, then turned to Rose beside him and said with a smile, "It's your turn to perform."

Bringing Rose was with this intent.

His own strength was relatively exaggerated; this weapon module might have its boosting effect overshadowed by his own abilities. Only a scientific creation that could enable even an ordinary person to wield great power was a meaningful technological artifact.

Although the initial test model had a threshold for use by truly ordinary people, Rose's individual strength wasn't to that outrageous extent, was it?

It was most appropriate for her to test this freshly produced experimental model.

"Sure." Rose looked at the crude mecha with great interest, and cheerfully agreed upon hearing his request.

She had been eager to try out the new weapon system Bai E had been mentioning.

"I'll help you put it on." Helen personally helped Rose don the suit of weaponized exoskeleton mecha.

Rose cooperated by entering the interior of the mecha, her limbs aligning with the framework; with Helen's assistance, she completed the whole system binding, and while doing so, she asked, "What's the target?"

A test naturally needed a target to aim for.

"Let's choose this one." Bai E pointed to a corner of the map in his hand, where the words "Intelligent Mechanism Base" were marked vividly.

For the development of Li Ming Town, the surrounding Smart Machinery Factories had been basically wiped out, and many of the Intelligent Mechanism Outposts, it seemed, had received orders from their superiors and were all contracting.

In the task of patrolling and sweeping by those synthetic soldiers in the military district, there was almost no sign of Intelligent Mechanisms on the map anymore.

Only the last stronghold belonging to the Intelligent Mechanisms in the vicinity of Blackwater City stubbornly stood in place.

Taking this opportunity, Bai E also wanted to completely eradicate it.

The rise of a city necessarily required clearing all obstacles in the surrounding area.

Intelligent Mechanisms, beastmen, bugs...

Bai E might not be able to pay attention to the situations around other cities for the time being, but around Blackwater City, Bai E would not allow any source that could threaten the city to emerge!

"You're playing big?" Helen was startled and looked at Bai E with some disbelief.

"We need a strong opponent to demonstrate the true power of this combat equipment," Bai E said with a smile, "besides, you have me, don't you?"

The test was one purpose, fulfilling his strategic objective was another.

Otherwise, how could he waste so much valuable time on just one test?

Rose was fearless, her eyes flashing with a strong fighting spirit as she quickly agreed, "Okay!"

Finally clad in the full exoskeleton combat mecha, Rose tentatively moved her shoulders a few times. The exoskeleton on the exterior, together with the arms and the mechanical palm holding the Dynamic Source Sword, followed suit with exaggerated motions.

Helen looked at Rose's body, which had no protection in front of the mecha interior, with eyes full of worry, "You have the weapons now, but I haven't had time to install the defense module yet... I thought you just came to test the performance..."

For instance, military mechas used simple stacking of Yuan series alloys, or like those of the Mechanical Court, enhanced their defense functions with Electromagnetic Field Shields... But right now, none!

Was she supposed to resist the Intelligent Mechanisms' guns and cannons with her bare body?

It was hard to imagine that being something humans could accomplish.

Even Bai E's own records showed he could only move freely in and out of the Intelligent Mechanisms' armies while piloting a mecha.

"What's the big deal?" Rose lifted the Dynamic Source Sword in her right hand, as she was quickly becoming accustomed to the overall performance of the exoskeleton combat mecha.

"Isn't this thing invincible?"

If its force field could be invincible, then it probably shouldn't be a problem to destroy anything it encountered.

The Dynamic Source Sword, in Rose's "delicate" stature, was like a perfect door panel. Apart from using it to chop down foes, it seemed to be a good choice as a shield as well.

"..." As a pure researcher, Helen had never thought her product would have special usage techniques developed by the user even before it was properly utilized.

"Let's go."

At this point, there was nothing left to say.

Perhaps just like Bai E said... there was always his backup plan, wasn't there?

Watching Rose control the mech towards the transport truck specially prepared for her, Bai E gave the command, "Depart!"

Departing wasn't just Helen's observation team, but the entire transportation crew of Li Ming Town.

When the adults said to purchase goods from Intelligent Mechanism Base, that meant they were going to purchase goods from Intelligent Mechanism Base!

Having grown accustomed to this rhythm of purchasing, they were gradually beginning to feel familiar with this new aspect of the world—

Turns out, this world wasn't as hopeless and terrible as they thought, was it?

...

"Report, Captain! A large convoy has been detected passing five kilometers ahead. Shall we approach for investigation?"

"Large-scale? Is it the people from Blackwater City?"

"Not sure... at least they aren't the military from Blackwater City. Their equipment looks sophisticated, but it's not uniform; it's more like a private armed force."

"A private armed force?" The man with a stubble chuckled silently to himself, "A large-scale private armed force would probably not escape the attention of Blackwater City's higher-ups. Maybe it's the private army of some of those people."

In this era, it was a common occurrence for some of the top brass in the cities to foster unofficial forces for tasks that were difficult to accomplish publicly, especially in cities without any significant external threats.

Blackwater City shouldn't have had the luxury to allow for such conditions, but if something exists, it has its reasons. Don't get hung up on why it exists in the first place.

Thinking this, the captain waved his hand dismissively, "Avoid them, keep moving forward, and carry out the original mission. We are messengers; we don't need to make unnecessary complications."

No matter how many messes and hidden troubles Blackwater City had, it was still a part of the Empire.

You solve your own internal issues.

The unification of the Empire was imminent, and that was the mission carried by them, the messengers.

...

The Intelligent Mechanism Base was nestled in a mountain range.

The grey-black steel merged almost seamlessly with the mountains, and from a distance, it was hard to distinguish between them, giving the impression that the mountains themselves were shimmering with a ponderous sheen.

This was a research and development base established by humans during the Golden Age, highly automated internally.

It fell to the Intelligent Mechanism rebellion at the very onset and has since been the main base of Intelligent Mechanism in the region, quite naturally.

As times changed, even though many of the original creations within the base had aged, Intelligent Mechanisms, having perfectly inherited human technology and developed their unique tech, had already made large-scale replacements and optimizations to its structure.

Now it was even more defensible and difficult to attack, a tough nut to crack.

The reason humanity maintained a cautious stance towards Intelligent Mechs lay here; the outlying Intelligent Mechanism outposts and factories could actually be dealt with, if one was willing to pay the price.

But the problem was that the spoils from attacking Intelligent Mechanisms were hard to assimilate, the cost was high, and it was easy to invite retaliation from the Intelligent Mechanisms of the main base.

The key issue was that once they retaliated, they just retreated back into their defensive shell like a withdrawing turtle.

It was like dealing with higher-dimensional demons; only they attacked humans, and there was no opportunity for humans to strike back.

As time passed, humanity's approach towards Intelligent Mechanisms was like selective blindness; as long as their mining vehicles weren't digging right up to their doorsteps, they generally left them alone.

Fortunately, the wisdom possessed by these Intelligent Mechanisms allowed them to rationally maintain this tacit understanding with humanity, which is how they managed to be "neighbors" peacefully for so many years.

But today, Bai E wasn't very willing to continue being "neighbors" with them.

For this reason, he had even made full preparations!

"Don't rush." Bai E, looking at the distant iron-grey mountains and knowing the whole area was the Intelligent Mechanism Base, stopped the transport convoy following him.

Then he began pulling out metal parts from his storage space, "I'll create a mecha first, and then we'll talk!"