Chapter 600: Living Brain Cells (Part 2)

No time to ponder what this sudden “killing field” in his mind might be—everyone present, except Midnight Dad still struggling with the blast door, raised their right hands to look at their wristwatches.

On the left side of the watch were three plastic buttons, with no text or symbols indicating their function.

The Laughing God, clad in white space suit, pressed the first button first; receiving no response, he pressed the other two, then pressed two and three together—none of the screens lit up.

Others followed suit, with identical results.

Blood Lion Roared growled: “An instinct tells me the broadcast’s words can’t be ignored—if we don’t activate our watches within five minutes, we’ll die.”

“Same here—I feel I have to believe it,” Laughing God raised his hand lightly. “Like believing in Mom.”

“Only believe Mom, not Dad? Are you discriminating against men?”

Li Cheng instinctively retorted: “Believe Dad, believe Dad, believe Dad.”

“Stop fooling around—four minutes twenty seconds left.”

Valkyrie, with her warrior-woman voice, twisted her wrist; the bottom of her watch snapped perfectly flush against her suit, leaving no gap.

The suit’s outermost layer was made of multi-layered fiber composite fabric, resistant to abrasion and wear, coated with an extremely tough rubber paint—impossible to open with clumsy, short gloves to inspect its internal structure.

The Out-of-Control in yellow suit murmured: “In my memory, all spacewalk suits were two-piece—first you slid into the upper torso mounted on a stand, then someone helped you put on the pants.”

Between them was a flexible rotational bearing belt.

But the one we’re wearing now...”

The equipment everyone wore did have a bearing belt—but its center held a deep, eight-pointed star-shaped keyhole; without a key, it couldn’t be opened, meaning the suit couldn’t be removed to access the watch with more dexterous human fingers.

“The rotary handles on the other three blast doors won’t turn either.”

Zhong Li Mie Ming sprinted across the circular hall; though the suits looked bulky, their layers seemed to contain exoskeletal frames—walking and jumping required little effort, especially now that everyone was gradually shaking off their daze and regaining mobility.

“Wait—doesn’t each of our watches have a metal wire extending from it?”

Blood Lion Roared realized something and said quickly: “Then this isn’t damage—it’s intentional design...”

“Four minutes left,” Li Cheng reminded, silently counting down in his mind.

People reacted differently—some helped Midnight Dad ram the door, others rhythmically tapped the watch buttons, some reached for the metal hoses hanging from the ceiling, trying to find an escape route; Dir in brown suit and Hydra in cyan suit briefly conferred, then twisted their watch wires together, attempting to activate the watches via short-circuit—still nothing.

“Could it be that we need electricity to power the watches?”

Edith in orange suit’s mind raced—when she swept her hand across her chest, she felt slight resistance, proving gas filled the hall.

Meanwhile, the metal hose connected to the suit’s backpack had initially been venting gas, confirming the backpack was some kind of life-support system.

Considering she’d breathed normally these past few minutes, without dizziness from high CO₂, and her life-support system had kept running, it implied the internal battery still had charge—just wasn’t powering the watches.

Could it be... the broadcast was hinting we should pick one companion, kill them, smash their life-support backpack, and extract the battery to power everyone else’s watches?

Thinking this, Edith subtly turned aside, blocking others’ view, and gripped the handrail tightly, trying to wrench the metal tube free to use as a club for defense.

The broadcast only said to activate the Noisy Kid’s watch and follow orders—it never said everyone had to activate theirs...

Clang! Clang!

Before Edith could act, the Ant on the opposite side openly threw her entire body against the railing, kicking and prying until she snapped off half the metal bar.

The noise drew everyone’s gaze; the Ant clicked her tongue, regretfully releasing the bar still attached to the grating floor, and said calmly: “Why are you all staring? As a spacefarer, carrying a short metal spear for defense is perfectly reasonable.”

Perfectly reasonable... bullshit. Don’t think we don’t know what you’re thinking.

Everyone here was sharp—Edith could think of it, so could everyone else; they kept quiet, but their body language was suspiciously telling.

“Buttons don’t work, blast doors won’t open—”

Su Nisheng in purple suit looked up at the hemispherical dome; the metal ceiling had no rivets or screws, as if molded as one piece. She lowered her gaze to the faintly glowing blue pool, fixing on the dozen or so palm-sized metal plates scattered across its bottom.

After a brief pause, she said calmly: “I’ll retrieve those metal plates.”

Zhong Li Mie Ming exclaimed in shock: “You’re sure—”

Before “sure” could finish, Su Nisheng had already flipped over the railing and jumped into the water.

Wow, Dongguan kid doing hurdles—so cool.

Huh? Who’s Dongguan kid?

Li Cheng, Valkyrie, Blood Lion Roared, and others all leaned over the railing, staring at the water’s surface.

The pool was about ten meters deep; normally, an average person or amateur diver would need a minute to reach the bottom—but Su Nisheng, clad in full protective gear, didn’t need to worry about pressure, and quickly dove down, grabbing the dozen metal plates with her hands and feet.

“The water’s too deep—help her!” Valkyrie said grimly.

In this situation, if we can’t say “don’t let the one who carries fire for others freeze in the snow,” we can at least say: when one lip is gone, the teeth feel the cold.

Out-of-Control didn’t hesitate—he yanked loose several of the most brittle hoses, tied their ends together, and threw them to Li Cheng.

Li Cheng secured one end tightly to the railing; Valkyrie took the other end, tied it around her waist, and dove in, grabbing Su Nisheng.

“Pull!”

Out-of-Control roared; everyone on shore—including Midnight Dad, who’d been hostile at first—yanked the hose with all their strength.

Valkyrie and Su Nisheng swam upward, climbing along the sloped inner wall of the pool with immense effort, finally reaching the surface.

The suit sealed perfectly; Su Nisheng’s exhausted breathing through the speaker was still crystal clear. She didn’t rest—immediately spread out all the metal plates.

The plates came in two types: one silver-white, one slightly yellowish; both had adhesive tape on their backs. When peeled off, they revealed brown woolen fabric underneath.

“What’s this? A key?”

Midnight Dad turned to the blast door; there was indeed a card-reader-like device beside it—but its thickness didn’t match the plates.

“No.”

Su Nisheng paused, peeled off several pieces of tape, then stacked the differently colored plates on top of each other.

Li Cheng, Out-of-Control, and Laughing God froze for a moment, then immediately joined in, helping Su Nisheng peel off the remaining tapes.

“Two minutes left,” Blood Lion Roared couldn’t help asking: “What are you doing?”

“The watch needs electricity to activate, right? Unless you’re some unnamed Canadian electric eel who can generate power with electro-music—”

Li Cheng didn’t look up: “Then we need a Voltaic pile.”

“The most primitive battery.”

Out-of-Control, as if anticipating Blood Lion Roared’s next question, said quickly: “Two different metals create a potential difference as positive and negative electrodes; between them is an insulating layer soaked in conductive solution, forming an ionic conduction path and a closed circuit. Like this.”

He took the pile from Su Nisheng, pressed the plates tightly together with force, then ran the metal wire from the watch’s edge across both ends of the pile, and pressed the watch button.

Zzzt.

The LCD screen suddenly lit up, revealing an eight-pointed star pattern, flickering on and off like breathing.

Out-of-Control tossed the pile to Li Cheng; everyone—including Midnight Dad—took turns activating their watches with the Voltaic pile, completing the boot-up just thirty seconds before the countdown ended.

“Welcome!”

As all the watches’ patterns synchronized in flickering frequency, a single-wheeled robot shaped like an inverted triangle with a single eye appeared on every screen.

It happily rolled its small wheel across each person’s display, its voice shrill with manic excitement: “I’m the AI of Xinxiang Base—you can call me Noisy Kid. Welcome, repairmen, and the alien species hiding among you.”