Chapter 4: The Mantis Stalks the Cicada

At the moment when the blonde woman, Selena, focused all her attention on the box, the man standing behind her suddenly thrust out his hand and slapped her back with force.

Shimmering electric arcs instantly pierced through both the blonde woman's combat suit and the man's glove, and it was only then that He Ao realized the hand covered by the glove and sleeve was not made of flesh and blood, but of pure machinery.

"Job, what are you doing?"

Having been hit by that palm, Selena did not fly backward, but instead leaned forward, trying to protect the metal box in front of her.

But someone was faster, the very same team member who had been holding the box. He sprung from his bent knees and leaped three to four meters, snatching the unlocked metal box from in front of Selena.

By then, He Ao had regained control of his limbs and put up his defenses, watching the drama unfold with interest. The moment Job's hand hit Selena, He Ao felt her level of danger rapidly diminishing.

Seeing through the destroyed jacket on Selena's back, He Ao also discerned the structure of her back—first, there was her soft and delicate skin, which had been sliced open to reveal a mass of circuits underneath, still sparkling with electric arcs.

So, she was a mechanically modified person.

Selena clearly felt that her mobility had been restricted. She turned her head to look at her deputy behind her, "What have you done to me?"

"Relax, Miss Selena."

After delivering the slap, Job immediately retreated three to four meters, establishing a relatively safe distance. He wore a calm smile, acting as if he had done a trivial thing, "It's just a new type of mechanized body virus that replicates a large amount of redundant data, causing your central processor to enter a brief period of overclocking,"

He shrugged with his gun in hand, "I really don't know why you all choose to modify your flesh into these fully mechanized bodies. Not only do you miss out on a lot of fun, but they are also so fragile."

The principle of this virus did sound intriguing, reminiscent of certain computer viruses that caused computers to freeze by overloading the CPU.

He Ao watched them quietly, trying to gather as much information as possible from their conversation.

But, mechanized bodies? Entirely mechanically modified bodies? Looking at Selena's appearance, it seemed her whole body had been transformed into machinery. Was this the technology of this world?

"Job," Selena twisted her head with difficulty, "attacking a Federation Investigator is a criminal offense. Do you want to go to the Federation court?"

He Ao, who had been lost in thought, perked up at this. He considered himself a law-abiding and righteous person, after all.

"The Federation? The Federation doesn't have jurisdiction over the wastelands," Job sneered and stepped back two more paces, his eyes signaling to the two team members closest to Selena, "The time is about right, restrain her."

The two team members hesitated briefly before rushing forward, each producing a metal ring and slipping them onto Selena's wrists. They pulled her hands behind her back and with a light press, the two metal rings were magnetically sealed together, imprisoning Selena.

During this process, Selena tried to resist, but her body simply wouldn't obey her commands. She could only perform basic movements and was unable to attack. She actually still had some offensive capability left and had been feigning weakness in the hopes that Job would fall for the trick and attack her, so she could take him hostage and find a way to remove the virus.

But Job was as cunning as a hyena, avoiding her by staying safely out of reach until the virus was fully effective.

He Ao also thought Job was rather scummy, so he quietly shifted the target of his tentacles from primarily defending against Selena to preparing to attack Job.

He had also begun to discern that among this group, Selena was alone in one camp, while the others were in another.

"It's not easy to find a virus that can bypass my antivirus software," Selena, now fully restrained, looked at Job with a cold expression, "Who hired you? Which consortium? I know my life fetches a million on the black market. Is a million enough to make you betray the law and sell out justice?"

"Justice," Job chuckled, "I like justice. The just Miss Selena is worth a million, it's not easy to come by such lucrative deals."

He signaled to the remaining people with his eyes, and then walked over to Selena's side, "Miss Selena, you should stop inquiring about these matters. Although we are just hyenas of the wilderness, we know that some clients must not be betrayed."

"So I can be betrayed?" Selena uttered coldly as she spoke, attempting to reboot the system, "I hired you to guide me, and this is how you treat your client?"

"Look at what you're saying, how could we possibly betray you," the other team members dispersed, encircling He Ao, while Job watched Selena out of the corner of his eye, "You are simply dying in the line of duty to prevent the Evil God's Descending Ceremony, and the Federation will surely commend your bravery.

Of course, even if you were to 'die in the line of duty,' your fifty thousand mercenary fee, we would still settle it with the Federation."

He then looked toward He Ao's huge figure and shouted, "Do it!"

The team members each took out various objects from their backpacks, placing them around He Ao.

Among these objects were ancient paper books, brand-new fountain pens, student's exercise books, fragments of human skulls, and human phalanges; all were sacrifices capable of 'pleasing' the God of Knowledge.

"What are you doing?" Selena, seeing these objects, suddenly lost her composure, "Are you summoning the offspring of the God of Knowledge?"

So you're in the same line of work, He Ao slowly moved his tentacles.

The team members who were diligently placing the sacrifices took it as a mere twitch and paid no heed.

"Of course," Job glanced at the metal box that Selena had just unlocked, "Bringing this thing to kill an Evil God Priest, isn't that a bit of a waste? It can clearly destroy an Evil God's Offspring. Do you know what falls out after you destroy the offspring of the God of Knowledge?

Talent Sequences!

The cheapest Talent Sequences are sold for hundreds of thousands in the market, and there's a significant chance the God of Knowledge will drop Talent Sequence 272, do you know how much 272 is worth on the black market right now? Ten million!"

The key point was that the metal box was a high-risk controlled item belonging to the Federation, unmanageable on the black market; they couldn't take it with them, so it was better to use it right away, take a gamble.

"You're insane, what if you don't kill the Evil God's Offspring? Do you know how many people will die if it grows?" Selena looked at Job in disbelief.

"What do we care about how many people die? With Miss Selena as our bait, all we have to do is run away when the time comes," Job said calmly, "We'll need Miss Selena's help to perform the biological authentication before the attack too."

As the team members placed each appropriate sacrifice, pure white glows began to form beneath He Ao's body, gradually constructing a complicated and intricate array.

So the Ritual Array really was beneath oneself.

He Ao's gaze swept over these pure white glows.

As the array lit up, a hazy white light blurred all vision for a moment.

Now's the time!

In an instant, dozens of tentacles turned into black shadows that obscured the light.

Boom—Boom—Boom—

That was the sound of the restraining device's metal wires being snapped.