Card maker? No, I'm a mechanic!

Jiang Zhe frowned, and with a forceful pull, he completely opened the coffin lid.

With a loud crash, the internal structure was completely exposed to the two of them.

Although this thing looks somewhat plausible at first glance, there are just too many inconsistencies in the details.

Something's not right.

He gestured roughly with his hand, "It's too shallow and too narrow."

The size of that groove was very strange.

Let alone a person lying down, even a slightly burly adult would get stuck inside.

Moreover, the entire space was extremely cramped, leaving absolutely no room to turn over or move around.

It's as if it was specifically designed to imprison something.

"Look here..."

Jiang Zhe pointed to the bottom of the groove, where there were dense, intricate, and tiny tubing lines, like blood vessels.

"These protrusions should correspond to the spine and the back of the head, if someone were to lie on them to rest."

"Within two days, his entire body will probably be ruined."

"Huh... do the people in these ruins look really weird? Grooves on their backs?"

Leia came closer, looking at the pipes with a strange expression, and couldn't help but shiver.

"Or do they actually sleep lying down? That's so strange!"

"It shouldn't be either of those."

Jiang Zhe shook his head and squatted down to get even closer.

With the help of the magnified eyepiece, he was able to see the true appearance of those pipelines.

They are not the kind of hoses that deliver nutrients or oxygen; rather, they are cables wrapped around crystals.

Countless cables intertwine and eventually converge at the top of the recess, where a large number of human heads are located.

There, there is a ring-shaped array of interfaces.

Moreover, fine probes protruded from each interface.

Jiang Zhe's heart stirred, and he took out a carving knife and gently scratched the tip of the probe.

"This is……"

He was startled, and an extremely bold conjecture gradually took shape in his mind.

The next moment, he suddenly stood up and took a few steps back.

His gaze quickly swept across the surroundings.

Dozens of rectangular blocks were neatly arranged in the room, with thick cables connecting each row.

This layout, this connection method...

This isn't a hibernation pod, nor is it even a morgue.

The place felt just like the server racks in the computer room of his past life!

"If we just consider these coffins as graphics cards..."

Thinking it over, Jiang Zhe took a deep breath and returned to the coffin he had opened.

"What's inside should be a biochip?"

"Or perhaps wet parts?"

The word instantly popped into his mind.

"By using a biological brain or neural tissue as the core for processing information, we can obtain computing power far exceeding that of ordinary chips."

"Moreover, the cost is incredibly low; all you need is nutrient solution."

"So those puppets are supported by this kind of biological computing power?"

"Oh, this..."

After hearing Jiang Zhe's explanation, Lei Ya's brows furrowed instantly.

"So you mean... this was originally filled with human brains?"

"This is absolutely insane!"

"Efficient, but also ruthless."

Jiang Zhe touched his chin, his eyes looking somewhat strange.

"And judging from the scale here, it's clearly just the tip of the iceberg."

"Deeper within the ruins, there must be an even larger and better-preserved wet archive."

He turned to look at the pipe rupture they had just entered through, lost in thought.

"Was it some wet, still-living part of this place that somehow acquired a body and escaped from here?"

Just then, he heard Leia's impatient footsteps behind him.

"They all look pretty much the same to me, just a bunch of junk."

Lei Ya was clearly not interested in Jiang Zhe's technical speculations, nor did she want to think about what was going on in his mind.

She simply turned around and wandered aimlessly among the rows of coffins.

"Hey Kang Cheol, is there nothing else here besides those things?"

She muttered to herself as she walked to a dark corner in the farthest part of the room.

One of the coffins there looked a bit crooked, as if it had been moved.

"Um?"

Seeing this, Leia couldn't help but feel curious, so she grabbed the cover and lifted it off forcefully.

"Clang!"

Under immense force, the cover was flung off without any resistance, revealing the internal structure.

Below that is a transparent sealed cover. Although the transparency isn't great, you can still see the murky liquid inside.

Leia glanced around casually, and was about to turn and leave when she suddenly realized something was wrong.

There seems to be something in that liquid?

She rubbed her eyes and took another closer look.

This sight made her eyes widen instantly.

"Hey! Jiang Zhe, come look at this!"

Her exclamation instantly interrupted Jiang Zhe's thoughts.

"What's wrong?"

"There seems to be something moving inside this coffin!"

"Um?"

Jiang Zhe snapped out of his daze and quickly walked over.

Above the sealed enclosure, a fist-sized, grayish-white object was clearly visible.

It looks severely shrunken, and its surface is even covered with wrinkles.

But beneath that dry, dead skin, there was still a faint rhythm.

"This thing is still alive?"

Jiang Zhe narrowed his eyes and moved closer.

Although faint, the fluctuations detected by the mental energy probe indicate this.

This walnut-like thing does indeed retain some activity.

"So tenacious..."

"Don't touch it," Leia warily pulled Jiang Zhe's outstretched hand. "What if this thing has a virus?"

"Then it would have died long ago."

Jiang Zhe shook his head, but he didn't let his guard down.

"Since this thing has survived to this day, its energy supply system must be different from others."

He didn't rush to touch the wet item, but instead carefully examined the coffin.

My fingers traced the seams along the side, carefully examining every detail.

Soon, he discovered something unusual on the side of the coffin.

Unlike the seamless surfaces elsewhere, there is an inconspicuous, independent pipeline here.

It did not merge into the main cable, but instead plunged directly into the ground.

"This is it. Let me see what's going on."

Jiang Zhe's eyes narrowed, and he gently pried open the spot with the carving knife.

"Click".

A hidden panel popped out.

As the metal plate fell off, the complex internal structure was finally exposed to the two of them.

It doesn't contain complex circuits, but rather a strange device composed of various crystals and runes.

Below that device, there was a small, sealed liquid storage tank.

Although the surface of the tank was covered with a lot of dust, there was still a considerable amount of liquid inside.

"I see……"

"This guy is a holdout; he cut off the connection to the main network and monopolized a backup line and nutrient solution."

"That's why it's been able to survive until now."