Unfilial disciple, do not ruin your master's dream of ascension and peaceful life.

~~~Ascension Guide~~~

Name: Yuan Ying

Hometown: The Kingdom of Divine Mechanisms, a world of mechanical arts.

Ability: Mechanical Female Corpse

In detail: It can emit wires from its entire body and control the electrical signals (including bioelectricity) of objects that are invaded by the wires with extremely high control precision. The wires themselves also have a certain strength and power, and can be used as tentacles to attack. If the invaded device is a networked device, it can easily hack into other devices connected to it, making it a very powerful hacking skill.

~~~~~~~~~~~

"—Powerful my foot!" Yuan Ying retorted angrily.

"Why are you suddenly yelling like that...?" Ye Yinqiu asked, puzzled.

"I just suddenly felt like complaining! Strong as I am, I hate direct combat... Don't come any closer!"

Seeing that Ye Yinqiu was about to attack again, Yuan Ying gathered a large strand of wires, twisted them into a long whip, and lashed it at her! She wanted to break through Ye Yinqiu's slashing shield by increasing the number of wires, but this time when it touched her skin, not only were all the wires cut, but a slash even traveled through the wires to her body!

"Wait, not again!? Eek!!!!"

Yuan Ying's plump thigh was severed. She endured the pain, extending an electric wire through the wound to reattach her leg. Ye Yinqiu looked smug.

"This is the secret technique of the Wuxiang Sword Heart Manual, 'Blazing Sun Scorching the Heart.' It mobilizes sword energy and integrates it throughout the body. Any attack that comes at you will be countered by the sword energy. It is a divine skill created by the Holy Venerable! When the Holy Venerable personally used this move, the sword energy released from his body was so strong that it could illuminate the entire Cangxuan Realm like a blazing sun, hence the name!"

"Who are you explaining this to? I don't want to know!"

Ye Yinqiu had become an untouchable hedgehog. In just a few rounds, Yuan Ying was forced to retreat. Now, she didn't even dare to launch wires at Ye Yinqiu anymore! Ye Yinqiu further improved the precision of controlling the transmission of her slashes. Now, as soon as the wires touched her body, the dense slashes would travel through her body along the wires!

The two fought from indoors to outdoors. Yuan Ying escaped from the server room through the emergency exit, while Ye Yinqiu smashed through the wall and chased after her! Outside was a parking lot, filled with cars belonging to commuters!

"Run her over and kill her!!!"

A dense network of wires pierced into each car, taking control of them. Just as Ye Yinqiu chased after them, three cars sped towards her from three different directions!

She dodged the first car with agility, avoided the second car, and flipped over the hood of the third car. While controlling her injuries, she absorbed as much impact as possible and slashed the ground with her sword!

The slash, traveling along the ground, severed Yuan Ying's foot in two, but this time she didn't rush to reattach the severed limb. Instead, she endured the pain and steered the fourth car to crash into it—

"A trivial skill!"

Ye Yinqiu was about to dodge and catch her breath as before when sparks suddenly shot out from the hood of the Tera...

boom!!!!

Flames and black smoke erupted suddenly—the lithium battery caught fire and exploded! Just as the thick smoke engulfed Ye Yinqiu, Yuan Ying raised her arms and shouted, "Yattazeeee! We won!"

The next instant, the sword flew out through the thick smoke and pierced her shoulder.

"Goo!?"

Ye Yinqiu emerged from the thick smoke, suffering minor burns that were not fatal.

"It hurts... Waaah... Waaah... It hurts so much! How did you dodge it...?"

"Well..."

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

During training a few days ago—

"Your damage reduction only works against physical damage and doesn't protect against burns, frostbite, radiation damage, etc., so I've made a list for you."

"So long..."

"You have to memorize this. You don't understand Earth. You don't know that some seemingly safe things can also explode, like this."

"Is this one of those celestial beasts called 'Car'?"

"It can be blown up."

"There's such a function!?"

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

"Luckily, Master was prescient. I was on guard as soon as I saw those things. When I saw them coming towards me, I knew it was a trap, so I kept my distance in time!"

"........."

Yuan Ying was so angry she almost cried.

So why put her, the intelligence officer, in direct confrontation?

"As for you, I thought you were better than the likes of Zhou Rong and Zhong Wei, but you're far inferior."

"Zhou Rong... Zhong Wei? You mean that explosive duo!?"

"Oh? You know them?"

"They have a terrible reputation in the black market!"

"Huh? He's already been killed by me and my master. As our first opponent, I thought he was just a small fry."

"........."

Yuan Ying was speechless with emotion.

She is indeed an extremely capable intelligence agent.

But the prerequisite is that she is willing to take the initiative to investigate intelligence.

"The explosives duo was recently killed in the Pujiang District"—this kind of thing could be easily found out with a simple search, but she was careless. Why?

(Oh right, I was so focused on watching Momozuki-chan's livestream that I forgot about the important thing!!!)

In short, you lost.

Ye Yinqiu stomped her to the ground, grabbed the hilt of his sword, and with just a little force, he could tear open her chest.

"You can continue to resist and be killed by me, or you can surrender obediently—"

"I surrender!"

"...You're so spineless!"

"What's the use of backbone? I'm just an employee! All I want to do every day is watch videos, follow my idols, watch VTubers, and mess around with random stuff! We don't need to be so confrontational, let's talk things over!"

Yuan Ying complained defiantly, her face contorted in pain from the intense agony throughout her body.

"What conditions should we discuss?"

"I can tell you how to release these people's data, and then we'll be even, okay? I won't bother you, and you shouldn't interfere with my business!"

"Well... I need to ask my master for permission."

"What else is there to ask for instructions? I just want to—"

[Naughty, naughty, Xiaoying... In my world, contracts are absolute. I can tolerate your dereliction of duty, but you can't turn your back on me.]

A woman's voice from the air interrupted their struggle.

A sharp mechanical tentacle suddenly emerged from the darkness, slicing open the skin on the back of Yuan Ying's neck and piercing into the medulla oblongata, the junction of the brainstem and spine.

"Huh!?!?!?!"

Yuan Ying let out a shrill scream. Her eyes rolled back, her tongue lolled out, tears and snot streamed down her face, her veins bulged, and her whole body convulsed!

Countless wires burst forth from her body, entangled in all electronic devices! All the vehicles in the parking lot, all the computers in the surrounding warehouses and office buildings, the underground light and power cables, the roadside transformer boxes... everything electrified was broken down into scattered mechanical parts, and then reassembled around Yuan Ying!

"Take this!!"

Ye Yinqiu reacted extremely quickly, preparing to kill Yuan Ying directly, but the mechanical shield with a vacuum layer blocked her sword, interrupting the spread of the slash!

In just a few seconds, Yuan Ying was completely encased in metal, forming an indescribable mechanical behemoth weighing hundreds of tons! Its entire body was crackling with electricity and sparks, countless tentacles were flapping wildly, and numerous cameras extended from its body, locking onto Ye Yinqiu!

"Don't waste time, kill her," the woman's voice rang out again.

Ye Yinqiu didn't understand any technology; all she knew was that Yuan Ying was being controlled by something dirty!

"What kind of demon are you? Take this!"

Snap!

The laser cutter shot out like lightning, its scorching blade severing Ye Yinqiu in half at the waist.

Her consciousness went blank for a moment.

The sensation in her lower body faded away.

She felt herself being thrown high into the air and then falling heavily to the ground, with charred blood clots scattered all over the floor.

Behind her, two warehouses, three office buildings, and all the roadside trees and utility poles within a 300-meter radius were all cut off in a straight line at waist height.

This was merely one strike from that mechanical monster.

"Ah...ahhh...ah..."

She couldn't feel any pain, nor could she make a sound.

Even so, she desperately grabbed the sword that had fallen beside her, determined to fight to the death, even if only half her body remained.

You can't handle this right now, get out of the way.

「!?」

Before Ye Yinqiu could react, Qianjing's voice suddenly rang out on her phone. An orange-yellow beam of light from twelve kilometers away blasted the mechanical monster right through!