A bizarre and terrifying experience; I messed up the dungeon world.

He rubbed his temples and turned to look at Lin Qi: "Let go, don't strangle her to death, we can't afford the medical bills."

Lin Qi withdrew his hand.

She pulled the old cotton-padded coat draped over her shoulders, tightened the open front, walked barefoot to the basin, picked up the robotic arm, and skillfully shoved it into the slot on her left shoulder.

Click.

All three self-locking latches engage simultaneously.

The mechanical hand stretched out, and its five metal fingers tapped together nimbly, producing a crisp, tinkling sound.

Zhao Lingling climbed out of the mud. She was soaked to the bone, her gray overalls clinging to her thighs and buttocks, sculpting her long, full curves. She wiped the mud off her face in a disheveled manner, then cautiously retreated to a corner, leaning against the mottled red bricks.

Lu Chen took a dry rag from inside the house and threw it on her head.

"Wipe it off." Lu Chen sat back down on the small stool. "Don't get my floor dirty. Aunt Wang will come to pick up the induction cooker tomorrow and will start nagging when she sees mud all over the floor."

Zhao Lingling pulled the rag off her head. The rag was a bit stiff and smelled of soap.

Zhao Lingling's mental process: Goal: Confirm the possibility of survival. Current situation: The other party has no intention of killing her to cover it up. This violates the behavioral logic of higher-dimensional beings. They seem more like...living their lives seriously? Impossible, this must be some kind of extremely deep disguise. Conclusion: Play along, and wait for an opportunity to escape.

"What exactly do you want?" Zhao Lingling gripped the rag in her hand, her voice low and menacing. "With control over the physical interference forces of this dimension, even a single microscopic constant patch could fetch billions on the black market. Are you mocking the existing scientific system by hiding in this run-down repair shop fixing old appliances?"

Lu Chen raised his eyelids and glanced at her.

"Could billions buy lungs that won't cough?" Lu Chen pointed to his chest. "Could they buy arms that don't need machine oil?"

Zhao Lingling was speechless.

"Replacing parts costs money, and living requires food." Lu Chen stood up and walked into the inner room. "Engineer Zhao, pay for the asbestos tile you damaged tomorrow. Two yuan and forty cents. Cash or QR code, it's fine. Tonight you'll sleep on the bench in the courtyard. If you dare to step into the inner room, I'll dismantle your satellite phone and sell it for scrap copper."

The curtain fell.

Only Lin Qi and Zhao Lingling remained in the courtyard.

The autumn night wind was cold, blowing in through the broken roof and causing the muddy water on the ground to ripple.

Lin Qi took out the last half of a dried sweet potato from his pocket and handed it to Zhao Lingling expressionlessly.

"Want some?" Lin Qi asked.

Zhao Lingling looked at the dry food with a little sweet potato peel on it, and then at Lin Qi's metal arm that gleamed coldly.

My stomach let out a gurgling sound, which was quite disrespectful to me.

Zhao Lingling hesitated for two seconds, then reached out her dirty hand and took the dried sweet potato.

It's as hard as a rock.

The next morning at 6:30.

The breakfast stalls on Jianshe Road had just set up their fryers, and the aroma of fried dough sticks wafted along half the street with the damp morning mist.

The door of the repair shop was slammed so hard it made a deafening noise.

It wasn't the kind of tentative tapping that Zhang Kuang was making, but rather the dull thud of heavy metal hitting a wooden board, which made the dust on the door frame fall down in a flurry.

Lu Chen came out wearing a cotton-padded coat and pulled open the wooden latch.

There was no sunlight outside; the sky was terribly overcast, and the leaden-gray clouds hung low.

The narrow alleyway in front of the shop was completely blocked by three large yellow construction machines. Leading the way was a wheeled heavy bulldozer with a red cloth hanging on its front. Its bucket was three meters wide, almost covering the entire facade of the repair shop.

Five or six men in black suits stood next to the bulldozer, wearing fluorescent safety vests over them. The leader was a middle-aged man with slicked-back hair, carrying a leather briefcase and holding a stack of documents stamped with a red seal in his hand.

Even more bizarrely, behind the bulldozer, there was an extended heavy-duty flatbed truck.

A huge cylindrical machine was covered by a thick, dark green tarpaulin on the truck. Several thick, low-temperature cooling pipes were faintly visible beneath the tarpaulin, their walls covered with thick white frost. The surrounding air glowed with an unusual, faint fluorescence.

That's an industrial-grade heavy ion linear cutter.

Used to cut through the hard granite crust, or... to forcibly cut through the heavy element protective layer.

Lu Chen stood on the threshold, his right hand tucked into the sleeve of his cotton-padded jacket.

Lu Chen's mental processes were in motion. Objective: Figure out their intentions. Assessment: Not a municipal demolition team. Ordinary demolition offices can't afford superconducting cutting machines cooled by liquid nitrogen. The truck's chassis had a counterweight exceeding eighty tons, and its suspension system was entirely up to military-grade shock-resistant standards. Conclusion: Remnants of Protocol Zero, or an overseas high-energy physics smuggling ring.

"You're Lu Chen?" The middle-aged man with slicked-back hair flipped through the documents in his hand and glanced at him sideways.

"it's me."

"The notice for relocation within a specified period for the seventh phase of the Jianshe Road shantytown renovation project was posted at the entrance of the alley last month." The man with the slicked-back hair shoved the document forward, directly in front of Lu Chen's nose. "This shop is an illegal addition that blocks the fire lane. It must be cleared and demolished before eight o'clock this morning."

Lu Chen did not accept the document.

He glanced at the name tag on the slicked-back haircut.

The label reads "Yuanfeng Heavy Industry Energy Development Co., Ltd." and lists the position as on-site dispatch supervisor, named Zhou Qiang.

Zhou Qiang's mental process was as follows: Goal: Raze this shop to the ground before 8 AM. Current situation: According to the underground resonance map provided by higher-ups, the residual decay field of the fourth logic unit is located 30 meters directly below this shop. Once the surface structure is removed, the heavy ion cutting vehicle can directly drill and extract the superconducting fluid. Just a holdout; throw 200,000 yuan in cash at him, and if he doesn't leave, demolish the house. Conclusion: A swift and decisive victory.

"Manager Zhou," Lu Chen's voice was flat. "I have a property ownership certificate for this house, issued by the Housing Management Bureau in 1984."

Zhou Qiang sneered: "That piece of paper from 1984 is long expired. This land has now been acquired by Yuanfeng Heavy Industry, with special approval from the city government. I'll give you two options: First, sign it, receive 150,000 yuan in demolition compensation, and queue up for resettlement housing in the western suburbs; second, we'll demolish it according to the law as an unclaimed illegal structure, and you won't get a single penny."

Zhou Qiang waved his hand.

The bulldozer emitted a piercing screech of its air brakes, and its massive diesel engine roared to life, spewing black exhaust fumes from its pipes and enveloping half the shop in smoke.

The bulldozer's bucket slowly rose, its cold, heavy steel plate aimed at the rotten wooden beam of the repair shop.

Footsteps could be heard coming from inside the house.

Lin Qi came out.

She changed into a clean work shirt, sleeves rolled up above her elbows, revealing her left arm's mechanical skeleton, which reflected a cold light in the morning sun. In her right hand, she carried a large, rusty pipe wrench, about half a meter long, made entirely of cast iron.