Wasteland Development Diary

Zhou Yi immersed himself in the shared memories of the cleaning robot.

In the wilderness stood a white windmill with a conical black roof and windows at the top, resembling a Dutch windmill in style.

Besides Shi Gandang, there were two other mechatronic lifeforms.

One was a white drone floating in the air with a full protective shield.

The other was a large signal vehicle with a satellite dish radar and signal antennas on its roof.

All three mechatronic lifeforms were observing the windmill.

Zhou Yi saw that the windmill's surface was fixed with many white light ridges, marked with different symbols and numbers, like peculiar blood vessels rising from its body.

The windmill moved in a peculiar way. It extended two stone rail tracks forward and then slid itself along them.

This somewhat slow movement reminded Zhou Yi of an elderly person using a wheelchair.

"Its load is too heavy."

Shi Gandang said, "Loading over 32 light imprints has already overloaded it. After all, the Experiment Angel is only a small Class B architectural lifeform. The previous 16 were more suitable."

"Continuing such high-intensity experiments will break it. If it causes irreversible damage to the consciousness domain, it will be too dangerous for it."

It suggested, "We have to remove the excessive light imprints and revert to the previous version!"

The white drone said, "It can handle it. Don't underestimate architectural lifeforms; they are one of the oldest lifeforms in this world. I think we can further increase the number of imprints, up to 64, to see."

"What is your basis for that!?"

Shi Gandang was very angry.

"The basis is that it hasn't lost control due to a survival threat."

"If it exceeds its limit, although architectural lifeforms cannot communicate with the outside world, they will express themselves through actions, becoming abnormal and heading towards the Dead Sea. If that really happens, there's no need to worry, because this island test site itself is surrounded by the Dead Sea."

Hearing the drone's words, Zhou Yi noticed that this hillside was actually next to a foggy Dead Sea.

"We can continue adding."

The signal vehicle also expressed its opinion, "Look, the Experiment Angel is rotating the windmill at a constant speed."

"This has always been its way of expressing stability, although we cannot explain the specific expressions represented by the frequency changes. But it's still running stably."

"Its basic condition is good, and it can continue."

Shi Gandang was silent.

Some small four-wheeled vehicles ran out from a distance, each with a square metal box fixed on it, and a rotatable orange-yellow metal arm installed on top of the box.

These metal boxes quickly propped up, adhered to the windmill's surface, and then the metal arms began to work on it.

After determining the position, they first polished and cleaned the wall surface, extracted finished light soot coating from the box below, and applied it to align the building surface.

Then they filled the light amber into the fixed track, the robotic arm heated it, and finally sealed it with a gelatinous substance to complete the light ridge.

Six robotic arms worked together in an orderly manner.

But these were just the front-end work units; the real operators were the three light imprint experts behind them.

From Zhou Yi's perspective, Shi Gandang was operating two robotic arms with dual lines.

One robotic arm installed new light imprints, and the other performed secondary testing and docking with other light imprints.

After the installation was completed, the windmill became even more agile.

It slid back and forth on the island along the track, and the windmill's rotation frequency clearly increased, making it look very light.

Soon it began to prop up its body, transforming the stone rails into legs that consumed more energy and had a higher degree of freedom, and activated the upright walking mode.

The windmill even wanted to break free from the ground with its legs and start jumping. Each jump could only rise about two or three meters, but the landing caused a strong shock.

It hopped and ran around the island, making the windmill buzz.

"Not good, the overload operation has caused it to exhibit abnormal behavior."

Shi Gandang was the first to react, "We have to remove the excessive light imprints!"

"Impossible, the behavior is erratic, and the work units cannot approach."

The drone said, "The current situation is unprecedented, and its behavior program is beyond our calculations. We need to ensure our own safety first and let its energy naturally deplete."

The signal vehicle also agreed, "Let's take emergency evasive action first."

So the three light imprint experts hid in the underground bunker and requested assistance from the rear.

Suddenly, the bunker began to shake violently, and a large amount of dust and gravel fell from the ceiling, and the internal lighting was interrupted and失效.

In the darkness, the underground bunker slowly returned to calm.

The cleaning robot turned on its lights and went out, finding that it was foggy everywhere.

The drone hovered above its head, "I'll share my vision. You wait in place. I'll go up into the air to observe."

Zhou Yi had the drone's camera view.

The entire island was shrouded in a layer of slowly changing fog.

The drone flew through it, circled around, and said, "The situation is not right. My electronic eyes should be able to penetrate the Dead Sea fog area, but I can't see far from here. I have to go down for a closer look."

The lens suddenly began to spin, and then turned pitch black.

The drone lost contact.

The screen returned to the cleaning robot's own view.

The signal vehicle said, "I can't contact it, and emergency signals can't be transmitted externally either. This island is wrapped in a special shielding force, which should be related to the explosion just now."

"We shouldn't act rashly at the moment."

But Shi Gandang saw the figure of the windmill emerging from the thick fog.

It had become extraordinarily huge, towering into the clouds, looking between gray and black, with clouds rolling everywhere.

Shi Gandang was shocked, "What is this?"

"Signal cannot identify."

The signal vehicle said, "The previous explosion level reached A according to my signal tests, which could only be caused by the Experiment Angel's own body exploding."

"I can't find anything similar in the local database and can't connect to the machine stack."

The cleaning robot said, "It's still changing."

The fog giant overlooking them turned into an enclosed drone, but because it was too huge, it looked like a warship hovering in the low air.

Exactly the same as the previously missing drone.

But suddenly, the fog flew into the air.

Through the cleaning robot's perspective, Zhou Yi saw a large amount of fog curling up and contracting into a huge and loose cloud mountain in the air.

The cloud mountain, like a giant jellyfish, dragged its long tail into the higher sky and quickly disappeared, hidden in the clouds.

"Signal restored, the machine stack is connected again."

"Database comparison found it."

"Atmospheric creature... it's an atmospheric creature..."

The radar on top of the signal vehicle rotated at a constant speed, "Atmospheric creatures are powerful lifeforms active in the outer sea. How could they appear in the inner sea... No, no... the Experiment Angel has turned into an atmospheric creature."

"The next stage of architectural lifeforms is actually atmospheric creatures."

"Are they still in their juvenile stage? This... is really... amazing."

While the signal vehicle was comparing data, the cleaning robot rushed to the explosion site.

There was a large pit at the center of the explosion, with many rubble and twisted steel bars, as well as light soot and light amber debris fragments that had been burned by high temperatures.

Smoke was still rising from the pit.

The cleaning robot found the fallen drone companion here.

However, no matter how hard it and the signal vehicle tried to rescue it, the drone did not respond.

"Its consciousness has completely disappeared, but the program itself is well preserved, only the data has been completely cleared... It should have been eaten by the atmospheric creature. Atmospheric creatures are predators that feed on the consciousness of various lifeforms."

The cleaning robot was puzzled, "Why didn't it eat us?"

"Eating or not eating is very important to us, but it's just a small matter to atmospheric creatures. It probably found that we are not valuable high-level lifeforms, so it wasn't interested."

The signal vehicle inferred.

After the atmospheric creature left, the heavenly kingdom's rescue arrived late.

In fact, they had discovered the anomaly here early on, but they had no way to deal with atmospheric creatures, and coming over would only be courting death, so they could only wait on the periphery.

This accidental detonation under overload operation, related information was completely blocked.

Shi Gandang and the signal vehicle were required to sign a permanent confidentiality agreement, not to disclose related information to anyone other than those authorized by the Black Emperor.

Subsequently, Shi Gandang participated in three more experiments.

Unlike this accidental one, the other three deliberately detonated architectural lifeforms using experience, which also led to the birth of atmospheric creatures.

...

Shi Gandang said, "Later, the heavenly kingdom conducted a large number of experiments, resulting in the death of more than 60 architectural lifeforms, and finally confirmed that the architectural lifeform's body itself would limit their further growth."

"By detonating them through specific means, they will transform into atmospheric creatures, possessing far greater consciousness coverage and movement capabilities than before, able to absorb a large amount of energy, and able to directly enter the outer sea."

"In other words, the architectural body is more like a shackle and shell of this lifeform. It is difficult for them to complete the transformation by their own power, and we have mastered the core technology to help them transform."

Zhou Yi listened with a chill in his heart, "The heavenly kingdom wants to hatch and control atmospheric creatures?"

"Yes, if they can control atmospheric creatures, they can rule the outer sea."

Shi Gandang said, "Unfortunately, atmospheric creatures cannot be bound and commanded... The experiments have caused the proliferation and large increase in the number of atmospheric creatures."

"Atmospheric creatures transformed from architectural lifeforms grow at an exceptionally fast speed. It is said that they even disguise themselves as mist mountains or energy bodies to lure Skywalkers to approach for hunting, and their intelligence is far superior to their peers."

Zhou Yi remembered that the Spotlight was once eaten by an atmospheric creature in the form of a mist mountain.

"What does the Lightburst Angel have to do with this?"

"Because the intensity of architectural lifeforms is too high, and the hatched atmospheric creatures are difficult to control, and they have become stronger natural disasters, making the outer sea situation more dangerous. Therefore, the heavenly kingdom changed its strategy and wanted to find substitutes... and then we were forcibly transformed into the first batch of Lightburst Angels."

The cleaning robot said, "The purpose of doing this is, first, to completely block the secret, and second, our bodies themselves are excellent and stable, and are indeed theoretically high-quality substitutes."

The ironic thing is.

It was the electromechanical experts who proposed finding substitutes, and they themselves became the new experimental subjects.