Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Rent collecting mission accomplished. Chen Jin started calculating on his phone, as always. “Four apartments, $1,000 each, that’s $4,000. With Song Xue Jia’s delayed rent, that’s $8,000 in total. Cleaning service for unit 801 cost $30; $50 discount for Guo Yan; $50 management fee for each unit, so $200 for all four units. That’s $4,100 in total. So my net income for the month would be…$4,100 minus all the expenses here, $3,800…divided by 2 is $1,900.”
Chen Jin shook his head. For an expensive city like this, making just under $2,000 a month definitely put him in the lower middle class. He probably made even less than a lot of salaried people. With all the amount he had available, he wouldn’t be considered rich. He was one of those people with low incomes. The only difference was that his parents provided food and a place for him to sleep; he had more downtime than others, that’s all. In other words, he was nothing more than an idler with a little cash on hand – he didn’t meet the standards of being a Fuer dai.
To have a better life style and more money to his name, he needed to work harder. Indeed, Chen Jin really was not an ambitious person. Not at all. But who wouldn’t want more money? Having $2,000 in his pocket was nothing – he could spend it all in the blink of an eye. He would have to daydream about all the other things he wanted to buy.
When one is tight on money, he has to choose between the best and the rest, looking for the best value. Can’t take all the good stuff. On the other hand, if one is loaded, he doesn’t have to choose or compare prices. He can simply buy whatever he wants and enjoy his financial freedom.
And for this reason, Chen Jin believed, a rich person would live a happy life. That was something he would love to achieve. So, he set a little goal for himself. “I shall listen to Mr. Wang, the richest man in the country. First, earn my first billion and become financially independent so I won’t have to ask mother for money.”
One billion?
Chen Jin wasn’t sure why he was so certain he could make that kind of money. “I mean I found a planet. It’s just making a billion bucks. How hard could it be?” he murmured to himself, with great confidence.
…
At night, in the other world, at the huge crater camp.
It was still so dusty and hazy that it even created a thick layer of sand at the bottom of the crater. This giant crater would be filled up with sand if the dusty weather continued. But Chen Jin didn’t think that far. In fact, he was hoping for it to carry on and form a 3-meter sand dune, which would be the same height as the portal, so that he wouldn’t have to use his ladder to climb down – he’d have easy access to both worlds, with just a step through the portal.
However, if the sand really piled up and got higher than the portal, he would have a big problem, as the portal would be blocked, and he’d have to shovel all the excess sand. Chen Jin did not want his access to either of the worlds to be effected.
In the meantime, a large amount of robot parts were scattered everywhere on the ground near the camp. There were metal brains, robot arms and legs, some parts and pieces that assembled their torsos, a few pieces for the serpentine belts, several mechanical parts, as well as pieces for control and power….and some plug-in weapon equipment. All of which were still functional after a circuit test. There were more than 100 pieces of them. With these, at least 10 robots like “Da Li” could be assembled.
In less than two days, Da Li had moved all these robot parts from the battlefield 30km away in the Northeast, after Chen Jin gave it the order. Da Li wasn’t a fast robot, but it could carry 200-300kg at a time without any break; it was much more efficient than Chen Jin was. And that was how it completed the mission it was assigned to within two days.
Looking at these parts, Chen Jin took his tool box and asked Da Li to bring them over one by one, starting to work on his assembling project. Yup, Chen Jin had decided to rebuild a few robots, so that they could help him finish all sorts of tasks.
This world was just way too big. Da Li told him that the planet was “Haierfa”, with a diameter of 12,758 kilometers. The surface of the planet, which consisted of six oceans and four continents, was as big as 5.1 billion square meters; the land made up 29% of the entire surface area, while the oceans took 71%…in all aspects, this planet was practically the same as the Earth.
In space, there was also a “Moon” – the closest natural satellite to Haierfa. Forget about the boundless universe – without any help, Chen Jin wouldn’t even be able to complete his exploration on Haierfa. In order to speed up the exploration, he needed some “assistants”. The kind of assistants that he could count on.
Due to the “restart virus”, however, Wawa and Da Li couldn’t be fully trusted. There was still a possibility that they might betray mankind. He could go back to Earth and ask his friends and family to be his “assistants”, but a great benefit like this would actually make them less trustworthy than robots, and would definitely create huge problems. Robots’ betrayal would mean nothing compared to humans’ greed.
Chen Jin had no choice but to put his faith in the robots in front of him, increase their number, and have them work for him. “The restart virus 2.0 had been updated for nearly 30 years, and these robots never turned their back on humans again, which showed that they had been stabilized and wouldn’t evolve again…” After all, the restart virus was designed to end the war and bring peace to the world.
Having come around to the idea, Chen Jin convinced himself that he should be able to count on these bots as he tried to feel better about the situation. He also came up with some precautionary measures for his personal safety; he decided that he would only stay near the huge-crater camp and let the robots do all the researching work, so that he could go back to Earth immediately should any situation occur, and get the relevant departments to handle it. He would not interact with the robots every day – he would leave as soon as he got the money like he originally planned.
No doubt this planet could give him an unimaginable amount of benefits, but between his precious life and all those benefits, he’d choose his life, for sure. He didn’t want to be dead and buried with any penny unspent. Chen Jin’s mind was racing; he had all kinds of thoughts going through his head. But it didn’t slow him down; soon, he had assembled a combat robot exactly like Da Li (without arms and legs). He installed 5 high-efficiency batteries onto its back and pressed the power button.
In no time, a glow of brilliant red with a tinge of orange started to appear in the robot’s eyes. Having seen this “human”, it began to shake intensely, trying to break free from the ropes that tied it. It said, “Kill humans!” in a cold-blooded voice.
Standing next to him, Da Li sent him a time log message, blinking a signal light on its chest. After updating the database, the restart virus 1.0 was then upgraded to 2.0. A clear, soft, blue glow started to emerge as the scarlet one slowly faded away.
With the robot’s greeting, “Hello, my master!”, Chen Jin knew it was no longer a threat, and would become a loyal robot assistant. He named him “Da Qiang”.
“Hello Da Qiang,” he greeted him.
“Hello, my master,” the robot replied.
“From now on, Da Li will be your captain. When I’m not around, you must follow his orders.”
“Yes, master!”
Chen Jin nodded. In the next few hours, he followed his previous steps and repaired three more robots. One of them was also a combat robot like Da Li and Da Qiang. He named it “Da niu”.
The fourth one was somewhat unusual. Its ball-shaped head, where a millimeter wave radar and numerous sensors were installed, was enormous; its eyes were made up of two telephoto SLR cameras; on its arm was a big 20mm sniper rifle. This was a “T85-S scouting sniper robot.” Its job was to investigate and snipe. For a robot with special features like this, Chen Jin named it “Da Tou”.
The fifth one was a medical robot. It was all white, from head to toe. On its waist hung a big white tool box with a red cross on it. There was a welding gun on its left arm, and a laser gun on the right; both were for repairing purposes. Chen Jin named this medical robot “Da Bao”.
The rebuilding work was complete.
Now Chen Jin had five robots – Da Li, Da Qiang, Da Niu, Da Tou, and Da Bao. It was enough to make a fully functional exploration squad. Chen Jin started to assign missions as soon as he finished installing high-efficiency batteries onto each one of them. “Da Li, search areas 100 kilometers within the camp. Report back to me immediately should you find any battlefields, towns, or targets with high value!”
“Yes, master.” Da Li saluted Chen Jin. Da Li led the team away and started to explore.
Clang, clang!